Juno News - February 16, 2026


Government ā€œhate lineā€ now targets OFFENSIVE JOKES


Episode Stats

Length

18 minutes

Words per Minute

177.78796

Word Count

3,231

Sentence Count

207

Misogynist Sentences

1


Summary


Transcript

00:00:00.000 Well, if you're in Durham Region, east of Toronto, you might want to be extra careful
00:00:08.960 about the jokes you tell. The region's website features a snitch line for things like
00:00:14.400 offensive jokes. That's right. If someone doesn't find your joke very funny, you may find yourself
00:00:21.760 under police investigation for being hateful or discriminatory. It's no joke. On the region's
00:00:27.360 website, VictimServicesDurham.com, we're told that an act of hate or discrimination can manifest in
00:00:35.360 many forms, including verbal harassment, slurs, and offensive jokes. The problem is, of course,
00:00:42.960 one person's joke is another person's racial attack. And where does bad taste come in? Humor can be
00:00:49.760 cutting. It can be cruel. At what point does it constitute a criminal offense? Lisa Robinson is
00:00:57.760 If you have some concerns, she's a counselor for Ward 1 in Pickering. Welcome, Lisa.
00:01:02.560 Hi, Mark. How are you today? I'm great. Thank you. Did I sum it up properly there?
00:01:07.920 You did pretty much. I mean, the actual name of it is really a community-based hate reporting program.
00:01:15.200 Okay. But, you know, if the government has to come out and reassure you on its own pages that it isn't
00:01:21.040 a snitch line, then that should tell you everything that you need to know about this, because it wasn't
00:01:25.360 a snitch line, then they wouldn't need to defend themselves in advance, right?
00:01:28.960 Yeah. If the government tells you it's not a snitch line, it's probably a snitch line.
00:01:33.360 Yeah. It truly is.
00:01:35.920 The thing is,
00:01:37.920 you can call them up if you've been subjected to humor you don't like. I mean, that's the bottom
00:01:43.760 line, right? Yeah. It actually says for offensive jokes right there on their own website. So if you,
00:01:52.000 like right now, were to say something to me and somebody got a hold of this here in Pickering,
00:01:55.840 they could easily file a report to victim services and say that they are offended and they would do an
00:02:02.320 investigation instead of doing what they really should be doing, like victim services. Normally,
00:02:07.120 if someone's going to go there, they would go there for, you know, sexual abuse, human trafficking,
00:02:14.320 you know, domestic violence. So we're actually now going to be using their services for examples,
00:02:21.040 like, you know, speech that they don't like retaliation perhaps, because you can, you can
00:02:28.640 put in a complaint and remain anonymous. Right. Yeah. But I mean, if you'd have to testify,
00:02:37.120 I mean, if this ended up in court, I mean, you'd probably be asked to testify, wouldn't you?
00:02:43.760 You would think. You would think, but if you're doing it anonymous, see, the whole entire thing is,
00:02:50.320 is that, you know, we already have laws for crime, don't we? Like, you know, for harassment,
00:02:56.080 for hate speech, for graffiti, vandalism, property, you know, all of that. So really,
00:03:03.280 in my opinion, we're just wasting over $89,000 of taxpayers' dollars to create a program and take
00:03:10.160 services away from people that actually need it, all on the whim of being able to report somebody
00:03:16.320 anonymously. Yeah. And the police are probably so woke up there, they'd make that a priority.
00:03:22.640 Somebody complained about an offensive joke. We better get on that. We better find out what
00:03:27.520 happened and what the nature of the joke was. And I mean, who decides what's funny and what isn't? I
00:03:32.240 mean, that's what it boils down to, isn't it? Are we eventually leaving it up to a judge to decide this
00:03:37.600 was really just a joke and, you know, not something that we should take any more seriously than that?
00:03:42.800 I mean, I guess we're leaving it up to the judge. Well, the first point of communication actually
00:03:51.520 goes to city staff. So when you fill out these anonymous reports online, it goes to a city staff
00:03:58.320 member who, you know, obviously are not trained. And I mean, they need to know what's the difference
00:04:03.120 between hate, what's the difference between bias, what's the difference between retaliation or,
00:04:08.640 you know, political speech. And they say that they're going to give them training. And as we
00:04:15.120 know with government, if you're going to give somebody training, it could be a one day course.
00:04:19.760 And then all of a sudden they're known as an expert. Yeah. So now we'll have like, you know,
00:04:25.760 these little mini experts with like, you know, little training saying what they classify as being hate
00:04:32.640 or biasness or what an offensive joke is. Yeah. And I guess you'll have to explain what the joke was.
