Juno News - Land acknowledgements now MANDATORY？

00:00:00.000 There's been a lot of chatter lately about free expression in Canada.

00:00:03.940 Who gets it? Who doesn't? And where do we draw the line?

00:00:07.860 For some, the rules are simple. If it isn't defamation or incitement, it should be allowed.

00:00:12.720 But public sentiment seems to be in a very different place.

00:00:16.880 On all sides of the political spectrum, Canadians are calling for more speech restrictions.

00:00:21.800 From denying visas to musicians who make inflammatory political statements,

00:00:26.140 to tightening protest zones around schools and places of worship.

00:00:30.380 But there is one kind of speech restriction that we're not talking about so much.

00:00:35.200 Compelled speech.

00:00:36.980 In Canada, it's not just what you can't say, but what you must say.

00:00:41.860 We've been here before, over pronouns.

00:00:44.920 Once a polite gesture, now a legal imposition.

00:00:48.780 The current thing obviously demands a new frontier, and today, that's land acknowledgements.

00:00:54.280 On the show, I'm joined by Catherine Cronus and Queen's University Law Professor Bruce Pardee.

00:01:01.340 Catherine is an elected parent council member in Ontario, and earlier this year,

00:01:05.800 she asked that her respectful objection to land acknowledgements be included in the meeting minutes.

00:01:11.980 That recording went viral, but so did the establishment reaction to it.

00:01:16.380 Hi, I'm Catherine Cronus, and I just wanted to say, as a parent member of the Hamilton-Wentworth District School Board,

00:01:23.980 I would like to emphasize that Principal does not speak on my behalf with regards to the land acknowledgement.

00:01:31.560 In my view, the board's imposition of a land acknowledgement during our school council meetings

00:01:36.120 undermines the democratic process, and constitutes a form of compelled speech,

00:01:41.560 which I believe contravenes the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

00:01:45.720 There is no school board policy mandating its inclusion.

00:01:50.400 In my opinion, the sentiments implied by the land acknowledgement are political in nature,

00:01:56.760 highly controversial, and therefore divisive and inappropriate within a government institution.

00:02:02.280 And I respectfully request that my objection be noted in the minutes of this meeting.

00:02:07.820 A short while later, the Hamilton-Wentworth District School Board suspended her from her elected role.

00:02:14.140 Her objection was deemed harmful.

00:02:16.680 Whatever you've used on land acknowledgements, and regardless of your personal choice in reciting them in private,

00:02:22.880 one question remains.

00:02:25.240 Should land acknowledgements, or any form of political speech, be mandatory in political institutions?

00:02:31.480 And should Canadians, even those elected by their peers, be removed from civic life for raising the question?

00:02:38.760 The issue is much, much bigger than a school board drama.

00:02:42.140 Are we creating a society where you can be punished, not for what you say, but for what you don't?

00:02:49.000 I'm Melanie Bennett. This is Disrupted.

00:02:51.460 I'm so pleased that you're joining me today.

00:03:03.140 Catherine, for people who may not be aware of what's been going on with you,

00:03:09.300 I was hoping that you could run us down a short, brief introduction to the recent controversy you've been involved in.

00:03:16.920 Sure. In a nutshell, I've been suspended from the school council of the Ancaster High School Council.

00:03:27.740 I was suspended because I issued an objection in a meeting on April 9th.

00:03:35.640 I issued a less than 50-second objection.

00:03:39.260 I thought I was quite polite, and I was firm, but polite.

00:03:45.380 And what I did was object to the imposition of the land acknowledgement being imposed in our school council meeting.

00:03:55.760 And in that, a lot of people picked up on the part about the land acknowledgement.

00:04:02.460 That seems to be a hot-button topic right now for a lot of people, but there were, to me, there are other interesting issues about this.

00:04:09.860 The fact that you are an elected person, so you are elected on the parent council,

00:04:16.120 that you are suspended for wanting to record an objection to political speech.

