Results matching “schneidereit” from Ezra Levant

I had a blast on John Oakley's morning radio show today. It makes such a difference to be in the studio, where one can make eye contact with the interviewer, rather than joining by phone from afar as I usually do. I did a number of other shows today, including Tom Young out in New Brunswick, who has a deep philosophical commitment to free speech. I love his show; I get the feeling that he has read many of the "Great Books". And it felt good to cap off the day with Rob Breakenridge from Calgary's CHQR. I haven't kept a precise count, but I think that Rob has probably done more shows about human rights commissions and their violation of free speech than any other radio host in Canada.

In print media, Paul Schneidereit wrote a review of Shakedown in the Halifax Chronicle-Herald, the biggest newspaper east of Montreal. Readers will recall that Paul isn't just an advocate of free speech, he's also served as an executive on the Canadian Association of Journalists, which last year came out with a blistering criticism of human rights commissions and their censorship provisions. Here are a few excerpts:

Let me put in a plug for Levant’s new book, Shakedown, which lays out, in example after example, how government-appointed human rights bodies warped the noble mission for which they were created. Inspired by the government-backed attack on his basic rights, Ezra dug into the work files of human rights commissions across the country. What he found should disturb every Canadian. In case after case, many of which go beyond attacks on free speech, Ezra shows how human rights bodies have put purported grievances of single individuals ahead of the facts, the public interest and even common sense.

Some examples. In B.C., a transsexual (formerly a man) won the right to counsel rape victims, despite objections from even the victimized women themselves. In Ontario, a case is going ahead against the owner of a restaurant who asked a medical marijuana user – after complaints from patrons – not to puff his weed at the entrance to his establishment. In Alberta, a pastor was ordered never, for the rest of his life, to utter words "disparaging" to homosexuals, by order of the state. And on and on.

...Let’s be clear. Section 13 and its provincial counterparts are an abomination. They avoid the rigorous tests found under Criminal Code restrictions on hate speech and libel and give government-backed thought police shocking powers to tell us what we can and can’t say.

Human rights commissions may have been "denormalized," to use Ezra’s term, but still not one Canadian government has acted to cut out the cancerous threat to free speech found in the legislation of too many human rights bodies across this country.

That's pretty strong stuff. As Paul notes, the public is ahead of the politicians -- nothing new there -- in terms of being ready for reform.

Mark Steyn noted Paul's column, too, and revealed yet one more example of HRC corruption and bias:

Meanwhile, the idiot decisions go on: This latest Ontario ruling, rejecting a complaint against the anti-Semitic Sid Ryan because the complainant is not Jewish, is entirely at odds with the well established racket of non-Jews like Richard Warman shaking down neo-Nazis for anti-Semitism or non-gays like [Darren] Lund shaking down the Reverend Stephen Boissoin for homophobia.

That's laughable. If only "victim groups" could file HRC complaints, Richard Warman would have been out of business. It's a made-up excuse, pure and simple, revealing the bias and whimsy of these HRCs. They're not true courts, but they're not even credible quasi-judicial tribunals. Jurisprudence means nothing to them -- except as political cover for their own extremist agendas. If they want to absolve a fellow Marxist, like Sid Ryan, they'll just change the rules until he's off the hook, and then go back to going after their enemies lists. What a disgrace.

Tomorrow morning I'm off to Ottawa. I'll be on CFRA radio with Rob Snow and Lowell Green, who have been fighting this fight for longer than I have! I'll be doing a lot of other interviews, including with some student media at Carleton University, the Hill Times, and CBC Newsworld's Politics with Don Newman. I'm looking forward to seeing him again.

I do have one public event for which tickets might still be available: a reception and dinner with Nigel Hannaford, hosted by the Fraser Institute. You can get details here.

I'll be in Ottawa on Thursday, too, and I'll keep you posted with details. When I have a moment, I'll give the exact dates for events in other cities, some of which will have book-signings.

Paul Schneidereit, the great freedom of speech advocate at the Halifax Chronicle-Herald, has a fun column today about the denormalization of Canada's out-of-control human rights commissions. I call it fun because it's flattering to me. But it's actually quite a serious column.

Here's the whole thing, and here are some excerpts:

To roll back the increasing, dangerous encroachment of human rights bureaucrats in the realm of free speech, the former publisher of the Western Standard argued the general public’s – and many politicians’ – until-then benign impression of the commissions themselves first had to change.

