Canadian Heritage Committee on Nov. 26th, 2025

[Fares Al Soud, Liberal, Mississauga Centre, ON]

Thank you, Ms. Holland.

Mr. Carolo, as you noted, your work with White Ribbon has long focused on preventing gender-based violence by addressing the social norms and cultural narratives that shape boys' understanding of masculinity. I know that Next Gen Men, whom I had the pleasure of meeting yesterday, operates in a similar space.

In an article with GlobeNewswire about a White Ribbon campaign called “My Friend Max Hate”, which you referred to in your opening remarks, you state, “It's alarming to see the growing impact of the manosphere and how they are conditioning vulnerable populations such as teens, particularly young men”.

What patterns are you seeing in how algorithmic content and influencer culture are shaping early attitudes towards gender? What makes these online narratives so effective at pulling vulnerable young men into misogynistic world views?

[Humberto Carolo]

Young boys and young men are turning to the Internet for connection: to learn about dating, to learn about what it means to be a young man, looking for social supports and looking to figure themselves out. As they do these searches, they are presented with these deeply misogynistic and hateful videos and resources put out by these social influencers.

We are seeing more and more of that kind of impact, and these young men start to take on those narratives. They start to accept those ideologies, those ways, those narratives and that advice, which are often disguised as improving self-esteem, improving their own looks and physique and so forth, but they often incorporate deeply hateful, misogynistic attitudes blaming women, immigrants and newcomer communities for all the problems that men, boys and young men are experiencing today.

It's that kind of increased ideology, that increased presence and impact that's deeply concerning. More and more young people are falling prey to those types of narratives in the absence of good, positive role models, influencers who talk about what it means to shed those harmful gender stereotypes and social norms that so many young men are pressured to live with and grow up believing in.

We need to change that around. We need to quiet those hateful voices, misogynistic voices, and instead present good role model voices, influencers who can share supportive, allied narratives that young men can take on.

[The Chair, Liberal, Lisa Hepfner]

Thank you.

Mr. Champoux, you have the floor for six minutes.

[Martin Champoux, Bloc, Drummond, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I found the witnesses' opening statements extremely interesting, and their answers to questions are just as interesting. It is very enlightening, but also very disturbing, let's be honest.

I will come back to the issue of exploitation, which Ms. Wood and Ms. Holland mentioned. It is a disaster that we are standing by and watching happen.

I would first like to turn to our friends at MediaSmarts, because if we conclude that the effects of social media on young people are generally negative, one of the main factors contributing to this is disinformation. There has also been talk of radicalization, which I would also like to discuss.

There are, however, positive initiatives that can help us find interesting solutions and improve education. Obviously, when we want to counter disinformation, we have to do it through education. At MediaSmarts, you conducted a research project called “Motives and Methods”. I'd like you to tell us a little bit about it, because there are some conclusions from this study that I find very interesting.

So I'll let you tell us more about this project.

[Matthew Johnson]

This research project that you're referring to, “Motives and Methods”, was a project that we designed to test the effectiveness of our “Break the Fake” resources, which are designed to teach quick and easy steps for verifying online information, in the hopes that people will make a habit of verifying all the information they encounter—particularly information that they may use as the basis for important decisions and particularly, as well, before they share information.

This research project demonstrated quite strongly that very limited exposure to this program had significant impacts on people's ability to identify false content but, just as importantly, to identify real content. There is a lot of evidence that it is the discernment between true and false information that is so important in avoiding the backfire risks that sometimes come when we focus excessively on teaching people to debunk false information.

[Martin Champoux, Bloc, Drummond, QC]

In your conclusions, you talk about discernment. You say that most participants had difficulty distinguishing between truth and falsehood, but that in general, most of them had a false belief bias, meaning they were more likely to say something was false, even if it wasn't. I find that somewhat positive, in a way, because it suggests that people are inherently suspicious of the content they see.

