The Dangerous Seductions of the ‘Anti-Racist’ Racist State

This essay is part of ICLMG’s new 20th anniversary publication, Defending Civil Liberties in an Age of Counter-terrorism and National Security. Join us for the online launch on Sept. 11, 2024, at 7pm ET. Click here for more information and to register.

By Azeezah Kanji

As white supremacist ‘extremism’ becomes a subject of increasing national security concern, the contradictions of using a racist state apparatus to address racism continue to intensify. As feminist scholars have taught,1Janet Halley, Prabha Kotiswaran, Rachel Rebouché, and Hila Shamir, Governance Feminism: An Introduction, University of Minnesota Press, 2018. there is almost nothing that can’t be turned into a weapon against us. This includes ‘anti-racism’ in the hands of the settler colonial state, which continues to reproduce the white supremacism situated at its heart – whether by the condemned violence of an ‘extremist’ hate attack, or the condoned violence of police and military killings, torture complicity, and genocidal erasure of Indigenous sovereignty.

Now, proposed online harms legislation2Canadian Heritage, “The Government’s commitment to address online safety,” Government of Canada, last modified on January 31, 2023: https://www.canada.ca/en/canadian-heritage/campaigns/harmful-online-content.html and protest restrictions3Peggy Sattler, Terence Kernaghan, Teresa J. Armstrong and Faisal Hassan “Bill 86, Our London Family Act (Working Together to Combat Islamophobia and Hatred),” Legislative Assembly of Ontario, 2022: https://www.ola.org/en/legislative-business/bills/parliament-42/session-2/bill-86 have been promulgated in the name of containing white supremacism; yet, as we know4Independent Jewish Voices Canada et al., “Anti-Racist Groups Concerned Canada’s Proposed “Online Harms” Legislation Could Do More Harm Than Good,” IJV Canada, October 4, 2021: https://www.ijvcanada.org/anti-racist-groups-concerned-canadas-proposed-online-harms-legislation-could-do-more-harm-than-good/ from both the long-term and recent history of speech policing in Canada, such powers are likely to be used in practice first and foremost to target Indigenous, Palestinian, Black, and Muslim justice activism. Similarly, Canadian politicians across the political spectrum have5Rachel Aiello, “’This was a terrorist attack,’ PM Trudeau says as MPs reflect on Islamophobia after family killed,” CTV News, June 8, 2021: https://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/this-was-a-terrorist-attack-pm-trudeau-says-as-mps-reflect-on-islamophobia-after-family-killed-1.5460984 embraced6Rachel Aiello, “MPs agree to call on feds to declare Proud Boys a terrorist entity,” CTV News, January 25, 2021: https://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/mps-agree-to-call-on-feds-to-declare-proud-boys-a-terrorist-entity-1.5281428 the use of counter-terrorism to combat ‘right-wing extremism,’ further entrenching legal instruments wielded primarily7ICLMG, Islamic Social Services Association, and Noor Cultural Centre, “Islamophobia in Canada: Submission to the UN Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion or Belief,” OHCHR, November 30, 2020: https://www.ohchr.org/sites/default/files/Documents/Issues/Religion/Islamophobia-AntiMuslim/Civil%20Society%20or%20Individuals/Noor-ICLMG-ISSA.pdf [OHCHR]. against Muslims in the name of protecting Muslims. For example, when the Proud Boys were listed as a ‘terrorist entity’ in February 2021, nine more8John Paul Tasker, “Canada labels the Proud Boys, neo-Nazi groups as terrorists,” CBC News, February 3, 2021: https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canada-proud-boys-terrorists-1.5899186 Muslim-identified groups were also quietly appended at the same time – exacerbating the list’s overwhelming Muslim-centrism under cover of anti- racism.

