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On Free Speech; Canadian Publisher
Topic Started: Jan 13 2008, 06:46 AM (192 Views)
George K
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Finally
Ezra Levant is the publisher of the Western Standard in Canada. His magazine published the Danish "Mohammed" cartoons, and of course, the Religion of Peace® was so offended that they filed complaints to the Canadian Human Rights Commission.

Levant appeared before a member of that commission, and there is video of him explaining what he did, why he did it, and the consequences of stifling him.

Take 15 minutes and watch these videos:


Opening Statement
("the government has no right to interrogate me on free speech")

"What was your intent in publishing these cartoons?"
("Why is that even a relevant question?")

Fear of Violence against Muslims
("The last house of worship firebombed in Edmonton was the synagogue I attend.")

I don't answer to the state.
("I do not seek to be excused because I meet your test of reasonableness. You are a thug.")

Simply wow.
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- Mik, 6/14/08


Nothing is as effective as homeopathy.

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Frank_W
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Resident Misanthrope
Awesome!!! :clap: I couldn't agree with him more. :thumb:
Anatomy Prof: "The human body has about 20 sq. meters of skin."
Me: "Man, that's a lot of lampshades!"
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George K
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Finally
Inspiring to see someone articulate and passionate go after the political correctness Nazis fascists, isn't it?
A guide to GKSR: Click

"Now look here, you Baltic gas passer... "
- Mik, 6/14/08


Nothing is as effective as homeopathy.

I'd rather listen to an hour of Abba than an hour of The Beatles.
- Klaus, 4/29/18
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jon-nyc
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Cheers
A Godwinian record, George!

But I agree with the sentiment. I guess that makes you and me emotionally truncated and relationally impaired. Maybe we should start a club.
In my defense, I was left unsupervised.
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Frank_W
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Resident Misanthrope
There may yet be hope for civilization.
Anatomy Prof: "The human body has about 20 sq. meters of skin."
Me: "Man, that's a lot of lampshades!"
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George K
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Finally
jon-nyc
Jan 13 2008, 09:36 AM
A Godwinian record, George!

Edited so as to only partially invoke Godwin.

(back in the days when I rode horses, we used to refer to some of the ladies as "Dressage Nazis")
A guide to GKSR: Click

"Now look here, you Baltic gas passer... "
- Mik, 6/14/08


Nothing is as effective as homeopathy.

I'd rather listen to an hour of Abba than an hour of The Beatles.
- Klaus, 4/29/18
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Renauda
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HOLY CARP!!!
George K
Jan 13 2008, 06:46 AM
the Religion of Peace® was so offended that they filed complaints to the Canadian Human Rights Commission.

Levant appeared before a member of that commission,

Wrong George. It was the Alberta Human Rights Commission- a provincial, not federal body. They received a complaint and were obliged to look into it. I doubt whether this has any legs. In any case, Ezra Levant is a notorious local sh1tdisturber who garners little respect from Albertans.
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Frank_W
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Resident Misanthrope
That's too bad, Renauda. In this particular set of interviews, he's very eloquent.
Anatomy Prof: "The human body has about 20 sq. meters of skin."
Me: "Man, that's a lot of lampshades!"
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George K
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Finally
I know nothing of Levant other than what I posted here. You're right about it being the Alberta Human Rights Commission. I apologize for the inaccuracy.

Here's Levant's Web Page

http://www.ezralevant.com/
A guide to GKSR: Click

"Now look here, you Baltic gas passer... "
- Mik, 6/14/08


Nothing is as effective as homeopathy.

I'd rather listen to an hour of Abba than an hour of The Beatles.
- Klaus, 4/29/18
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Renauda
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HOLY CARP!!!
FrankW
 
In this particular set of interviews, he's very eloquent.



More like eloquent and obnoxious blowhard.
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George K
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Finally
Apparently the same thing has happened to Mark Steyn.

THE RIGHT NOT TO BE OFFENDED Print E-mail
Steyn on Canada and the Commonwealth
Saturday, 12 January 2008

Do you remember a cover story Maclean's ran on Oct. 23, 2006?

No? Me neither, and I wrote it. Such is life in the weekly mag biz. But it was an excerpt on various geopolitical and demographic trends from my then brand new tome, America Alone: The End of the World as we Know It. I don't know whether my bestselling book is still available in Canadian bookstores, but it's coming soon to a Canadian "courtroom" near you! The Canadian Islamic Congress and a handful of Osgoode Hall law students have complained about the article in Maclean's to (at last count) three of Canada's many "human rights" commissions, two of which have agreed to hear the "case." It would be nice to report that the third sent the plaintiffs away with a flea in their ears saying that in a free society it's no business of the state to regulate the content of privately owned magazines. Alas, I gather it's only bureaucratic torpor that has temporarily delayed the province of Ontario's en­­thusiastic leap upon the bandwagon. These students are not cited in the offending article. Canadian Muslims are not the subject of the piece. Indeed, Canada is not mentioned at all, except en passant. Yet Canada's "human rights" commissions have accepted the premise of the Canadian Islamic Congress - that the article potentially breaches these students' "human rights."