We keep telling people to check their sources. Do you conclude that this bias means that we may be on the right track and that the message is starting to get through?

[Matthew Johnson]

Unfortunately, this is not necessarily a positive sign, because what we see is what some scholars have referred to as trust compression, where people see any strike against a source as disqualifying it completely. What this means, of course, is that there is no sense that any sources are reliable. If a source has to be absolutely unimpeachable before it can be seen as a reliable source, it becomes impossible for us to have any shared sense of what is true, which makes it impossible to have any kind of civic discussion.

It's just a generational quality. It is also the impact of AI. It has had a corrosive effect of leading people to doubt things and cast doubt on things that are true, because it has become so easy to create convincing false content.

[Martin Champoux, Bloc, Drummond, QC]

So we still have work to do, if I understand correctly. We will do it.

Ms. Holland, you mentioned algorithms earlier and you made an interesting comment about the dopamine that surfing the Internet releases in young people. That's very interesting. We can't pretend that digital companies aren't aware of this. It is hard to believe that they are not using it as a tool. We have banned advertising aimed at children, precisely because this type of advertising excited children and made them very vulnerable. We do the same thing for a whole range of products. Earlier, Ms. Wood said that we do not ask parents to regulate alcohol and cigarettes, for example. The same logic should apply in this case.

Do you think digital companies are mocking us by claiming they don't control this, when in all likelihood they know exactly what they are doing by pushing this kind of content towards our children?

[Naomi Holland]

Yes, 100%, they know what they're doing. Last year, social media companies made $11 billion off under 18-year-olds. They completely know what they're doing. They want to put it on parents. They want to put it on kids: “Kids should be taught more.” Yes, but that's putting it on kids. The way these apps are designed, they are so addictive. Neuroscientists are hired to study the brain. The apps are using biometrics and studying the faces of children. They know exactly what they need.

Social media companies are after two things from kids: time spent on their app and scroll speed. They want kids to scroll faster and faster, where you have to get the brain almost to a zombie-like state. The faster they scroll, the more ads they will see. They know, especially on TikTok, what they need to feed them. They feed them something shocking, like a car accident. They look, and then they show them something sexy. They look out of curiosity. Then they show them something disturbing that makes them feel gross, so they scroll faster. They are being fed content that is truly like a dopamine drip. Their brains are just hungry and wanting more and more.

Asking children to make reasonable decisions on social media is like asking them to bench-press 300 pounds. It is not realistic. It is not physically possible. It is not fair for us to ask children to be responsible for their own social media use.

[Martin Champoux, Bloc, Drummond, QC]

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Lisa Hepfner]

That's another good metaphor. Thank you very much.

Mr. Diotte, you now have the floor for five minutes.

[Kerry Diotte, Conservative, Edmonton Griesbach, AB]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

We obviously all care about the health of children and about online harms. That's a no-brainer.

I guess the big question is.... Looking at something like Bill S-209—I believe, Ms. Wood, you mentioned that bill—we see that there are concerns that, for instance, using third party age verification providers could risk a second harm, meaning that a lot of these websites are located outside of Canada. You have to feed it data, highly personal data, and that could cause a real problem. Obviously, there's the argument about freedom of expression and censorship. There's also criticism of that bill because there is a very broad definition of what is sexually explicit material, and it could inadvertently apply to mainstream images and so forth.

The big question is this: How do we walk the fine line between too much government control and too little government control in protecting children?

I'll start with you, Ms. Wood, on that question.

[Holly Wood]

Thank you very much.

I think Bill S-209 is a prime example. As I said, it's been in Parliament for five years. It's had three reiterations, three rewordings. They've done extensive studies. The big part of Bill S-209 is that other countries are already doing it. It's already successful. It's been implemented, and it's making a difference.

When you look at things like this, look to other countries, do international studies, work with international partners to understand how they implemented it, how it's working, and what the VPN matters are—because children can dance around VPNs, unfortunately.

