Book censorship in Canada
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Book censorship in Canada is primarily limited to the control of which books may be imported. Canada Border Services Agency is able to block materials considered to be inappropriate from entering the country, although this practice has become less frequent since the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms was put into place.[1]
Domestic censorship is uncommon, although not impossible under the Criminal Code. For example, printing or disseminating any publication containing hate speech or child pornography is a criminal act.[2] In times of war, these powers have sometimes been expanded to remove any publication with a viewpoint that opposed the government.[3]
As with book censorship in the United States, the removal of publications from libraries due to public outrage is occasionally practiced.[1] School libraries are especially likely to cause controversy. Canada has had a couple of widely publicized school board bans and one that notably turned into a Supreme Court of Canada battle, Chamberlain v. Surrey School District.[4]
The Canadian government guarantees freedom of speech and of the press within "reasonable limits" in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.[5] It is quite rare for Canada to ban books domestically, outside of wartime.[1] The Criminal Code does prohibit certain kinds of speech, such as hate propaganda and "undue exploitation of sex". Therefore the publication of any such materials could result in criminal charges.[2] During both World Wars, the War Measures Act brought into effect vast censorship, both to keep up morale and to insulate the country against opposing political views.[1]
Canadian customs officials are empowered to block the import of any material considered to be hateful, obscene, seditious, or treasonous.[6] The goal of these restrictions is largely to protect from the social harm that encouraging hateful and obscene behaviors can create. Critics, however, feel that this censorship infringes too much on their free speech rights. Unfortunately, what is or is not hateful or obscene is difficult to describe precisely. In the words of Justice Kenneth Smith "There are many examples of inconsistencies in Custom's treatment of publications." Because there are no hard limits to what is or is not banned, the law can be applied unevenly.[7] When the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms was passed in 1982, free speech rights became more protected, and fewer materials have been detained since.[1] After the Little Sisters ruling customs censorship decreased once again because the law was revised so that Customs was responsible for proving the material was inappropriate instead of the onus being on the importer to prove it is not.[7] Child pornography laws in Canada have also allowed for government censorship of books, including fictional books.[8][9]
School board bans
School board bans are usually responses to public outrage over explicit material. Primarily, these complaints are generated by individual parents, although on occasion they can come from teachers, administrators,[10] or organizations like the Parents' Rights in Education group that was responsible for sweeping bans of LGBT books in 1997 Calgary.[11] That being said, the definition of what is or is not explicit often reveals biases.[10] Obscenity is a difficult term to define concretely, so the application of the law depends upon whether or not the material questioned would offend community standards.[11] To be clear, that means community standards of the nation as a whole, not the standards of the community that the book was written for. Because of this, the removal of books tends to show prejudice. Where a book containing a chaste relationship between a straight couple is unlikely to raise any eyebrows, if that couple is gay the book is far more likely to offend the community.[7]
The most prominent example of a school board ban happened in Surrey BC in 2003, where two teachers were "accused of promulgating a gay agenda" because they wanted to teach using picture books that included same-sex couples. The Surrey school board banned the three books ("One Dad, Two Dads, Brown Dad, Blue Dads", "Belinda's Bouquet", and "Asha's Mums") originally on the grounds that they might contradict the religious beliefs of the students' families. However, as the conversation continued they expounded that they believed homosexuality was inherently inappropriate for young children. Due to the religious nature of their reasoning, this decision was tried before the Supreme Court. The court overturned the ban 7–2, on the argument that certain kinds of families may not be excluded to make others feel more comfortable. In her comments about the case Chief Justice Beverly McLachlin wrote "Tolerance is always age appropriate".[4]
In 2023, the Peel District School Board attempted to remove all titles that had been published before 2008 as an "equity-based weeding process". These books were perceived as inherently lacking inclusivity and thus harming students based solely on their publication date. The district prevented these books from being donated and required them to be thrown out. There were plans to remove any book published more than fifteen years ago on an ongoing basis "to remain culturally relevant". Stephen Lecce ordered the weeding process to be halted from its completion after thousands of books had already been removed.[12]
