CBC and TVO

I thought Rex Murphy had a great discussion on censorship today, with a range of talkers including Alan Borovoy, Keith Martin and me. Even one of Mohammed Elmasry's spokeschildren called in, as did one or two other hard-leftists who made the creative argument that commandeering Maclean's magazine and forcing them to run "the other side" of a story is somehow not censorship (haven't they heard from their leader, Noam Chomsky?).

When I hear incoherent gobbledegook like that, my blood pressure rises. But Rex is patient with everyone, which is one reason he's so successful. He puts counter arguments to such callers very gently, like when he asked Elmasry's spokeschild if she believes her demand for "equal space" in a privately owned magazine really makes sense -- if, say, special interest magazines ought to be forced to run "the other side" of the story, too. Imagine living in such a world -- where a Catholic magazine would have to set aside equal time for anti-Catholic views, or where a Jewish magazine would have to save space for anti-Semites and Israel-haters, or where I'd get a guest column in Elmasry's own weekly e-mail newsletter. I think -- I hope -- that the 500,000 people who listen to Rex's question connected these dots on their own.

One thing that irked me somewhat on both Cross Country Checkup and the TVO show last week is how such government-ordered censorship is being conflated with the bogus news story about bill C-10 (drafted by the Liberals, adopted by the Conservatives) that would apply a morality code to movie productions that receive Canadian tax subsidies. It seems obvious to me that the government telling a pornographer to use his own money rather than tax dollars, is morally and legally different than the government hauling anyone into a star chamber to answer for their thoughts and words.

It's a sign of the unseriousness of Canada's small arts community that they would compare their receipt of government hand-outs to the McCarthyism faced by Steyn, me and others. But it's not surprising; it reminds me of any Oscar night, when Hollywood's A-list bravely rants against George W. Bush or even long-dead Sen. McCarthy -- but don't dare mention the censorship-by-murder of Dutch film-maker Theo van Gogh. It's easy to be brave when criticizing Bush; the silence of the arts community about human rights commission censorship suggests the only thing they're really idealistic about is free money.