Since the CIC launched its complaint, I've been asked by various correspondents what my defence is. My defence is I shouldn't have to have a defence. The "plaintiffs" are not complaining that the article is false, or libellous, or seditious, for all of which there would be appropriate legal remedy. Their complaint is essentially emotional: it "offended" them. And as offensiveness is in the eye of the of­­fended, there's not a lot I can do about that.

But, given that the most fundamental "human right" in modern Canada is apparently the right not to be offended, perhaps I could be permitted to say what offends me. I'm offended by the federal and British Columbia human rights commissions' presumption that the editing decisions of Maclean's fall within their jurisdiction. Or to put it another way, I don't accept that free-born Canadian citizens require the permission of the Canadian state to read my columns. The eminent Q.C. who heads the Canadian Human Rights Commission may well be a shrewd and insightful person but I don't believe her view of Maclean's cover stories should carry any more weight than that of Mrs. Mabel Scroggins of 47 Strathcona Gardens. And it is slightly unnerving to me that large numbers of Canadians apparently think there's nothing wrong in subjecting the contents of political magazines to "judicial review."

Let's take it as read that I am, as claimed, "offensive." That's the point. It's offensive speech that requires legal protection. As a general rule, Barney the Dinosaur singing "Sharing is Caring" can rub along just fine. Take, for example, two prominent figures from Scandinavia. Extremely prominent, as it happens. In his Christmas address to the Swedish people, King Carl Gustaf hailed the dawn of "one new Sweden. Young people with roots in other cultures put Sweden on the map in musical styles, in the field of sports, with business ideas that were not there when I was younger...To welcome changes and to let the mix of cultures and experiences enrich our lives and our society is the only road ahead." Blah blah blah. Usual multiculti bromides. Could have been our own Queen's Christmas message or her vicereine on Canada Day. Stick it in the Globe and Mail and no one would bat an eyelid.

By contrast, here's another Scandinavian head of state. Two years ago, Queen Margrethe II of Denmark, musing on Islamic radicalism in her own country, said that people need occasionally to "show their opposition to Islam... It is a challenge we have to take seriously. We have let this issue float about for too long because we are tolerant and very lazy. And when we are tolerant, we must know whether it is because of convenience or conviction."

Can you still print the Queen of Denmark's remarks in a Canadian publication? To be honest, I'm not sure. If you examine Dr. Mohamed Elmasry's formal complaint to the Canadian Human Rights Commission about my article, Grievance #16 objects to the following assertion:

Quote:
 
"The number of Muslims in Europe is expanding like 'mosquitoes.' "


That claim certainly appears in my piece. But they're the words not of a notorious right-wing Islamophobic columnist but of a big­­shot Scandinavian Muslim:

Quote:
 
" 'We're the ones who will change you,' the Norwegian imam Mullah Krekar told the Oslo newspaper Dagbladet in 2006. 'Just look at the development within Europe, where the number of Muslims is expanding like mosquitoes. Every Western woman in the EU is producing an average of 1.4 children. Every Muslim woman in the same countries is producing 3.5 children.' "


Given that the "mosquitoes" line is part of the basis on which the HRC accepted Dr. Elmasry's complaint of "Islamophobia," I'm interested to know what precisely is the of­­fence? Are Mullah Krekar's words themselves Islamophobic? Or do they only become so when I quote them? The complainants want a world in which a Norwegian imam can make statements in a Norwegian newspaper but if a Canadian columnist reprints them in a Canadian publication it's a "hate crime." It's striking to examine the Canadian Islamic Congress's complaints and see how many of their objections are to facts, statistics, quotations - not to their accuracy but merely to the quoting thereof. But, of course, they've picked the correct forum: before the human rights commissions, truth is no defence.

Just for the record, my book is not about Islam, not really. Rather, it posits Islam as an opportunist beneficiary of Western self-enfeeblement. The most important quotation in the entire text is nothing to do with Muslims or mosquitoes but a bald statement by the late historian Arnold Toynbee:

"Civilizations die from suicide, not murder."