One of the newly added ‘terrorist’ groups is Kashmiri, operating in the context of the Indian state’s massive and abusive9Human Rights Watch, “India: Repression Persists in Jammu and Kashmir,” HRW, August 2, 2022: https://www.hrw.org/news/2022/08/02/india-repression-persists-jammu-and-kashmir military occupation: Kashmir boasts10Ifat Gazia, “In Kashmir, military lockdown and pandemic combined are one giant deadly threat,” The Conversation, July 20, 2020: https://theconversation.com/in-kashmir-military-lockdown-and-pandemic-combined-are-one-giant-deadly-threat-142252 the highest ratio of soldiers to occupied civilians in the world. Remaining on the list is charity IRFAN, penalized11Daniel Leblanc and Colin Freeze, “Charity that worked with Palestinians added to Canada’s terror list,” The Globe and Mail, April 29, 2014: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/charity-that-worked-in-palestine-added-to-canadas-terrorist-list/article18320497/ for making medical donations to Gaza; even as the terror of ‘medical apartheid’12Mouin Rabbani, “Medical Apartheid in Palestine: The Case of COVID-19 Vaccinations,” Jadaliyya, March 10, 2021: https://www.jadaliyya.com/Details/42475 and destruction13Maram Humaid, “Gaza hospital at breaking point after Israeli bombardment,” Al Jazeera August 8, 2022: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/8/8/gaza-hospital-on-breakpoint-after-israeli-bombardment of vital medical facilities inflicted against Palestinians under Israel’s occupation persists unchecked. As noted in a joint letter14Azeezah Kanji, Tim McSorley et al., “Open letter to federal leaders: Do not expand anti-terrorism laws in the name of anti-racism,” ICLMG, February 22, 2021: https://iclmg.ca/letter-federal-leaders-terrorist-entities-list/ from anti-racism, legal, and human rights experts, co-organized with the International Civil Liberties Monitoring Group (ICLMG): “The listing of organizations like the Proud Boys alongside Palestinian and Kashmiri groups […] conflates groups originating under or responding to long-term military occupation, with white supremacists and neo-Nazis, all under the rubric of a broad and inconsistent concept of ‘terrorism.’” Such examples highlight not merely the incompleteness but the profound ideological bias of a concept of ‘terrorism’ that fixates on the violence of those on the undersides of state power, while authorizing the far greater violence of the state itself.

Adding a couple of white supremacist groups to the list of ‘terrorist entities,’ or criminally charging a few white supremacists as ‘terrorists,’ does not rectify the counter-terrorism ‘colour line.’ Rather, it masks it. For instance, Nathaniel Veltman, who deliberately plowed his truck into a Muslim family in London, Ontario, is being prosecuted under ‘terrorism’ provisions for an act of mass killing already committed – while Muslims, in stark contrast, have been criminalized15Michael Nesbitt and Dana Hagg, “Terrorism Prosecutions in Canada: Elucidating the Elements of the Offences,” Alberta Law Review, February 8, 2019: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3325964 pre-emptively for acts distant16Jeffrey Monaghan, “Terror carceralism: Surveillance, security governance and de/civilization.” Punishment & Society, January 11, 2013: https://doi.org/10.1177/1462474512466197 from any death or injury at all. This has produced a situation in which Muslims, responsible for less than 10%17Andre Mayer, “Michael Zehaf-Bibeau and Martin Couture-Rouleau: How Canada tracks homegrown radicals,” CBC News, October 27, 2024: https://www.cbc.ca/news/michael-zehaf-bibeau-and-martin-couture-rouleau-how-canada-tracks-homegrown-radicals-1.2807390 of casualties18CSIS, “Public Report 2020: The Threat Environment: Ideologically Motivated Violent Extremism,” Government of Canada, last modified: April 12, 2021: https://www.canada.ca/en/security-intelligence-service/corporate/publications/2020-public-report/the-threat-environment.html#toc4 from public political violence in Canada since 9/11, have been subjected to 98%19Michael Nesbitt, “An Empirical Study of Terrorism Charges and Terrorism Trials in Canada between September 2001 and September 2018,” Criminal Law Quarterly, February 7, 2019: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3325956 of completed terrorism prosecutions, with many of the cases featuring extensive involvement of state informants, central to conceptualizing and advancing the prosecuted plots.