00:04:21.680 And I think we need to talk about that a little bit more.

00:04:24.700 Yes, absolutely. I think this is why it's touched a nerve, and it's become a part of the national conversation at the moment.

00:04:34.540 It seems that there's a lot of support for my position, which is I should be able to issue an objection to something which I feel is politically imposed in a council meeting.

00:04:49.540 There's several layers with this.

00:04:52.540 The first is that the board was imposing it on a school council meeting.

00:04:58.220 So school councils actually were legislated to be advisory bodies and an apparatus to hold boards to account and to hold schools to account.

00:05:11.680 So for the board to be imposing this in a school council meeting is, I think, overreach, and that's part of my objection.

00:05:19.540 So school councils should be able to determine what gets said in their meeting or not.

00:05:24.760 And then there's the other issue with this being, I think, a political creed that, you know, shouldn't be, you know, our government institutions should be neutral.

00:05:37.760 We're taxpayers, and we have like a plural society, and not everybody's going to feel the same way.

00:05:43.500 So we shouldn't have something that is imposed a particular ideological view.

00:05:51.720 Now, the JCCF has actually, is now supporting you in a case wanting to be reinstated onto the board.

00:06:00.080 And I'd be curious to hear from Bruce about some of the legal implications of this case.

00:06:05.560 Right. So for anyone who hasn't seen it, Catherine's objection, the statement that is in question, is a very reasonably stated, modest opinion.

00:06:20.520 She took the opportunity during the board, the meeting of the parents' board, to state an opinion about the nature of the land acknowledgement that was being required of them.

00:06:36.080 And that's all it was. I encourage people to go and have a look at it if they like.

00:06:40.480 And so what's in question here is whether or not this institution can simply dictate the content of people's opinion and control whether or not they state those opinions.

00:06:57.040 Now, let's be very clear about this.

00:06:59.680 Catherine is not an employee of the board.

00:07:02.360 She is a parent of a child going to school and was elected to the board.

00:07:10.120 And as Catherine has alluded to, the purpose, one of the purposes of these boards is to hold the board to account.

00:07:17.680 So here's what the board is doing.

00:07:19.140 The board is defining what it is that the parents are allowed to talk about.

00:07:24.860 And it's absurd. It's an absurd situation.

00:07:31.240 And I'm certainly glad that Catherine's lawyers have responded as they have.

00:07:35.840 It makes a lot of sense. But the situation is absurd.

00:07:39.420 It's a reflection of the degree to which institutions have been compromised.

00:07:47.100 They're infiltrated. We keep saying this.

00:07:49.220 The institutions are infiltrated. They're taken over by an ideology.

00:07:52.100 This is a spectacularly clear example of just that.

00:07:58.260 This is the board defining what kinds of opinions you are allowed to have and restricting parents' ability to speak those opinions in a mild, respectful, reasonable way on the record.

00:08:15.320 And so you would like to think that this is a no-brainer.

00:08:20.380 But the system, the way it is right now, we'll have to wait and see.

00:08:25.220 Yeah, so one of the things that struck me is that this is a question of conscience, right?

00:08:31.360 So as far as I understand, the Constitution gives people the right to have their own opinions.

00:08:38.680 You know, it's the freedom of religion and conscience.

00:08:41.400 But in this case, it would seem even if the board had a policy that mandated land acknowledgements, which I don't believe that it has.

00:08:51.040 And Catherine, you could correct me if I'm wrong here.

00:08:53.280 But even if it had a policy to mandate this kind of political speech or any political speech,

00:08:59.680 that that would perhaps go against, you know, the freedom of conscious element of our own Constitution.

00:09:05.220 Well, imagine this.

00:09:07.680 Imagine that the board did have such a policy.

00:09:11.500 I mean, it actually doesn't.

00:09:13.160 But let's say that it did.

