by Brunilda Cimo for The Toronto Globalist. From Vol. V Issue I.
Hate crimes by census areas, per 100,000 people. Graphic by MONIKA TRAIKOV and MATTHEW WALL
Race is a concept which historically has organized many societies. Sanjeev S Anand, in Expressions of Racial Hatred and Racism in Canada: An Historical Perspective, defines racism as “the belief that one race is superior to another, and this belief is associated with attitudes and acts.” After learning a lesson from the atrocities of the Nazis against the Jewish people, many countries – including Canada – do not accept that race has any biological basis that determines superiority or inferiority.
Thus, Canada has undertaken initiatives to protect all “racial” groups, through its multicultural policy. Also, as Anand states, the Charter added in 1982, stioulates that “[t]his Charter shall be interpreted in a manner consistent with the preservation and enhancement of the multicultural heritage of Canadians.” Because the government has adopted and tries to promulgate the idea that a person’s race is not a valid reason for descrimination, Canada is perceived as a society tolerant of “cultural diversity.” However, as Anand indicates, in Canada alone there are at least 75 hate organizations that use the internet to spread their hatred. Given the prevalence of these white supremacists groups, hate sites and the effects that these have on many individuals (such as teenagers), I will argue that racism is still a problem in Canada. The internet allows for the promulgation of racist views in new and possibly more efficient ways because it is easily accessible to millions of people. Moreover, it is difficult to censor such material because of the technology it employs and freedom of expression rights guaranteed by the Charter.
Websites allow hate organizations to access new groups of people. The internet can be accessed more easily than other methods used by hate groups in the past. As Joe Roy (cited by Margaret E Duffy in Web of Hate: A Fantasy Theme Analysis of the Rhetorical Vision of Hate Groups Online) says, “There’s no question that the Net is one of the key factors in the growth of hate groups[…] These groups are reaching people who would’ve never been exposed to it otherwise”. In other words, the internet is a more efficient modern method to attract and recruit members. For example, Elissa Lee and Laura Leets in Persuasive Storytelling by Hate Groups Online: Examining its Effects on Adolescents indicate that in the past, the Nazis would use “fliers, newsletters, small rallies, mailings, and interpersonal contact[,]” mostly for targeting people who had the same “beliefs” or were part of the group and thus “predisposed to accept the messages.” However, the internet can recruit or persuade many more people.
Youths are especially vulnerable to these messages. Lee and Leets have found that male teenagers generally use the internet more often than any other group; and a poll in US found that 25% of teens have seen hate group websites. Moreover, Lee and Leets say that “[h]ate Web sites appear to be one of many potential pitfalls that await youths on the Internet.” In other words, young people are more likely to view websites because they spend more time than any other group browsing on the internet, making them more susceptible to hateful messages. Youths are not only more likely to view these websites because of their greater use of the internet, but many of these hate websites specifically target youths, and try to convince them to believe in their ideology. Children and teenagers are attractive targets simply because they are in a stage of moral and intellectual development. Generally, once certain beliefs are ingrained at a young age, these ideas are not easily removed later in life; most likely, they tend to be reinforced. Lee and Leets show evidence suggesting that even former members of White supremacist hate groups have pointed out that the special target of hatred groups are “young, White, male teenagers”. A study in California found that many students in high school were physically “approached” or “recruited” by hate organizations.
Hate crime reports suggest a possible a link between the viewing of hate sites and hate crime occurrences. Canadian Centre for Justice Statistics show that in 2001 and 2002, twelve police forces indicated that 57% of hate crime incidents were about race or ethnicity issues, and visible minorities were overrepresented as victims in these types of crimes. This pilot survey also found that in 83% of the cases, the perpetrators were not known to the victim, making the incident a hate crime because it shows that the victim was selected based on his/her racial or ethnic characteristics. Among these incidents, black victims had a higher chance of becoming victims, followed by South Asians, Arabs/West Asians, East and Southeast Asians, and lastly Whites. Not surprisingly, considering that many sites now target young individuals, the survey found that the perpetrators involved in these incidents were younger than previous perpetrators. In the past the average age of the men participating in hate crime was around 29.5 years, but the present average age is 23.6. Also, Duffy says that many studies have found that hate sites motivated hate incidents against African Americans and the shootings at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado. In other words, we see that some of the young people, who are targeted by many hate websites, may eventually engage in hate acts against other “racial” groups.
Internet free speech is almost impossible to censor and this contributes to an even greater effect on the racist attitudes. This is the case for two main reasons. First, technologically it is almost impossible to regulate or disconnect hate websites. Some of these hate sites are not even Canadian, so they are not under the jurisdiction of Canadian law. Many times trying to block a website is very difficult as others can create what are called “duplicates.” Anand says that in one case, in Germany, Deutsche Telekom tried to block a Santa Cruz Company that was spreading hatred propaganda through its website. Deutsche Telekom failed, as many other “duplicates” were created by “free speech proponents.” Thus, hate sites constitute almost unstoppable information which aim to instigate racist attitudes. Secondly, from a legal perspective, prohibiting hate sites infringes on the freedom of expression, which is part of the same Charter that guaranteed multiculturalism. Both rights are highly valued in our society and to transgress either one, requires a lot of of convincing evidence. Many agree that some free speech should be prohibited. There have even been efforts by the Canadian government to try and put some limits on free speech. One such effort was the Cohen report in 1965. This Special Committee on Hate Propaganda in Canada said that some form of speech should be prohibited these days because our society is more diverse, and during times of stress we tend to put the blame for our problems on others. In other words, they were worried about racist scapegoating. The recommendations of this report, Anand says, led to hate propaganda laws. Nevertheless, thus far there have only been a few cases with convictions. We can see from Statistics Canada that hate propaganda is the least common form of hate crimes reported, whereas mischief and assault are the highest. If hate crime involves an act then it is easier to detect. However, if the act involves speech (i.e., hate propa- ganda), it is more difficult to prove. Thus, hate websites are prevalent and can influence the attitudes of many people and teenagers toward other races. Because of the right to freedom of expression, they almost never can be censored.
To conclude, although Canada has made many efforts to encourage diversity (such as through the Multiculturalism Act and the Charter), racism has not been erased. Hate sites are better instrument for the spread of racist ideas than methods used in the past. Moreover, hate sites are a sta- ble source of racist ideas as they cannot be technologically and legally censored. Hate sites transcend borders and thus can- not be controlled by the Canadian legal system. Even when these sites are Cana- dian, censoring them is difficult because many people can create duplicates and can also claim that the act of controlling them violates their freedom of expression guaranteed by the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Thus, hates sites are not only pernicious in themselves but also cause racist attitudes to become prevalent in Canada.
Brunilda Cimo is a graduate of the University of Toronto, having studied International Relations and Political Science.
