A new low has infected the body politic

Last week on Twitter a conservative activist and former school trustee wrote, “I’ve suspected @michaelcoren is a kiddie diddler for some time. Just a suspicion, mind you, I’m not saying he is. But I wouldn’t be surprised in the least if we end up reading about him in some sordid, wicked setting …”

It’s not the first time this particular individual has placed such hateful garbage on social media. In July 2018, he tweeted that, “I’m beginning to suspect that Michael Coren may be a pedophile” and that, “I believe he has all the classic characteristics of a kiddie diddler. I’ve observed him for some time.”

For these earlier tweets his account was suspended, but he obviously didn’t care. Because I support the revised Ontario sex education curriculum, another conservative campaigner wrote on her Facebook page that I looked like the sort of person who sold his daughter for sex on the street. That comment was then repeated on the page of a right-wing academic at a Christian college.

I have been accused of adultery, theft and even Satanism, and the most outrageous lies about my personal behaviour and religious beliefs have been spewed more times than I can remember. False claims that I’m mentally ill (hardly shameful) or gay (who cares?) abound, and my family is occasionally targeted, too.

I say this not to claim martyrdom or to pretend that I am anything special — all sorts of people with any sort of public profile are abused like this — but because it reveals a disturbing trend. The right in Canada is increasingly organized and brutal in its campaigns of slander, insult and distortion, and I fear that as the federal election approaches, this will become even worse.

I, of course, realize that nastiness is not the preserve of any one political side, but when it comes from the left it tends to be from the extreme. On the right, however, it has now entered the mainstream. Putting aside eccentrics like my pedophile- accusing friend, most of the attacks come from far less bizarre figures. For more than five years I have been a fairly outspoken progressive, a Christian socialist in fact, but before that I was a religious and political conservative. Never then did I have the same experience.

I’m a fairly low-level writer and broadcaster, so imagine what happens to genuinely senior figures. The campaign of vitriol against Justin Trudeau borders on the psychotic, with a horrific zoo of attacks, even including death threats.

Former Ontario Liberal leader Kathleen Wynne was regularly subjected to insults around her sexuality, and in Alberta, right-wing crowds roar for NDP Premier Rachel Notley to be arrested. There have been 11 threats on her life, and she and members of her government have repeatedly been harassed.

Toronto councillor Kristyn Wong-Tam wrote recently of being accosted during the municipal election by a group of large, aggressive men “making a series of false, defamatory and outlandish allegations.” They filmed the intimidation and then posted it on social media, where it was then repeated by other right-wing bloggers and activists.

“It reminded me of the social media tactics that produced the birther lie that dogged former president Barack Obama and the Pizzagate fantasy promoted about Hillary Clinton,” she wrote.

There is method behind this madness. If the screams are loud enough, they drown out sensible discussion and force liberals and social democrats to spend their time defending themselves against lies and libel rather than outlining their policies. It’s an approach that was extremely successful in the last U.S. election and in the Brexit campaign in Britain.

Nor is it just trolls and crazies, and constantly blaming Russian bots simply won’t do. A new low, a modern baseness, has infected the body politic.

I blame a contemporary right that has learned lessons from Trump’s America and the European alt-right, and some good old Canadian rightists who run blogs and podcasts. It’s for moderate and responsible conservatives to take back their movement and their parties, if indeed it’s not too late.