00:04:40.000 And then presumably the person who's under investigation will say, well, no, that's not
00:04:44.480 the joke. The joke goes this way. You know, they misinterpreted it. So that it's like, you know,
00:04:50.320 what you say and what they hear, you know, there's potential gap there in terms of understanding. I mean,
00:04:56.720 there are nuances in jokes as well. And I mean, just imagine some of the body humor that could very
00:05:03.280 well be subjected to some kind of investigation. If somebody performs, you know, like a Chris Rock
00:05:09.840 or Dave Chappelle were to perform out there. I mean, their humor is very edgy in many cases.
00:05:20.000 Yeah. They could find themselves under investigation by somebody who thinks that they've been
00:05:25.440 assaulted in a racial way. If you know what I'm saying, the use of certain words.
00:05:30.720 Yeah. Oh, absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. And the thing is, too, is that, you know,
00:05:37.520 people can make these complaints against you and you may never even know that they've made
00:05:41.680 a complaint against you. And that is extremely scary. So, for example, like, you know, let's say
00:05:48.640 people that don't like my political expression and like, you know, they've already tried to target me
00:05:53.040 as being racist, transphobic, homophobic. They can now report that online and they don't even
00:05:59.040 have to tell me that that has been reported. And with municipals across the country right now,
00:06:05.760 they're all revamping their, like their GIS systems and they're connecting everything because,
00:06:13.280 you know, data is extremely important. So right now, if they start doing that, they could easily
00:06:18.960 connect it with like, you know, my, my property mortgage, my license plate, my, you know, my
00:06:24.640 library pass card, you know, with the recreation center, it could all be in one spot. And then
00:06:31.360 everywhere you go, it will have like, you know, this little thing about you saying like, you know,
00:06:35.920 all these complaints against you from anonymous participants, and you can't even defend yourself.
00:06:40.800 And you can't take it off the record because you might not even know that it's on the record.
00:06:44.640 Yeah. I mean, we're going on the road of social credit scores, aren't we? You know, somebody
00:06:49.920 filing a complaint and you can't defend yourself against any particular person, unless you remember
00:06:56.880 telling a certain person, a joke. I mean, and I guess in that way, the person could call in anonymously,
00:07:06.560 but you know, it's not too hard to figure out. I mean, unless you're telling jokes to thousands of
00:07:12.320 people in Pickering, but it's ridiculous. Have you raised this in council at all?
00:07:18.560 No, I haven't because this just came out two days ago. I wasn't even, I was unaware of it at the time.
00:07:24.800 So I haven't had a chance to raise it in council yet, but I definitely will be because, you know,
00:07:29.840 people are drawing parallels right now to this program and Nazi Germany, because that's how it
00:07:37.040 started in Germany. You know, it didn't start with, with camps and with soldiers going down the
00:07:42.400 streets. You know, it started with snitching on their neighbors and that's how it started. So
00:07:48.640 people are drawing the parallel between these two now. And I think they have every right to do so
00:07:54.000 because that's what it feels like. Yeah. I mean, you're creating a sense of paranoia. You know, that's
00:07:59.920 what happens in communist countries really, where you, you're going to tell on your neighbor and
00:08:06.400 that's, that's how you police a huge population. You know, you rely on people to snitch on their
00:08:12.640 neighbors and they could be snitching for any number of reasons. Maybe they just don't like you
00:08:17.920 as a person or they don't like your politics or they don't like political sign that you put on your
00:08:23.440 front yard. It could be any number of reasons. And so, yeah, I mean, but they could be
00:08:28.960 targeting you here by the sounds of it, because you've got, you've run afoul of the rest of your
00:08:34.000 council colleagues. And we've spoken about this in the past, you and I, the fact that you've been
00:08:39.360 deprived a salary now for approaching 22 months, is it? 23 months, almost. I'm at 21 months,
00:08:47.200 which is almost two years. Yes. So it's coming up in years. You have not been paid a salary
00:08:52.000 because your council colleagues decided that they would deprive you of a salary,
00:08:57.040 despite the fact that you were elected as a counselor for ward one.
00:09:02.880 Yep, absolutely. And, and it all goes down to my speech. Like, you know, if I say things that they
00:09:07.840 don't like, if, you know, I say that we should only be flying governmental flags on governmental
