For your reward, you get Fake News Friday, the only show keeping canada's failing, fake and biased legacy media in check. This week, host Rupa Supermanion is filling in for the great candace malcolm, who s taking some much-deserved time off with her family, and filling in instead for the Great Candace Malcolm is the brilliant and talented Harrison Faulkner.
00:00:00.000happy friday canada congratulations on making it to the end of the week for your reward you
00:00:14.900get fake news friday the only show keeping canada's failing fake and biased legacy media
00:00:19.760in check i'm harrison faulkner filling in for andrew lawton who usually fills in for the great
00:00:24.900candace malcolm who's taking some much-deserved time off with her family now sitting in the seat
00:00:28.880i usually occupy is the very talented rupa supermania the host of the rupa supermania podcast
00:00:33.860now before i throw it over to you rupa i just got to say besides being one of canada's top
00:00:38.140journalists you happen you happen to have a real mack at getting a getting a rise out of the left
00:00:42.820on twitter now i don't know if it's intentional or it's by accident but my goodness you know how to
00:00:47.080get a rise out of them what's your what's your reaction been to the left's reaction of your
00:00:51.100reporting what's it been over two and two weeks now two and a half weeks yeah well well first of all
00:00:57.020harrison thanks for having me here it's a real honor to be here um and you know i i don't i don't
00:01:03.660think i'm the top journalist in canada i i don't even think i'm in the top 10 i'm just i'm just
00:01:09.100you know just a simple person sitting here in ottawa and uh writing on things that i care about and
00:01:15.660that's pretty much it and i'm not afraid to call it as i see it uh and uh but going back to your
00:01:21.700question uh and this was the big story that i broke a couple weeks ago on uh these court documents
00:01:28.820that reveal that canada's uh travel mandate um vaccine mandate for travel had no scientific
00:01:35.520rationale it was all driven by politics uh with the prime minister using the um the the vaccine
00:01:42.560mandate as a political wedge issue uh in the hopes of getting a majority um uh for an election he called
00:01:49.020two days after he announced uh the mandate um and the story itself got a you know an extraordinary
00:01:56.660amount of traction online a lot of people shared it i got uh many many messages of support and
00:02:02.900encouragement and people uh really glad that i uh that i got to the bottom of this uh but there were
00:02:10.080a few people i would say who were um more than just a few people who were really riled up uh i i would
00:02:17.560say uh at this uh at this uh at my story they were um you know making accusations uh that this was
00:02:25.940well first of all they said these court documents didn't even exist um that i was making it all up
00:02:31.540um and then uh and then uh the federal court tweets um saying that hey guys uh given the extraordinary
00:02:40.440amount of interest in this case we're actually releasing these documents right now so that shut them up
00:02:46.000right away but then they had to move on to something else um and then they started calling
00:02:51.460me a russian agent and um you know the usual smear uh that that uh that you know those of us in the
00:02:59.100independent space are accustomed to uh being at the you know we're at the receiving end of such smears
00:03:04.400um and that uh you know that i was just uh again making it up i'm a liar and so on and so forth no
00:03:11.060no one actually was engaging with the story no one was actually trying to um you know actually
00:03:15.640engage with what i was trying to say and what the court documents themselves reveal i mean you don't
00:03:20.260even have to believe me just look take a look at the court documents um and uh and and i and i flagged
00:03:26.140two uh two specific responses uh to my story uh one of them was from liberal mp mark greetson um
00:03:35.360and uh the other one uh being charles angus of the ndp mark greetson uh said that um you know he
00:03:43.160tweeted saying and he was by the way he was quote tweeting a journalist um who who who didn't even
00:03:48.900react to what he was saying which which in itself is pretty revealing um and mark greetson said that
00:03:55.440uh that that my story was uh was was uh blatant propaganda it was that i was lying and that uh and
00:04:03.680and this kind of we shouldn't wait till the next election to confront uh this kind of blatant lying
00:04:10.320and propaganda it must be confronted now um when i read that tweet i was you know i was really taken
00:04:16.560aback i was uh you know it was it was chilling because this is coming from a politician from the
00:04:22.120governing party he's no garden variety um anonymous troll um and uh and he he was you know he was taking
00:04:29.420such a strong uh position against a story that he didn't um he he he didn't agree with and he was
00:04:34.480taking it out on not just the story but also the journalist and um and and then there was a second
00:04:40.840reaction from charlie angus of the ndp uh and uh and he said that uh this is written by a national
00:04:47.780post columnist the national post gets tons of money from the government so uh and so therefore
00:04:53.240you know they're they get money from the government and they're spreading bs and propaganda
00:04:58.020um yeah well insinuating insinuating that anybody who takes money from the government can't be writing
00:05:04.400critical articles about the government that's kind of the angle which is just exposing this whole thing
