Rights group says online hate speech is escalating in Canada News
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Rights group says online hate speech is escalating in Canada

Amnesty International released a report on Monday outlining the rising level of online hate speech towards women, visible minorities, and the 2SLGBTQI+ community in Canada.

The report details the increase of xenophobia, misogyny, and racism in Canada. It also explains how these factors intersect with one another to create a “virulent cocktail” of hate mongering in the online sphere. South Asian and Muslim diaspora communities were especially subject to inflammatory attacks and harmful narratives, according to the group.

The report also notes the historical role of white supremacism in Canada. According to the group, it continues to manifest today, in narratives propagated by politicians and social media grifters. One such example is the Instagram account 6ixBuzz, which has over 2.5 million followers and has been criticized for spreading misinformation, Islamophobia and homophobia. The account is also said to have disseminated anti-Asian, anti-Sikh, and anti-Indian bias. Amnesty International points to how these narratives place the blame for the “economic failures of governments and the global neoliberal order” on minority communities instead of addressing government policy and the decades-long systemic underfunding of social programs in Canada.

Hate crimes within the online sphere remain largely unregulated by the Canadian government. The proposed Bill C-63 introduces harsher punishments for online hate speech (including up to life imprisonment). The bill, if enacted, will also appoint a Digital Safety Commissioner to manage a framework addressing online hate speech. However, this bill has been criticized as overbroad and ill-defined, thus posing a significant risk of allowing politically motivated persecution.

Internationally, Canada is a signatory to both the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) and the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (CERD). These international treaties require the state to take firm action against the incitement of misogynistic or racist hate speech.

Amnesty International launched the Make it Safe Online campaign alongside the report, which seeks to combat online hate speech and Technology-facilitated Gender Based Violence (TfGBV) via “messages of critical resistance, inclusion, and hope.” They also released a Canada-specific social media campaign meant to combat the increasing prevalence of “us vs. them” narratives.

THIS DAY @ LAW

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