00:09:14.380 Let's say it was board policy that at every single meeting held under its auspices,

00:09:19.620 there was to be a land ex-molencement recited.

00:09:22.680 Okay?

00:09:23.320 Even if that was the case,

00:09:25.840 it must be okay for someone to put their hand up and say,

00:09:30.220 I actually don't agree.

00:09:32.020 I don't agree that this is right.

00:09:33.180 That is the mark of a free country.

00:09:36.380 If you are not allowed to dissent from the laws,

00:09:40.700 even if it's a law,

00:09:42.460 and it's not a law in this case,

00:09:43.860 the policy doesn't exist.

00:09:45.800 But if it did,

00:09:46.720 if there was a law that said you have to do this,

00:09:49.100 let me give you an example.

00:09:50.180 Outside of this area, you know,

00:09:51.760 if there's a law that says,

00:09:53.400 you know, you have to drive under a certain limit on the highway,

00:09:57.900 well, then you have to drive under a certain limit on the highway.

00:10:00.540 But you are allowed to say,

00:10:02.000 actually, I don't agree with the law.

00:10:03.980 I'm doing it, but I don't agree with it.

00:10:06.580 I mean, you're allowed to say that.

00:10:08.000 Everybody is allowed to dissent from the content of the law,

00:10:11.260 to say they do not agree.

00:10:13.100 And that is the thing that Catherine is being punished for, 1.00

00:10:16.200 for expressing an opinion that this practice,

00:10:20.040 it's not even a policy,

00:10:21.320 that this practice that somehow the principal or the board is insisting upon,

00:10:26.100 is not a good idea.

00:10:28.620 Right.

00:10:29.000 And just,

00:10:29.520 if I could just interject just a little bit about this,

00:10:32.340 the fact that it's not a policy,

00:10:34.200 this is very important because in HWDSB and school and school boards

00:10:39.240 throughout the province,

00:10:40.260 they have a policy procedure,

00:10:43.980 like a procedure for,

00:10:45.920 you know,

00:10:46.100 these policies,

00:10:46.780 as Bruce said,

00:10:47.440 are ultimately like the laws of the board.

00:10:49.880 And they have to go through public consultation.

00:10:53.780 And because,

00:10:54.820 so they haven't done that in this case,

00:10:57.040 there hasn't been any board of elected trustees

00:10:59.680 determining this policy at the board table,

00:11:04.420 which would,

00:11:05.460 which would be like send out notice to the community that this was,

00:11:09.780 this was going to be a policy.

00:11:11.120 They haven't done that.

00:11:12.100 They have,

00:11:12.520 they have ushered this in,

00:11:14.100 you know,

00:11:15.000 sort of de facto,

00:11:16.400 and it's become customary.

00:11:19.820 And nobody's pushing back on this.

00:11:23.640 Even though I'm aware of other people,

00:11:25.860 other,

00:11:26.060 other parents,

00:11:26.980 other community members in Ancaster and throughout other boards,

00:11:30.420 throughout the province that have an issue with these land

00:11:33.060 acknowledgements,

00:11:33.760 is because people are,

00:11:35.500 are totally afraid and have been cowed into just,

00:11:39.400 you know,

00:11:39.840 accepting them and not being,

00:11:41.360 not being pushed back,

00:11:42.400 not pushing back.

00:11:45.000 One other thing that I find really interesting is,

00:11:48.600 as far as I understand,

00:11:50.080 a parent council is there to hold a board to account on various issues,

00:11:54.920 which is,

00:11:55.760 you know,

00:11:56.120 they're there to help govern sort of like trustees.

00:11:57.960 Trustees are meant to hold the board accountable for various things.

00:12:02.080 But in this case,

00:12:03.260 it wasn't the parent council that suspended you.

00:12:06.680 It was the board that suspended you.

