The Latest

(Co-written with Anver Emon, Professor of Law, University of Toronto) Everyone can get hurt. We are complex beings, with multiple attachments, and so we naturally are offended by insults, degrading comments, and uncivil speech. If such wounds hurt, should they be the subject of penalty or public censure? For intractable disputes, it is naïve to think that speech codes can serve to dampen, or even resolve, conflict.

Imagine that I am a teacher who has decided to teach my students about cultures other than their own. I want those students to understand that wearing a kirpan, a turban, a kipa, a hijab, or a niqab does not make a person less Canadian, less deserving of respect, or “abnormal.” So, I decide I will wear items belonging to my own cultural practices as a demonstration of how easily we can all interact with the diverse community around us. I choose, as a Muslim woman, to cover my hair with a hijab and cover my lower face with a niqab.

Welcome to the club, Canada.  On October 18, 2017, we joined the ranks of nearly every other Western democracy when Bill S-231 – the Journalistic Sources Protection Act (“JSPA”) – was finally passed into law, codifying a set of important protections for journalists and their sources. 

Toronto Hydro is the 2017 recipient of the Code of Silence Award for Outstanding Achievement in Government Secrecy in the category of local government departments and agencies. The Canadian Association of Journalists (CAJ), Centre for Free Expression at Ryerson University(CFE), News Media Canada and Canadian Journalists for Free Expression (CJFE) have joined forces to expand an award that the CAJ has for almost 20 years handed out to government departments, agencies or public bodies that put that extra bit of elbow grease into keeping any sunlight from reaching public attention.