The means to accomplish this, Ezra pointed out, was easy: Let people know exactly what the commissions were doing, in matters like his, the complaints laid against Maclean’s magazine for an article written by Mark Steyn, and other cases that showed the disquieting lengths these appointed government agents seemed prepared to go to infringe on one of democracy’s most fundamental rights.

As awareness grew, Ezra reasoned, as human rights commissions became more and more "denormalized" in the public eye, so too would grow the opportunity for real reform...

Back in January, if someone had predicted that the governing Conservatives, fresh off another federal election victory, would hold a policy convention in which delegates would vote overwhelmingly to repeal Section 13 of the federal Human Rights Act, I would have told them they were wildly optimistic.

But that’s exactly what happened last week in Winnipeg.

Paul's right: human rights commissions have been revealed as abnormal. By that, I mean they violate Canadian norms, norms of freedom, of tolerance of different opinions, of natural justice, and of political neutrality in our government. And, especially in the case of the federal Canadian Human Rights Commission, they are grotesquely abnormal, to the point where they have become the largest spigot of anti-black, anti-gay and anti-Semitic online bigotry in the country. I know that's hard to believe, but CHRC staffers have testified under oath that they have joined neo-Nazi organizations and published literally hundreds of hateful messages online themselves, in an attempt to entrap others in such "illegal" conversations. How perverse -- and how un-Canadian.

It's no longer enough for the government to "tweak" the CHRC. It is infected to the point where it need amputation, if not more. How could such a sick organization continue? Seriously: how can staff who joined neo-Nazi groups be allowed to continue with their employment at a "human rights" agency? And how can Jennifer Lynch, the chief commissioner who approved the neo-Nazi tactics, be permitted to remain at the helm of such a sick ship? And don't even get me started about other scandals, like their decision to hire a disgraced ex-cop as a "hate speech" investigator, someone who was drummed out of a real police force for corruption.

Good grief. Denormalize them? Absolutely. As Paul points out, that just means telling the truth. 

Here are three new Op-Eds that I've come across, critical of the abuse and corruption of Canada's HRCs.

The first is from Paul Schneidereit, who was at the Halifax conference on freedom of speech sponsored by the Sheldon Chumir Foundation. I like it because it zeroes in on the terrifying messiah complex expressed by the Nova Scotia HRC's boss, Krista Daley. Daley, fresh from her training at the United Nations (where she, no doubt, took plenty of lessons on "human rights" from China, Russia and Iran), told the Halifax audience that freedom of speech would have to be restricted until everyone in Nova Scotia's Animal Farm was equal -- an "almost utopia", she called it. Here's Paul's Op-Ed on her scary vision. Here's a teaser; you should read the whole thing:

 NOVA SCOTIA Human Rights Commission director and CEO Krista Daley seems like a nice enough woman. We just inhabit alternate universes.

And here's Stephen Ward's Op-Ed in the Bugle-Observer (I love that name). It's a version of the speech he gave at the same conference. I like his thinking: offensive ideas should be debated before the public, not before some hack bureaucrats like Daley.

I really thought Ward did a good job; here's his last paragraph:

I favour a journalism that encourages reasoned and reasonable discussion. But my love of fair reporting and of building cultural bridges does not insist on silencing those who may not want to build a bridge, or to speak in measured tones. Of course, we should educate citizens to tolerate and respect each other. But, we should also teach that in a plural society to be offended should be expected.

And, from Canada's other coast, here is an item from the Cowichan Valley Citizen, by Walker Morrow. It focuses on Mark Steyn's and my acquittal, and makes the point that both Mark and I have: we were let go because we're difficult for HRCs to swallow without indigestion. They prefer to go after smaller prey, who can't afford lawyers and who don't know how to effectively fight back in the court of public opinon. Money quote:

I highly suspect that Ezra Levant just became too hot to handle. He's a provocateur to the core; the creator of the firebrand Alberta Report; a forming member of the Reform Party; an attack dog for the Conservative Party. Not exactly the quiet sort, and as soon as he became embroiled in the HRC process, he became one of the foremost in the fight against it. I have no doubt that letting Ezra's complaint go was nothing more than self-preservation on the Alberta HRC's part.

Three good reads!

I had a ball at the Sheldon Chumir Foundation's conference on the media's right to offend, which took place at University of King's College in Halifax on Saturday.

