Jesse Brown Destroyed Canadaland's Credibility

Update (Nov. 21): The original version of this article did not include the updated statement from Pacinthe Mattar’s appearance on “Shortcuts #929 Stumbling Through the Fog of War" addressing the removal. We regret the error.

It also stated that it was unclear whether Brown directly or implicitly made the decision to excise the claim in their original “correction.” It has since been updated with excerpts from an listener email from Karyn Pugliese obtained by The Catch explaining she made the decision, and Brown was not involved. The original passage in this article reads as follows: “This isn’t to say Brown directly asked for this correction to be made, there’s no evidence of that. But whether implicitly or directly, Brown’s attitude and behaviour has now interfered with Canadaland reporting. At time of writing, there has been no formal announcement addressing this ‘correction.’"

Update 2 (Dec.7): I spelled Aliya Pabani’s name wrong and it took her to point it out to me for me to correct it. I’m embarrassed beyond belief. I’ve edited the piece to reflect the change and I can’t express how much I regret it.

Charting the exact rise of Canadaland’s prominence in the current news media landscape is an unnecessary task for most of my readers. If you’re aware of The Catch, you’re almost certainly aware of Canadaland. Inseparable from the podcast-network’s brand is that of its founder and publisher, Jesse Brown.

Brown, specifically, has been a sort of countercultural figure in news. As the Columbia Journalism Review notes, he began his journalism in high school directly inspired by punk zines. Since then, his name in Canadian media rose when he covered the Jian Ghomeshi trial with Kevin Donovan. His work during that time has since been criticized by Donovan, who called him a “sentence finisher", and said that Brown was reluctant to ask difficult questions.

But the core to Brown’s prominence is his founding of Canadaland, arguably the most prominent alternative news network in this country. The company has used its listener-funded model to great success, even recently celebrating its 10th anniversary. At the beginning of the pandemic, I began listening to Canadaland for an alternative approach to news and to support reporting that wasn’t dominated by huge corporate interests. I even became a paying member for a few months. The Canadaland bottle opener still hangs on my key chain. I’m looking at it as I write this.

Though the company has done good reporting (e.g. Ratfucker, Thunderbay, COMMONS), and good news media criticism, cracks rose up from time-to-time. Aliya Pabani, for instance, has publicly raised concerns about racism at the company in the past.

An unavoidable misstep came when Brown invited on Terry Glavin, an Indigenous-genocide denialist and all-around smug asshole, to platform his views. There was outcry over this decision by Brown before the interview, especially by Indigenous people, but he pursued the interview anyway. It went exactly how you expect, with Glavin shitting his diaper about being unfairly maligned. For the record, Sean Carleton, professor of Indigenous Studies at University of Manitoba, is one of the many people that has debunked Glavin’s claims. Countless Indigenous people and academics studying the subject could have been platformed and interviewed. Instead, Brown chose the most antagonistic option.

I can’t remember the exact moment I cancelled my Canadaland membership, but it was shortly before this time. Though I still listened on occasion, direct financial support was something I couldn’t justify.

With Brown’s behaviour recently, justifying consuming their work is something that every Canadaland listener has to do.

Warning Signs

The attacks on Oct. 7 and the subsequent genocide of Palestinians has resulted in a shameful amount of white-washing by legacy news media. In this environment, Canadaland was poised to combat this narrative. Initially, they did well in covering the silencing of Palestinian perspectives. Pacinthe Mattar, a journalist whom I have the utmost respect for, sat down with Jonathan Goldsbie, who guest hosted that week for Short Cuts. The episode was originally a measured understanding of the situation (we’ll return to this later). If you haven’t read Mattar’s longform feature for The Walrus about the systemic repression of marginalized voices in journalism, do so immediately. I believe it to be recommended reading.

The next week was… interesting. In the “duly noted” segment of Short Cuts episode #931 (begins around 22:00). Brown wanted to update listeners on the bombing of the al-Ahli Arab hospital that killed nearly 500 people.

Israel denied responsibility, claiming it came from the group Islamic Jihad and not their forces. Brown mentioned the “general consensus” from CNN, BBC and Associated Press, who believe the most likely outcome was that it was fired from Gaza. He briefly mentions the Al Jazeera investigation contradicting these positions, but doesn’t go into too much detail of either’s supporting arguments, except a quote from CNN.

