Tim Berners-Lee, the man who invented the internet, intended it to be a place for everyone. But now the web is being used to undermine democracy and free speech. It has become a tool for the powerful to suppress dissent. “That feeling of individual control, that empowerment, is something we’ve lost,” Berners-Lee told Vanity Fair in 2018. Today, not only do corporations like Google and Meta dictate what we see online, but, in places like Canada, the government is quickly making itself the gatekeeper.
Last year, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau presented his Online Streaming Act as a means to purportedly support the development of online Canadian content. In fact, the legislation handed over power to the Canadian Radio-Television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC), a government entity, to determine what makes it into people’s streaming algorithms and what is removed. In other words, the Canadian government gave an agency previously responsible for regulating TV and radio media power to also regulate what is promoted and what is censored on platforms like YouTube and Facebook.
My speech would be a prime target
Apparently this doesn’t go far enough for our Dear Leader Trudeau, who recently revealed his Liberal Party’s proposed Online Harms Act C-63. It amends the Canadian Human Rights Act to specify that posting hate speech online qualifies as discrimination. It also grants individuals the ability to file anonymous complaints against other Canadians for engaging in speech they consider to be hateful on social media. Trudeau says the bill aims to make the internet safer for children, but C-63 goes much further than cracking down on cyberbullying and child exploitation. It not only introduces fines of up to $50,000 for offenders found guilty by a Human Rights Tribunal of saying unsavory things online and up to $20,000 paid to complainants (who may forever keep their identities secret), but it will also allow penalties up to life imprisonment for “hateful conduct,” raising the maximum punishments for hate propaganda offenses from five years to life imprisonment for advocating genocide.
Lest you be assured in the belief you would never say something abhorrent enough to qualify, don’t even think about it. The Liberal Party have included in the bill a mechanism that will allow for peace bonds, including house arrest, to be issued to individuals who someone believes may engage in hate speech at some point in the future. An application would be filed, and if the attorney general and a judge determines there is “reasonable belief” that an individual may break hate speech laws, they could be made to wear an electronic tag or ordered to stay home.
Justice minister Arif Virani (who is also attorney general) told the Globe and Mail that it is “very, very important” to restrain the behavior of those who have “a track record of hateful behavior who may be targeting certain people or groups.” If “there’s a genuine fear of an escalation, then an individual or group could come forward and seek a peace bond against them and to prevent them from doing certain things,” Virani explained. In other words, Canadians could effectively be charged with pre-crime. C-63 adds section thirteen to the Humans Right Act, which now considers speech alone as discrimination if it is “likely to foment detestation or vilification of an individual or group.”
Someone like me, whose criticisms of gender identity ideology are considered transphobic hate speech by the Trudeau government-funded Canadian Anti-Hate Network, would be a prime target. Just last year, a panel event I was booked to speak on was canceled by the venue, citing the Human Rights Code. In a letter from the Cowichan Community Center, the administrative and facility booking coordinator explained:
Given the likelihood that the purpose of this event is to promote, or would have the effect of promoting discrimination, contempt or hatred for any group or person on the basis of sex, gender identity, gender expression, sexual orientation, or any other similar factor, it is determined this rental must be canceled.
There had been no indication or evidence that there would be any discrimination or hatred expressed at the event, entitled, “Inclusivity, Gender Identity, and Women’s Rights,” yet I had essentially been accused of pre-crime.
This wasn’t the first time this has happened. Following a speaking event I did at the Vancouver Public Library (VPL) in 2019 called “Gender Identity Ideology and Women’s Rights,” the library updated its room booking policy to introduce a “Rental Pre-Screening and Risk Assessment procedure to identify whether events are likely to, or will, violate the Criminal Code or the BC Human Rights Code, or present a significant security risk to the Library.” The updated policy states that “hate speech, as defined by law, is not permitted, and that VPL will not accept event bookings that are intended to promote or incite hate as defined by Canadian law.” Later that year, nearly 10,000 Canadians signed a petition to have my talk at the Toronto Public Library canceled, on account of the prediction it would consist of “hate speech.” Canada is becoming more and more illiberal.
This behavior has become the norm over recent years, supported by Trudeau’s ruling Liberal Party, who seem to have determined anything that challenges government orthodoxy amounts to “hate” or even terrorism. Recently, it was reported that CSIS, Canada’s intelligence agency, and Canada’s Integrated Terrorism Assessment Center (ITAC) had assessed the “anti-gender movement” and the connected parental rights movement as a “violent threat” to Canada. CSIS spokesperson Eric Balsam told CBC News that, while violent rhetoric does not always lead to violence, “the ecosystem of violent rhetoric within the anti-gender movement, compounded with other extreme worldviews, can lead to serious violence.” In other words, the idea that words are dangerous to the point of being criminal is accepted by government agencies.
The prospect of jail or house arrest for distasteful speech should terrify everyone, but, more than that, the new laws will have a silencing effect on so many people. Those already inclined to cancel or reject booking for talks addressing controversial subjects, such as Canadian libraries and community centers — supposedly public spaces — would be emboldened. And those already fearful of rocking the boat will surely think twice as hard before dissenting.
This article was originally published on The Spectator’s UK website.
