{"id":81618,"date":"2022-04-05T16:35:59","date_gmt":"2022-04-05T20:35:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newsroom.carleton.ca\/?post_type=cu_story&p=81618"},"modified":"2025-08-19T09:37:10","modified_gmt":"2025-08-19T13:37:10","slug":"canadian-far-right-covid-19-social-media","status":"publish","type":"cu_story","link":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/story\/canadian-far-right-covid-19-social-media\/","title":{"rendered":"Close to home: The Canadian far-right, COVID-19 and social media"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\n
\n\n \n \n \n \n
\n\n
<\/div>\n \n
\n
\n\n

\n Close to home: The Canadian far-right, COVID-19 and social media\n <\/h1>\n \n <\/header>\n <\/div>\n\n \n <\/path>\n <\/path>\n <\/svg>\n <\/div>\n\n \n\n <\/div>\n<\/section>\n\n

This article is republished<\/a> from The Conversation under a Creative Commons licence. All photos provided by The Conversation<\/a> from various sources.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Weeks after the so-called \u201cfreedom convoy\u201d protests ended, a familiar quietness has returned to the streets of downtown Ottawa. No more sounds of blaring horns and people partying into the wee hours. The only remaining visible traces are abandoned trucks in impound yards<\/a> and barriers on streets. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But these too will be cleared, just like the 40 trucks worth of litter and debris the convoy amassed<\/a>. However, the convoy isn\u2019t just an event for the history books. It\u2019s still happening.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The convoy\u2019s reach \u2014 inspiring similar movements globally<\/a> \u2014 amazed the world and shocked Canadians, prompting suspicions of \u201cforeign interferences<\/a>,\u201d linking it to American funders<\/a> and Russian bots<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

While not denying the roles of non-Canadian participants<\/a>, it\u2019s misleading to construe the protests as being imported from outside Canada \u2014 it\u2019s also inaccurate to view it as an emergent, novel phenomenon. The \u201cfreedom convoy\u201d was a culmination of years of the far-right\u2019s persistent mobilization. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

A breeding ground for the far-right<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Far-right networks grew during the last two years as they digitally tapped into grievances about the pandemic<\/a>. The convoy was a far-right-led and co-ordinated event that exploited COVID-19-related gripes and existing discontents on various socio-political issues, shared among Canadians who harboured growing distrust in the Liberal government. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hijacking truckers for their brand, the convoy is a far-right movement masquerading as a working-class revolution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The convoy\u2019s leadership included veteran far-right activists like James Bauder, the creator of Canada Unity<\/a>, Tamara Lich and Patrick King, members of the Maverick Party<\/a> and veterans of Wexit<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

They partnered with relatively newer figures, BJ Dichter, a former conservative candidate<\/a>, and Chris Barber, a truck company owner<\/a>. These people all have a history of publicly posting discriminatory messages on social media and are super-spreaders of conspiracy theories online<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"A
\n Tamara Lich, an organizer of the so-called \u2018freedom convoy\u2019 embraces supporters as she leaves the courthouse in Ottawa after being granted bail, on March 7, 2022.<\/span>
\n THE CANADIAN PRESS\/Justin Tang<\/span><\/span>
\n <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The convoy can be seen as a continuation of the 2019 United We Roll<\/a> (UWR) organized by the Yellow Vests Canada movement<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The convoy and UWR share many of the same organizers, notably Lich and King, and participants, like Canada First<\/a> and Diagolon networks<\/a>. Both were supported by the same political figures, including Maxime Bernier (People\u2019s Party of Canada) and Andrew Scheer (Conservative Party). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

While they differ in the main issue they exploited, namely oil and pipelines versus COVID-19, both grew out of extreme communities where explicit anti-Muslim racism and calls for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau\u2019s execution were rampant<\/a>. Boosted by the COVID-19 conspiracy movement and million-dollar funding<\/a>, the convoy is UWR on steroids.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Social media and the far-right<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

