Is censorship in Canada in retreat?

Not so long ago there was a really heated debate in Canada, which overshadowed even the talk about potential Chinese interference in the election of the prime minister: censorship loomed over Canada, but it did became real.

In March, supporters and opponents of the bill "promoting Canadian singer-songwriters" battled in Parliament. In 2020, the first attempt was made to "push" this bill through Parliament, but the 2021 elections cut it short.

The second was better: Pablo Rodriguez, the Liberal Party Minister of Heritage, introduced the bill in February 2022, and no matter how hard the Conservative Party fought against it, they were unable to do anything, the law passed.

A month ago, the law regulating broadcast corporations like Spotify, Netflix, and YouTube went into effect. Censorship finally became real. We explain in detail why in our article about this law.

As originally conceived, even simple videos of ordinary YouTube accounts were subject to regulation, but not until now: the government, which promoted this law, calls for the exclusion ordinary users of social networks in this law.

The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) is responsible for broadcasting and regulation, and it must now regulate all content, recommending more Canadian content to Canadians.

In a nutshell, the government wants to force platforms like Netflix, YouTube and TikTok to contribute in promotion Canadian content and not touch ordinary citizens: those who post weekend vacations or birthday parties of their daughter, even if they use commercial songs in their videos. So far, the CRTC has not yet developed rules to implement the bill.

Also, the government directive states that the CRTC should prioritize the parts of the bill that deal with "reviewing Canadian content, promoting Indigenous peoples and achieving better representation of African Americans and the LGBTQ community."

Who knows how these arguments will end. Time will tell.