"If you insist on maintaining the current prominence of voices in the article, I ask you to change the word “Haters” in your headline to “content creators” to remove any moral judgment and one-sidedness from your headline."
March 5, 2024
To:
Marie Woolf, Reporter, Globe and Mail
David Walmsley, Editor-in-Chief, Globe and Mail
Robert Fife, Ottawa Bureau Chief, Globe and Mail
Sandra E. Martin, Standards Editor, Globe and Mail
Dear Marie Woolf, David Walmsley, Robert Fife, and Sandra E. Martin,
I am writing to express my concern about the article: “Haters could migrate to smaller platforms not covered by online harms bill, fear minorities,” published on March 5 in Globe and Mail.
First, although your article is about people possibly migrating to smaller platforms if blocked on social media and the reaction of minorities to Canada’s online harms bill, you give the first voice to Richard Marceau, general counsel at the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA), Canada’s most prominent pro-Israel lobby group. The second person you quote, Bernie Farber, was employed by the Canadian Jewish Congress (CJC) from 1984 until 2011. The CJC was absorbed into CIJA in 2011. You only give voice to Amira Elghawaby, Canada’s Special Representative on Combatting Islamophobia, further down the article.
This is concerning and problematic since the headline of the article mentions the term “haters,” and the lead voices in the article are from individuals heavily vested in pro-Israel lobby groups. Given the current climate of the Israel-Palestine war, this close juxtaposition would suggest that groups opposing Israeli violence are inherently “haters.”
If you insist on maintaining the current prominence of voices in the article, I ask you to change the word “Haters” in your headline to “content creators” to remove any moral judgment and one-sidedness from your headline.
Second, you do not provide an overall context on how the online harms bill could very likely target pro-Palestine advocates since their content is already frequently mislabelled by tech platforms as hate speech.
A report by Human Rights Watch (HRW): Meta’s Broken Promises Systemic Censorship of Palestine Content on Instagram and Facebook, has shed light on how “Meta’s policies and practices have been silencing voices in support of Palestine and Palestinian human rights on Instagram and Facebook.”
In this report, HRW details 1,050 instances of Instagram and Facebook taking down or deleting content posted by Palestinians and their supporters between October and November 2023.
Good reporting would mention that pro-Palestine advocates could very likely be the primary target of the online harms bill. By failing to mention this information, you also do not raise the underlying issues of such a bill: Islamophobia, anti-Palestinian racism, censorship, free speech, and the state of democracy, which are all interconnected.
In a way, this article partakes in all the issues mentioned above.
I, therefore, ask you to add more critical voices and perspectives about the repercussions of Canada’s online harms bill.
I hope Globe and Mail will make these changes and consider my suggestions in future reporting about Canada’s online harms bill.
Sincerely,
Fatima Haidar,
Media Analyst, Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East