Happy World Press Freedom Day!.You can be forgiven for not knowing it was today. It is a sedate affair and not everybody pays attention to the many UN observances of everything under the sun. May 2 was World Tuna Day while May 23 will be the International Day to End Obstetric Fistula. Be sure to mark your calendars..Press freedom is vital in any democracy and it is constantly under threat. Authoritarian regimes will always crack down on free press in order to consolidate power over the citizenry..In some nations the threat to journalists is immediate and brutal. Since the beginning of 2022, 25 journalists and media workers are known to have been killed while on the job around the world..In other nations, imprisoning journalists and media workers is the norm. According to Reporters Without Borders, nearly 500 journalists are in jail around the world for the crime of trying to ply their trade. .In Canada, the threat to press freedom is more subtle than the worst of nations but it is very real..In 2002, Canada was fifth from the top in nations ranked for press freedom according to Reporters Without Borders. Since then, Canada's ranking has dropped to 19th place and is behind nations such as Estonia and Jamaica. The slide is expected to continue..The Canadian government has been using economic pressure to control the press. Modern media is in a state of transition which has put tremendous fiscal stress upon mainstream media outlets. Most legacy media outlets have been losing money for years as internet-based competition has bitten into their revenues. That has made outlets vulnerable, and the Canadian government has taken advantage of that through subsidy programs and bailouts..More media outlets are dependent upon tax subsidies than ever before. The government has set up their own commission to determine which media outlets are to be officially recognized by the state and which aren’t. This of course encourages media outlets to not rock the government boat if they can help it. An outlet that upsets the state could suddenly and arbitrarily find it has lost its accredited status thus its funding..Authoritarian states will always set up a state media outlet and Canada is no exception. While the CBC used to do some great investigative journalism and was clearly independent of direct government control, it has devolved into being little more than a communications branch of the state now. The broadcaster parrots government press releases with little to no critique while it drains the public purse of nearly $1.5 billion tax dollars per year. The state broadcaster also sells advertising thus draining resources from non-government media which of course makes those outlets even more dependent upon government funding. An ugly cycle..The government has used human rights commissions as tools to quell critical media as well. In 2006, the Western Standard was dragged through multiple hearings and threatened with penalties for having dared to republish cartoon depictions of Muhammad and Macleans magazine was dragged through the process for printing excerpts from Mark Steyn. This doubtless chills discourse on sensitive issues..Unrestrained discourse has continued despite the best efforts of the government to quell it. The internet has allowed small, independent outlets and citizen journalists to gain prominence and reach large numbers of Canadians..Rather than trying to play whack-a-mole and chase down countless outlets and individuals, the government has chosen to put the onus on internet providers. The state won’t directly stop independent voices from speaking, it just wants to deplatform them. If one can't access social media platforms, one can't get their word out. It's as if the government had said to newspapers 30 years ago, "You have freedom of press!" but would shut off the printing presses if the outlet printed something to anger the state. .The Liberal government first created Bill C-10 with the intent of regulating internet providers. That bill died when the 2021 general election was called so they redrafted it into Bill C-11 and has spawned bill C-18 since then as well. Both bills have the intention of controlling the internet. The government is making the control of information one of its top priorities and we should all be worried about this..While alarm bells have been ringing over this trend in Canada, few have been paying heed to them. Communications academic Michael Geist has been tracking government efforts to control the internet for years and he describes current legislation from the government as being extreme. Former CRTC vice-chairman Peter Menzies has described the government’s legislation as shocking..Freedom of press is an essential freedom and it is terribly threatened in Canada. While people tend to think of bloggers and journalists imprisoned in developing nations when they think of threats to free press, they often forget just what kind of threats to free press exist right at home..A government unchecked by free media is a government poised to become a dictatorship..Happy World Press Freedom Day indeed. Enjoy what's left of it while you can..Cory Morgan is Opinion & Broadcast Editor for the Western Standard.cmorgan@westernstandardonline.com
