Tag: Canada Day

Why are some people such jerks online? And how do you respond to social media attacks?

Posted on by Shari Graydon

Is social media snark the gateway drug to full-on trolling?

I wondered this a lot last month, scrolling through the hate-tweets directed my way. Had I condemned a respected religious leader? Body-shamed a feminist icon? Described COVID as a viable form of population control? 

No, I’d had the temerity to confess in a Toronto Star commentary that I wasn’t in the mood to celebrate Canada Day. 

On LinkedIn, my piece generated thousands of views and many thoughtful and supportive responses. In contrast, on Twitter, dozens of vitriolic messages advised me to leave the country — although not nearly so politely. 

I was characterized as self-righteous, self-loathing and snobbish, “the worst a free democratic country can produce.” I was labeled “a non-entity”, accused of “grifting”, and ridiculed for having a degree in theatre. (Because it’s easier to attack someone personally, based on erroneously-drawn conclusions, than it is to mount a reasoned argument.)

One critic sneered that I was no doubt a fan of immigration (correct, although not mentioned), while another condemned me for having “defecated on the memory of the people who died at Verdun, Passchendaele, Ypres, Juno…Korea, Afghanistan.” (Nope, not even close.)

As disturbing as these attacks were, they pale in comparison to the kinds of hostile abuse directed at many other women, especially those who are Black, Indigenous, Asian, Muslim, lesbian, trans, women of colour… On a daily basis, they are targeted, threatened and silenced.

Over the past decade, in the process of teaching experts how to engage audiences through media, I’ve been enlightened by thousands of extremely knowledgeable and thoughtful scientists, health care professionals and advocates, across all sectors. Despite their deep insights on critically important issues, many of them have sometimes declined to share their experience-informed perspectives even when asked because they don’t have the time, patience or willingness to deal with poisonous online attacks that increase along with one’s profile. 

Who can blame them? 

That’s why Informed Opinions is now investing in a new project aimed at addressing online abuse. In the coming months we’ll be telling you more about our innovative new app and research initiative.

In the meantime, in trying to answer for myself the question, “Why are some people such jerks online?” I came across a New York Times article from 2007 which described the phenomenon of “online disinhibition”. 

Apparently, we’re more likely to be nasty because of the time lag between when we post a message and when we get a response… because the social media world is not governed by authority figures who might encourage us to behave better… because our empathy centres are hijacked by the absence of emotional signs and social cues typical of more personal interaction. 

And yet I and millions of others manage to regularly share thoughts and feelings on social media without personally insulting or attacking others. So I found this sentiment, penned on Quora by Alec Sorenson, more persuasive:

“People are jerks online because they’re jerks normally;
being online just allows them to be jerks without fear of consequence.”

Not insignificantly, social media companies have programmed their algorithms to reward ugliness. Academic research has determined that both Facebook and YouTube prioritize attacks. And posting something that triggers a pile-on of people who reinforce the attack with “likes” gives jerks the kind of dopamine surge experienced when gambling or using recreational drugs. By privileging online harassment and insults, these platforms are perpetuating an addiction to abuse. 

All of which feeds the inevitable conclusion: individual members of civil society, the organizations we support and the governments who serve us need to insist on accountability. 

We need to demand that social media companies live up to their own “community standards” and start genuinely managing not just fake news but the damaging content that their abusive users post. 

Even though the comments directed my way were tame in comparison to the insults and threats many other women and gender-diverse people experience, I did find them disturbing. I had to consciously remind myself that:

  1. Mounting personal attacks vs engaging with another’s ideas is cowardly and unworthy of response;
  2. Evidence-supported views trump the uninformed opinions of those who also deny that COVID exists or buy into disproven conspiracy theories; and, encouragingly,
  3. Most of my critics have few followers and little influence.

I also find valuable the insight articulated by George Bernard Shaw, who recommended:

Never wrestle with a pig;
you both get dirty and the pig likes it.

Coincidentally, the day after I drafted the post above, I came across this piece written by the brilliant Roxane Gay about her own evolution with social media. It’s worth the read.

Shari Graydon is the Catalyst of Informed Opinions, a non-profit working to amplify the voices of women and gender-diverse people and ensure they have as much influence in public conversations as men’s.

I can no longer celebrate Canada Day

Posted on by Shari Graydon

NOTE: This piece was originally published on the Toronto Star’s website on 23 June 2021, and in the paper’s print version the following day. It became the site’s most-read story, and generated significant response. Although I knew my thesis would be controversial, I was still taken aback by how incredibly hostile many people’s defensiveness made them. Some recommended I leave the country, others interpreted my views as an attack on Canadian war veterans. The feedback was often personal and aggressive. It gave me a small window into the abuse that Indigenous people and other members of marginalized groups must face on social media every day. At the same time, seeing the image of Canadians celebrating July 1st on Parliament Hill that the Star used to illustrate my piece reminded me of having witnessed many immigrant families do exactly that during my years in Ottawa. Knowing what a haven this country has been for people persecuted around the world made me proud then, and continues to now. But our claims to moral superiority are undermined by our treatment of Indigenous peoples, both historical and current. We need to do better.