From the spread of the Ku Klux Klan<\/a> in the 1920s to a pre-Second World War Nazi \u201cSwastika\u201d movement<\/a> in the 1930s, to the Edmund Burke Society<\/a> in the 1960s, the Creativity Movement<\/a> in the 1970s and neo-Nazi skinheads<\/a> in the 1980s-90s Canada has always been home to hateful far-right groups and movements. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now, Canada has far-right groups like Canada First<\/a>, ACT! For Canada<\/a>, PEGIDA<\/a>, The Canada Defence League<\/a> and terrorist entities like the Three Percenters<\/a>, The Base<\/a>, Atomwaffen Division<\/a> and the Proud Boys<\/a>. In the past decade, they have all found a welcoming audience across Canada, primarily by extensive use of social media<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Due to limited mainstream media access, far-right groups were among early adopters of digital media<\/a>. Social media platforms are the far-right\u2019s primary tool to form community and mobilize action. And social media\u2019s lack of regulation allows the far-right to circulate disinformation and conspiracy theories to feed on people\u2019s fears. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Far-right groups commonly use conspiracy theories to justify the belief that out-groups \u2014 \u201cthe others,\u201d the Muslims, the left, the liberal, the immigrants \u2014 are always in secret actions to control in-groups\u2019 welfare<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"A
\n Far-right networks\u2019 grew during the last two years as they digitally tapped into grievances about the pandemic.<\/span>
\n (Shutterstock)<\/span><\/span>
\n <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Once the pandemic hit, far-right narratives switched from being predominantly racist and xenophobic to those based on civil rights, freedom and COVID-19-related conspiracies. Many far-right groups alleged that the pandemic was plotted by Bill Gates and a \u201cNew World Order\u201d to facilitate the injection of 5G enabled microchips into the population<\/a>, none of which is true. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

While they may be dismissed by some as bonkers<\/a>, these false claims continue to be believable for people looking for certainty while living through unprecedented times. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Alliances and disinformation<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

To reach a wider audience, the far-right spread false claims that vaccine mandates violate Canadians\u2019 charter rights and freedoms<\/a>. Using freedom and rights as umbrella terms, they easily formed alliances with existing anti-COVID-19 mandate groups in Canada like Vaccine Choice Canada<\/a>, Hugs Over Masks<\/a> and Canadian Frontline Nurses<\/a> as well as networks with similar interests outside of Canada, notably in the United States. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

These alliances allowed for the expansion of offline and online networks, much wider dissemination of conspiracies and disinformation and increased the capacity to mobilize protests and fundraising. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The far-right benefited from social media\u2019s tendency to privilege reductionist and simplified narratives. By providing simplified explanations of complex crisis and clear identification of the enemy that caused the crisis conspiratorial messages are more memeable<\/a> and, therefore, more likely to be popular and viral than any scientific explanations about the virus. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The far-right also capitalized on algorithmic biases that privileges content that evoke emotions<\/a>. The algorithmic dynamics helped the far-right in propagating the binary populist framework<\/a> \u2014 \u201cwe, the people\u201d versus \u201cthe corrupt and evil elites,\u201d \u201cbad politicians and leaders\u201d who implemented COVID-19 measures versus \u201cgood politicians and leaders\u201d who don\u2019t \u2014 to foster and incite rage among discontent Canadians. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This binary logic was powerful not only in fuelling the rage of those who share far-right ideologies, but also in striking a chord with those angriest over COVID-19 restrictions. The pandemic will eventually be over, but the Canadian far-right networks are here to stay.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

—
\nCarleton Newsroom<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"The<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons licence. All photos provided by The Conversation from various sources. Weeks after the so-called \u201cfreedom convoy\u201d protests ended, a familiar quietness has returned to the streets of downtown Ottawa. No more sounds of blaring horns and people partying into the wee hours. The only […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":410,"featured_media":81729,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"cu_story_type":[1623],"cu_story_tag":[],"class_list":["post-81618","cu_story","type-cu_story","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","cu_story_type-expert-perspectives"],"acf":{"cu_post_thumbnail":false},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_story\/81618","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_story"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/cu_story"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/410"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_story\/81618\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":81731,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_story\/81618\/revisions\/81731"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/81729"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=81618"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"cu_story_type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_story_type?post=81618"},{"taxonomy":"cu_story_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_story_tag?post=81618"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}