Hate-on-the-Net Targeted by Rights Commission in Canada

Hate mongering on the Internet is a human rights issue, and the Canadian Human Rights Commission (CHRC) has undertaken to help curb, if not eradicate, it. Examples under a recent week’s public examination in headlines include:

These cases, and others like them of course, are getting the attention of media and civil agencies as being human rights issues, but the frequency of similar instances, many only marginally criminal, has prompted human rights authorities to look to the tools they have to manage and curb the insidious creep of the behaviour.

The CHRC sees itself as ’having a unique role in combating hate on the Internet.’ It also appreciates that the hate battle on the net is only part of broader fight against any hate-motivated activity in Canada and around the world, and that the expunging effort requires wider coordination and co-operation beyond Canada’s borders. The CHRC’s website carries a thorough question-and-answer sector outlining what recourse individuals have to defend themselves — how to file a complaint; what to do when it’s filed; non-involvement of police; what happens when a violation has been identified; remedies that can be ordered (up to fines, reimbursement, even jail, to name a few of the elements).

Prime legislative authority is provided by the Canadian Human Rights Act, as legislated by Parliament, and revised. Section 13 of the Act, dating from 1985, gives specific powers to the Commission to deal with complaints about Internet-transmitted hate messages. The Commission believes that it has the only non-criminal legislation in the world to deal with Internet hate.

Hate messaging, of course, is addressed in the Canadian Criminal Code, and code breaches would be a police matter, but cases put to the human rights commission do not involve the police. The commission prefers to exercise the services of an independent tribunal to investigate and hear complaints brought to it. The tribunal has the capacity to issue interlocutory order of restraint and penalties.

And the penalties have teeth. If a tribunal finds in favor of a complainant, that a section 13 has been violated, legislation provides that the respondent:

Failure to comply with a tribunal finding can lead to a Federal Court order, which carries the threat of imprisonment for contempt if ignored by the respondent.

Since 2001 when the law was passed, the Commission has received 51 complaints under section 13. The breakdown of these shows 27 went to the tribunal for more investigation; six remain under investigation; nine were closed for want of evidence; and nine await decision on admissibility.

The commission says that any remedy awarded by the tribunal will serve a number of purposes, not least the reduction and prevention of discriminatory practices, which undermine human rights. But it will also have significant symbolic values and raise public sensitivity and awareness and hasten acceptance of denunciation of what often start as ill-thought-out pranks or anger over a petty matter.

The school children’s behaviour mentioned above is an April prank that got out of hand on a student-built website chat line and in four days attracted 670 participants. The teacher involved was embarrassed and devastated about remarks related to his character and the nature of his dancing at public bars and supported by his teachers’ society, school and school board.

The political abuse involved a constituent railing against government agriculture policy, its ‘dirty tricks’ and ‘dictatorial attitudes.’ The constituent’ letter, as it appeared on the net, angrily described the Prime Minister as ‘our own Canadian Hitler,’ and the Agricultural Minister was likened to Hermann Goering, No. 2 Nazi in Germany and head of the Luftwaffe in the Second World War. Canada was the first non-European country to endorse protocol against racism and xenophobic material on the Internet.

While the examples given here are less horrendous than cases of rights breaches which invoke killing and violence, the fact they so readily make news headlines is testimony to the public’s heightened sensitivity to human rights privacy.