Brown lends credibility that government statements also support that claim. “What I’m reading people express is not what they know about who’s culpable, but who they feel is to blame, (emphasis in original)” Brown said, before framing those who don’t believe Israel’s denial as falling into antisemitic conspiracy theories.

There are people who feel that if Israel was responsible for this attack, it follows that they would deny it. Then it follows that America being an ally of Israel would back them up, then, you know, Canada, the UK, of course they would follow suit and then how hard would it be for, you know, the media, the Western media to find experts to back that up. And all I’ve gotta say is, go ahead and feel that way. But if you are taking a moment to think that through, instead of feeling about it, think about it, you may realize what you’re describing is literally a global Zionist media conspiracy. That’s what that would take, and you don’t have to go there. We don’t have to have an opinion when there’s not information to know. You don’t have to decide there’s a global Zionist media conspiracy that you believe in. You can still support a free Palestine, you can still find what’s happening in Gaza right now abhorrent and do everything you can to stop it and still say “I just don’t know for sure what happened with that hospital! Maybe we’ll find out later on.”

This is a disingenuous claim. As The Catch published around the time of the al-Ahli Arab Hospital bombing, there is plenty of reason and evidence to justify doubt about Israel’s account of events. A global media conspiracy is not needed to explain these accounts, or geopolitical alliances. There may, in fact, be evidence gathered from afar that supports Israel’s claim, but evidence that contradicts them also exists. If one is interested in finding out the specifics, demand Israel let in UN investigators, which I’m sure they’ll do happily.

Additionally, the idea that news media wouldn’t reflect the position of its governments, even if it’s wrong, is an absolutely wild claim to make in the post-9/11 era. None of that context was raised, but the association of those who distrust Israel’s claims with the conspiracy theories of rabid Nazis certainly was. This is what happens when your news media criticism doesn’t contain a systemic critique.

Twitter Posts

Brown has since been sharing instances of antisemitism that have occurred since Oct. 7. For context, Brown himself is Jewish and clearly cares about raising awareness of antisemitic incidents (as we all should). These include a rabbi in Ottawa being threatened, and a Montreal synagogue being firebombed. But the issue is that Brown has also shared instances of antisemitic attacks that use pro-Palestinian messaging as a cover, while refusing to point out that these are not the commonly-held beliefs of pro-Palestinian activists. It’s public knowledge that the far-right is attempting to use the Palestine liberation movement to Trojan Horse their views into the mainstream. This must be acknowledged and combated, without conflating pro-Palestine movements with the beliefs and actions of far-right white supremacists.

But Brown’s blatant and disingenuous framing of pro-Palestinian activists began in earnest when he tweeted out on November 10 “Jewish-owned bookstore vandalized,” referencing vandalism at an Indigo store.

Indigo CEO Heather Reisman founded The Heseg Foundation for Lone Soldiers. As NOW reported in 2007, its “mission is to provide scholarships to ‘lone soldiers,’ non-Israeli-born Jews without family there who nevertheless join the Israeli military.” Reisman was not targeted because she’s Jewish, she was targeted because she directly and materially supports the Israeli military.

Deep in the replies of the erroneous tweet, Brown acknowledged this when it was pointed out to him. At time of writing, the original tweet framing it as an antisemitic act is still up, while his reply admitting he was wrong remains buried.

Then, Brown quadruple-downed on this framing, in a thread on the website that began with the words “Are you active in pro-Palestine/ceasefire/BDS protests? Do you reject accusations of antisemitism in your movement? I really want to talk to you.”

Despite Brown beginning it with a declaration that he doesn’t intend on conflating anti-Zionism with antisemitism, he uses actual antisemitic incidents in the thread alongside pro-Palestinian sentiments interchangeably. He conflates the vandalizing of Indigo with the 85th anniversary of Kristillnacht, as though the storefronts of Jewish people under Nazi Germany compare to a national brand run by a CEO that directly funds a fascist military organization.

“I promise you that most Jews don't know your list about which Jewish businesses are tied to Israel and which are not,” Brown writes in one tweet, using a photo of a Palestinian flag outside Cafe Landwer. “What we know is that angry protesters are confronting us in the places where Jews go to eat, get coffee, shop, and drop off our kids.” The entire point of these protests, Brown omits, is to draw attention to the companies that are tied to Israel. If it makes patrons of that company uncomfortable, that’s the point.

Brown accuses Shree Paradkar, Toronto Star ombudsman, of antisemitism for retweeting a white Jewish woman discussing not centring themselves as Palestine is subjected to genocide. Then, he ignores someone bringing up his silence on the murder of journalist Shireen Abu Akleh by focusing on being called an “emoji millionaire.” Brown then states “it does ring a ‘fuck this rich Jew’ bell.”