00:05:09.260to begin with and yeah i mean i think you know if if they had if the liberals knew that their
00:05:13.660mandates could stand on their own and there was justification for them to stand on their own
00:05:17.840i don't think they'd be reacting the way they did to your reporting rupa but you mentioned this
00:05:22.120point about anonymous online trolls and how usually journalists will face uh will face pushback and
00:05:28.960even hate from anonymous online trolls that's the game we all end up having to to play with but it's
00:05:33.840different when it's politicians it's different when it's actual journalists that are on the other side
00:05:38.940of uh on the other side of the house i mean that's just sort of that's just an unheard of thing but
00:05:45.460i want to i want to talk about this canadian association of journalists tweet because what we've been
00:05:50.760hearing it's it's really been i think it's been so overused we've been hearing it for what four
00:05:56.220weeks now it's it's this whole new push from what we're seeing i think from a lot of legacy media
00:06:00.520journalists to make it seem as though they are victims that the rest of canada are attacking
00:06:05.880these journalists particularly these young female journalists and sending them death threats and
00:06:10.600sending them horrible messages now we're not going to condone any of that anyone who sends any
00:06:14.380messages like that are stupid they're dumb but the point that is the point that i think should be
00:06:19.660raised about this is the canadian association of journalists wrote on twitter they they tagged
00:06:24.260toronto star the hill times global news and they all kind of joint signed this list of demands which
00:06:30.700they sent to the police to what is it the toronto police ottawa police and the rcmp and i just want to
00:06:35.480read it because it's just ridiculous so they start off by saying enough is enough online hate against
00:06:41.060journalists must be addressed and then today the canadian association of journalists send a list of
00:06:45.880demands to the police including four federal ministers and the ontario attorney general so i'm
00:06:50.120going to quickly summarize this list of demands because the last one i think is just such a such
00:06:54.420a kicker so the first one is we need a comprehensive and cooperative approach to online hate across police
00:07:00.700forces recent threatening emails to journalists use similar language used by domestic extremist groups
00:07:05.780journalists who showed support for colleagues were also targeted and the next one is police forces must
00:07:11.480review and improve their processes for making complaints of hate speech and harassment victims
00:07:16.460should not be waiting hours on the phone to file complaints or be treated rudely and dismissed by
00:07:21.060officers you see victims should not be threatened by police even i mean it's it's just it's just
00:07:26.360ridiculous number three we ask for greater transparency and dialogue from police forces to help keep
00:07:32.120journalists and all targets of hate safe and then and then here at the bottom i just want to list this off
00:07:36.980they write for the most part the targets of these hateful and threatening messages are women and
00:07:41.380women of color in canadian media we will not tolerate anymore enough is enough well there happens to
00:07:46.020be a woman of color a female journalist of color who received not just hate from anonymous online trolls
00:07:51.220but hate from actual politicians in this country rupa i want to ask you did the canadian association of
00:07:56.300journalists ever bother to ask you how you were handling all the hate you were receiving for real
00:08:00.920journalism uh no i i i i didn't even rate a mention in in their uh tweet or uh no i i you know i think i
00:08:13.800think as far as uh journalists in the independent space are concerned we just don't even exist as far
00:08:18.360as the legacy media is concerned right it's all about them look um of course you know if there are credible
00:08:24.700threats to one's personal safety i've been at the receiving end of that not not here in canada
00:08:29.880but overseas you know over the course of my career uh and when it comes to credible threats
00:08:36.260like that you go to the cops you go to the police and you you you and you allow uh law and order to
00:08:42.120take its course that's what most normal people do you don't take these threats to twitter and complain
00:08:48.080about it there you you you you know that that just makes no sense to me or you could do both why
00:08:53.160don't you do both uh the point is that you know unfortunately what what ends up happening what's
00:08:59.060ended up happening is the journalists instead of reporting on the story have become the story
00:09:03.600themselves and i didn't go to journalism school um i think you did but i but but i think this is this
00:09:10.600is one of the things that they teach you in journalism school you should never become the
00:09:13.720story yourself you should you should you should you should report on the story and that's a very
00:09:18.600important distinction and i think a lot of um many journalists um um you know especially those
00:09:25.380who identify themselves as being on the left um uh ideologically tend to forget this lesson and they
00:09:31.600make it about themselves for whatever reason i don't know maybe it's it's to gain more traction
00:09:36.460on social media it's to get more attention um i i i don't under i i really don't understand if you
