Posted on 06/16/2008 11:12:11 PM PDT by The_Republican
Freedom of the press is on trial in Canada.
The trial is before a court with the Orwellian title of the British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal. The accused are Maclean's magazine and author Mark Steyn. The crime: In mocking and biting tones, they wrote that Islam threatens Western values.
Had Steyn written that, given the Crusades, colonial atrocities in Africa and the slave trade, Christianity had been on balance a curse, he would not be in the dock. In the United States, these charges would have been tossed out by any federal judge, who would have admonished the plaintiffs that, here in America, we have a First Amendment.
The United States, however, is an isolated exception, as Western nations seek to impose wider restrictions on what has come to be called "hate speech."
Questioning the Holocaust is a crime in Canada and Europe, as British historian David Irving discovered when he was sentenced to prison in Austria. To say the Armenian massacres of 1915-1924 were an attempt at genocide is a crime in Turkey.
In France, animal rights champion Brigitte Bardot has been fined $23,000 for provoking discrimination and racial hatred by denouncing Muslims who slaughtered a sheep in a religious ceremony. Bardot had been punished five previous times for her statements.
Censorship is making a comeback. Outside the United States, it is considered an acceptable price to pay for the new diversity Western Man seems now to value more than the old liberty.
In 1990, writes Adam Liptak of The New York Times, Chief Justice of the Canadian Supreme Court Brian Dickson wrote, in upholding the conviction of one James Keegstra for anti-Semitic slurs:
(Excerpt) Read more at realclearpolitics.com ...
I do believe it will get better eventually. Unfortunately, I may not live to see it. I hope my daughter does.
Not if John McCain has anything to say about it. Though I do believe the power of political correctness in America is peaking with the campaign of Saint Barack. By the time this is over even the libs will be sick of it. e.g. Harriet from Manhattan, Clinton Kool Aid drinker, “I can be called white but you can’t be called black.” Yep. No thought tribunals or Fairness Doctrine for us.
This is part of a larger problem, that the whole notion of liberty as some of us grew up knowing it is fading away fast, generation by generation.
When people hear about some new proposed law or government policy, very, very few people stop to question whether the government has authority to do so. (And I start to feel naive to question it anymore.) People just weigh what the potential practical consequences might be. For instance, if someone proposes to outlaw smoking in your own home, too many people, maybe most people now, will just think, “Well it will reduce the Medicare costs that we’ll have to pay taxes for, and it’s for their own good. It’s better for their kids too. Who needs to smoke? There’s no right to smoke in the Constitution.” It’s beyond their imagination to consider that someone has a RIGHT to do something that Enlightened People don’t think wise and proper to do. For them, the core principle of individual liberty is a platitude subordinate to any random goal or desire they come across. Each of us can feel proper and righteous to propose a new rule by which all of us will be managed.
I’m sure most of the public school system is the blind leading the blind on this topic. I doubt more than a few of the teachers have a healthy appreciation for freedom. It’s incompatible with all the relativist ideas they are steeped in. It’s incompatible with every little political agenda they buy into. It only gets in their way if it’s actually applied rather than given lip service.
Maybe we need some policy to encourage a career path from military service to teaching. Or any other way to get those likely to care about freedom into the classrooms.
Waiting for the typical “Pat is a anti-semite buffoon coment”
Pat is right on again.
I’d like to believe that, but PC won’t die of it’s own sickness. It has to be killed by the ideas of freedom.
Hey, I think I have a tagline again.
Biblical Message a Crime in Colorado
http://www.onenewsnow.com/Blog/Default.aspx?id=139868
Wee, I have a new tagline as well.
I miss Pat.
Ironically, there’s an ad alongside the RCP article advertising “beautiful Muslim singles for Matrimony” ....
Egad
Well, now that you mention it, Pat is an anti-semite buffoon, however, he is correct in this column.
What flavor of Israeli koolaid are you drinking?
How does my comment result, in your view, from Israeli koolaid? Please explain.
Propagandists have unlimited freedom. Individual rights are on trial in Collectiveville by a kangaroo court.
For now.
hey you up?
The I miss Pat was my good night post.
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