I can no longer celebrate Canada Day, and I’m at a loss as to why anyone else should, either.

The holiday has become for me a reminder of the unspeakable wrongs my ancestors visited upon those who inhabited this land for many centuries before white settlers arrived. Wrongs that many governments have continued in my lifetime.

Sickened by the stark testimony from thousands of residential school survivors brought to light by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, I first began feeling this way in 2015. But it’s not like illumination hadn’t been available before that.

I had read Maria Campbell’s powerful account of growing up Métis on a road allowance in Saskatchewan. I had followed the news coverage of the Oka and Ipperwash crises, Stephen Harper’s apology to Indigenous peoples in 2008, the Idle No More movement protests in 2012.

So I feel shame over how long it took me to get here; how many opportunities I was given to arrive at this conclusion; how much evidence I needed to be presented with in order to understand — not just the historical travesties, but my own family’s complicity.

I grew up in the leafy, affluent suburbs of west island Montreal and Vancouver’s North Shore, in circumstances that assured my ignorance was as vast as my privilege. I learned more about the first peoples of this continent from TV and movies than I did in school — no doubt all of it grievously wrong. And I never crossed paths with a person I knew to be Indigenous until I was in my early thirties.

The first time I heard human rights lawyer Mary Eberts use “settler” to refer to herself, the concept was so foreign to me that I took several minutes to grasp what she meant. And when I did, I was not ready to claim the term for myself.

Then a few years ago, at a conference in Calgary, an Indigenous panelist invited the mostly white people present to consider how we had benefited from colonization. That moment called to mind my mother’s childhood home on a lush and productive fruit farm bordering on the south shore of Lake Ontario. I had spent many delightful weeks there as a kid, climbing the poplar trees, swimming in the pool, collecting chestnuts in the fall.

Although the property hasn’t been in my family for decades now, it still figures prominently in my imagination. My mother’s maiden name was Secord, connecting her, like many in the region, to the famous Laura Secord. A few years earlier, I had proudly participated in a walk commemorating my ancestor’s historic trek to warn the British troops of a likely American invasion during the War of 1812.

Laura Secord’s father had come north from Massachusetts to what was then known as Upper Canada in 1795 to accept a land grant. So claiming my connection with Laura Secord necessitates acknowledging my settler status.

You may not feel a connection to land that was inappropriately granted to your predecessors. Maybe your own forebears didn’t own the fields they worked. Or maybe your family came here more recently, absolving you of the responsibility I now feel.

But here’s what I invite you to think about on July 1 this year:

As long as Indigenous children are still being taken from their homes at a disproportionate rate by social service workers … As long as Indigenous communities are still living under boil-water advisories … As long as Indigenous women are still being murdered, or incarcerated for being poor or profoundly damaged by intergenerational trauma, how can Canadians hold up our flag as an emblem of the values we say we support?

Every cent earmarked for Canada Day celebrations — the concerts, the fireworks, the speechmaking — should be multiplied by a thousand and invested instead in the reconciliation efforts repeatedly called for not just by Indigenous peoples but by government reports documenting the indefensible acts carried out in our names.

No doubt it would still be a drop in the bucket relative to what’s required, but at least it would remind us every year that we cannot in all conscience, celebrate “Canada” until our actions live up to our commitments to human rights.

Shari Graydon is the Catalyst of Informed Opinions, a non-profit working to amplify the voices of women and gender-diverse people and ensure they have as much influence in public conversations as men’s.

O Canada… Oh, Canada

Posted on by Shari Graydon


A few years ago the Conservative government threw a bone (briefly) to Canadian women, and (rashly, as it turned out) promised to update the lyrics to our national anthem to include the 50% of the population currently excluded. (Rumour has it that outspoken advocate for women, Senator Nancy Ruth, pressed her colleagues into doing the right thing — one of the many reasons we’re proud to call her an honorary patron.)

I celebrated by writing an op ed for the Ottawa Citizen saluting the measure, but by the time the paper hit the newsstands, backlash from the Conservative party base had caused the government to rescind on its momentary burst of fair-mindedness.

Along with, I suspect, millions of other equality-supporting citizens, I remain irked about this. I think it’s a national shame that O Canada continues to cite only the nation’s “sons”, when it could easily substitute a gender-inclusive reference.

Indeed, many Canadians already replace the official wording with lyrics that more accurately reflect the country’s reality.

This week, Ashley Armstrong, who is currently providing invaluable admin and communications support to Informed Opinions, created the impactful 86-second video campaign above that draws attention to this issue.

As the country prepares to celebrate Canada Day, we urge you to watch, tweet, share, like, link to and talk about it. “Daughters” everywhere will thank you!