00:09:42.560were to ask a journalist covering a war-like situation in you know whether it's afghanistan or
00:09:48.140um or you know in a conflict zone for example um do you see them taking to twitter and uh and and
00:09:55.580you know and and and you know and saying that you know this has been happening to them i i don't think
00:10:01.040so i think i think part of say journalists are not meant to be liked people i mean this is you've
00:10:06.820got to understand that um you know i like to be liked but i also understand that that's not going to
00:10:11.520happen with everybody that i that i interact with uh not all of my readers like me all the time and
00:10:17.040that's fine um i also get a lot of hate mail i also get a lot of people saying uh why don't you go
00:10:22.320back to where you came from um you know i could i could i could spend my time on twitter and uh and
00:10:27.740say and and say that this is you know i'm deeply offended i'm racialized so i'm a victim of uh of uh
00:10:34.660this sort of behavior and i could spend a lot of time dwelling on this but you know i rather move on
00:10:41.160because i think there they're bigger bigger things to uh to care about uh you know and i i certainly
00:10:46.920don't want to be the story um so you know again uh you know not to belittle the experiences of people
00:10:52.600who um um get uh death threats their way or threats of rape uh i'm sure that's happening uh these are
00:11:01.480genuine threats these are credible threats take them to the cops let them decide you know let them
00:11:06.080investigate and get to the bottom of it um yeah i just don't see the purpose in you know in in just
00:11:12.620taking to twitter and then uh you know and coming up with a conspiracy theory that this is all coming
00:11:18.180from the right right of course yeah yeah but that's the easy that's that's sort of the easy way out and
00:11:23.600an easy way for them to continue to villainize a particular group of canadians that i think
00:11:27.560for the most part have a lot of have a lot of valid reasons to be upset at canada's legacy media
00:11:32.620now i want to i want to go back to a point you made you know when was the last time you saw a real
00:11:37.060wartime journalist a journalist who actually reports in the field in combat zone go on twitter and say
00:11:42.800you know these these enemy combatants are firing bullets at me can can someone please step in and
00:11:47.780stop i mean it's so rude they're treating journalists so poorly i mean it's just ridiculous right i mean
00:11:52.060i i i i i can't imagine any one of these crying journalists reporting in an actual war zone they can't
00:11:59.420even handle twitter bots and twitter anonymous trolls writing messages about them then they can't
00:12:04.920do any real reporting and you make the point about journalists not wanting to be the story and they
00:12:09.680don't teach that in journalism school well i think they didn't used to teach that in journalism school
00:12:13.960that's why we have such a divide we have a group of journalists who are cut from the old cloth the real
00:12:19.220journalists in this country that know what it's like to uphold journalistic principles they know what
00:12:23.380it's like to really do the job of holding power to account then you have this new this new kind of
00:12:28.120fresh blood this new class of journalists that are occupying these legacy media newsrooms who have
00:12:33.720been told by their journalism schools because i've been in these inside of these classrooms that as a
00:12:38.580matter of fact it is okay for journalists to be activists in fact i remember in my second year in my second
00:12:44.180year at school we were given an assignment to write write a story about if journalists could be activists if
00:12:49.960journalists could make themselves part of the story and the professors were pushing that line
00:12:54.120to us so they they've told a whole new class of journalists that you need to find a way to make
00:13:00.120yourself part of the story you need to get yourself into it be an activist get in there for political
00:13:03.980causes and you know that's why i i consider i don't consider myself to be a journalist i consider
00:13:08.660myself to be in the media space there's a big distinction i know what i do is not right down the
00:13:13.960line but i don't pretend that i'm i'm one of those people and that's i think the big difference and i think
00:13:18.460canadians just want some honesty from these reporters and again it just shows you the canadian
00:13:22.760association of journalists they they are totally lacking in actually standing up for journalists
00:13:28.140in the field who receive real credible hate of course they weren't there to help you out rupa but
00:13:32.780no they weren't and and let me just tell you tell you something real quick here uh you know i i come
00:13:39.800from a family of academics and uh and you know people who uh you know i have a view on everything
00:13:45.860and you should see the kind of hate mail that they get uh and they're not they're not uh you know
00:13:51.380they take it in their stride uh you know and again as i say it's not our job here is not to be liked
00:13:58.260by people i think that's a very that's the wrong approach i think your your your job is to report
00:14:03.960the facts as they are and let people come to their uh you know decide for themselves whether whether they
00:14:08.920believe you or not and if you get um hate mail that's par for the course that i get hate mail all the
00:14:15.080time i get all kinds of you know people are you know i get uh people you know from the progressive
