Let’s imagine for a moment that there is a Canadian company called Facechinook. This company started several years ago as a beautiful online social experience to keep communities and friends connected with each other.
It quickly turns into a jumbled hodgepodge of opinions – some important and some less documented – dependent on publicity, clicks, and political content that is difficult to contain. However, this same Canadian company is quickly becoming the largest social media project in the world, to the point of influencing international elections and even wars.
One day, Facechinook, which now dominates content distribution worldwide from its headquarters in Mississauga, Ontario, decides it doesn’t like US government policy and, in one fell swoop, bans from its platforms all local media established in the United States. Someone flips a switch and, boom, 330 million Americans can’t access Fox News or NBC or the New York Times on its digital platforms.
In this fictional world, do you think the people of the United States would accept that Canadians decide what they can or cannot consume? Impossible, right? American freedoms cannot be violated, even in an “imaginary country”.
Well, it is precisely those same democratic rights and freedoms that are being violated in Canada today.
Facebook has decided that content produced in Canada should not be distributed to Canadians, because Canadian legislation, designed and passed by Canadian politicians elected by Canadian citizens, does not meet the needs of the Facebook business.
Indeed, Meta, the parent company of Facebook, this week began blocking information to certain Canadian users on its platforms, as part of its fight against the Liberal government’s online information bill.
Some major media, like The Press, The Journal of Montreal and the Financial Post, were among the first targets of Facebook’s blockade of Canadian news, but small local media are also affected. ChrisD.ca, a Winnipeg-based digital news platform, reported that some readers can no longer access its content on Facebook. For small local news outlets like ChrisD.ca or ours, the majority of reader traffic comes from online platforms. Now, rather than receiving local information about their neighborhood in Winnipeg or Montreal, these same readers are being forced to receive international or American content.
You can love, hate or despise some or all of Canadian media. But that is not the question. Just look at how easy it was for Facebook to decide what you should or shouldn’t see – all it took was the push of a button at Facebook headquarters and tens of thousands of dedicated Canadian content creators are suddenly obscured.
You’ve heard for years that when something is free, you are the product. Well, now we are not only the product, but also the slaves.