No place in municipal politics for threats, real or perceived
Iqaluit council has the authority to make decisions — even bad ones — without feeling threatened
Members of the public look on during the June 10 Iqaluit city council meeting. Coun. Sam Tilley, seated on the right, later condemned a pair of Facebook comments targeting councillors, calling it a “threat.” (Photo by Arty Sarkisian)
The risk with employing “dark humour” to make a point is that some people are going to find it too dark while others will simply find it unfunny.
That’s why it’s not surprising that the Nunavut RCMP took an interest in some Facebook comments made about Iqaluit city council’s recent changes to its animal control bylaw. Council reduced the length of time the city has to wait before killing a loose dog its officers catch to 24 hours from seven days.
After council passed the measure on June 10, a critic posted on Facebook: “It would be a truly terrible shame if anyone ever came across the city officials who passed this amendment and mistook them for lost/unclaimed dogs.”
A second commenter replied saying, “my eyesight is pretty bad these days so anything is possible” and followed it up with a laughing emoji. She later explained the comment away as “dark humour.”
But it read like the kind of message Tony Soprano used to send: Nice house … it’d be shame if something were to happen to it.
Coun. Sam Tilley shared a screenshot of the exchange on Facebook and said he considered it a threat.
Two days later, the RCMP said they received a complaint about the social media messages and were investigating. As of Thursday, no charges had been laid.
Nunatsiaq News covered the social media uproar because it was newsworthy. It fit the classic man-bites-dog (no pun intended) definition of a news story — something unusual you don’t see every day.
Sadly, we live in a world where elected representatives are gunned down at their homes, as two Minnesota lawmakers were last week — the day after police in Iqaluit began their investigation into the Facebook comments.
But that’s in the United States, you say?
In 2023, Gov. Gen. Mary Simon closed her own social media accounts to comments because of “abusive, misogynistic and racist” posts, including “violent threats.”
In Ottawa in 2019, a police hate crime investigator looked into a sexist slur scrawled on the window of Liberal cabinet minister Catherine McKenna’s campaign office.
That same year, the clerk of the Privy Council, Michael Wernick, warned that overheated political rhetoric on social media was creating an environment in which he feared “somebody is going to be shot” during that year’s election campaign.
Public officials need to be able to do their work free of the fear of threats, whether real or perceived.
Regardless of how you feel about Iqaluit’s rules about the euthanizing of loose dogs, the council has the authority to make decisions — even bad ones — without being intimidated or threatened.
A previous editorial pointed out councillors did a dismal job of engaging the public on what they should have known would be a controversial issue. Both council and city hall failed to provide a good public explanation for why a 24-hour period before putting a dog down is better than the previous seven-day hold.
Overheated rhetoric, including threats, is one factor keeping good people from running for public office. And goodness knows, Iqaluit residents desperately need good candidates to run for city council.
If there’s one thing that appears irresistible to advanced apes like us it’s pearl clutching and moral grandstanding.
Give me a break…
Violence is an effective political tool
Every community in Nunavut have this problem. What will it take for the public to see loose dogs as a major problem. Children have been mauled and killed. I’ve always said all dogs bite no matter what. It’s an animal! If people can’t take care of a pet then don’t get a pet! Simple!
Nice gift to a child at Christmas or birthday but it’s a commitment for life! Think about that! People don’t like this decision, go run in the next election! People are never satisfied, can’t make everyone happy. Oh well, damn if you do and damn if you don’t! I say go with the 24 hr and kill the animals.
I think the irony is that there are vastly more dangerous things to Nunavut children, issues that are not to be spoken of. Yet we are now using our loose dogs as the threat real threat…..how about we do the same to all Nunavut children’s threats…frankly if that was the reason, lets open the discussion. I don’t think thats the true reason though, its simply using it as the excuse.
8 posts this weekend on social media of dogs lost or broke from leashes this week. This has escalated a ton over the past 5 years or so. This is easily the most amount of loose dogs is higher than ever. One dude complained the price had gone up on him because it was not the first time he had to get the dog back from the city.
It has got to a point where something had to be done. Now that they did something, dog owners are NOW want to talk? People have been upset about this for years.
Seven articles and two editorials? At this point, even the fire’s asking for a day off. Maybe Nunatsiaq should switch to covering the weather — at least it cools off occasionally.
There’s a term for this called “flooding the zone with shit” … which should be used as a subtitle under the banner of this particular outlet.
Only in Iqaluit would a sarcastic throw-away comment on social media give rise to a police investigation, two news articles, and now this nothing-burger of an editorial. Jim Bell must be rolling over in the grave.
Interesting cherry pick of when threats are tolerated.
Weekly on social media, there are threats against the cab drivers and security at boarding home and the bars. There is not a peep from anyone. Not from the city, not from the media, and not from other locals. These threats of violence are common. Very common.
While I might not agree with Janelle on this dog issue, we can’t pretend that we have not seen her get threats.
All of a sudden online threats are not acceptable? Miss me with this nonsense.
Letting your dogs run beside your truck isn’t ‘on a leash’, not when there are other vehicles on the road. This should not be a difficult concept, but apparently it is.
At the same time when there have been other complaints brought the the police regarding social media posts the police always say… we cant prove it was them that actually wrote it so we cant do anything about it.