Threats close Stella Luna Gelato Cafe
A warning to anybody who considers supporting unapproved protests
This article originally appeared on Feb 15th (or 17th) 2022 on ottowacitizen.com. You can read the original article on their website. My commentary inline below, with the original article in quotations.
Threats close Stella Luna Gelato Café after owner's name appears in GiveSendGo data leak
Tammy Giuliani says that she now regrets making her $250 donation.
The heading uses the word “leak” instead of “hack”. Nothing to see here. Carry on.
The subheading of the article is designed to make the point quickly that supporting a cause you believe in, but goes against the official narrative, can and will have consequences.
Ottawa’s Stella Luna Gelato Café was forced to close Tuesday after receiving threats when owner Tammy Giuliani’s name appeared on a hacked list of GiveSendGo donors to the Ottawa “Freedom Convoy.”
The author freely admits that the information was obtained via a “hack” vs a "leak" in contrast to the heading. Twitter, meanwhile, had blocked sharing of the Hunter Biden laptop story, claiming it was information gained via a “hack.” Translation, it's OK to hack and share personal information when the victims of the hack are on the “wrong side."
Giuliani says that she now regrets making her $250 donation on Feb. 5 and that staff in the shop had begun receiving threats Monday morning after her donation was posted on Twitter.
Reinforce the theme here. Be careful of what causes you donate to. You will regret making that small donation. No mention of where the threats came from.
“We got a call from the team saying, ‘We’re getting phone calls here,'” Giuliani said in a phone interview Monday afternoon. “I said, ‘What’s going on?’ and they said, ‘They’re threatening to throw bricks through our window. They’re threatening to come and get us.’ We said, ‘Lock the door and we’ll find out what’s going on.'”
Again, this should leave the reader to wonder who is making these threats. The truckers and patriots that were protesting had not been violent for 3 weeks. The media keeps warning that they will become violent any minute now. Yet, here the author just mentions that there were threats of violence and destruction, with no investigation into where those threats are coming from.
Giuliani said she ordered the shop closed and staff to go home for their own safety. She said she intended to report the threats to police.
Again, reinforce the idea that supporting the "wrong side" will have consequences. There are thousands of people in Ottowa that have been there for 3 weeks and not one major issue of violence that I'm aware of. Yet, who are the people calling this woman's shop and threatening her with violence, over a $250 donation to support a cause she believed in?
In the leaked GiveSendGo post, Giuliani wrote she had initially given $100 on GoFundMe, but asked for a refund when that fund was frozen.
“Now I’m giving you $250 and taking food down to the truckers every day. Thank you for continuing to fight for Canadians across this country,” she wrote.
Here Giuliani expresses her support for the truckers, but then in the next paragraph again expresses her remorse.
Giuliani confirmed she made the donation, but said she had no idea about what she thought was a “peaceful, grassroots movement” would become.
One minute she's giving food to truckers and supporting the protest, and the next, "had no idea what it would become." Is she referring to some change in the peacefulness of the movement, or is she referring to the threats she is receiving because the media purposefully exposed her name and the name of her business as a supporter of this movement?
“When a group of people first decided they were going to travel across the country to spread this message of solidarity, it seemed like a beacon of hope for small businesses like us,” she said. “It’s no surprise that small businesses have been on the edge. Families are at risk of losing their livelihood. I’m a sucker for a grassroots cause.
A “sucker for a grassroots” cause that was not harmed by anyone supporting or participating in that cause. The author is telling you again, to be careful who you support as they are most likely (if not an approved cause of course) lying to you.
“Never in our wildest dreams did we anticipate what has transpired over the past couple of weeks,” she said. “None of us anticipated what it turned into and we certainly don’t condone it.
The author does not try to explain what transpired or what a 3 week peaceful protest over basic human rights had “turned into.”
“In retrospect it was bad judgment, but does that mean that people have a right to threaten our staff? Does it mean people have the right to threaten to throw bricks though our window and to threaten my family? We made a mistake. Who could have anticipated it?”
More of the same hidden messaging. Was it a bad judgement because the protest turned into something she no longer supports, or is she simply trying to appoligize and beg the mob for mercy?
Giuliani made her Feb. 5 donation on the second weekend of the demonstration, when Ottawa police were describing it as “volatile and dangerous” and lawyers were seeking a court injunction to silence the constant blaring of air horns in the downtown core.
It is (as of this writing) now Feb. 17th. The "volatility" of the demonstration has not born it's fruit, much to the disappointment of those who oppose it.
update: March 1st. We now know that the demonstration was peaceful all the way through it’s end when the government of Canada suspended basic rights and disbanded it.
The backlash against Stella Luna on social media was swift and intense, with many pointing out that a rival creamery, Mooshu Ice Cream on Bank Street, had to close because anti-mask demonstrators threatened its staff.
This appears to state that while Stella Luna was open (with business probably booming) during the protest, it’s competitor had to close because “anti-mask demonstrators threatened its staff.” Obviously this competitor is on the right side of the story, or the author would not have graciously placed this advertisement for them here in the article.
Giuliani said the demonstrators had caused problems at her shops too, entering without masks and trying to force confrontations.
“I notified the staff not to get into any confrontation. I said, ‘Your job is to serve food and drinks, not get blasted by someone trying to make a point.'”
If this were the case, if there were actual patrons in the shop threatening her employees, why not shut down then? Why only when someone threatens to throw a brick through the window, over the phone?
Giuliani says she’s made contributions to many other charitable causes, too, including animal shelters, a soccer team and a choir. “We rarely say no,” she said.
Nothing much to say here. She's a good person, just like you, who happened to get caught up in this crazy notion that the people hold power over their government. As evident in the rest of the article, she's realized the error of her ways and is stepping back in line and apologizing profusely.
The company has borrowed money to stay afloat during the pandemic, a debt that will probably take seven years to pay off, she said.
Stella Luna operates two shops in Ottawa and one in Merrickville. It employs about 40 people, Giuliani said.
See? She's just like you. She owns a small business that has been hit hard by the pandemic response and is doing the honest thing and paying off her debts to keep those 40 employees paid and their families fed. She really didn't mean to step out of line. She's sorry. She'll think twice about that next time, and you should too.