f you really want to burst the media narrative on Canada’s so-called anti-Islamophobia motion, take a look at how they covered a little something called
M-312 in the last government.
Back in 2012, the House of Commons voted on a motion by Conservative MP Stephen Woodworth that called for the formation of a special committee to revisit a section of the Criminal Code that states a child becomes a human being only at the moment of complete birth.
It lost by a 2-1 margin but not before substantial media controversy. This was, we were told, the beginning of a plot to ban abortion in Canada.
Now, at face value, this was not true. The motion did not once mention abortion. Nor did it propose any changes to any laws or federal policies, aside from calling on the committee to recommend potential revisions to that section of the Code. These recommendations could then be ignored and, as happens all the time, the report left to collect dust.
Yet it’s not like these caveats caused critics, or the press, to play down their coverage. They went full steam ahead, drumming up fear from coast to coast. And they were well within their right to do just that.
After all, Woodworth was a vocal social conservative at a time when his like-minded MPs in caucus were frustrated to discover that, even though their government had reached the promised land of majority status, Stephen Harper would not be advancing any socially conservative legislation.
Canadians have a right to know the potential long-term ramifications of even the smallest of gestures coming from their parliamentarians. This is what the media did with M-312. Yet they’re doing the exact opposite when it comes to
M-103.
