Commentary
Aware that Sept. 11, 2026, marks the 25th anniversary of the largest and most notorious act of terror in human memory, the CBC’s senior director of journalistic standards and public trust issued a memo to news staff reminding them of the public broadcaster’s policy. It stated:
“Do not refer to the Sept. 11 attacks as terrorist attacks. The hijackings led to passenger jet crashes in Washington, D.C., Pennsylvania and Manhattan. The World Trade Center (WTC in second reference) was destroyed.”
For those too young to remember, on Sept. 11, 2001, 24 members of Al-Qaeda, an organization known for its terror tactics, hijacked four American commercial flights. Two of them were flown into the twin towers of the World Trade Centre, each of which collapsed, killing 2,753 people, several of whom jumped to their deaths to avoid being consumed by flames.
A third plane was crashed into the Pentagon, killing 184 people, while a fourth plowed into a Pennsylvania field after passengers launched an assault on the cockpit.
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Given its nature, it came as no surprise that the CBC memo was leaked. The recipient, Warren Kinsella, revealed its existence in his Toronto Sun column and, not surprisingly, controversy ensued.
News organizations in the United States and the UK moved to match the story, and social media lit up with posts from people alarmed that the CBC, Canada’s public broadcaster and recipient of roughly $1.5 billion in annual funding, would be troubled by applying the term “terrorism” to the events of Sept. 11, 2001.
“Any agency in Canada that doesn’t publicly reject this bastardization of history, and an insult to the souls lost during our largest terrorist attack in US history will no longer have friend in this FBI,” Patel wrote. “Not to mention our heroes that responded in the aftermath. WE WILL NEVER FORGET 9-11.”
Just in case Canadians missed Patel’s message, U.S. Ambassador Pete Hoekstra drove the point home with his own statement:
“Just this year the FBI has been instrumental in or directly responsible for multiple disruptions of significant terrorist and violent criminal organizations operating within Canada. Failure to recognize and confront radical and terrorist ideologies significantly endangers our efforts to establish and harmonize a shared national and economic security partnership.”
It didn’t take long for Canadian officials to take the hint. The nation’s security depends heavily on the FBI, which monitors the internet, for tips on risks. The Canadian Security Intelligence Service, in a rare public move, posted that “we know that the devastating terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, changed the world, tragically ended many lives, and affected thousands more.”
Shortly after that, Canadian Identity and Culture Minister Marc Miller, through whom the CBC reports to Parliament, indicated his approval, calling the decision to amend the policy a “welcome change to what was a piece of pedantic and foolish guidance that caused legitimate anger.”
This revealed three things. The first was that Canada depends mightily on U.S. agencies for information vital to its own security and that, even within the context of the current trade dispute, that’s not something it can put at risk.
The second was that the Americans are confident that its security agencies are of a lot more value to Canada than Canada’s are to it and that it is willing to use that leverage as it sees fit.
The final point is that the CBC is not so independent of government that it and its policies cannot be influenced by those in power—the people the public expects journalists to hold accountable. There’s little doubt that there are situations within which the use of words like terrorism can be problematic. Equally obvious is that the 9/11 events are not among them.
The decision to issue the directive to CBC journalists in advance of the anniversary was ill-considered, and the public broadcaster was correct to amend it.
What we are left to worry about now, though, is whether the CBC makes its own decisions about how to cover the news. If it doesn’t, and in an age in which media are increasingly dependent on government subsidies, Canadians might have a lot more to worry about than whether the public broadcaster allows its reporters to use the word “terrorism.”
Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