Again, the material in Bill S-209 is a prime example of what's working and what's not and the language. When you look at government control, it's important to understand that children are children. They can't vote until later in life. They can't drive until later in life. They can't smoke cigarettes or drink alcohol until later in life, so why can they view harmful content with their adolescent brains that aren't fully developed?

When it comes to our kids, yes, parents have a role, but governments also have a responsibility under international laws, regulations, charters and covenants. I think that part of due diligence in government—

[Kerry Diotte, Conservative, Edmonton Griesbach, AB]

Thanks. I think that suffices.

I just want to ask a couple of other participants the same question.

Ms. Holland, you probably heard the question, I assume. How do we walk that fine line between too much government control and too little?

[Naomi Holland]

Well, right now there's not enough. Tech companies basically have.... It's the wild west. They have no accountability. They know that their products hurt children, and they're not putting in safety measures.

There was a study recently looking at Instagram. They looked at 47 safety measures, and only eight of them were effective. They know what they need to do to protect kids. They don't want to. They don't have any incentive, and they have no accountability, so why would they do it when they're profit-driven companies?

The other thing I want to say about free speech is that we have to ask who is raising these concerns. Oftentimes, the concern is coming from people who are funded by tech companies. I'll give you another analogy: Saying that putting any restrictions on tech companies would hinder your freedom online is like saying that the laws that regulate driving—speed limits and seat belts—are going to hinder your ability to drive safely on the road.

I think it's a lot of smoke, and I don't think the data is there.

[Kerry Diotte, Conservative, Edmonton Griesbach, AB]

Finally, it's the same question for Ms. Hill.

[Kathryn Ann Hill]

I'm sorry. Are you asking how we navigate that fine line?

[Kerry Diotte, Conservative, Edmonton Griesbach, AB]

Yes, basically I'm asking about the fine line between too much government control and not enough. I think that's what we're all trying to determine.

[Kathryn Ann Hill]

I'll preface this by saying that I'm not a lawyer or a legislator.

What we believe, and what we know, is that the expertise does exist in Canada. I would say that how we navigate that fine line is by consulting with the best thinkers we have in our nation and by consulting with civil society organizations about the concerns that may be present.

If we look at some of the legislation that's gone through or was attempted to be passed, we see that there were a lot of critiques that came from academia, from civil society and—for legislation that was directed at youth—from youth themselves. I think it's figuring out a process, when we're drafting this legislation, where we're including those voices up front so that we have an opportunity to look for where the pitfalls are and to learn from other nations where they've encountered those pitfalls—because, without question, we need regulation.

As you said, we all want children to be much safer. Nobody is fighting that fight; everybody believes and supports that. It's about how we get there. Part of that is by finding legislation that will protect privacy. That is critically important. We can't pass legislation that infringes on children's or adults' privacy rights and guarantees of freedom of speech. We absolutely must do that as a democracy—we care about that very deeply—but we can also protect children. We can do all those things.

[The Chair, Liberal, Lisa Hepfner]

I will turn now to Ms. Royer.

You have the floor for five minutes.

[Zoe Royer, Liberal, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Professor Coulter, you noted an uptick in the number of violent images that young people are exposed to online. I'd love for you to elaborate on what you're seeing in the research as to the psychological or behavioural impacts of that repeated exposure and what that looks like for adolescents.

If you can, I'd also like you to give us a rough idea of how many images the average young person is exposed to by the age of 16, and what that level of saturation means for their ability to process that harmful or graphic content.

There's a third piece here: Are these impacts experienced differently by boys and girls emotionally, socially or in terms of risk behaviour?

[Natalie Coulter]

Thank you very much for that question.

I don't have any hard numbers, but I do know that UNICEF has done a worldwide study looking at over 280,000 young people. I can draw that up if you'd like.

What I would like to say, in terms of pushing images online, is that one of the important things to remember about social media is that the way the algorithms work is designed to make money off harmful and hateful images because they circulate faster and they move faster. This is embedded right into the design of social media companies. We can see that in the way hate speech and a lot of different images get circulated.