00:09:12.000 buildings, it doesn't matter what I say, they, they deprive me on my speech. So now they're going to also
00:09:17.200 have a snitch line where they could start putting it in there as well. And I mean, it's, it's, it's the
00:09:22.880 mentality that's happening here in Durham right now. And it needs to be stopped right away.
00:09:27.840 Yeah. I mean, I don't know if you've raised this with the province. I think this is
00:09:32.080 terribly wrong, what they did, because you're accountable ultimately to the people who elected
00:09:38.160 you, not to your colleagues. And if the people of ward one elected you and like you and want
00:09:44.480 to keep you there, then you should be paid for what you do for them. So they're depriving you of your
00:09:49.680 salary. They're really depriving their own people in the riding, they're depriving ward one of proper
00:09:58.000 representation, paid representation, which you'd be entitled to under the rules of the, of the city.
00:10:05.360 And I hope that they do something at the provincial level to stop this. This is absolutely ridiculous.
00:10:10.400 I mean, it's so, so easy to gang up on one person who happens to disagree with policies that the rest of
00:10:17.600 the woke group, uh, that you work with apply on a regular basis. What do you think?
00:10:26.000 Yeah, absolutely. Because that's what it is. It is this whole entire gang mentality to silence me,
00:10:31.680 to shut me up, to stop my opinions and I have to still work. Right. So you're absolutely right there.
00:10:38.800 A lot of people are saying, Oh, well, you're not working. So like, you know, you're not getting paid.
00:10:42.080 They don't realize I have to work because if I don't work, I will lose my position because the
00:10:47.520 only way they could actually kick me out as a counselor, if, unless they changed the municipal
00:10:51.520 act is if I die, if I ended up in concert rate, I'm incarcerated, if I quit, or if I missed three
00:10:57.840 meetings in a row. So I don't even have the option myself to not work if I don't want to, because I'm
00:11:05.520 not getting paid because then I would end up being kicked out. So, you know, I, I was elected to
00:11:11.360 represent, uh, the people of Pickering and that's exactly what I'm going to do. And I'm going to keep
00:11:16.400 doing it no matter what they do to me or how many of these things they start putting in place to try
00:11:21.440 and ruin everybody's lives. Yeah. I mean, you're definitely a thorn in the side of the mayor and
00:11:25.840 the rest of the gang over there. Are you going to run again? I mean, in the next election? Oh, absolutely.
00:11:31.680 100%. Yes. I'm not gonna, I'm not going to, um, cower away from these people. I have a lot of
00:11:37.680 support. I'm even considering running as mayor in the next election, because the good thing about
00:11:44.800 this is that, um, if I was to become mayor, it comes with the strong mayor's power. So when you
00:11:49.840 have the strong mayor's powers, you have the ability to remove certain people from their positions
00:11:55.360 as soon as you go in there. So really what I could do is I could go in there and I could like,
00:12:00.880 you know, clean up what I think, um, is corrupt, maybe a strong word, but I'm going to say corruption.
00:12:08.240 I could clean up the corruption in city hall, tear it down, build it back up and give it back to the
00:12:12.560 people. And that's exactly what I would intend to do with those powers because city halls should
00:12:17.600 belong to the people and all the draconian measures that they've already put in place there.
00:12:21.520 I mean, you can't even come and speak to something in our council chambers, unless you
00:12:27.280 have two thirds vote, allowing you to speak on that subject.
00:12:32.560 I mean, so people council has to have as a vote as to whether you can speak on an issue or not.
00:12:38.400 And if you don't get two thirds to support you, you don't get to speak.
00:12:42.960 Yes. That is a new rule that they put in 2024.
00:12:48.240 Yeah, it was a six to one vote. Um, before, like, just for example, so for contrast,
00:12:53.280 to know what we're talking about here before, if somebody wanted to come to our chambers and speak
00:12:57.040 on a topic, anything they wanted to, they could do that as long as they gave us 10 days notice
00:13:01.440 before the agenda. So it could hit on the agenda, but we changed the rules saying, no,
00:13:06.560 now you have to get a mover and a seconder. So if like, let's say you want to come and speak in our
00:13:11.040 chambers, you would have to like, get in touch with me. And then I would have to find another
00:13:15.520 counselor that would say, okay, let's bring this forward. And then you would still have to get two thirds,
00:13:21.600 a majority of the, of council to say, yes, we're going to allow you to speak on that topic.
00:13:27.200 It's very draconian. Draconian by the day. It's absolutely ridiculous what
00:13:30.720 these people are doing. And I hope you're waking people up over there. I mean, it's getting harder