00:12:09.580 And legally speaking,

00:12:10.760 I don't know what that means or what it implies,

00:12:13.680 but it's,

00:12:14.540 it would seem that if you were to be suspended for whatever reason,

00:12:17.820 if you'd broken some policy,

00:12:19.680 so on and so forth,

00:12:21.140 then that should come from the council and not the board.

00:12:23.420 Correct.

00:12:24.280 I,

00:12:24.540 in my view,

00:12:25.320 the board is in violation of the education act,

00:12:28.420 which gives,

00:12:29.840 again,

00:12:31.140 councils,

00:12:31.580 the ability to self-govern through,

00:12:33.960 in fact,

00:12:36.180 it's the education act that recommends school councils develop bylaws.

00:12:40.020 And in our bylaws,

00:12:40.920 we have a conflict resolution process that the chairs are responsible to,

00:12:46.140 to do.

00:12:46.840 So what the board has done as they've come in and we still don't know what the

00:12:52.020 complaint is exactly.

00:12:53.380 They haven't cited any particular part in a code of conduct.

00:12:57.800 They haven't told me what the harm is.

00:13:01.180 Again,

00:13:01.380 they've claimed harm.

00:13:03.380 Somebody's claimed harm.

00:13:04.560 We don't even know if it's the board that's claiming harm or if it's an

00:13:07.400 individual has gone to the board.

00:13:09.960 We are still waiting.

00:13:11.260 It's actually been a month since the lawyer has sent out the demand letter.

00:13:15.200 We sent it out on June 4th.

00:13:16.720 It's now July 4th.

00:13:17.900 And we still have not heard any response from,

00:13:20.980 from the board.

00:13:23.440 And let's just be very clear about what they mean by harm.

00:13:27.180 Right.

00:13:27.620 So this,

00:13:28.040 this is,

00:13:28.620 this is the alleged harm that has resulted from Catherine expressing an

00:13:32.360 opinion.

00:13:35.460 And this is,

00:13:36.780 this is the nature of the ideology we're talking about.

00:13:40.100 Right.

00:13:40.840 They are defining for all of us or attempting to,

00:13:45.780 what is an acceptable opinion to hold.

00:13:49.920 And if you wander outside of that window,

00:13:52.480 then they're going to claim that by holding an opinion contrary to what they,

00:13:57.380 they've decided that you are causing other people harm.

00:14:01.020 Okay.

00:14:01.160 This is untenable in a country that claims to be free.

00:14:07.480 That is,

00:14:07.840 this is not the way a free country works.

00:14:09.800 And yes,

00:14:11.080 in this country,

00:14:12.340 it is,

00:14:12.920 as Catherine has alluded to,

00:14:14.440 people are,

00:14:15.040 people are,

00:14:17.180 are reticent to speak their mind because everything has become a punishment for

00:14:24.140 crossing this imaginary line where you're not allowed to think and say things that the

00:14:31.080 authorities don't approve of.

00:14:32.500 this is becoming serious.

00:14:35.960 This is this,

00:14:36.620 we have crossed some kind of a threshold in this country and people have,

00:14:41.240 have lost their courage to say what it is that they think.

00:14:46.560 Like Catherine,

00:14:47.780 I know a lot of people who do not agree with all this nonsense,

00:14:51.560 but they are extremely reluctant to say so out loud.

00:14:55.620 You know,

00:14:56.120 that sounds like East Germany,

00:14:58.640 not Canada.

00:15:00.580 Yes,

00:15:01.320 Bruce,

00:15:01.660 if you could hear,

00:15:02.680 if you take a look at my objection again,

00:15:05.260 the video that I posted on Twitter,

00:15:07.760 you might hear faintly in the background,

00:15:10.840 the sound of cracking eggshells because I got tired of walking on them.

00:15:16.780 Right.

00:15:17.140 And I,

00:15:18.620 I will say that there,

00:15:20.440 there's a lot of tension.

