CBC should wish for better statistics

NATALIE CLIMENHAGA THE GATEWAY (UNIVERSITY OF ALBERTA)

EDMONTON — To celebrate Canada’s 140th birthday, CBC News has decided to use the popular social networking site Facebook to gauge what Canadians want for their country’s future. And according to their group, the Great Canadian Wish List, abolishing abortion is currently Canada’s number-one priority.

On the poll’s Facebook group page, CBC explains that the top wishes will be based on the number of supporters who join a particular wish’s group, and will later be featured in a Canada Day special.

Maybe the CBC figured maple leafs, fireworks, and parades were going to run away with it; either way, it’s hard to believe that they honestly plan on coming out and announcing the “winners” of an illegitimate opinion poll run through a Facebook group. Especially given that for the past few days, the top wishes by the membership have been “Abolish Abortion in Canada,” followed by a wish group calling for “a spiritual revival in our nation.” These results hold absolutely no significance whatsoever.

Any self-respecting CBC journalist should view the creation of this entire project as an enormous embarrassment. If you read through the discussion threads, it becomes evident that this project is being exploited by large church groups who’ve organized themselves across the country.

Now, in response to this overwhelming “support,” an “I wish that Canada would remain pro-choice” wish group is in third place — not because its members view this as the most important wish for Canada’s future, but because they don’t want the anti-abortion group’s ideology to win.

I’m not criticizing the concept of using Facebook to reach the youth demographic — in fact, though it hurts me to admit it, Facebook has become the single most efficient way to reach high-school and university-aged Canadians. But when did Facebook become a credible journalistic source?

It seems like CBC just figured getting the kids’ ideas off of the Intertubes would be a hype idea. But as far as I’m concerned, polling people via a social network is less statistically credible than citing facts found on Wikipedia for an essay. I thought Maclean’s magazine was guilty of questionable statistical practices with their infamous university rankings issue, but this latest project takes the 140th-birthday cake.

The CBC could have paid some poor intern $8 per hour to talk to random people on the streets, and it would’ve been a more credible way to compose a Canadian wish list — at least then there would be a way to know if the people who are being polled were even Canadian. As it stands, there’s currently nothing preventing non-Canadians from voting in this survey.

When you look at most public opinion polls, there has to be a margin of error listed and some explanation of where the source data came from. But with this, there’s no way of knowing who these people are.

It used to be that Facebook was a social network reserved exclusively for post-secondary students, but now it’s open to anyone and everyone over the age of 13. All you need is an e-mail to sign up for Facebook — individuals can even hold multiple accounts. And while there’s no way of reading through the list of names of a group’s members, I wouldn’t be surprised if many of those pro-lifers hail from bible-belt USA.

The majority of young Canadians probably don’t want abortions made illegal, but this statistically invalid “source” would suggest otherwise. Instead, a polling idea of what could’ve been an interesting glance at what Canadians want has ended up becoming a complete joke.

“Normally when you make a wish, you keep it secret. This Canada Day, CBC wants you to shout it out,” the media organization says on their Frequently Asked Questions page. But hasn’t anyone told the CBC that if you say a birthday wish out loud it doesn’t come true?

At least now I won’t be surprised if Ben Mulroney comes out on Canada Day with a Facebook-inspired report profiling Canadians who want to save the country’s fetuses.