https://www.facebook.com/cbcnews/videos/10153312402009604/?pnref=story
This brings up something I did not know: The new law protecting against the sharing of intimate images online passed last year also added a number of new groups protected against hate propaganda. The old list was "colour, race, religion, ethnic origin, sexual orientation". To this we now have added "national origin", "age", "sex", "mental or physical disability".
This means that the statement (I have heard before) of "I am afraid of young people today because they are violent and out of control. We should all hate and fear them." could now be hate speech (to be clear, the "we should all hate and fear them" was added to make the matter more explicit, I don't think I have actually heard it stated so clearly). One question that results is whether a politician who advocates for changes to the Youth Criminal Justice Act based on this sentiment has the protection of parliamentary privilege given that we would be shifting this protection from not just a civil tort, but also against a criminal act.
However, I would also note that "young muslim men are prime candidates for recruitment to ISIS and should be watched closely" might previously have enjoyed the protection of slicing and dicing the "muslim" group and being able to say that it is not advocating hatred of all muslims, but now engages three different grounds, and is clearly skirting the edge of hate speech.
Finally, to be clear, I am not afraid of nor have hatred for "young people today" nor "young muslim men" and am further relying on CCC s. 319(3)(d) for protection against being accused of hate speech for repeating other people's sentiments.
The
question is whether he is hoping to use the existing criminal code
provisions, in which case it will just be a whole pile of fail, or
whether he is planning to introduce new provisions.
The United Church is especially protected under 319(3)(b) in that as long as they can link their speech to a religious text then they are completely immune. They can't break that provision because some of their base is dependent on it to stay out of prison. (Further, it protects a Zionist who steps over the line and advocates hatred of those who stand in the way of giving the jewish state control of all the promised lands.) However, I think everyone else is protected by 319(3)(a): if the statements are true, or 319(3)(c): "statements were relevant to any subject of public interest". Further, there is the stumbling block of the definition of "identifiable group": any section of "the public" distinguished by "national origin". I read this (and remember this is criminal law, so is read narrowly rather than broadly) as being people walking around in Canada, so provides no protection to Israelis in Israel. (a likely more tenuous argument might engage whether Israeli politicians in Canada might also not be protected, as they might not be a member of the public, being an organ of the Israeli State rather than a pure person). Given this, unless one is advocating for attacks or hatred of Israeli tourists it is possible that a legitimate defense could be presented against the case on its face. Therefore a Crown Prosecutor, can not pursue the charges because there is no reasonable prospect of conviction. Finally, there is the question of defining "advocating hatred" versus "advocating punishment or unequal treatment". The big challenge is that this is an interpretation imposed by the courts rather than the executive, and so it is likely to fail.
So here is some news: Last year, someone mused about whether the
Dentistry scandal was hate speech, and it was observed that "sex" was
not included in the definition of "identifiable group" in Criminal Code
s. 318. Well, it seems this has been changed in the mean time by
Protecting Canadians from Online Crime Act, SC 2014 c 31 s 12.
However, one should note that one now needs to be careful: "Young people today are violent and should be feared and hated." could fall under the new definition of hate propaganda, because "identifiable group based on age" was also added. |
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