00:15:22.200 There is a culture of fear,

00:15:24.040 even within like at a,

00:15:25.860 at a school council level,

00:15:27.340 you shouldn't have to be terrified to make a critic,

00:15:32.120 say a critic,

00:15:32.860 like be critical.

00:15:34.080 You shouldn't have to be.

00:15:35.720 And,

00:15:35.860 and here's the thing with,

00:15:37.500 with,

00:15:37.840 with what happened to me,

00:15:39.120 the suspension came as a shock because in the former meeting in February 11th,

00:15:43.140 we had another council meeting.

00:15:44.920 And at that meeting we,

00:15:46.460 there was discussion.

00:15:47.340 This is when we were going to adopt our bylaws,

00:15:49.600 bylaws,

00:15:50.280 by the way,

00:15:50.860 which include a,

00:15:51.840 a clause for respect for diverse opinions.

00:15:56.080 And I was pushing them on.

00:15:58.340 Like,

00:15:58.700 are you like,

00:15:59.440 do you actually believe this?

00:16:01.160 I,

00:16:01.460 I,

00:16:01.700 I was expressing fear.

00:16:03.340 I was worried that it wasn't a safe place for classical liberal and conservative,

00:16:07.640 um,

00:16:09.160 parents or community members to be able to voice their views.

00:16:12.020 And I was assured at that meeting that,

00:16:14.920 this was a free space,

00:16:16.440 free speech place that parents should be able to push back that nobody's ever stopped us before.

00:16:22.540 And so I took that as,

00:16:25.360 okay,

00:16:25.540 so I should be able to issue this objection,

00:16:27.640 uh,

00:16:28.420 keep it brief and,

00:16:29.460 and,

00:16:29.680 and non-disruptive and just,

00:16:31.240 and just be able to move on.

00:16:32.560 So yes,

00:16:33.140 I was very shocked when I received the suspension because everything that I have done was trying

00:16:38.400 to avoid a suspension.

00:16:40.580 Yeah.

00:16:43.860 Right.

00:16:44.080 And so if you want,

00:16:45.380 we could,

00:16:45.780 we can,

00:16:46.260 we can,

00:16:47.380 we could,

00:16:49.560 we could put it this way.

00:16:51.000 So institutions,

00:16:53.440 authorities,

00:16:53.920 will,

00:16:56.440 will,

00:16:57.100 will take,

00:16:58.860 will take and exercise whatever,

00:17:01.480 whatever power the people give them.

00:17:03.200 And so in a way,

00:17:06.200 yes,

00:17:06.580 we can say,

00:17:07.280 you know,

00:17:07.620 the,

00:17:07.760 the,

00:17:08.000 the fault in all of this,

00:17:09.340 if you want to put it that way,

00:17:10.980 is lies at the feet of the board.

00:17:13.660 I mean,

00:17:13.840 they,

00:17:14.100 they have taken a step now,

00:17:15.920 which is egregious and untenable.

00:17:18.480 It cannot stand.

00:17:20.480 It's,

00:17:20.800 it's a,

00:17:21.160 it's an outrageous case.

00:17:23.340 However,

00:17:23.920 we should also add though,

00:17:27.320 in a sense,

00:17:28.820 the real fault is all the spineless people who will not say what they think.

00:17:35.040 It's all those people who will hide behind the silence,

00:17:38.900 have thoughts in their heads and not be willing to express them because of all those people did otherwise.

00:17:45.660 This kind of thing would not be able to happen because the,

00:17:50.880 because the weight of opinion would be against it and the authorities wouldn't dare,

00:17:55.580 would not dare to act in this kind of outrageous way.

00:18:00.560 And so there is lots of blame in this to go around.

00:18:05.340 Yes.

00:18:05.860 And I would also add that the council members themselves,

00:18:10.100 I,

00:18:10.300 I,

00:18:10.700 I'm completely alienated from the council.

