Canada’s Far-Right is Targeting South Asian and Sikh Canadians to Incite Anti-Immigrant Hate

Anti-hate experts and researchers say Canada’s far-right is shifting its focus to spreading conspiracy theories and sowing hate towards South Asian and Sikh communities in Canada.

In recent weeks, many far-right Canadian influencers have ramped up attacks against Canadians of South Asian origin – particularly Sikhs – telling them to “go back to their country,” while blaming immigrants for societal ills, like unemployment or housing.

Others have taken to filming or photographing people without their consent and encouraging their followers to do the same while spreading misinformation and harmful narratives about immigrants.

Peter Smith, journalist and researcher with the Canadian Anti-Hate Network, says there has been a visible increase in content targeting of South Asians in Canada.

“There is definitely a trend within the far-right spaces, particularly in Canada, of targeting South Asian communities and individuals for derision,” Smith told PressProgress. “They are making them the focus of a lot of anti-immigrant narratives and we’re seeing the phrase, ‘they have to go back’ being deployed a lot.”

Smith says the far-right in Canada has honed in on the South Asian and Sikh community as their latest target.

“I think the far-right in Canada excels when it has kind of an issue du jour and that, unfortunately for South Asian communities, they have kind of become it for the last little bit.”

“Last year there was a heavy focus on 2SLGBTQ+ events, particularly at libraries, not to say that that has gone away by any extent, but there’s kind of these peaks and valleys of what is the central focus of Canada’s very broad far-right and they’ve been finding a lot of success with these anti-immigrant narratives.”

Many tropes being used by the far-right are “not new,” Smith notes, explaining they are being used more often to advance a particular image of South Asian immigrants, and in particular, Sikh men.

“(They) need an example to point to, phrases and imagery that (they) can point to to make these kinds of campaigns successful and that’s kind of what we can see in this sudden interest in demonizing particularly Indian men, but South Asian people in general,” Smith said.

“I think there’s a real kind of inherent danger whenever we see the demonization of a large group of people, in particular whenever you see the demonization of particular communities.”

In the midst of social media posts targeting specifically turbaned Sikh men, a hate crime was reported to police in Peterborough, Ontario on July 26 after a man alleged he was spat on and “had his turban knocked off and stepped on.”

Other incidents were recently outlined by the World Sikh Organization in a press release, including another Sikh who was allegedly attacked had his turban removed and stolen in Scarborough, Ontario, and another man in Sudbury, Ontario, who was attacked and threatened to be run over for wearing a kirpan, a Sikh article of faith.

The WSO added they are “deeply troubled by recent hate attacks on Sikhs” and an “alarming rise in online harassment of Sikhs across Canada” in recent months.

“Sikhs are a very visible community due to their articles of faith, which makes them easy targets for hate attacks,” WSO President Danish Singh said in a statement. “We are seeing hateful messages targeting Sikhs online generated by ultra-right-wing groups in Canada, but these are being amplified and promoted by Indian nationalist social media accounts.”

“We are concerned that the toxic environment being created could lead to further attacks on Sikhs. We will be communicating our concerns to law enforcement and expect them to arrest and prosecute the perpetrators of these crimes as soon as possible.”

The Global Project Against Hate and Racism, an organization tracking transnational hate and far-right extremism, reported a large increase in hate and slurs directed toward South Asians globally since January 2023.

“Anxieties around losing jobs, the perceived ‘subversion’ of white people, and both distrust and anger towards South Asians who are blamed for these problems are prevalent across platforms,” the report states.

A spokesperson for the Sikh Press Association agrees Canada’s far-right is “politicizing” the hate.

“Canada seems to be experiencing a worrying spike in the brazenness of anti-Sikh sentiment. It seems thousands of Canadians are on social media daily spreading hate about all minorities of the country and within this there seems to be a particular venom for Sikh communities, who are accused of infiltrating government, monopolizing the trucking industry and yet simultaneously downgrading the quality of life here,” the Sikh PA said in a statement to PressProgress.

“What seems to have emboldened the racism though, is the efforts of far-right organizing and pseudo-media to politiciansze the hate, entwining it with debates about immigration and national security. Through this, Canadian Sikhs seem to have become the symbol of all that the country’s racists oppose.”

The GPAHE also reported that hate speech, extremism and slurs directed at South Asians doubled on platforms like 4Chan between 2023 and 2024, while on Donald Trump’s platform Truth Social, hate speech and slurs against South Asians increased over 250% in the same time span.

The report also notes prominent Canadian white supremacist groups, including Diagolon, led by Canadian far-right influencer Jeremy Mackenzie, have also ramped up their hate speech and racism towards South Asians.

According to the GPAHE, he also shared a post calling for “first world countries…to quarantine India,” otherwise Indians will “colonize every first world country.” Diagonal is also calling for the “deportation of all Indians.”

“The phrase, ‘they have to go back,’ which advocates for the deportation of Indian immigrants en masse from Canada, is worryingly reminiscent of a trend gaining popularity in Europe called “remigration,” which therefore for ethnically cleansing the continent of non- Europeans through forced deportations” the report states.

The growing anti-immigrant sentiments and racism have taken a violent turn in the UK, with rioters carrying out violence and attacks targeting immigrants and asylum seekers after far-right figures in the UK spread false information about the race of a suspect in an attack in northern England.

Far-right influencer Tommy Robinson, who was recently arrested on immigration charges in Canada during a Rebel Media organized tour, was one of the first prominent online figures to spread disinformation about the attack on social media, circulating conspiracy theories about Muslims and immigrants.

The alarming trend mirrors tactics being used in Canada.

“I think anti-immigrant narratives are unfortunately resonating with with a fair number of people all across North America and and Western Europe right now and you can see when you look at a lot of Canadians’ far-right social media that they are actively looking to those issues, connecting with influencers and groups talking about similar things and resharing their content,” Smith added.

Smith says that many far-right figures are convinced that “they’re being replaced,” and are responding to that threat in mant different ways, adding that the language being used is “militaristic” and could lead to potential escalation.

“That is what it could lead to when you have people talking quite in military terms about a ‘coming war.’ The response to war is hospitality.”