Since then, Brown tweeted “Starbucks in Jewish neighbourhood vandalized,” ignoring that it took place on a day of labour action against Starbucks. These coincided with the Pro-Palestinian movements due to Starbucks’ suing the union for their statement released in support of Palestine. Since November 16, he has largely stayed silent, with the last post being an attempt to distance the views of Canadaland and its employees.

It’s notable that Brown has not platformed any of the documented crimes committed by Israel to even remotely the same level. An estimated 17,000 Palestinians in Gaza have been killed as Israel continues to commit genocide, alongside those killed from settler violence in the West Bank. That’s what gets lost in this discussion.

Canadaland Reporting Affected

In response to Brown’s continuous bizarre and dishonest framing on Twitter, Editor-in-Chief Karyn Pugliese, for whom I also have immense respect, released a statement. Posted to the Canadaland Twitter account, Pugliese stated Brown’s statements are not indicative of the company’s views. “Personal opinions posted on an individual’s account do not necessarily reflect those of the company, or of the staff as a whole.”

Painting Brown’s behaviour as his own personal beliefs which don’t reflect Canadaland is an exercise in futility. Brown built the entire brand of his podcast network off of his approach to journalism, his role in its growth and its attitude towards reporting. It’s fair to say that Brown’s integral connection to Canadaland has no equal, except possibly Conrad Black to the National Post.

Pugliese only recently joined the Canadaland team as EIC, after taking over from Brown. It’s telling that she opened the letter by introducing herself as the “new editor-in-chief,” but what’s more telling is that this statement doesn’t mention the removal of a verified story in one of their podcasts by claiming it was unverified.

The episode in which Mattar appeared originally contained her discussing the incident of a reporter being threatened live on-air by an Israeli police officer. Canadaland has removed that discussion from the episode. “A previous version of this episode featured claims of an altercation between an alleged Israeli police officer and Arabic-speaking reporter, elements of which Canadaland has since not been able to verify.”

What they meant by this is unclear, as Reporters Without Borders has verified this incident.

Mattar further stated on Twitter, “I've emailed Canadaland 3 separate times to clarify their reasoning for removing this anecdote. They say they 'couldn't verify': 1) whether the Israeli officer was police or security, 2) the accuracy of the translation. It doesn't add up.” She then linked to Reporters Without Borders’ on the incident.

Since that was made public by Mattar, there has been another update to the podcast that links to the same Reporters Without Borders piece that Mattar linked. It reads as follows: “(Update, November 17, 2023: While the Israeli security agent involved does not appear to have been a police officer, other details of the encounter have since been verified elsewhere.)”

In an email to a listener obtained by The Catch, Pugliese addressed the original decision to remove the segment.

The decision to make that edit to the video was not Jesse’s. It was mine and the Managing editors as it came to our attention there were two possible errors of fact. We did not want to publish inaccurate information and we wanted to be transparent about the cut. As it turned out, it was a good thing. Based on the information now provided by Reporters without Borders we did, indeed, originally publish one important error. I think we did well to make that edit.. I am glad we were transparent about it.

Brown’s provably disingenuous framing and vehement doubling-down has destroyed the credibility Canadaland painstakingly built over the past decade. He blatantly kneecapped that image through dishonest omissions and framing. Interference soon followed, whatever the circumstances surrounding it. The good work done by him and his team has been tarnished, and any work published in the future now has an irrevocable black stain on it. It’s doubtful that Canadaland will implode from this, but if you’re looking for reporting that challenges the narratives provided by legacy media, Brown and Canadaland have concretely proved they aren’t interested.

It was my (perhaps naive) hope that I, an independent journalist that prioritizes countercultural values, would fulfill my internship, or achieve a job, at the company. There’s been problems with Canadaland reporting in the past, but no news outlet is perfect. Unfortunately, that view has been shattered. Brown has plunged headfirst into his mission to conflate mass movements working stop genocide with antisemitic beliefs. It’s not that he’s unaware, people have concretely shown that he’s omitted facts, yet he continues to keep up posts that contain misleading information.

The Conrad Black comparison appears increasingly more apt. After this, there’s little reason to distinguish between Canadaland and the National Post in my view.

Congratulations, Jesse, very punk zine of you. Here’s hoping your union has more sense than you.