Evidence of meeting #31 for Public Safety and National Security in the 43rd Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was far-right.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Bloc
Andréanne Larouche Bloc Shefford, QC
My question is about the fact that you're talking about your upcoming study on the far right in the Canadian Armed Forces. You're talking about toxic masculinity, so the sexualization of women's bodies. You're also talking about—
Director, Research Professor, Centre d’expertise et de formation sur les intégrismes religieux, les idéologies politiques et la radicalisation
I didn't conduct a study on women in the Canadian army. However, we conducted a study at the Royal Military College Saint-Jean, which is close to our place. This study looked at the officer cadets' beliefs and knowledge about different religions and radicalization. We'll be presenting this study at the conference.
That said, studies have already been carried out on the far right in the army. The results of these studies will also be presented during the conference in February. I don't have any results to show you today, because we don't have them yet.
In addition, I have done many interviews with women who were high-ranking members of various far-right groups in Quebec. They all told me the same thing. The role of women in this group is traditional. The women are there, ultimately, to serve the men.
However, there are sometimes exceptions. For example, the Soldiers of Odin had a woman leader, Katy Latulippe. Very often, these women become leaders of the group when their boyfriend is in prison or when something of that nature happens. It's a bit like a transfer of power within the family. Women often join these groups by being someone's girlfriend, basically.
In general, the role of women is quite traditional in these groups.
Bloc
Andréanne Larouche Bloc Shefford, QC
Okay.
I'll go back to the previous question.
Clearly we must take ideologically motivated violent extremism seriously. As you have seen, this type of extremism increased significantly between 2013 and 2018. This includes the hatred expressed by groups such as the neo-Nazis, or the misogynistic culture with the incel or “involuntary celibacy” movement. These hate groups have used social media as a communication tool a great deal. In the report, you also explain that the isolation and job loss caused by the pandemic amplified the risks of people ending up in online echo chambers where these extreme ideologies can spread.
How could we prevent this radicalization, which we can see is linked to the increased online presence during the pandemic?
Director, Research Professor, Centre d’expertise et de formation sur les intégrismes religieux, les idéologies politiques et la radicalisation
I would say that it's linked to the online presence, but that it goes much deeper than that.
Cognitive biases play a key role in conspiracy theories and all those extremist groups that believe in conspiracy theories. These biases are very significant, and not only for extremists, both far left and far right. The biases have been amplified by what Gérald Bronner, a French colleague with whom I work, calls the cognitive marketplace of ideas online. In the marketplace of ideas, we don't have any control. The most attractive proposals aren't true or scientific, but instead revolve around conspiracy theories.
Racism and immigration issues are often behind these conspiracy theories. There has been a great deal of talk about QAnon. Actually, QAnon is recycling old conspiracy theories and modernizing them. This happens in cycles and it's always the same conspiracy theories.
In the case of QAnon, it's about a global pedosatanic cabal. However, I can tell you that, in the 1990s, I studied a group of Catholic fundamentalists called the White Berets based in Rougemont. I don't know whether you're familiar with them.
Director, Research Professor, Centre d’expertise et de formation sur les intégrismes religieux, les idéologies politiques et la radicalisation
In the 1990s, the White Berets were already talking about a global pedosatanic cabal. They said that the government would inject chips under our skin to control us. Does that sound familiar? We're hearing that quite often today.
When people talk about QAnon as if it's a brand new thing, I find that somewhat amusing, because these types of conspiracy theories keep coming back.
The purpose of a conspiracy theory is to find a scapegoat for our misfortunes. Goodness knows that, in the past year, many people have suffered a great deal of misfortune. Of course, there was a need to find a scapegoat. One way to fill that need was to talk about the “Chinese virus.”
Liberal
The Chair Liberal John McKay
Thank you. I apologize again, but we're in rough shape here.
Go ahead, Mr. Harris, for six minutes, please.
NDP
Jack Harris NDP St. John's East, NL
Thank you, Chair.
Thank you to both of you for the very interesting presentations.
First of all, Dr. Geoffroy, you talked about these groups changing or morphing over the years and said that lately they are all acting out to become anti-vaccination and anti-public health. Does that mean they're not really tied to any particular ideology and are perhaps looking for a place to act up, looking for a home or looking for a cause to align with so they can carry out their attitudinal behaviour? Is that going on as well?
