The Western Standard is famous-er! Will I get another complaint out of it?
I feel such a sense of pride that the Western Standard website is being discussed by such a high panel! And, though the post was indeed made to the site after I sold it to Matthew Johnston, the blog post in question is indeed one written by me, on December 2, 2007!
Here's the post! I'm not just live-blogging Steyn's case. I'm liveblogging my own case at the same time! Top that!
Sunday, December 02, 2007
Elmasry vs. Steyn
As Adam mentioned below, Mark Steyn and Maclean's have been taken to at least a couple of human rights commissions by the Canadian Islamic Congress.
I'm familiar with the CIC and their propaganda campaigns. (Funny enough, the news story on Maclean's website is itself CIC baloney -- they are in no way Canada's "largest" Muslim organization, despite their pretenses. Wikipedia has a quick bio of Mohamed Elmasry, their president-for-life.)
Here's a column I wrote about them after an encounter I had with Elmasry at a journalism conference last year. We were on a panel together, and he railed on about how the "zhoos" controlled the media. He received more than a polite response from the crowd of reporters, and a vigorous defence from a particular CBC radio producer in the crowd. Substitute a Louisiana accent for his Egyptian accent, and Elmasry's speech could have been given by David Duke. How he continues to get kid-glove treatment -- even on the Maclean's website! -- is amazing. Surely his public support for killing Israelis warrants some mention whenever he's quoted in the press.
After the National Post ran my column, the CIC served us with notice under the defamation laws. Of course, they had no case -- we had the defences of truth, fair comment, etc. -- so the CIC had to settle for a letter to the editor almost a year later.
But the CIC learned their lesson: there's no point suing in defamation law, where the CIC would have to pay for their own lawyers, and our lawyers if we won, and where silly things like the rule of law apply. Better to go to the human rights commissions where the taxpayer pays for the prosecution, traditional rules of evidence and procedure don't apply, and free speech is not protected. It still has all of the down-sides for the defendant -- the hassle, the cost, and a lower bar for a "conviction" -- but none of the cost for the complainants.
Speaking of which, the Western Standard's own human rights hearing is finally coming up, nearly two years after we published the Danish cartoons and were first hit with the complaints. We don't have an exact date yet, but the formal "investigation" meeting will be in January. Though we ceased publishing the magazine, we are still a corporate entity, and it's important to me that we see this human rights challenge through.
For your info, here's the hand-scratched complaint against us, and here's our reply. The whole thing feels like justice on the streets of Sudan or Saudi Arabia, more than Canada. I'm sure liberals who fight for the separation of church and state will be speaking out about this human rights complaint any moment now, as vociferously as if the Bishop of Toronto had taken a gay rights magazine to court.
I hope Maclean's fights their complaint hard -- if I know Ken Whyte and Mark Steyn, I'm sure they will. I just hope that the choice is theirs.
I wonder how long before the rest of the surrenderist press corps, the types who applauded Elmasry at that journalism conference, realize that this is their fight, too.
Posted by Ezra Levant on December 2, 2007 | Permalink
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