If Veltman were to have been treated in the same way as a Muslim, he and members of his entire family and community would have been harassed20Shanifa Nasser, “When CSIS comes knocking: Amid reports of Muslim students contacted by spy agency, hotline aims to help,” CBC News, August 7, 2019: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/csis-students-university-muslim-campus-1.5229670 regularly at their schools and workplaces by security agencies, denied21OHCHR, supra note 7. security clearances for playing paintball, surveilled22Tabasum Akseer, “Understanding the Impact of Surveillance and Security Measures on Muslim Men in Canada,” Centre for International and Defence Policy, Queen’s University, 2018: https://www.queensu.ca/cidp/sites/cidpwww/files/uploaded_files/Martello42EN.pdf in their places of worship, targeted23Bruce Livesey, “CSIS and RCMP accused of entrapping terrorism suspects,” National Observer, October 10, 2017: https://www.nationalobserver.com/2017/10/10/news/csis-and-rcmp-accused-entrapping-terrorism-suspects for entrapment while struggling with mental illness, placed24Fahad Ahmad and Jeffrey Monaghan, “From probabilities to possibilities: terrorism peace bonds, pre-emptive security, and modulations of criminal law,” Crime, Law and Social Change, July 28, 2020: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10611-020-09909-y preventively under suffocating ‘peace bond’ conditions without trial, and put25ICLMG, “Canada’s No Fly List,” ICLMG, July 19, 2018: https://iclmg.ca/issues/canadas-no-fly-list/ on no-fly lists on the basis of name coincidences and racist stereotypes. Such draconian state powers should not be extended, but dismantled.

And yet, in the very state processes purporting to study and address systemic racism in Canada, the state’s own violent operations are persistently omitted. For example, at the federal government’s National Summit on Islamophobia, convened in July 2021 in the wake of the London killings, not a single lawyer or legal expert on state Islamophobia was invited as a speaker – despite briefs co-submitted with the ICLMG emphasizing the scope and centrality of state practices in (re)producing Islamophobia as a whole. This pattern continues to be repeated in state ‘anti-Islamophobia’ initiatives. Predictably, the vast infrastructure of oppressive national security laws and practices is therefore rendered almost entirely invisible, as are the lived experiences of those who have had to bear the heaviest burden of living under them.

