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The refrain of Canadians from all walks of life calling on the Senate to kibosh the Trudeau authorities’s censorship invoice is rising louder by the day. Final week, a letter from over 40,000 Canadian content material creators urged senators to reject Invoice C-11 in its present type, sounding the alarm on what they see as a really harmful piece of laws.

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From day one, Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez, the federal government’s level individual on C-11, has claimed his laws is designed to help Canadian content material creators, saying it “will assist make it possible for our cultural sector works for Canadians and helps the following era of artists and creators.” He ought to have requested content-creators earlier than making that declare!

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In a letter despatched to each member of the Senate, Digital First Canada, a bunch representing tens of 1000’s of small-scale Canadian content material creators, warned that Invoice C-11 may kill the careers of the very artists the Trudeau authorities claims it desires to assist. “Proper now, our livelihoods are in danger,” reads the letter. And it notes that the federal government rammed Invoice C-11 by the Home of Commons with none room for debate or amendments. “Earlier this 12 months, over 40,000 creators and customers raised our voices within the Home and thru letters to defend our digital companies in opposition to these modifications. We have been ignored.”

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A lot for having the backs of Canadian artists.

Main firms like Google and YouTube have additionally come out forcefully in opposition to Invoice C-11, warning that Canadian customers shall be force-fed government-approved content material. Google, partnering with Open Media, notes that Canadians’ favorite content material “might be systematically downranked in favour of content material that the CRTC deems ‘Canadian sufficient,’ based on their wildly outdated Nineteen Eighties-era standards.”

YouTube is issuing a related message. If Invoice C-11 is “put into follow,” YouTube’s chief product officer wrote in a current weblog put up, “which means that when viewers come to the YouTube residence web page, they’re served content material {that a} Canadian authorities regulator has prioritized, moderately than content material they’re all for.”

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Some teams, just like the Canadian Unbiased Music Affiliation, have come out in favour of the laws. However they should suppose by the laws’s implications. Even when Invoice C-11 helps them discover a little bit extra success right here at residence, and there’s no assure of that, it might be to the detriment of any success they could hope for past Canada’s borders.

Relatively than accepting an amazing quantity of constructive criticism, Rodriquez has doubled down on his rhetoric, claiming firms like Google are merely “making an attempt to intimidate Canadians.” Perhaps. However to many people it appears extra as if firms like Google are attempting to warn Canadians concerning the hurt C-11 will inflict on Canadian producers and customers.

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Tasked with salvaging a nasty piece of laws, Rodriguez appears to suppose name-calling and finger-pointing are the federal government’s solely actual line of defence in selling Invoice C-11. If he had a stronger message to ship to Canadians, we’d have heard it by now. Little marvel the federal government is resorting to rhetoric over substance.

The unique issues about Invoice C-11 additionally stay. If authorities bureaucrats get to decide on what content material to push on Canadians, there’s a really actual threat the federal government shall be tempted to make use of its filtering powers to silence its critics.

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With Invoice C-11 now within the Senate, members of Canada’s higher home have a chance to at the least give the invoice the scrutiny it must have had when it was earlier than the Home of Commons. Up to now senators on the transport and communications committee have heard from dozens of witnesses warning concerning the risks of C-11. With widespread opposition to the invoice coming from all corners of the nation, the Senate ought to do greater than merely amend the laws. Senators ought to refuse to cross the invoice altogether.

Given the dimensions of the opposition to C-11, the federal government might even be relieved to see it go.

Jay Goldberg is Ontario director of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.