I think that's an important piece to remember, that part of the business design and the nature of the way it's making money is actually to circulate and promote these kinds of images, because they do circulate a lot faster. They move a lot faster. Every time they move and circulate, it keeps young people online and scrolling more, but it also means that content is moving, which means that they make much more money from that. I think the impact it has on young people is that it's very difficult for young people to protect themselves from it, to not have those algorithms push that content towards them.

I think the impact it has on young people is very different in different communities. This is one place where we really have to think about how it's easy to talk about children and it's easy to talk about young people, but when we see something circulating, like an image of.... One of the images that have circulated.... In the United States, we see a lot of horrible images of people being harmed by police that get circulated over and over and circulate to young people, and that has a much bigger impact on young people of colour, and maybe on boys of colour, than it does on other young people.

I think we always have to be really critical in thinking about how it's easy to paint young people with one brush, and we have to think about how the intersectionality of all these different kinds of content does shape and impact young people from different kinds of points and perspectives.

[Zoe Royer, Liberal, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

Thank you for that.

I seem to recall a statistic from at least 10 years ago, which was that by the time a young person is 16, they've seen over 100,000 violent images, and what happens is that they develop a bit of numbness, including many of the things that you describe.

I'd like to go to Ms. Hill now.

You mentioned that countries such as Finland, the U.K. and Brazil have national digital literacy strategies, while Canada does not yet. Could you please outline what those strategies typically include and how they support safer online experiences for young people?

[Kathryn Ann Hill]

I'd be happy to.

Finland is one, globally, that we turn to fairly regularly. They started very early on in Finland. They started their media literacy education in the 1950s, and that was necessitated by issues of exposure to propaganda for their citizens. They started addressing how to improve critical thinking and build the resilience of their citizens to the misinformation, disinformation and lies that exist in propaganda. They started that in the 1950s.

Their strategy is lifelong learning. We have a lot of evidence to support that lifelong learning is incredibly valuable and important, and that it is the one way we're going to build our resilience. They start at pre-kindergarten and continue through to seniors' centres. It's a national strategy with national leadership, saying this education matters and it needs to exist in all types of environments.

We're not just talking about K to 12. We've allowed ourselves, to some degree, in Canada to be distracted by that. We say it's an educational issue, hence it's a provincial mandate and we can't do anything federally because this is about kindergarten to grade 12. We need to take it out of that narrative and perspective and say, no, this is about lifelong learning and learning everywhere all the time. As we know, the AI we're living with today is already different from the AI we were living with six months ago, and the technology we had a year ago already seems out of date. Lifelong learning is critical if we're going to have generational opportunities to protect children and youth.

We have to think about the vulnerable members of our society, as well, and the people who are highly marginalized. We talk to seniors. They feel incredibly excluded and unsupported and unprepared to deal with the technology that exists and that they must interface with. You cannot find housing, get a job, access health services or access social services without using a smart phone or some kind of Internet-mediated device.

Finland is doing lifelong learning. In the United Kingdom, they are only about six or seven years ahead of us. They started investing about seven years ago through the regulator Ofcom. Ofcom is their version of our CRTC, with a slightly broader mandate. They invested heavily and developed a strategy and a platform called “Making Sense of Media”. We have the privilege of sitting as an adviser to the evaluation committee for “Making Sense of Media” in the United Kingdom.

They looked at what existed at the time and what was in place. What were all of the education efforts happening across the U.K.? There was cataloguing, benchmarking and identifying strategies that were effective. That's one of the things we don't know. We don't have benchmarks. We don't know what the media or digital literacy levels of our students and all adults are in Canada, but we also don't know what the best strategies are. That's why we're evaluating our resources to see what—

[The Chair, Liberal, Lisa Hepfner]

We've run out of time for this question. I don't know if you can wrap it up quickly.