Meanwhile, egregiously, some of the same ‘national security experts’ responsible for legitimizing26Jessica Davis, “There are Canadian women fighting for Islamic State – and Ottawa needs a plan,” The Globe and Mail, March 17, 2019: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-there-are-canadian-women-fighting-for-islamic-state-and-ottawa-needs/ the demonizing discourse of ‘Muslim extremism’ – for example, one former CSIS analyst-turned-professor exposed27Maryam Jamshidi, “What a Few Cakes Say About the US Drone Program,” Just Security, September 16, 2020: https://www.justsecurity.org/72430/what-a-few-cakes-say-about-the-us-drone-program/ for baking cakes depicting drone deaths and torture; making anti-Muslim atrocities into items of pleasurable consumption – are now, somehow, being treated28Catharine Tunney, “London police are looking at terrorism charges in truck attack. Here’s why that’s so rare,” CBC News, June 10, 2021: https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/terrorism-charges-london-muslim-1.6057483 as authorities29Jessica Davis, “More transparency is needed on decisions about terrorism charges,” The Globe and Mail, June 10, 2021: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-more-transparency-is-needed-on-decisions-about-terrorism-charges/ on how to fight anti‑Muslim extremism. And the same Canadian political leadership that sheds tears for Muslims mowed down on a public street or shot dead while in prayer at a mosque, simultaneously maintains policies that brutalize Muslims largely out of sight – increasing30Dr Diego Lopes da Silva, Dr Nan Tian and Alexandra Marksteiner, “Trends in World Military Expenditure, 2020,” SIPRI, April 2021: https://www.sipri.org/publications/2021/sipri-fact-sheets/trends-world-military-expenditure-2020 military spending, selling31Mersiha Gadzo, “Canadian rights groups urge Trudeau to end Saudi arms sales,” Al Jazeera, September 21, 2020: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/9/21/canadian-rights-groups-urge-trudeau-to-end-saudi-arms-sales arms32Christopher Reynolds, “Singh calls for halt on Canadian arms sales to Israel as violence escalates in region,” The Canadian Press, May 12, 2021: https://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/singh-calls-for-halt-on-canadian-arms-sales-to-israel-as-violence-escalates-in-region-1.5425145 to states that slaughter Muslims, attempting33Matthew Behrens, “Canada’s slow-drip torture of refugee Mohamed Harkat,” rabble.ca, June 24, 2020: https://rabble.ca/columnists/2020/06/canadas-slow-drip-torture-refugee-mohamed-harkat to deport Muslim refugees to risk of torture, and spending34Steven Chase, “Ottawa has spent $9.3-million fighting legal claims over Canadian’s alleged torture in Sudan,” The Globe and Mail, February 15, 2021: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/politics/article-ottawa-has-spent-93-million-fighting-legal-claims-over-canadians/ millions of dollars to fight the compensation claims of ‘War on Terror’ torture survivors in court.

State ‘anti-racism’ functions not only to obscure the endemic racism of state institutions, but to augment their harmful capacities. In the January 2022 final report35Minister of National Defence Advisory Panel on Systemic Racism and Discrimination, “Final Report – January 2022,” Government of Canada, last modified: April 25, 2021: https://www.canada.ca/en/department-national-defence/corporate/reports-publications/mnd-advisory-panel-systemic-racism-discrimination-final-report-jan-2022.html of the Minister of National Defence Advisory Panel on Systemic Racism and Discrimination, for instance, remedying the racism and sexism experienced by those serving within the armed forces is upheld as essential for sustaining military recruitment. As for the acts of racist and sexist aggression endured by those on the receiving end of Canada’s military operations – including torture36Alex Neve, Chris Alexander. Craig Scott, Eileen Olexiuk, Peggy Mason, “Is the Afghan detainee case unfinished business?” Open Canada, June 14, 2017: https://opencanada.org/afghan-detainee-case-unfinished-business/ and rape37Yves Engler, “Justice for the victims of Canadian peacekeepers,” Ricochet, August 26, 2022: https://ricochet.media/en/3880/justice-for-the-victims-of-canadian-peacekeepers – they are absent from the report, and remain hidden in the shadows and shoved under the rug. Experience shows how ‘diversification’ and ‘multiculturalization’ serve as strategic assets for violent institutions. For example, in the infamous case of John Nuttall and Amanda Korody, the RCMP used38R. v. Nuttall, 2016 BCSC 1404: https://www.bccourts.ca/jdb-txt/sc/16/14/2016BCSC1404.htm Muslim officers to pose as religious authorities, to increase the efficacy of entrapment efforts against psychologically vulnerable, impoverished and marginalized Muslim targets.

Such events elucidate not only the fallacy, but the absurdity, of appealing to the colonial state apparatus as the solution to racism when in fact it lies at the source. At best, it’s like trying to empty an ocean by catching some of the waves as they wash up on shore: an exhausting and endless exercise in futility. At worst, it’s like cutting off one head of the hydra and feeding it to the others: an illusory victory which only ends up further strengthening the beast.

For tools to combat Islamophobia, visit islamophobia-is.com  and ICLMG resource page: iclmg.ca/resources-against-islamophobia

Azeezah Kanji is a legal academic and journalist, whose work focuses on anti-colonial approaches to international law, state racial violence, and the ‘War on Terror.’

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