Media has much to account for
Canadian news media companies enter the new year with eggs on their faces. Our country’s “progressive” journalists have been exposed as evading their responsibility to cover stories that might cast doubt on their own judgment concerning the far-left.
For years, organizations like the CBC, the Toronto Star and the Globe and Mail have relied on a small group of handpicked voices to speak on behalf of minority communities. Like a game of musical chairs, the same few activists and academics appear in social justice-themed stories, parroting the same old talking points that are full of problems but lacking practical solutions.
Since the rise of social media activism against police brutality in the mid 2010s, these voices are increasingly chosen based on their Twitter clout. The news is still a business, after all, and those with Twitter clout help drive traffic to stories they’re featured in, which means more clicks and more ad revenue for news outlets. A shift to social media-centred reporting accompanied the rise of wokeness in newsrooms, and the embrace of woke tenets, such as privilege, victimhood and cancel culture.
Although 2020 was a unique year in many ways, nothing really changed with respect to how journalists use their power against people of colour. Led by newspaper and broadcast executives like Phillip Crawley ( Globe and Mail), John Boynton ( Toronto Star) and Brodie Fenlon ( CBC News), journalists took this year’s heightened interest in racism as a chance to double down on playing the role of factitious kingmakers. Unfortunately, minority communities generally lack the resources and platforms to push back.
But truth does prevail, eventually. The character flaws of news media’s handpicked activists and academics have been revealed for all to see.
For the past few weeks, the Ontario Judicial Council has heard sworn testimony in the disciplinary hearing against Ontario Court Justice Donald Mcleod. This testimony has documented authoritarian behaviour from individuals affiliated with Black Lives Matter’s Toronto chapter and others who have targeted Justice Mcleod because he doesn’t share their far-left politics.
According to the testimony given so far, these authoritarians secretly recorded at least one conversation with the judge and shared it without his knowledge; asked the judge to set up a meeting and then used evidence of that very meeting to conspire against him; and drove a wedge between Justice Mcleod and young members of his community by misrepresenting his mentorship as legal advice or intimidation.
On the final day of testimony before the disciplinary hearing
recessed for Christmas (it’s scheduled to resume in February 2021), the Ontario Judicial Council also heard from a Black Muslim community leader who was part of Justice Mcleod’s volunteer organization.
With tears running down her cheeks, this highly regarded woman recounted the harassment she received from the social media activists who were targeting Justice Mcleod. The activists tried to sabotage her career, too, by sending letters to her employer and even posting her personal information online. At one point, she feared for her safety and was concerned about living alone.
Saboteurs who drove this Black Muslim community leader to tears are the very same far- left voices who are being amplified by reporters, editors and columnists.
Consider the backgrounds of the individuals in this troubling group that has targeted Justice Mcleod and his colleague: a Ryerson University professor quoted as an authority on race and gender issues by the Toronto Star, an author who was shamelessly promoted by CBC’S “Being Black in Canada” project, a poet who’s regularly interviewed on CBC platforms and websites and a University of Toronto professor who is treated by the Globe and Mail as an “anti-racism” expert.
These media- anointed representatives are trying to ruin the lives of Black Canadians who refuse to bow down to the far- left. Is it a surprise, then, that none of these “progressive” news outlets have published anything substantive about Justice Mcleod’s disciplinary hearing since it began in early December?
The CBC, the Toronto Star and the Globe have each been silent. Not even their reporters and columnists who routinely write about racism have had a word to say about a Black judge being punished by the Ontario Judicial Council, or the harassment of a Black Muslim woman.
Journalists can’t tell you what’s happening to Justice Mcleod right now without also lifting the curtain and further exposing themselves. Entering 2021, it’s clear that news media companies must acknowledge that they invited the wrong activists and academics onto their platforms, or simply admit that their newsrooms are willing to overlook the authoritarian streak of the far-left.
FLAWS OF NEWS MEDIA’S HANDPICKED ACTIVISTS AND ACADEMICS HAVE BEEN REVEALED.