In Canada We Don't Have a Justice System, We Have a Rusty Legal System.

Justice Isn’t Broken—It Was Never Built for You

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“It is not good to be partial to the wicked or to deprive the innocent of justice.”

Proverbs 18:5

Queens University Law Professor, writer and media pundit Bruce Pardy told me a year and a half ago, while I was beginning to pursue institutional justice, that, “Canada doesn’t have a justice system, we have a legal system.”

I listened, but it has taken months to fully appreciate Professor Pardy’s wisdom. Because the alternative — that we only have a legal system — is too bleak to admit.

But plain and unvarnished, the truth is that we do not have a justice system.

We have a legal mechanism. A procedural apparatus. A machine of rules and forms. It may look impressive to the untrained eye, but don’t mistake the gears for the outcome. Justice is not the product. It is the myth printed on the box.

If it existed in this country, justice would be a great iron gearwheel, rusted, hidden behind the machinery, long detached from public life. It was never meant to be turned by one person. The few who try — ordinary citizens who dare to challenge powerful institutions — find themselves alone, back bent, straining to move something that does not budge. The system was never designed to be just. It was designed to be consistent, predictable, and, above all, manageable — for the benefit of those already in control.

Money, connections, and institutional clout are the lubricants that keep the machine turning. Without them, you’ll find yourself slipping. Push as hard as you want — scream, plead, submit paperwork until your fingertips bruise— it won’t move.

Justice doesn’t respond to truth. It responds to pressure applied by those who already hold the lever.

Try bringing a complaint against a university. Try accusing a union of betraying its members. Try standing alone before a labour board or tribunal with no lawyer, title, or institutional weight behind you. You’ll quickly learn the rules are enforced selectively, the timelines are flexible — for them, not for you — and the process exists more to exhaust you than to resolve anything. These places are temples to fairness, but their altars are closed to the public.

You can enter, but you will not be heard.

Most Canadians don’t know this because they will never test it. They’ll live believing that if something truly unjust happens, the system will catch it. If they’re ever wronged, they can fill out a form, see a judge, and find a resolution. They do not see what’s behind the curtain: delays dressed as due diligence, decisions based not on evidence but institutional comfort, and officials offering a little performative justice for show, while doing little to disguise their annoyance that one single man would ever come to the temples dedicated to justice.

The altar stands in the temple, and upon its lintel is carved the word Justice, worn smooth by the hands of the hopeful. But the offering laid upon it is not guilt, nor truth—it is the individual, bound and bled for the pleasure of institutional gods. These are not gods of righteousness, but of power and preservation. And only the foolish kneel, believing the name above the altar still speaks truth.