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Hate speech hurts free speech

EVAN BALGORD Evan Balgord is the executive director of the Canadian Anti-Hate Network.

We are experiencing the highest number ever of police-reported hate crimes in Canada. One in five Canadians report being the victim of online hate. One in two members of the 2SLGBTQ+ community report the same.

Some members of the Muslim community, and especially women, are afraid to go outside after the London, Ont., terrorist attack that killed members of the Afzaal family and so many incidents of people wearing hijab being attacked in cities like Edmonton.

This doesn’t occur in a vacuum. There’s an ecosystem that draws people in and fills their heads and hearts with hate. This ecosystem is sustained by content creators and hate propaganda finding and connecting with an audience.

If we disrupt that ecosystem by going after both the platforms (audience) and the propagandists, fewer youth will fall into hate movements and there will be fewer terrorist attacks and fewer hate crimes. Time and time again we’ve seen that deplatforming works.

The government is finally moving forward with two new pieces of anti-hate legislation. The online harms bill, arguably the most important piece, hasn’t been introduced yet. But, we know it will require social media companies to remove hate speech on their platforms. The other piece of legislation, which we’re debating today, is Bill C-36.

We used to have a law called section 13 of the Canadian Human Rights Act. It let advocates file complaints about hate propaganda targeting specific communities that were likely to do significant harm. Serious complaints went to a tribunal, which could order a cease and desist and a small fine.

The law was challenged and the Federal Court of Appeal upheld the law as consistent with values of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Unfortunately, the law had already been repealed by a Conservative private member’s bill. Communities have no reasonable tools to protect themselves from hate-mongers without it.

Bill C-36 will bring back section 13, with stronger definitions of what constitutes hate, and draws on all the jurisprudence of our existing hate laws. There’s an 11-point guide called the Hallmarks of Hate, which has been endorsed by the Supreme Court and outlines what is and what isn’t hate speech.

We know for a fact that hate speech silences and marginalizes women, BIPOC, 2SLGBTQ+ persons, and so forth. They choose to leave or never enter politics, journalism, or keep their opinions to themselves as protection against racists and abusers who send them hateful messages and rape and death threats.

Hate speech is an attack on free speech. Removing hate speech will make it more possible for women, BIPOC, 2SLGBTQ+ persons, etc., to exercise their Charter rights to expression and fully participate in society. Their speech is more valuable in our society than hate speech from racists and abusers.

Reasonable people can come together and discuss how we best safeguard free expression while removing hate speech and allowing for there to be a tool to make hate propagandists cease and desist.

Opponents of section 13 will downplay the fact that the law was used sparingly, against the worst of the worst and literal neo-Nazis. The jurisprudence, wording, and history of the law clearly demonstrates it’s for repeat and significant offenders. The Canadian Human Rights Commission can and will throw out frivolous or vexatious complaints. Anybody saying it will be used widely is uninformed or fear mongering.

Some critics, then and now, say the law is redundant because we already have a criminal law against hate speech. That’s true, but we’ve learned in the last decade that it’s like pulling teeth to get law enforcement to lay charges. The case against Toronto neo-Nazi pamphleteer James Sears, who encouraged his readers to sexually assault women, took over five years of sustained community advocacy.

Despite those efforts, the penalty is a slap on the wrist.

Section 13 was effective in stopping neo-Nazis and their ilk before because it’s reasonably fast and directly available to communities targeted by hate. It’s so necessary today. The Supreme Court endorsed it, the new bill tightens it up and makes definitions clear. There are safeguards in place to avoid frivolous complaints.

A reasonable debate on how to improve it and protect free expression is always welcome. But, if we are going to err and have to make small corrections later, we must, for once, err on the side of victims rather than the side of neoNazis.

OPINION

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2021-07-31T07:00:00.0000000Z

2021-07-31T07:00:00.0000000Z

https://torontostar.pressreader.com/article/282965338140180

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