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Collected Item: “Big business, bigger crowds.”

Give your story a title.

Big business, bigger crowds.

What sort of object is this: text story, photograph, video, audio interview, screenshot, drawing, meme, etc.?

Video

Tell us a story; share your experience. Describe what the object or story you've uploaded says about the pandemic, and/or why what you've submitted is important to you.

This is a tweet from Toronto Ontario which depicts an absolutely massive group of people crowding outside of an Ikea in North York. Just this week, Ontario has seen a massive spike in coronavirus cases, which has prompted the province into another shock lockdown. However, it is apparent that these restrictions are somehow not applicable to big business. Rather, this Tweet touches upon another important feature of the pandemic and the Canadian ‘lockdown.’ Smaller businesses have been forced to pay out of pocket for the adequate infrastructure to remain open during a pandemic, and in many cases have been forced to shut down when ordered to by the province. However, with each passing lockdown it becomes more apparent that these rules, restrictions, and realities do not apply to the larger corporations and super-stores such as Ikea and Wal-Mart. Larger companies can afford to take the fines, they can afford the infrastructure, PPE and much more – smaller businesses simply cannot operate in these conditions, and there has been insufficient aid to make sure that these smaller businesses, their owners and employees are properly protected. And while cases continue to rise, and smaller businesses are forced to close; it makes little sense to give a free pass to these large transnational multi-million dollar companies.

Use one-word hashtags (separated by commas) to describe your story. For example: Where did it originate? How does this object make you feel? How does this object relate to the pandemic?

Toronto, lockdown, small business, ppe, big business

Enter a URL associated with this object, if relevant.

https://twitter.com/Kollerkunzultz/status/1378461423110606848

Who originally created this object? (If you created this object, such as photo, then put "self" here.)

@Kollerkunzultz

Give this story a date.

2021-04-03
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