On Thursday, May 15, Brian Passifiume of the Toronto Sun published an article entitled “Community groups sign letter opposing proposed 'bubble zone' bylaw.” In it, he made reference to a joint letter for which Social Planning Toronto was gathering signatures from community partners. The letter, which has since been sent to City Council, was responding to a proposed bylaw that would limit where peaceful protests, pickets, and demonstrations would be allowed to take place in the City of Toronto.
The letter expressed concerns that the “bubble zone” bylaw could limit our Charter-protected rights to freedom of expression and peaceful assembly, silence marginalized communities’ voices in particular, lead to police overreach, and inadequately respond to hate. It acknowledged the alarming suppression of rights and freedoms we are witnessing in the U.S., and urged Councillors to remember their legal obligations to uphold Charter rights and freedoms and protect our democracy. (The full text of the letter, along with its 67 signatories, is available to read on our blog.)
In his article, Passifiume incorrectly identified the author of the letter, calling out an SPT staff member by name and misattributing quotes to them throughout the piece.
At 10:30 a.m. May 16, Social Planning Toronto’s Executive Director Jin Huh sent an e-mail in good faith to both Passifiume and Toronto Sun Editor-in-Chief Adrienne Batra asking that all references to the staff member be removed. This was done both as a matter of correcting the public record, and out of concerns that the staff member in question, who is Muslim, will be the target of harassment.
By 3:30 p.m., the factual errors in the article had still not been corrected, and Passifiume and Batra were contacted again. The e-mails in question have been published in their entirety below, though the name of the misidentified staff member has been redacted to protect their privacy. We ask that Passifiume and Batra correct this mistake as soon as possible.
E-mail from Jin Huh to Toronto Sun journalist Bryan Passifiume and Editor-in-Chief Adrienne Batra, sent Friday, May 16 at 10:30 a.m.
Dear Bryan,
I am reaching out today to correct several errors in your recent reporting on our bubble zone open letter.
You name [REDACTED] as the key author and organizer behind the letter. This is incorrect. She was forwarding the letter on behalf of the organization and Social Planning’s signatory was me, executive director Jin Huh. (As was evident by the fact that my name was listed, along with my title, as one of the signatories.)
Though you did reach out to us for comment, you did not include the specific charges you were levelling against our staff members (as is standard during a fact checking process), which did not give us a chance to correct your error. It was also generally unclear what you were seeking comment on – as per the quote below and given the short timeline you provided us, we did not have time to follow up with you.
I am writing an article on this, and would welcome your comments -- specifically how protesting outside "vulnerable institutions" such as "places of worship, faith-based schools, cultural institutions, child care centres, and congregate settings like seniors’ homes," as quoted from your letter.
We ask that you remove all mentions of [REDACTED].
Secondly, you suggest that your contacting us was the reason we closed the letter. You may not have noticed that the deadline for the letter closing was very clearly stated on the webpage – noon yesterday.
We have closed the letter – at the time we had planned from weeks ago – so we can send it to City Council ahead of Thursday's council meeting. We will be publishing the final text on our website and in our newsletter, where it can be easily accessed by the public.
Thank you for your time. We look forward to seeing the corrections on your website as soon as possible.
Jin
Follow-up e-mail from Jin Huh to Toronto Sun journalist Bryan Passifiume and Editor-in-Chief Adrienne Batra, sent Friday, May 16 at 3:30 p.m.
Hi Bryan and Adrienne,
I continue to be very concerned about the name of my staff being incorrectly published in the article you posted yesterday. As I mentioned in my prior letter, she is neither the author nor organizer of the joint letter; in publishing her name within the context of your article with misinformation and inflammatory tone, you have unfairly created a risk of her becoming a public target.
I am respectfully asking again that you remove her name from the article immediately and amend the facts as I’ve shared below. We’ll be posting our initial letter to you to ensure the public has the correct facts.
Looking forward to your response,
Jin
At the time of posting, the Sun still has not fixed the mistake.