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I don’t know much about what that young woman was up to with her sign and her slurs, and the publication ban prevents me from saying more. But I did know that there was something suspicious about the entire thing from the moment I saw it. It would have been equally suspicious if her sign had urged people to vote Trudeau or Singh. Whatever criticisms or concerns you have for and about Conservative politicians shouldn’t be enough to utterly short-circuit your common sense. Sometimes, a person shouting obscenities in the downtown core of a large city, and even being arrested for same, is just a person shouting obscenities. It wasn’t, or should not have been, a news story, and it certainly wasn’t something that Scheer should have felt compelled to respond to — just as I wouldn’t have expected the NDP leader or prime minister to respond if the sign had carried their names.

The entire incident is particularly perplexing because we're all supposed to know better

The entire incident is particularly perplexing because we’re all supposed to know better. We’re supposed to be on the alert for torqued social media postings and attempts to manipulate the news. We’ve already seen partisan divides and culture war tensions in our allied nations deliberately inflamed and torqued by hostile actors, foreign or domestic. Our own government is so worried about it that it has put together a panel to monitor our elections and watch out for efforts to tip the scales of public opinion through malign action.

The first line of defence for any democracy is an informed citizenry. But the second line of defence, alas, is said citizenry applying even the slightest degree of analysis and good judgment to the information they’re receiving. If we fall short of that when it’s a single dishevelled woman screaming and spitting in public, we’re gonna look awful cute when hit with a targeted and sophisticated disinformation campaign waged on us by a hostile government.

• Twitter: mattgurney

Update: This column has been updated to more accurately describe the appearance of the woman in the video.