00:14:21.160left i've i've been at the receiving end of racist attacks from the progressive left i've pointed
00:14:26.460several of these out on twitter just just out of interest uh uh and uh you know but i'm not i'm not
00:14:33.140dwelling on this and you know i certainly don't want to be a victim um and i take these things in my
00:14:38.080stride and if i genuinely feel threatened but here's the thing there's a difference between um
00:14:43.080you know getting a threat from an anonymous troll and getting an implied threat from a member of the
00:14:49.500governing party oh yeah um right um and the the latter is pretty insidious it is sinister i experience
00:14:58.100this kind of thing overseas and uh you know i i i worry about it you know i i'm telling you i i you
00:15:04.900know it had a chilling effect on me and an anonymous troll tells me something i just block them and i move
00:15:10.420on uh but a politician a sitting a politician as an mp from the governing party says that this must be
00:15:18.560confronted now now you can make the distinction that he was he was referring to my story and not
00:15:23.760me but how do you separate the two no exactly and i think just before we move on to the next story
00:15:29.060there's so many important points i mean we could talk about this for an hour pretty much but there's
00:15:33.080so many interesting little points to talk about with this new push from the canadian association of
00:15:37.520journalists this this this approach to try and engage the police in the defense of a particular
00:15:43.880class of journalists right they're going to leave independent journalists behind but they want the
00:15:48.140toronto police the rcmp and ottawa police to come to the rescue of a particular class of journalists now
00:15:54.120a lot of people have pointed out that this is sort of a way to also justify liberal online
00:15:58.760censorship and maybe you could go down there i think there's definitely a conversation to be had
00:16:01.840about that but the caj has just routinely failed to actually defend journalists and this the toronto
00:16:08.700star is a part of this is a part of this sort of joint letter right this is the same toronto star
00:16:14.300that wrote a front page news story by pulling tweets that have apparently now been called into
00:16:20.480question these so-called tweets that that basically say the unvaccinated can go to die we don't care if
00:16:27.400there aren't enough icu beds for the unvaccinated they they they poured gasoline on a very very
00:16:32.860divisive issue back when the vaccine issue was right at the heart what we were discussing in this
00:16:37.880country and now after telling the end basically publishing on the front page that unvaccinated
00:16:42.700can die the same toronto star is now saying that their journalists need the help of the police to come
00:16:48.900and defend them and it's important to know too where is the caj rupa when andrew lawton was pepper
00:16:53.880sprayed by police in ottawa or when alexa lavoite rebel was shot in the leg by a tear gas canister
00:17:01.100point blank by the police or for example when our own candace malcolm was basically being threatened
00:17:07.980by calistani extremists and had basically her house uh targeted and her real safety targeted by
00:17:15.600calistani extremists who didn't like her reporting uh you didn't see a bunch of police rush to the rush
00:17:21.340to the defense of uh outwardly to the defense of candace you didn't see the canadian association
00:17:26.280of journalists stop what they are doing and say we need to protect this journalist right to do her
00:17:30.280job you didn't see them there because i think the truth is they're really in it to protect one class
00:17:35.120of journalists and that i don't think is us rupa i don't think they're here for the independent
00:17:38.740journalists they're not uh they're for us and neither should we count on them to be there for us i think
00:17:44.780i think uh that that would be a complete waste of time and i think you know um you know as as
00:17:50.700independent media gets stronger and it is for sure uh and uh you know gains more traction with the
00:17:57.220general public uh they're gonna have to uh you know at some point acknowledge our existence and it'll
00:18:03.080happen sooner rather than later no i think it will and i think as as more canadians realize what
00:18:08.860they're getting from the legacy media the more they cut the cable cord and and and cut their
00:18:13.880subscriptions to the globe and national posts and all these different places they're going to come
00:18:18.300to the legacy media and they're going to realize you know actually this is where real journal
00:18:21.900journalism is being done now switching gears because as you know those who those who watch
00:18:26.560this program know that we try to end the show on a bit of a lighter note we try and find something
00:18:30.640to laugh about on this show well there's a toronto star op-ed written by michael corin who's a former
00:18:35.960toronto uh what's what was it sun news network the failed sun news television network he was he used to work
00:18:41.680there the guy used to be a conservative but he's totally switched his position and he's now bashing
00:18:46.460conservatives as much as he can in the media well michael corin wrote a wrote an article in the toronto
00:18:51.540star and the headline is the headline is canadian christian nationalism not christian it's not canadian
00:18:57.680or patriotic patriotic either so you read that headline you probably think yeah you know probably
