Silly Little Country

Worse then Silly, Sinister now

In Canada we have "commissions" (not quite courts, but with some similar powers, and few of the same constraints of due process) purportedly to defend human rights. I had thought their purpose was to investigate and adjudicate on possible instances of employment discrimination, or housing discrimination. No doubt meant as a cheap solution to burying courts in frivolous complaints.

Lately, however, some of the commissions have been brought into what I would view as 'free speech' constraint cases - processes that are now underway, one against Macleans magazine for publishing an excerpt from Mark Steyn's "America Alone" and one against the Western Standard for publishing the Danish cartoons. There is a variety of processes going in in various commissions.

The British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal has now started its hearings in the Macleans case and it is producing an utterly fascinating stream of material. Andrew Coyne is live-blogging the hearing at the Macleans site (link above). Ezra Levant, facing a similar complaint in Alberta in the Western Standard case, is in action on his website.

And it is evident that much is coming together here. The sheer idiocy of the constitution of these commissions is perhaps made most clear by Levant in this post - what a fright. As Levant points out, stupid people like these can make incredible impositions on individuals and businesses, and governments, with no background knowledge whatever, and no due process. What is now truly frightening is that they are now in the business of ruling on political speech. As Coyne keeps pointing out, they are being asked to rule on matters that are perfectly reasonable matters of debate.

And then there is the sheer stupidity and incoherence of the complainant's case. By the way the complainant is the Canadian Islamic Congress, essentially Mohammed ElMasry, though he has assembled some dimwitted law students (known widely now as the Sock Puppets) to front for him by talking about how badly hurt they were to read Mark Steyn quoting European imams. On the quality of the case, Jay Currie (also live-blogging) writes here:

The term “clutching at straws” seems to cover pretty much the whole of the Socks’ case.

But what is more chilling is that he follows with this:

And, amusingly enough, the Tribunal, so far has indicated that the total fecklessness of the Socks’ case and the rank incoherence of the Socks’ mouthpiece does not matter. And, hey, the Tribunal has a point: where the test is “may tend to promote hatred or contempt” the bar is a millimeter from the floorboards.

And Ezra Levant says roughly the same thing somewhat differently:

If it were, it would have been thrown out. Which is, in fact, exactly why Human Rights Commissions are the weapon of choice in the soft jihad.

A real lawsuit would fail; there is no cause of action called "you hurt my self esteem"or "I want to write a long letter in your magazine". There's defamation, but that comes with defences like truth, fair comment, etc.

This started out as a political science class, a lecture in Marxist thinking about the media, racial identity politics, etc.

But now it's just a journey through Khurrum Awan's own weird psyche.

In other words, it's exactly what this kangaroo panel will respond to. Foolish Maclean's -- hiring Julian Porter, Roger McConchie, etc.! They should have brought in some zen-talking yoga instructor.

These Tribunal panellists know nothing about the law; they know nothing about media, or publishing. Yet they presume to judge Maclean's on both. No; they are, in their DNA, grievance hustlers. Awan's Oprah Winfrey-style testament is a perfect fit of psychobabble for them.

I am hoping that one day this embarrassing charade will be looked back on as the moment that induced Canada to correct its course seriously in this area (though the current government, which ought to have been my best hope, is seeming pretty flaccid on the issue at the moment). If that proves not to be the case, my consolation is that I got to live through a special and wonderful time in history and will likely die, given my age, before the whole thing becomes just utterly revolting. Though it is looking pretty close right now.

Now the Sock Puppets themselves are another story. So I will devote a small post shortly to them.

UPDATE: Some clarifications in this post - worth at least citing.

Labels: HRT, sock puppets

posted by Alan Adamson @ 6:13 AM