The New Affirmative Action of Bill C-11, and Canada's Creative Class That Wants Nothing to Do With It.
“I'm from the government, and I'm here to help.”
- Ronald Reagan
Now that bill C-11, (aka the Online Streaming Act) has passed the Canadian Parliament, Canadian creators everywhere are humbly indebted to our fatherly (or motherly) government for ensuring their creations will be duly appreciated by the entire country. Even us lowly Substackers can now rely fully on benevolent government interventions that will undoubtedly propel us from simple mediocrity to world-famous status with a mere flip of that mysterious algorithm switch.
How wonderful it is that we have such powerful actors looking out for our best interests and doing everything possible to ensure our success in a market currently dominated by (*gasp*) merit. Ah, merit - such an antiquated concept surely has no place in a country as progressive as Canada. Indeed, the election and re-election of our current Prime Minister should be ample proof of that…
Alright. Please excuse me while I go throw up.
More and more these days, the above quote uttered by former actor and US president Ronald Reagan in 1986, drifts unbidden into my consciousness.
The complete quote is this:
The nine most terrifying words in the English language are: I'm from the government, and I'm here to help.
Back in the land of reality (a land currently not inhabited by our Prime Minister), actual Canadian artists (digital and otherwise) are not as sold on this new reality as the general public is led to believe they should be.
To quote one of the more famous of these artists, Margaret Atwood:
Bureaucrats should not be telling creators what to write… it is creeping totalitarianism if governments are telling creators what to create.
Ms. Atwood doesn't mince words. There's a reason she is who she is, and it's not government “equity” that made her that.
Senator David Adams Richards, (presumably one of the 16 senators that voted against this bill) goes much further:
The idea of any hierarchical politico deciding what a man or woman is allowed to write to fit a proscribed national agenda is a horrid thing.
George Orwell says we must resist a prison of self-censorship. This bill goes a long way to construct such a prison.
As seems to be the norm with this government, any concerns expressed by the public are treated with condescension and written off as the result of “misinformation” or conspiracy theories.
Aside from the opinions of creators and artists, professionals within the industry don't seem to think much of this bill either.
Todd Beaupré, director of product management at YouTube says that pushing Canadian content on those that don't want it will result in more negative reactions from those viewers. This negative feedback will teach the algorithms that “Canadian content isn't as engaging or satisfying as other content.” This in turn could result in those Canadian videos getting fewer recommendations from the YouTube algorithms. He also states that currently over 90% of the views on Canadian content videos come from outside Canada.
BlogOfKen is specifically focused on Canada, so I would hope it would qualify as “Canadian content”. Even so, at the time of this writing, almost 20% of my readers are from outside of Canada. The last thing I need is to have this blog recommended to people who have no interest in it based on some government policy and then have them down-vote it out of spite, which then makes it less accessible to others who actually would be interested in it.
I also have a YouTube channel that I use as a creative outlet for another passion of mine, which is playing guitar. Again, this seems like it should obviously be Canadian content (since I'm a Canadian citizen living and working in Canada), but how do I know that the powers that be will consider it to be “Canadian enough”? Like, if I play a cover of Windy & Warm by American fingerpicker, Chet Atkins, is the fact that I'm a Canadian citizen and it was produced in my livingroom enough to make it Canadian content? Or does it not qualify because it was written and recorded first by an American? You can check it out and judge for yourself. And no, I'm definitely not above a little shameless, self-promotion. I think I have more faith in that, than I do in the government's idea of promoting me.
Back to David Adams Richards. As well as being a senator, Mr. Richards is also an accomplished writer who has won many awards. He is one of only three writers to have won in both the fiction and non-fiction categories of the Governor General's Award. In 2009 he was made a member of the Order of Canada for his many literary contributions. If there is anyone in this country who's opinion on this matter should be heard and respected, it's his. His speech to the Senate is so full of great quotes, I'd like to put them all in here, but it would be much better if you would just go read it yourself. Here is his full speech, and I highly recommend watching the accompanying video of him giving it. At the end, he answers a question about whether he thinks that government funding of the Arts is not necessary, even though many have benefitted from that funding. His answer was simple: “They benefitted because they were talented”. His implication here is that throwing money at those who are not talented won't benefit them anyway. This should be obvious, but seems not to be, and yet it has always been the case anyway.
I am going to leave you with one more quote from Senator Richards from that speech. The context here is that those who are making these laws don't know anything about these things, and so how could we possibly trust that they are even able to define “Canadian content”, let alone discern it?
We have filled the world with our talent, but not because of the Minister of Heritage. We have spread our books and movies across the world, but it is not because of some formula. We have insulted so many of our authors, singers, actors and painters by not paying attention to them, and then claiming them when they go somewhere else.
They come back to get the Order of Canada and to be feted at Rideau Hall. Drake is known worldwide not because of the CRTC. Thank God Drake was not up to them, or Leonard Cohen or Gordon Lightfoot either.
This law will be one of scapegoating all those who do not fit into what our bureaucrats think Canada should be.
Our creative class, whether they be musicians, bloggers, photographers, videographers, or anything else that could be converted to digital media and promoted online is getting a taste of affirmative action, and most of them want nothing to do with it. I guess they think they're better than that.
And I for one, wholeheartedly agree.