Peter Menzies

Plus! American liberals are most likely to condone violence, did Guilbeault break CBC’s news firewall and Canadian Press forgets how to rewrite a news release

Just as with Newton’s third law of physics, every political action provokes an equal and opposite reaction.

This is the problem with encouraging cancel culture and the suppression of free expression. Sooner or later, you’re the rednecked mother who’s up against the wall. Keeping in mind that freedom comes with responsibilities, deploying political morality hit squads was a bad idea then and it’s a bad idea now.

In Canada in recent years, it has been those on the liberal-left side of the ledger who have been pushing illiberal ideas in the form of removal of statues, compelled speech (pronouns), controlled speech (Online Harms Act), regulation of content (Online Streaming Act) and through professional bodies. Examples there include the prosecution of Jordan Peterson by the Ontario College of Psychologists, Amy Hamm by the B.C. College of Nurses and Midwives, the drive to ensure Trinity Western University could not launch a law school and Francis Widdowson’s sacking as a tenured professor at Mount Royal University. Oh, and who can forget the furore, newsroom uprising and National Post apologia when Rex Murphy wrote a column insisting most Canadians are not actually racists.

You may believe these acts to be justified but there is little doubt concerning the intellectual inspiration behind them. It comes from the Liberal-Left where people decided there must be rules to deal with other people they believe hold disagreeable opinions or say unsavoury things. Former prime minister and media darling Justin Trudeau put it down to “fringe” minorities with “unacceptable views” while Jonny Ball, writing in Unherd, has this explanation:

“It is an unfortunate and common misconception among progressives that those who disagree with them must have been bamboozled, or else they must have some illegitimate self-interest which has led them to maintain a position which is not simply a different interpretation or view of the world, but a fundamentally immoral one.”

South of the border, it was only a couple of years ago when the corporate world was embracing woke ideology by changing sports teams’ names and using trans TikTokers to sell beer. It is now guarding its shareholders interests by, for instance, swiftly suspending late night talk show host Jimmy Kimmel indefinitely for making what FCC Chair Brendan Carr deemed inappropriate remarks in the wake of the assassination of Charlie Kirk.

Washington Post editor Karen Attiah was fired for what she insists were comments consistent with her role as a journalist. US President Donald Trump, cheered on by many on the right (but certainly not Ted Cruz) threatened the broadcast licenses of US networks, vowed to designate Antifa as a terrorist organization (there’s a case for that) and target the “radical left.”

And now, those media who stayed silent, complied or cheered while one side trampled on the rights of another and folks like Don Cherry were given the bum’s rush are in full OMG! OMG! Fascism! voice. All you have to do is read the Twitter stream of the Toronto Star’s Bruce Arthur and you’ll see what I mean.

This is the problem with encouraging cancel culture and the suppression of free expression. Sooner or later, you’re the rednecked mother who’s up against the wall. Keeping in mind that freedom comes with responsibilities, deploying political morality hit squads was a bad idea then and it’s a bad idea now.

Canadian media follow American politics and news pretty closely so I was surprised (OK, I wasn’t really) they didn’t pick up on a particularly prescient bit of news about attitudes in the USA.

An overwhelming majority – 72 per cent – agreed violence can never be justified against a political opponent. Good. But among those who approve of it, people who lean left are far more inclined to want to kick other people’s teeth in, according to the poll.

As TheHill.com put it, “The Sept. 10 poll shows the more liberal respondents were, the more likely they were to say violence can sometimes be justified.

“A quarter of respondents who identified as “very liberal” said violence can sometimes be justified to achieve political goals, along with 17 percent of those who identified as “liberal,” 9 percent of moderates, 6 percent of those who said they’re “conservative” and 3 percent of those who identified as “very conservative.”

Meanwhile, oblivious to any threats from the Left, the Canadian Anti-hate Network – a “proudly independent antifascist” body is hiring a full time reporter to focus exclusively on right wing extremists. The job was posted the day after Charlie Kirk was slain.

While there was a lot of justifiable fuss over Trump’s bullying of TV networks, there were no eyebrows raised when Identity and Culture Minister Steven Guilbeault made it clear his government is willing to hold CBC accountable for journalism standards.

Keep in mind that in the past the CBC has vigorously defended the independence of its newsrooms, its president insisting neither she nor its board could interfere in its conduct. Guilbeault’s statement following the suspension of reporter Elisa Serret for going on an antisemitic rant, seems to indicate he sees a role for government as a CBC watchdog.

“CBC/Radio Canada belongs to all Canadians and, as leaders, we have a responsibility to hold it to account and demand the highest standards of journalism,” he said, noting, for context, that the government should never interfere in programming decisions.

But those are not journalism standards. A small crack, perhaps, or maybe a chip in the windshield worth watching.

One of the first things young journalists are taught is how to rewrite a press release and not get sucked into using the terminology preferred by its corporate or political authors.

Sadly, it appears Canadian Press has abandoned that approach, preferring in its report on the federal government’s creation of a new housing agency to use Prime Minister Mark Carney’s language and refer to $13 billion in deficit spending as “investment.” The “Carney government launches ‘Build Canada Homes’ with $13B initial investment” headline appeared across the country. This is a betrayal of sound journalism practices that will only further diminish the public’s trust in establishment media.

The role of journalists is to make sure the public hears the truth, which means challenging statements, particularly those that are unsourced. The CBC’s Rosemary Barton did not do that when interviewing Government House Leader Stephen MacKinnon on her program.

Mackinnon explained that he had spoken with a number of Conservative MPs who told him that they were under pressure from their constituents to cooperate with the government and take it easy with that Opposition thing. Rather than challenging and asking for names of the MPs, the source of the constituent pressure (Liberals, CPC, NDP members, etc) or any proof whatsoever to support MacKinnon’s claim, Barton just let it slide.

Condolences to the dozens of Global News reporters who were let go in Corus’s latest round of cuts. Not much left in its newsrooms in the West.

Two bouquets this week, one to the New York Times for launching a newsletter – Believing – dedicated to the coverage of religion, a topic of immense importance to many people that most publishers abandoned years ago. And an even bigger floral arrangement goes to independent old time reporter Bob Mackin for being – to the best of my knowledge – the only journalist to correct the government’s very truthy claim that it had “cancelled” the consumer Carbon Tax. As Mackin smartly noted, “The tax law was not repealed. Only the tax reduced to zero. The law is still there and the tax could make a comeback someday.”

There may still be a heartbeat. For more on media bias regarding targeting the “far right” while ignoring the “far left” see my column Tuesday in The Hub.

(Peter Menzies is a commentator and consultant on media, Macdonald-Laurier Institute Senior Fellow, a past publisher of the Calgary Herald, a former vice chair of the CRTC and a National Newspaper Award winner.)

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