00:18:12.640 I don't feel comfortable reaching out to them and talking about this matter for obvious reasons,

00:18:18.200 but I would assume I would,

00:18:20.400 I would expect them to be advocating for my reinstatement because part of their duty as council members and is legislated by the Education Act is to hold the education system to account or to enhance the accountability of the education system,

00:18:39.620 which means and they're also expected to act with honesty and integrity as per our,

00:18:46.460 our bylaws.

00:18:47.160 So I would expect that even if they disagree with my position on the land acknowledgement,

00:18:54.220 they should be,

00:18:55.040 they should be fighting for their own autonomy as a council and say,

00:18:59.860 look,

00:19:00.140 we can deal with this.

00:19:01.400 Let,

00:19:01.680 let's get back to our bylaws and our conflict resolution process.

00:19:05.500 And,

00:19:06.080 and we don't need your,

00:19:07.180 we don't need your help.

00:19:08.060 In fact,

00:19:08.400 you're overreaching.

00:19:09.160 You don't,

00:19:10.000 this is out of your,

00:19:11.840 out of your,

00:19:14.360 sorry,

00:19:15.140 out of your wheelhouse,

00:19:17.220 out of your bailiwick,

00:19:18.440 out of,

00:19:18.860 out of your,

00:19:19.500 out of your jurisdiction,

00:19:20.500 out of your authority,

00:19:21.740 right?

00:19:22.620 Catherine and the other members of the parents council are not board employees.

00:19:26.940 They are not subject to the directions of the principal or the head of the board.

00:19:31.000 They are free agents.

00:19:32.560 They are parents of children at the,

00:19:34.600 going to,

00:19:34.960 going to these schools.

00:19:35.880 They are allowed to have their own opinions.

00:19:39.160 They are allowed to state those opinions.

00:19:41.880 And,

00:19:42.140 and if in fact,

00:19:44.200 these parent boards are under the thumb of,

00:19:47.540 of these boards,

00:19:48.720 well,

00:19:49.000 then they mean nothing because they're all being directed and instructed about how to behave and what to think and what to say.

00:19:55.500 That makes no sense.

00:19:56.860 There's no reason for them to exist.

00:19:58.900 Correct.

00:19:59.880 It is the job of the council members to ensure that the education act is being followed.

00:20:05.880 Part of the education act is for parent councils to be able to advise the school and or the board on any matter.

00:20:16.480 It doesn't say any matter except for topics that we find very controversial and difficult to talk about.

00:20:22.420 But it says any matter.

00:20:25.260 So we should be,

00:20:26.240 they should,

00:20:26.980 the council is going against their own best interests by not supporting me and at least on this.

00:20:32.840 If,

00:20:33.360 if that's the case,

00:20:34.200 I actually don't know one way or the other what,

00:20:36.260 what's happening.

00:20:37.720 Yeah.

00:20:38.220 It really does seem that the parent council is becoming an enforcement body for the bureaucracy.

00:20:44.720 In this case,

00:20:45.860 you know,

00:20:46.200 the,

00:20:46.380 the school boards more than anything else.

00:20:48.220 So according to either one of you,

00:20:51.840 what,

00:20:52.020 how,

00:20:52.220 how would you like to see this go?

00:20:53.880 What would be a good solution in a free society?

00:20:55.920 Okay.

00:20:58.840 I think that if the board decides to overturn his decision,

00:21:04.020 which they doubled down because we sent the letter out and then they didn't let me,

00:21:07.640 I missed a meeting.

00:21:08.340 I wasn't able to go to a meeting.

00:21:10.040 If they issue,

00:21:11.300 if they reinstate me onto council,

00:21:13.360 that would send,

00:21:14.660 I,

00:21:14.820 I think that I would hope that parents throughout the board would breathe a bit of a sigh of relief,

00:21:20.260 knowing that,

00:21:21.620 you know what,

00:21:22.180 we should be able to speak and,

00:21:24.300 and what,

00:21:25.940 what,

00:21:26.300 what,

00:21:26.720 what they did to her was wrong.