One manifestation of that suicidal urge is the human rights commission. It is an illiberal notion harnessed in the cause, supposedly, of liberalism: gays don't like uptight Christians flaunting the more robust passages of Leviticus? Don't worry about it. We'll set up a body that'll hunt down Bible-quoting losers in basements and ensure they'll trouble you no further. Just a few recalcitrant knuckle-draggers who decline to get with the beat. Don't give 'em a thought. Nothing to see here, folks.

The Canadian Islamic Congress is now using this pseudo-judicial shortcut to circumscribe debate on one of the great central questions of the age: the demographic transformation of much of the Western world. The Islamification of Europe is a fact. It's happening. It's under way right now. Are Canadian magazines allowed to acknowledge that? And, if they do, are they allowed to posit various scenarios as to how it might all shake out? The CIC objects to articles that suggest all Muslims are jihadists and radicals. Very well. Are we permitted to try and calibrate what proportion is radical? For example, a recent poll found that 36 per cent of Muslims between the ages of 16 and 24 believe that those who convert to another religion should be punished by death. That's not 36 per cent of young Muslims in Waziristan or Yemen or Sudan, but 36 per cent in the United Kingdom. Forty per cent of British Muslims would like to live under sharia, in Britain. Twenty per cent have sympathy for the July 7 Tube bombers. And, given that Islam is the principal source of population growth in every city down the spine of England from Manchester to Sheffield to Birmingham to London, these statistics are not without significance for Britain's future. Can we talk about it?

Not if the CIC and their enablers at the human rights commissions get their way. I note, too, that the Ontario Federation of Labour is supporting the Canadian Islamic Congress's case. As Terry Downey, executive supremo of the OFL, primly explains, "There is proper conduct that everyone has to follow"- and his union clearly feels my article is way beyond the bounds of that "proper conduct." Don't ask me why. I don't pretend to understand the peculiar psychological impulses that would lead the OFL to throw its lot in with Dr. Mohamed El­­­masry and the CIC. Except that there seems to be some kinky kind of competition on the Western left to be, metaphorically speaking, Islam's lead prison bitch.

Oh, dear. Is that "offensive" to the executive committee of the OFL? Very probably so. I may well have another "human rights" suit on my hands. Heigh-ho. Might as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb.

Or we could all grow up and recognize the dangers in forcing more and more public discourse into the shadows. As David Warren put it, the punishment is not the verdict, but the process - the months of time-consuming distractions and legal bills that make it easier for editors to shrug, "You know, maybe we don't need a report on creeping sharia, after all. How about we do The Lindsay Lohan Guide To Celebrity Carjacking one more time?"

Canada is not unique in the urge of its bien pensants to pre-emptive surrender: Australian publishers decline books on certain, ah, sensitive subjects; a French novelist was dragged into court to answer for the "Islamophobia" of one of his fictional characters; British editors insist books are vacuumed of anything likely to attract the eye of wealthy Saudis adept at using the English legal system to silence their critics.

Nonetheless, even in this craven environment, Canada's "human rights commissions" are uniquely inimical to the marketplace of ideas. In its 30 years of existence, no complaint brought to the federal HRC under Section XIII has been settled in favour of the defendant. A court where the rulings only go one way is the very definition of a show trial. These institutions should be a source of shame to Canadians.

So I'm not interested in the verdict - except insofar as an acquittal would be more likely to legitimize the human rights commissions' attempt to regulate political speech, and thus contribute to the shrivelling of liberty in Canada. I'm interested only in getting the HRCs out of this business entirely. When it comes to free speech on one of the critical issues of the age, to reprise Sir Edward Grey on the eve of the Great War, the lamps are going out all over the world - one distributor, one publisher, one novelist, one cartoonist, one TV host at a time.
A guide to GKSR: Click

"Now look here, you Baltic gas passer... "
- Mik, 6/14/08


Nothing is as effective as homeopathy.

I'd rather listen to an hour of Abba than an hour of The Beatles.
- Klaus, 4/29/18
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Renauda
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HOLY CARP!!!
Quote:
 
Nonetheless, even in this craven environment, Canada's "human rights commissions" are uniquely inimical to the marketplace of ideas. In its 30 years of existence, no complaint brought to the federal HRC under Section XIII has been settled in favour of the defendant.


Exactly. The problem lies with the fact that Canada has become corrupted with the import of US style liberalism and constitutionalism leading to a Charter of Rights and Freedoms. It all began back in WWII when we fell under the influence of FDR and US forms of governance. Since the Johnson era it has only gotten worse. Creeping US liberalism and constitutionalism are the bane of our parliamentary governance and federalist system. In short, the Finlandization of Canada.
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George K
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Finally
Thanks for your thoughts, Renauda.

