Calgary Stampede police advisory published in Canada's official languages
- Published on July 16, 2025 at 20:34
- 4 min read
- By Gwen Roley, AFP Canada
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"The old Canada is gone. Police now has to ask foreigners in other languages not to r@pe people," says a July 13, 2025 post on X.
The post includes a screenshot of an article with the headline: "Police warned Stampede-goers of sexual assault in Arabic, Hindi."
The screenshotted text says the Calgary Police Service (CPS) issued written warnings in the two languages as part of a public safety campaign before the Calgary Stampede, an annual rodeo exhibition and festival in Alberta's largest city.
Similar claims appeared on X and Facebook, with some posts implying that the advisories were not presented in English or French.
The posts spread after a series of stabbings disrupted the event July 8, according to a press release and local media reports (archived here). Previously, a 2023 class-action lawsuit alleging that Calgary Stampede allowed a performance school staffer to sexually abuse students prompted lawmakers to call for more accountability from all levels of government.
As Canada's years-long immigration consensus has broken down, AFP has repeatedly debunked misinformation accusing newcomers of committing crimes or unfairly exploiting social benefits.
The latest posts claiming that police specifically urged Arabic and Hindi speakers to avoid committing sexual assault are similarly misleading.
The headline in the posts comes from an article from Juno News, a current-events blog founded by leaders from the conservative alternative media outlets True North and The Counter Signal -- the latter of which has previously propagated misleading claims (archived here).
In the article, the word "Arabic" links to a series of messages CPS shared on X covering event safety and predatory behavior.
The first post in the thread is written in English, however (archived here). The connected posts repeat the same information in 11 other languages, including Arabic, French, Spanish, Ukrainian and Vietnamese.
Despite the claims online, a message in Hindi does not appear in the thread. Punjabi -- which uses similar characters and is also widely spoken in India -- is featured.
The mention of "Hindi" in the article links to a personal X account that reshared a separate CPS information campaign, which was also broadcast in English, Punjabi and Arabic (archived here).
The Juno News article is behind a paywall, so AFP was not able to review whether the text goes on to explain that the campaign was also shared in Canada's official languages. But the social media posts sharing the headline did not include this context.
CPS told AFP it often translates social media posts to reach as many residents as possible with its messaging.
"We typically translate communications in English and 12 additional languages, which are chosen based on the literacy rates of Calgarians," the service said in a July 14 email.
AFP found other CPS information campaigns covering sexual assault, a police impersonation scam and elder abuse, all shared in several languages including English and French (archived here, here and here).
CPS also told AFP it shared the messaging about sexual consent in an effort to raise awareness during large events, which can create higher risk for assault.
Read more of AFP's reporting on misinformation in Canada here.
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