00:21:28.280 And so I think that that's what I'm looking for is my reinstatement back on council.

00:21:35.040 That's,

00:21:35.560 that's the only thing that makes sense to me.

00:21:37.440 I mean,

00:21:37.640 I,

00:21:38.200 I,

00:21:38.900 a little part of me hopes that the council continues to double down.

00:21:45.200 Their position is so outrageous.

00:21:48.140 This is such a great case. 0.99

00:21:50.260 It's ridiculous. 0.91

00:21:51.900 They have, 0.90

00:21:52.920 we have to see what happens if it ever gets to a courtroom.

00:21:56.020 But,

00:21:56.680 but I mean,

00:21:57.900 really,

00:21:59.380 the,

00:21:59.760 the,

00:22:00.920 the statement in question is,

00:22:02.540 is of a,

00:22:03.460 of such a nature that it is a blatant restriction of freedom of expression.

00:22:12.180 And the board,

00:22:13.480 of course,

00:22:13.820 is part of government.

00:22:14.720 It is subject to the charter.

00:22:16.660 There's just,

00:22:17.660 there's,

00:22:18.060 it is just,

00:22:18.840 it's a perfect,

00:22:19.820 it's a perfect illustration of the overreach of,

00:22:24.300 of petty functionaries inside a school board.

00:22:27.880 And so part of me hopes it goes all the way.

00:22:30.740 And the whole thing will,

00:22:32.560 I mean,

00:22:33.120 it's already blown up,

00:22:34.060 but I hope,

00:22:34.580 I hope it will,

00:22:35.400 will get ever bigger to demonstrate not only that this is not appropriate or,

00:22:41.860 or,

00:22:42.500 or legal,

00:22:43.220 but that this is the way that some of our institutions are now behaving.

00:22:49.280 Yeah.

00:22:50.720 International eyes are certainly on Canada on this particular issue.

00:22:53.960 And Catherine's story is ongoing.

00:22:56.520 So it'll be interesting to see what develops.

00:22:58.980 Will this,

00:22:59.640 will the school count,

00:23:00.480 a school board and parent council double down or will they relent?

00:23:04.400 I guess we'll see,

00:23:05.220 but I appreciate Catherine and Bruce,

00:23:08.240 both of you coming onto the show to discuss some legal implications in this case.

00:23:13.660 Sure thing.

00:23:14.180 Thank you,

00:23:14.700 Melanie.

00:23:15.840 All right.

00:23:16.140 Thank you guys.

00:23:16.660 Does Canada value individual conscience?

00:23:19.280 If the moment a citizen steps outside the boundaries of accepted moral orthodoxy,

00:23:24.600 these principles are quietly set aside.

00:23:27.880 Catherine Cronus wasn't disruptive.

00:23:30.220 She didn't insult or demean.

00:23:32.580 She simply disagreed.

00:23:34.500 She questioned the rules.

00:23:36.400 That was enough to warrant institutional sanctions.

00:23:39.900 Dissent,

00:23:40.540 it seems,

00:23:41.260 has become synonymous with misconduct.

00:23:43.700 This is how speech control operates across the modern West,

00:23:47.300 through the bureaucracy,

00:23:48.340 through soft moralistic exclusion,

00:23:52.520 through the normalization of ideological compliance in civic life.

00:23:56.980 If elected citizens can be removed for objecting to compelled speech,

00:24:01.540 are we simply managing heresy?

00:24:04.400 For me,

00:24:04.960 the future of a free society should not depend on agreement.

00:24:08.600 Rather,

00:24:09.200 it should depend on allowing citizens the space to disagree.

00:24:13.200 I'm Melanie Bennett.

00:24:14.540 Join me next week on Disrupted.

00:24:18.340 Disrupted.

00:24:19.340 I would like us to participate on Disrupted.

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Juno News - July 17, 2025

Land acknowledgements now MANDATORY？

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