Civil society must step up to counter hate

Right-wing extremism is Canada’s number one domestic threat, but we have no organization to track and counter the more than 100 active hate groups in Canada. With no anti-racist watchdog organization, hate groups have had some success in putting on a façade of respectability, and have become part of our political landscape.

We need three things. First, we need in-depth and courageous reporting on these right-wing extremist groups. It takes little effort to expose their racism, and Canada’s media need to accurately characterize these hate groups. Second, we need leaders from every community to come together to counter the growing anti-Muslim and so-called alt-right movements that focus on Muslims, but are also anti-Semitic, anti-Black, anti-Sikh, etc. This is an opportunity for inter-community dialogue. Third, and most importantly, Canada needs a professional organization to track, document and counter right-wing extremism and racist groups.

Over the past 35 years, there have been at least 120 documented “aggressive incidents” related to right-wing extremist groups, including assaults, weapons charges and murder. These are just the incidents we know about. Now, some groups are arming themselves, conducting paramilitary training and staking out mosques. Anti-Muslim and so-called “alt-right” and racist attitudes have become more socially acceptable. Muslim and Jewish community organizations tell us that hate incidents have spiked in the past year.

While there are some indications that our law enforcement agencies are finally beginning to recognize the growing threat of right-wing extremist groups, we can’t count on law enforcement and the courts to address right-wing extremism on their own. Our civil society needs to pick up the slack to counter the rise of racist, anti-Canadian sentiment.

To be sure, anti-racist and anti-fascist activists are confronting hate groups in their own communities, which has pressured and demoralized the anti-Muslim movement in Canada. Other organizations deal in deradicalization, track hate incidents in their communities, and do anti-racist advocacy. These groups all play a role in countering right-wing extremism.

But the only organization that has been consistently monitoring hate groups across Canada is Anti-Racist Canada (ARC), which has been an invaluable resource to media, law enforcement and activists. For the past 20 years, ARC has documented the activities of neo-Nazi groups and is now exposing the connections between today’s anti-Muslim movement and established white supremacy groups. However, ARC is a blog and a passion project — it’s under resourced and it misses things all the time.

B’nai Brith and the now-defunct Canadian Jewish Congress used to fill this role. Following the murder of six million Jews in the Holocaust, virtually two out of every three Jews in Europe, the worldwide Jewish community and the post-war anti-fascist movement adopted the motto “Never Again.” Jewish communities across the world founded organizations to monitor, advocate and act against any resurgence of hatred and anti-Semitism as propagated by the extreme right.

Whether it was the threat posed in the early 1960s by the re-emergence of a Canadian Nazi party under the leadership of John William Beattie and David Stanley, or the attempts by Holocaust deniers Ernst Zundel and high school teacher Jim Keegstra to resuscitate Nazism, the Canadian Jewish community was there —documenting it and fighting back.

The last wave of white supremacy in the guise of the Heritage Front in the 1990s was closely tracked by the CJC and B’nai Brith, which fought and intervened in numerous court battles that played a key role in driving neo-Nazi groups back into their basements for nearly 30 years.

However, with the CJC no longer in existence and B’nai Brith leaning more towards supporting Israel and challenging anti-Zionism in addition to anti-Semitism, a vacuum has been created.

Today, extreme right-wing groups are smarter. They say they aren’t racist, they’re alt-right — and now that everybody knows alt-right means racist, they’ll find a new term. In Canada, they call themselves patriots and nationalists. They’ve successfully put on a façade of respectability and made their extreme views more socially acceptable. There are groups recruiting in our universities and finding allies in advocacy organizations and mainstream politics. It’s past time to expose them.

Once again, Canada needs its civil society to step up to investigate and counter hate groups. Silence and ignorance are no longer options.

Bernie M. Farber is the former CEO of the Canadian Jewish Congress. Today he advocates and writes on human rights and social justice issues. Follow him on Twitter @berniefarber.Evan Balgord is a freelance journalist and a researcher of right-wing extremism in Canada. Follow him on Twitter @ebalgord.