Online harms bill would create a new hate-crime offence, impose big fines | Hacker News Reader

Online harms bill would create a new hate-crime offence, impose big fines

theglobeandmail.com

28 pointsvoisin21 comments

> Justice Minister/AG Virani says today the new hate crime offence he seeks to put in the Criminal Code through Bill C-63 would not require police/prosecutors to seek his approval to lay charges, as opposed to other current hate crimes on the book.

https://twitter.com/NChartierET/status/1762255094441996367

http://archive.today/KshkZ

I would say that anybody in Canada should look at getting out, but the way the global internet operates these days, and how it has facilitated a kind of extraterritoriality, I wonder what our options are for avoiding the effects of this kind of thing happening in other nations, now and into the future.

To where? The US?

You’re afraid of “this kind of thing” happening in other countries. What do you believe is happening here and what problems do you have with it specifically?

I think you already know what I'm concerned about, but you're asking me so you can have me put it into words and then get me bogged down in those.

The core of my comment is the way these kinds of laws can lead to a kind of extraterritoriality, which I articulated plainly.

You’re using vague but scary language without offering specifics. Sounds a lot like fear mongering.

Why should Canadians “get out”? That’s a pretty bold thing to call for. I think asking you to explain yourself is perfectly reasonable. So… why?

If you fear getting “bogged down” with words maybe you shouldn’t be engaging in a discussion board.

Again, the core of my post is pseudo-extraterritoriality brought about by these kinds of laws, which I'vestated plainly twice now. If you'd like to discuss that, I would have been happy to. Not so much now, because you're not giving discussion vibes. But if anybody else wants to discuss the point of my comment and not try and drill down on specifics that are entirely tertiary to my point, that's cool with me, and exactly why I made the post on said discussion board.

That you want to discuss something totally anciliary is not my fault or concern.

In terms of vibe I think I'm more on your side than that other guy's. Internet-hate-crime laws fundamentally spook me because I grew up in a purple US state and on balance feel authorities are likely to abuse them.

>pseudo-extraterritoriality

I don't know what this means, can you elaborate?

> If you fear getting “bogged down” with words maybe you shouldn’t be engaging in a discussion board.

This very sentiment highlights the problem. If you aren't a master of crybullying and couching your own hate speech in impenetrable rhetoric, you're subject to criminal penalties.

Israel is attacking civilians but calling that out as genocide is antisemitic in their eyes. Yet visibly supporting their Palestinian victims is itself "advocating genocide." They've flipped the script, and this bill codifies suppression of dissent. All of these ism and phobia terms are so fucking vague it's embarrassing.

And yet for a bill about stopping bullying and hate speech, there are provisions like:

> For greater certainty and for the purposes of the definition content that foments hatred, content does not express detestation or vilification solely because it expresses disdain or dislike or it discredits, humiliates, hurts or offends.

So what the fuck is the point? This is all meaningless. It's going to be hilarious to see enforced.

If you asked me 25 years ago which country would slide down the toilet to becoming authoritarian fastest, I never would have guessed it would have been Canada.

>The bill, introduced by Justice Minister Arif Virani, would also raise penalties for hate-propaganda offences from five years to life imprisonment for advocating genocide.

One need only look at the ongoing conflict between Israel and Palestine to see how ridiculous this new law is. Supporters of both sides accuse the other of "advocating genocide" by offering any sort of rhetorical support at all. You should have absolutely no doubt that opposing whatever war or military conflict Canada or NATO is involved with at the moment will be interpreted by the authoritarian Canadian regime as, "advocating genocide", no matter what actual verbiage is used. Nobody who believes in the semblance of a free society can support such a draconian law.

This take is wild to me. The USA is currently in the midst of discourse about:

Banning abortion, making it criminal/murder to drop IVF eggs, burning/banning books in election ads, making it an offense to even mention your sexuality or home life in some situations, coddling Russia as if they're the good guys, electing a guy who clearly tried to engineer a coup, making it impossible to even identify as a trans person because of the social stigma (again).

But generally the people for all of the above (or parts of it) are crying murder when Canada tries to say maybe it's an offense to advocate for genocide and other such things online. The cases that happen with these laws won't be Trudeau's cronies coming up and taking you away in a van, they will go before perfectly reasonable judges who will rule if you were doing enough harm to warrant jail time. If the courts were stacked in the way the USA's have been I might be worried, luckily we have a better system up here for such things.

Sounds like you're believing far too much of what you read on social media, to be honest.

You’re grossly misinformed. Advocating genocide is already a crime in Canada. This just makes it more explicit in an online context since the laws around this were created pre-internet.

And given that this is a law that has existed for literally decades, can you cite a single example of where it has been misused to stifle free-speech?

Name one.

(That’s not to say we shouldn’t be keeping a close eye on these things of course, but you’re yelling fire in a theatre where there isn’t even smoke. Give me a break)

Certainly the Trudeau regime has never abused its power to deprive Canadian citizens of their rights and freedoms, and would never use this new, draconian law to do it again.

https://torontosun.com/news/national/ottawa-appeals-court-de...

Exercising “rights and freedoms” isn’t what the people in that protest were doing. Breaking that up was the right thing to do.

Federal court disagrees with you. You just happen to not like what they were protesting.

I lived in Ottawa at the time these protests were going on. These people weren’t there to protest. They were there to antagonize.

Nice pivot attempt.

I asked for an example of existing laws against inciting genocide being used to stifle free speech. Because you made the claim it was inevitable... I pointed out that it's never happened even though those laws have existed for decades.

So, do you have something to back up your claim or not? Or are you just regurgitating right-wing fear-mongering nonsense without any independent thought?

As for the Ottawa protest; It's curious you invoked that protest and not any one of dozens of First Nations protests occupying various spaces over the past two decades. All of those people were also forcefully removed at gunpoint (See also: dozens of similar situations in the USA like Standing Rock).

It's different when it's white people whose views align with your own I guess, eh?

[dupe]

Discussion over here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39513092

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