Director, Research Professor, Centre d’expertise et de formation sur les intégrismes religieux, les idéologies politiques et la radicalisation
We and our colleagues from the UNESCO Chair at the Université de Sherbrooke are conducting parallel research on the various movements against health measures. A core group of people who are part of these movements or who believe in this agenda come from the far right.
During the pandemic, we've seen different movements coming together in anti-health measures groups. These movements are merging and working together in a category that I would call the “anti-authority movements.” My colleague, Ms. Perry, has already published articles on this topic.
Anti-authority movements are often conspiracy movements that question all forms of authority: government authority, health authority and educator authority. According to these groups, educators like me are indoctrinators.
During the pandemic, we've seen that they have—
NDP
Jack Harris NDP St. John's East, NL
Excuse me, but I'll interrupt. I'm just trying to keep the questions going.
Are they migrating from other existing groups, such as the Atalante or the various other ones you mentioned?
Director, Research Professor, Centre d’expertise et de formation sur les intégrismes religieux, les idéologies politiques et la radicalisation
Yes, there's a shift. One leader of the anti-health measures movement in Quebec, Steeve L'Artiss Charland, is the former second-in-command of La Meute. There's also Mario Roy, who is now in prison for contempt of court and who is part of the sovereign citizens movement. He's a former member of La Meute and Storm Alliance. Because of a decline in these groups in Quebec, in 2019, many of these people moved over to the anti-health measures groups. They even took the lead and managed to solidify this movement.
We've also seen other groups. For example, the anti-vaccine groups include many people from the new age movement and people who believe that cancer can be cured by the power of thought. Before the pandemic, these groups were considered somewhat dangerous. However, I don't know whether you've noticed, but with the pandemic, the anti-vaccine movement has become dangerous. It's one thing to refuse a vaccine, but in the context of a pandemic, this could cause death.
We didn't care too much about these movements before the pandemic. However, strangely enough, the movements have come together. I can now see that the anti-vaccine movement will merge with the far-right agenda. During the pandemic, these agendas found a way to join forces. Will they split up or splinter again after the pandemic, or will they continue to merge? That's a good question. I'm not a futurist.
NDP
Jack Harris NDP St. John's East, NL
With regard to the idea of these individual groups being a danger to society, when I look at your research, the end result is about 20% over 10 years of involvement in some kind of violence, which would be either verbal, physical or online.
How serious is the danger that they pose? There are “threats and hate speech” listed in your categories of violence, also “vandalism”, “mischief”, “physical conflict”, “harassment and bullying”, “attacks and assault” at 6%, and “terrorism” is 1%.
Are they a serious threat and danger to life and limb, or are they at a lower level than that, for the most part?
Director, Research Professor, Centre d’expertise et de formation sur les intégrismes religieux, les idéologies politiques et la radicalisation
I'm often told that these groups aren't dangerous because they're small in number and marginal. We often estimate that the far right in Canada amounts to less than 1% of the population. Political parties that have a far-right ideology don't get many votes. The parties will get less than 1% of the vote. They won't succeed in getting members elected to Parliament, for example. Within the population, these groups are extremely marginal.
However, just because they're marginal doesn't mean that they aren't dangerous. For a terrorist attack to occur, all it takes is one person fuelled by extremist ideologies. We saw this in the attack on the Great Mosque of Quebec City. The small groups are dangerous given that it takes only a few individuals for these types of acts to occur. Moreover, an individual becomes dangerous when they're desperate, meaning when they see that their political option has no hope of being democratically recognized or of succeeding. At that point, they may think that violence is the only way to further their cause.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal John McKay
Unfortunately, we're going to have to leave it there. I apologize, again, which I do quite frequently.
Colleagues, once again, we have 25 minutes' worth of questioning in the second round, and we have 17 minutes in which to accomplish it. I'm going to be arbitrary again and cut members back to about half of what they were anticipating.
With that, we'll start with Mr. Kurek for three minutes.
Ms. Lambropoulos will then have the floor for three minutes.
There will be one and a half minutes for Mr. Harris and Ms. Larouche, and Mrs. Stubbs and Ms. Damoff will have three minutes each.
Mr. Kurek.
Conservative
Damien Kurek Conservative Battle River—Crowfoot, AB
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
Again, I'd like to thank both of the witnesses for coming today.
