the Antitoi raid: anti-Gentle gag-warfare — insurgency as puerile street-theater
hanging a sword-stemmed fleur-de-lis flag from the nose of a U.S.A. Civic War hero’s Boylston St. statue when it would simply be cut down by bored O.N.A.N.ite chiens-courants gendarmes the next morning, or taping bricks to the return-postage-paid solicitation cards of Sans-Christe Gentle’s C.U.S.P. party, or fashioning Astroturf doormats with a likeness of Sans-Christe Gentle on them
Context
The low end of the anti-O.N.A.N. campaign catalogued: Bertraund's "harebrained schemes" are political gags — the "sword-stemmed fleur-de-lis flag" on a U.S. war-hero statue, "bricks to the return-postage-paid solicitation cards of Sans-Christe Gentle's C.U.S.P. party," Gentle-faced doormats. The naming is the tell: Gentle is "Sans-Christe" (Christless) to the Québécois, C.U.S.P. the party they mail bricks to, and the O.N.A.N. police are "chiens-courants" (running-dogs). Insurgency at this level is petty vandalism against the symbols of the founding — sad because harmless, but it fixes the register of ordinary Québécois contempt for Gentle's regime.