Now, what does your sig say? I tried babelfish, and got gibberish.
A guide to GKSR: Click

"Now look here, you Baltic gas passer... "
- Mik, 6/14/08


Nothing is as effective as homeopathy.

I'd rather listen to an hour of Abba than an hour of The Beatles.
- Klaus, 4/29/18
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Renauda
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HOLY CARP!!!
It's a quote of Putin's in allusion to a Russian fairy tale: "Comrade Wolf knows who to eat. He eats and listens to no one."
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George K
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Finally
Renauda
Jan 13 2008, 01:42 PM
It's a quote of Putin's in allusion to a Russian fairy tale: "Comrade Wolf knows who to eat. He eats and listens to no one."

Babelfish: "Comrade volk knows whom to eat. It eats no one and listens to."

Which doesn't quite make as much sense, does it? :lol2:
A guide to GKSR: Click

"Now look here, you Baltic gas passer... "
- Mik, 6/14/08


Nothing is as effective as homeopathy.

I'd rather listen to an hour of Abba than an hour of The Beatles.
- Klaus, 4/29/18
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Renauda
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HOLY CARP!!!
Now the trick is for you to determine who Putin is calling Comrade Wolf.
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George K
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Finally
Renauda
Jan 13 2008, 02:04 PM
Now the trick is for you to determine who Putin is calling Comrade Wolf.

:lol2: Got it in one.
A guide to GKSR: Click

"Now look here, you Baltic gas passer... "
- Mik, 6/14/08


Nothing is as effective as homeopathy.

I'd rather listen to an hour of Abba than an hour of The Beatles.
- Klaus, 4/29/18
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Mikhailoh
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If you want trouble, find yourself a redhead
I am amazed no one has established a Godwin sock. Anybody got a pic?
Once in his life, every man is entitled to fall madly in love with a gorgeous redhead - Lucille Ball
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George K
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Finally
Mikhailoh
Jan 13 2008, 03:58 PM
I am amazed no one has established a Godwin sock.  Anybody got a pic?

Sure.


Posted Image

Michael (Mike) Wayne Godwin is an American attorney and author. He was the first staff counsel of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and the creator of the Internet adage Godwin's Law. As of July 2007 he is general counsel for the Wikimedia Foundation.

~~~

Godwin's early involvement in the Steve Jackson Games affair led to his being hired by the EFF in November 1990, when the organization was new. Shortly afterwards, as the first EFF in-house lawyer, he supervised its sponsorship of the Steve Jackson Games, Inc. v. United States Secret Service case. Steve Jackson Games won the case in 1993.

As a lawyer for EFF, Godwin was one of the counsel of record for the plaintiffs in the case challenging the Communications Decency Act in 1996. The Supreme Court decided the case for the plaintiffs on First Amendment grounds in 1997 in Reno v. American Civil Liberties Union. Godwin's work on this and other First Amendment cases in the 1990s is documented in his book Cyber Rights: Defending Free Speech in the Digital Age (1998), which was reissued in a revised, expanded edition by MIT Press in 2003.

Godwin has also served as a staff attorney and policy fellow for the Center for Democracy and Technology, as Chief Correspondent at IP Worldwide, a publication of American Lawyer Media, and as a columnist for The American Lawyer magazine. He is a Contributing Editor at Reason magazine[3], where he has published interviews of science-fiction writers Bruce Sterling, Neal Stephenson, and Vernor Vinge.

From 2003 to 2005 Godwin was staff attorney and later legal director of Public Knowledge, a Washington, D.C.-based non-governmental organization concerned with intellectual property law. In recent years, Godwin has worked on copyright and technology policy, including the relationship between digital rights management and American copyright law. While at Public Knowledge, he supervised litigation that successfully challenged the Federal Communications Commission's broadcast flag regulation that would have imposed DRM restrictions on television broadcasting.

From October 2005 to April 2007, Godwin was a research fellow at Yale University, holding dual positions in the Information Society Project at Yale Law School and at Yale's computer science department. [4] [5]

Godwin was hired as general counsel for the Wikimedia Foundation in July 2007.[6] Commenting on the self-correcting nature of Wikipedia in an interview with The New York Times in which he freely acknowledged that he had edited his own Wikipedia article, Godwin said, "The best answer for bad speech is more speech.”[7]
A guide to GKSR: Click

"Now look here, you Baltic gas passer... "
- Mik, 6/14/08


Nothing is as effective as homeopathy.

I'd rather listen to an hour of Abba than an hour of The Beatles.
- Klaus, 4/29/18
Online Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
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