00:19:01.920not a ton of support for christian national nationalism in this country but then how how did i know
00:19:07.680that in this article somewhere they were going to tie pierre paulia into canadian christian
00:19:13.460nationalism sure enough three paragraphs in there he is it seems to be the playbook for the legacy
00:19:17.360media oh my goodness yes it's it read like a screed a rant and it had all the elements of verbal
00:19:25.000diarrhea from the left uh you know yeah you you get uh you have trump um you know you you have all of
00:19:31.120the the key keywords key buzzwords right you have trump you have the far right you have uh nationalism
00:19:37.600you have pierre pierre pauliavra you have the freedom convoy of course we can't forget that those
00:19:43.580people so you know it just it just read like you know this this guy clearly it read like he had a lot
00:19:50.880of issues and he was just kind of uh you know you know going into this rant to get get this office
00:19:58.580chest uh but you know i actually had to read this nonsense uh because and i blame you for this
00:20:06.700harrison sorry the things i have to do uh you know for true north but uh but anyway so you know he he's
00:20:13.900he's making you know he has a very specific interpretation of christianity um he doesn't
00:20:18.920like calvinism that's pretty obvious and he has this very you know he's this elite disdain uh you know
00:20:25.580that you know he says these people uh at the protest they had misspelled uh quotes from the bible
00:20:32.040or even misquoted from the bible so my question to him is does that mean that their faith is not
00:20:36.860genuine uh they're not christians uh if if they can't spell right um you know it all sounded very
00:20:44.360very elitist um and and more to the point about you know his criticism of of christian nationalism
00:20:51.160see you can you can be a christian and you can be a nationalist so you can be a christian nationalist
00:20:57.200you can you can be a christian and you can be a socialist uh as a matter of fact the foundation
00:21:03.800of the british labor party is christian socialism and the foundation of many political parties uh in
00:21:09.320europe um so if you can be a christian and a socialist why can't you be a christian and a
00:21:14.260nationalist you know and so basically this guy i mean in this you know long rant you know
00:21:20.740It comes across as though, and it's unfortunate that this is coming from an Anglican priest, or, you know, it doesn't matter that he's Anglican, but the fact that this is...
00:21:31.520Well, from a priest in general, I think.
00:21:33.460Yeah, yeah. I mean, he just seems angry. I thought priests were supposed to be kind and compassionate and understanding of the other, but it was quite the opposite.
00:21:42.860He just sounded very hateful in his op-ed, and to me, to my mind, it sounded like he wanted a situation where basically a small power elite decides what level of religiosity we should have in society, what brand of Christianity we should have, maybe even what brand of culture.
00:22:03.980It just, for me, you know, it was just plain nonsense.
00:22:10.280Yeah. Well, I mean, the way that the legacy media do this, they find the scariest words and put them together to try and gin up a lot of readership, because, as we know, these guys are struggling to get viewers on their websites anyway.
00:22:22.720So the more that they can use this sort of language and ride the American wave, I mean, if you're plugged into American news, you'll know, for example, that a lot of people on the American right were having a total laugh at the Atlantic this week,
00:22:34.680when the Atlantic tried to say that rosaries are now becoming a hate symbol, an extreme hate symbol.
00:22:40.160So, of course, and there's also been some talk about Christian nationalism.
00:22:44.100There was a congresswoman who proclaimed that she was a proud Christian nationalist, and, of course, that just got the left up in arms.
00:22:50.200But there's this very strange phenomenon happening where legacy media journalists are so focused on trying to tie the frontrunner in the conservative leadership race to the very worst elements of politics in our culture.
00:23:07.700And you don't see that from the independent media on the other side.
00:23:52.380It's actually all quite predictable, actually.
00:23:55.060Pierre Polyev would be very much a centrist in American politics.
00:23:58.760And that's the irony of this whole thing.
00:24:02.080They're panicking because, you know, you have these polls coming out that show that younger people are turning conservative and possibly turning to Pierre.
00:24:12.900So I think this is the kind of thing that really upsets them.
00:24:16.360This is the kind of thing that could, you know, upset, you know, existing narratives, you know, that they've tried so hard to, you know, have in place over the last few years.
00:24:27.980And it's just, it's just the elites, you know, it's just elite opinion facing a direct challenge right now.
00:24:35.220And, and, and they're trying to counter it by, you know, trying to smear the conservative leadership race and particularly Pierre Polyev, whether you like him or not, that's a different issue.
00:24:44.880But, you know, I think to tie him in with everything, including Christian nationalism, it's just really, really bizarre.
00:24:50.520It just is a sign of desperation, as you say.
00:24:53.280Yeah. And I think they're starting to feel it too, that they know as they're going to try and demonize this new group of, of a fresh face conservatives that are seeing a new option.