00:13:36.560 because they obviously want to silence you. And so I hope that people of Pickering know what's going on
00:13:42.800 in their city council and how they are treating you. And by treating you that way, you know that
00:13:48.160 they'll treat them like the same way, right? Oh, absolutely. And the scary thing is though,
00:13:55.040 is like a lot of people do not pay attention to municipal politics. So I go into places and people
00:14:02.000 say, oh, how is it going? And I'm like, you don't know. And they're like, no, what's happening? And I
00:14:05.280 tell them I haven't been paid for 21 months and they're shocked, you know, because a lot of people
00:14:09.920 just don't pay attention to municipal politics. So I've got to find a way to get to all of those
00:14:15.120 people dropping flyers in people's houses. Most of the time, you know, they just pick them up and
00:14:20.320 put them in the blue bin. And if they're not following social media or other, you know, podcasts
00:14:27.040 such as yourselves, like, you know, if they're not on, if they're, cause they're constantly watching
00:14:30.640 CP 24 or CNN, you know, you're not going to find the truth in that. So I don't know how to get the word out
00:14:36.480 there. Well, maybe you should call victim services because they're being discriminated against
00:14:41.840 by the rest of council by depriving you of your pay. Well, that is, that's exactly what they're
00:14:49.360 doing. And you know what? I called myself a modern day slave because a new modern day slave act did
00:14:55.040 come out in 2024 and I referenced it. And of course, you know, they came down on me for that as well.
00:15:01.600 Yeah. Well, you're, you're working without pay. Yeah. I mean, the job comes with pay
00:15:08.560 and council is depriving you of it because the bullies on council don't like what you're saying
00:15:14.640 and don't like the fact that you're speaking out on things that they don't want spoken about.
00:15:19.200 I mean, that's tyranny. What you're describing is tyranny, Lisa. Last word for you.
00:15:25.600 Yeah, absolutely. Really. I mean, I just, I hope maybe that there's a way that we can put a stop
00:15:34.000 to this because this has to stop because another thing is, is that once something happens, once
00:15:39.680 when one municipality or one region, it spreads like wildfire throughout Canada.
00:15:45.760 That's how you kill dissent. That's how you stop dissent. And you get everybody doing the same
00:15:51.120 thing, voting the same way, saying the same thing like the media is. There's no dissenting voices
00:15:56.800 in the legacy media. Everybody says the same thing, reports the same stories, uses the same clips in
00:16:01.520 the same order. You know, no dissent. That's really what they want.
00:16:06.960 Yep. That's exactly it. And what people also don't know or probably don't know is that every Friday,
00:16:13.040 I get a blue bag delivered to my house along with the other counselors. And inside of it is an index of
00:16:19.200 all correspondence from like, you know, other municipalities across Ontario. So, you know,
00:16:26.880 if somebody adopts that, you know, they don't want to have and no more recording. So public can't go
00:16:32.400 in and record in their chambers, which happened in Pickering. We sent that out to all the other
00:16:37.280 municipalities. And now you see the other municipalities adopting it. And that's exactly how
00:16:43.120 it spreads. So now this here, they're going to say, we have like, you know, this, this snitch reporting
00:16:49.520 line. And that now is going to go in an index, and it's going to go to all the other municipalities or
00:16:55.040 to the regions. And they're going to say, Oh, my goodness, well, you know, if your region can do this,
00:17:00.400 then you know, we're going to adopt it to just like you said,
00:17:03.120 look how progressive they are in Pickering.
00:17:07.760 Yeah, we seem to be the lead on a lot of these authoritarian draconian measures that are happening.
00:17:13.760 Absolutely. Yeah. Good for you for fighting this, Lisa. Thank you so much for coming on the show.
00:17:19.200 How do people support the work that you're doing out there in Pickering?
00:17:22.640 Well, you know what, it would just be great to get an email from them, you know, at lifeliberty
00:17:28.480 and and Lisa at gmail.com or they can follow me on my social media on my Twitter on my Twitter,
00:17:35.600 lifelibertylisa or you know, if they want to go on my Facebook and help the fight, you know,
00:17:40.480 it's counselor Lisa Robinson. All right. Thank you, Lisa. Have a great day.
00:17:45.200 Okay, thanks. You too. Bye now. If you enjoyed this show,
00:17:48.720 consider supporting great independent journalism where breaking news stories are told
00:17:53.520 by going to junonews.com backslash straight up straight up is the name of this show
00:17:58.320 junonews.com backslash straight up. Thank you so much.