While continuing to deny that the murder of over 1000 Indigenous Canadian women since 1980 suggests any wider “sociological phenomenon,” Prime Minister Stephen Harper is using the deaths of four Canadians in domestic terror attacks to bring a controversial new “anti-terror legislation” into law. As evidence of the threat that terrorism now poses to the country, Harper and his ruling Conservatives have cited two domestic terror attacks in Canada last year as well as December 2014’s hostage-taking in Sydney, Australia.
Critics say that the legislation, Bill C-51, would bring Canada dangerously close to becoming a totalitarian state. Indigenous rights advocate Holly Jarrett describes the bill as “propaganda.”
“That’s what it is,” Jarrett tells me over the phone, “And this, in my opinion, is another one of his ploys to pull away attention and let the tail wag the dog.”