Mr. Gurski, what would your expert opinion be on the threshold for determining if something rises to being terrorism? It appears that there's a great deal of overlap between what could be religious extremism, in motivated attacks, for example, against the Jewish community, but those could also be xenophobic IMVE, by this study's definition. Similarly, anarchy is a political system defined by the absence of a government.
How do you differentiate from political extremism when it comes to anti-authority violence, and is there any differentiation between these groups?
As an Individual
It's an excellent question, and I'm glad you asked it. As somebody who worked in counterterrorism for as long as I did, I ask myself that a lot of times too.
We at CSIS were driven by the Criminal Code, and in section 83.01 of the Criminal Code, it defines an act of terrorism as a serious act of violence planned or perpetrated for three primary reasons: ideological, political or religious. That's right in the Criminal Code.
A lot of what I'm hearing described today, in my mind, would not qualify as an act of terrorism. It would qualify as a hate crime, such as misogyny. It could qualify as run of the mill, if I can use that term. For example, I hear a lot of references to the incel attack in Toronto in 2018. I went on record in Canadian media saying that it was not an act of terrorism. It was an act of violent misogyny.
I do think when we mass these terms together, it's very problematic. It's very problematic from the perspective of who gets to look at them. CSIS doesn't do criminal investigations. It's the security intelligence service that gathers intelligence to help the RCMP and law enforcement at the end of the day.
I think we have to be very careful with terminology here. A lot of what Mr. Geoffroy is talking about is absolutely worrisome to me, but it sure as heck isn't terrorism. It's something else that's on our plate of ills, if you want, as a Canadian society. I prefer to limit the term very closely. I've even advocated to just get rid of the term “terrorism” altogether out of the Criminal Code, because there are other crimes, other prosecutions, that are possible to take care of these things.
Conservative
Damien Kurek Conservative Battle River—Crowfoot, AB
It's tough to ask a question after that, but if you could define “violent extremism”, what would that definition be?
As an Individual
Most people will see violent extremism and terrorism as synonymous. I tend to lean in that direction and, to be perfectly honest, Mr. Kurek, I don't have the time to split hairs on whether there's a different between the two. They are virtually synonymous.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal John McKay
Thank you, Mr. Kurek.
Madam Lambropoulos, you have three minutes, please.
Liberal
Emmanuella Lambropoulos Liberal Saint-Laurent, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I'd like to thank both of our witnesses for being here with us to answer our questions. It has been very interesting testimony on both parts.
My first question is for Mr. Geoffroy.
In your report, you referred to 521 events observed. Does this include online events? I don't know whether you spoke about this.
Director, Research Professor, Centre d’expertise et de formation sur les intégrismes religieux, les idéologies politiques et la radicalisation
This doesn't include online events. It includes only events that happened in the real world. The only online events that we included were harassment events.
Liberal
Emmanuella Lambropoulos Liberal Saint-Laurent, QC
I'll ask my second question.
Do you know the causes of the increase observed over the past decade?
I'm not talking about 2020 because you said that it was by far the year with the most cases. I think that it was quite a unique year. You spoke about the Quebec case, and I understand your point.
Under normal circumstances, why would this increase occur?
Director, Research Professor, Centre d’expertise et de formation sur les intégrismes religieux, les idéologies politiques et la radicalisation
This is the topic of a study coming out in September in which we're developing a psychosocial profile based on interviews. I can't talk too much about that right now.
The reasons are extensive and complex. I'll give you the example of an interview that I conducted with the leader of La Meute, Mr. Maikan. I asked him why his group came to intimidate us when we were giving a talk on the far right at the CEGEP. He told me that this was the only way for his group to be heard.
Some people in Quebec and, I think, in other parts of the world, feel that their voices aren't being heard.
Liberal
Emmanuella Lambropoulos Liberal Saint-Laurent, QC
In my own research during my master's, I looked into misogyny and violence against women specifically. One of the findings that I was able to find was that this number has gone up in big part because people and society have obviously been evolving, and more and more people are included.
Women are getting places. They're holding positions of authority and of leadership, and people can't necessarily handle that. People who have normally benefited from the status quo don't necessarily like that this is happening, and they feel like they need to speak out. What exactly are your thoughts on this?