Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Good afternoon, members of the committee. Thank you for the invitation to speak to you today.
My name is Kathryn Hill, and I'm proud to serve as the executive director of MediaSmarts. I'm joined today by our director of education, Matthew Johnson. While I'll be making our remarks, Matthew, who's our resident expert, will join me in responding to questions.
MediaSmarts is Canada's centre for digital media literacy. We're a not-for-profit charitable organization, and our vision is for people in Canada to be empowered to engage with media confidently and critically. To achieve this goal, we advance digital media literacy through world-class research, education, public engagement and outreach. Digital media literacy is essential to an informed and engaged populace and electorate. Canada is especially in need of a coordinated approach that moves beyond an only access- and skills-based understanding of digital media literacy.
Each of the four competencies of digital media literacy—the ability to access, to use, to understand and to engage with media of all kinds—is essential to freedom of expression. In a digital environment, both our thoughts and our actions are influenced by the design of the tools we use, whether that's a recommendation algorithm that preferentially feeds us outrage-provoking content or a user interface that prompts us to react without thinking.
At MediaSmarts we believe, based on our own research and work done around the world, that these three things are true: People should be free to express their opinions online; however, there are circumstances when limits on online speech are warranted—for example, if it endangers or harms others—and we need to educate people on how to have respectful and responsible dialogue online. While most people would agree there are circumstances when limits on online speech are warranted, we believe, and research shows, that promoting digital media literacy education is a complementary approach that is less intrusive and more likely to foster freedom of expression.
It was taken for granted that networked media would be a boon for freedom of thought and expression and would democratize access to media creation and distribution. The past decade has shown that censorship can take less overt forms, for example when members of marginalized groups are kept silent in online spaces for fear of harassment, or when the tactic—just one of many—known as the “heckler's veto” is used, when points of view are drowned out by harassment and abuse and then amplified by the algorithms.
Another impact of digital media on free expression is polarization. While research suggests that Canadians are actually not deeply polarized, media, specifically digital media such as social networks, make us believe that we are. The result of this false polarization is that when we try to engage with someone online, we start by assuming they hold more extreme views than they probably do and are more hostile towards us than they actually are. This threatens freedom of expression, because, if we believe people on the other side of an issue hold extreme views, we are less likely to engage with them in reasonable discussion. That's why we not only educate young people on how to shape the social norms of their online communities, but also teach them how to spot arguments that are based in hate and how to tell these hateful arguments apart from real debates. We help them to learn how to question their own beliefs and assumptions.
Civic engagement is happening online, so it's more vital than ever to ensure that all Canadians have the skills, knowledge and understanding needed to be ethical digital citizens. It is not sufficient to teach these skills only to young people. The constantly changing nature of technology in the media ecosystem makes lifelong learning essential. Whether our primary concern is disinformation, hate speech and harassment or polarization, a strong commitment to digital media literacy and education is necessary to ensure that freedom of expression is balanced with critical thinking and positive civic engagement. We need a media-literate populace that can identify cases when regulation and legislation are appropriate and understand why the legislation or regulation may be critical to protecting human rights.
While the Internet has not turned out to be the utopia for free thought and expression that was once promised, it has, nevertheless, become where our politics and lives happen. We cannot cede this space to those who promote hate and deliberately spread disinformation, nor do we want to see heavy-handed limits on freedom of thought and expression. By prioritizing digital media literacy, we can create a more informed, respectful and engaged society, ensuring that the Internet remains a space for free and meaningful expression for all Canadians.