ANALYSIS: As Canada Becomes More Restrictive, Resistance Is Growing, Experts Say

People march past police at a demonstration, part of a convoy-style protest, in Ottawa on April 30, 2022. (The Canadian Press/Patrick Doyle)

Restrictions on freedoms in Canada, such as freedom of speech and assembly, have been steadily increasing for years now, says Philip Carl Salzman, professor emeritus of anthropology at McGill University.

“They’ve turned up the heat under the water, and it’s gotten warmer and warmer,” he told The Epoch Times. A lot of Canadians have gotten used to the heat and aren’t reacting strongly, Mr. Salzman said, but we’re starting to see signs of resistance boiling up.

Mr. Salzman highlighted the recent suicide of a Toronto principal that drew public outcry against the stringency of “anti-racism” requirements for educators.

Richard Bilkszto was under mental duress, his family and friends said, after an equity trainer hired by the Toronto District School Board allegedly mischaracterized him saying he was upholding white supremacy when he disagreed that Canada is more racist than the United States. Mr. Bilkszto spent years seeking an apology for the damage to his reputation.

The outcry over his death has been relatively bipartisan, Mr. Salzman said.

Many other instances of restricted speech or action have drawn clear partisan lines. Those examples relate to topics that include abortion, vaccine mandates, patriotism, and LGBT policy in schools.

An early example of such restrictions is the federal government’s requirement in 2018 that companies declare a pro-choice stance on abortion to qualify for summer jobs funding. The policy received strong pushback from faith-based groups, and the Liberal government subsequently changed the application criteria wording to remove the requirement.

In 2023, several restrictions have been imposed by the government or other institutions and Canadians have reacted with varying levels of resistance.

Recent Restrictions

When calls to quash Canada Day celebrations emerged in cities across the nation, public opposition was significant. All but the Vancouver Fraser Port Authority relented and allowed unfettered celebration.

When Quebec’s tourism ministry prohibited a Christian event in a province-run convention centre in June because of the organizer’s pro-life views, it met with little protest at first.

Opposition parties initially applauded the government’s decision, but Parti Québécois (PQ) and Quebec Solidaire leaders reconsidered the implications. The two parties ultimately called on Quebecers and lawmakers to question the government’s power to determine who can gather and express themselves. PQ Leader Paul St-Pierre Plamondon said the government’s powers were being used “arbitrarily.”

While the Quebec government maintained its position, the matter is now before the courts.

Also in June, Calgary’s city council voted to place new limits on pro-life groups now prohibited from distributing communications portraying images of aborted fetuses to people’s homes without including a “graphic content” warning.

Richard Dur, executive director of Prolife Alberta, says the flyers are powerful statements on the reality of abortion. While his group doesn’t distribute such material, he stands by the right of other groups to do so.

“The targeted attack on free speech, especially pro-life free-speech, has persisted for decades and has only gotten worse,” he told The Epoch Times. He criticized the “bubble zones” that prohibit pro-life Canadians from demonstrating near abortion facilities.

“Rightfully, provisions already exist within the Criminal Code of Canada to charge, prosecute, and convict those who harass others,” Mr. Dur said. “Restrictive bubble zones around taxpayer-funded abortion facilities restrict free speech, freedom of expression, and the peaceful assembly of pro-life Canadians.”

Calgary has placed similar zones around libraries and other public facilities to restrict protests against drag story hours and similar events. The Canadian Constitution Foundation is mounting a court challenge to the city’s new bylaw, which was passed by city council on March 14.

When Pride Month arrived in June, it provoked unprecedented resistance from parents who want more control over what their children are learning about gender and sexuality in schools.

Educators in growing numbers are being prohibited from informing parents about their children’s gender transition. One such ban was put in place in 2020 in New Brunswick. Premier Blaine Higgs moved to oppose it in 2023, amending provincial legislation that entrenches parental rights in this regard.

“They’re saying ‘wait a minute, parents are in charge of the child ... not the state.’ I think that’s an example of how people are objecting," Gwendolyn Landolt, a lawyer and author, told The Epoch Times.

Compared to the United States, she said, Canadians’ reactions have always been a little “mild” when it comes to challenging the restriction of freedoms. “Maybe it’s changing now.”

Canadians have increasingly lost trust in the powers that be in Canada, Ms. Landolt said. By contrast, she said, in the 1980s most Canadians seemed to feel elected officials were generally acting in the best interests of everyone.

The most significant blow to that trust relationship, she said, was the battle over COVID-19 public health orders. That broke the dam of Canadians’ polite and mild nature, Ms. Landolt said, and the Freedom Convoy was the result.

Dax D'Orazio, a research affiliate for the University of Alberta’s Centre for Constitutional Studies, highlighted bills C-11 and C-18 as further restrictions to the freedoms of Canadians, both of which passed this year.

These new laws regulate online content, and critics have said they may lead to “censorship.”

Culture Wars

“At the moment, conservatives and traditionalists—for lack of better terms—feel as though they’re losing the culture wars, and that there’s been a widespread acceptance of progressive values that’s diminishing their ability for free expression,” Mr. D’Orazio told The Epoch Times.

He said he hopes to see Canadians move away from the division of “culture wars” and toward “creating healthy public discourse where it’s possible to have a reasonable disagreement.”

Bruce Pardy, a Queen’s University law professor and executive director of the think tank Rights Probe, says liberals used to feel they were losing the culture wars.

“Once upon a time, when they were cultural mavericks, liberals championed free speech,” Mr. Pardy wrote in an op-ed for the National Post on June 24. “Now the shoe is on the other foot. ... Free speech is no longer needed to protect the left, whose sensibilities now prevail.”

Mr. Pardy identified what he calls “doctrines of the apocalypse” that are prevalent. They include the critical race theory behind the anti-racism training that the late Mr. Bilkszto received. These doctrines are antithetical to open inquiry, individual autonomy, and free speech, Mr. Pardy said.

For Mr. Salzman, the root of the issue is that the reins have been taken over by those who want to impose a “kind of utopian vision,” which they have deemed their duty to impose in a “top-down” fashion.

“In Canada, in particular, what that vision involves is a shift in reference. The reference is no longer the will of the people, or the consent of the governed,” he said. “The reference point is the international elite, the World Economic Forum, the United Nations, the World Health Organization.”

Ms. Landolt said that although she thinks Canadians are less likely than Americans to be vocal if the government infringes on their freedoms, it’s important for Canadians to speak up.

“We have to make sure we get a future government that will start listening to the public instead of ordering us around,” she said.