Binks from Free Canuckistan shlepped into town for the day, as did a number of other Halifax bloggers like Girl in Blue and Nova Scotia Scott, and plenty of friends of this blog and supporters of my fight against the HRCs. It was also great to see allies from the MSM, including Michael deAdder, the editorial cartoonist, and Paul Schneidereit, who has been Atlantic Canada's leading proponent of freedom of speech, both from his post at the Halifax Chronicle-Herald and in his position with the Canadian Association of Journalists.

Scott and Binks have pretty exhaustive reports and analyses from the event, so for now I'll just make a few observations.

As I said when I received this invitation, I wanted to find out what made John Miller tick -- he's the Ryerson journalism professor who tried to intervene on behalf of the Canadian Islamic Congress, and against Maclean's magazine and Mark Steyn, in the five-day show trial in Vancouver this spring.

What would possibly possess a journalism professor to be pro-censorship?

The answer is pretty simple and boring, actually: he's a guilty white liberal who is willing to sacrifice our ancient liberal values of freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and the separation of mosque and state, in an act of journalistic affirmative action. That's it. You can see a near-transcript of his remarks here, where he essentially opened with an apology for being a white man.

It was nothing more thoughtful than that: he's white, Maclean's magazine is white-ish, so any brown-skinned Arab who complains against it has moral authority, even if they have no legal or moral case.

Pretty lame.

Miller didn't seem very familiar with the depth of the anti-Semitic bigotry at the Canadian Islamic Congress; over dinner, he expressed surprise when I told him that, at a Canadian Association of Journalists forum in 2006, Elmasry repeatedly condemned the "zhoos" who owned the media in Canada, and abused their zhooish powers to keep down good Muslims.

There was a weird moment during the panel when Miller said that Mark Steyn simply wasn't a good journalist -- compared to him, one presumes -- because Miller couldn't find corroboration for one of Steyn's quotes about Ayatollah Khomeini's weird fatwas about sex.

Those quotes were from Khomeini's famous Tahrir-ol-vasyleh, his Iranian version of Mein Kampf -- his master plan for the world, right down to how to have sex with chickens -- the part Miller thought Steyn was making up.

I went to Google as Miller was talking, and found a ton of references for it. There's even a reference to it in the bestselling novel, Reading Lolita in Tehran. Harper's magazine referred to it; there's a whole Iranian feminist foundation dedicated to repealing Khomeini's rules, including his sex rules.

It was pretty sad: an ageing journalism professor, looking down his nose at Steyn and accusing Steyn of sloppiness (and disparaging mere bloggers, too), while half the kids in the room could have found what Miller couldn't in about five minutes on the Net. Some "expert" witness.

Oh well.

Perhaps the weirdest person at the conference, though, was Krista Daley, the boss of Nova Scotia's Human Rights Commission. You can read Scott's near-transcript of her opening remarks, here. They're scary enough. But in the question and answer session that followed, Daley went further. She said that freedom of speech was all well and good, but only once she and her fellow human rights commissions had done their work, making Canada "completely non-discriminatory", a "fully equal society" and my favourite: "almost a utopia."

The obvious question being: why only almost a utopia? Why not go for the whole thing? Why so modest?!

I mean there's nutty, and then there's David Koresh nutty. She's going to bring Canada to the doorstep of utopia, through her human rights commission? And, until then, our freedoms will have to be curtailed?

That's almost Unabomber nutty. It will not surprise you, dear reader, to learn that before gracing Nova Scotia with her presence, High Priestess Daley worked at the United Nations on human rights matters, picking up all sorts of tips from those leading lights, China and Iran. Now she's back in Halifax, with the little people, trying to elevate them. And how ungrateful they are!

There were other speakers, too -- most of them being pretty full-throated defenders of freedom of speech. And I was impressed with the Chumir Foundation's own staff, who are quite true to Sheldon Chumir's own personal style: liberals, but civil liberties liberals, liberals who understand that value of our culture and its heritage of freedom. I started talking with Chumir Foundation boss Janet Keeping about the Magna Carta, and she told me that, whenever she goes to London, she makes sure she visits the museum where she can look at that great old document with her own eyes -- an impressive anecdote.

I enjoyed the conference, and Peggy Wente's lunchtime talk was great. I was pretty scrappy, and I couldn't refrain from calling Daley "David Koresh" in my speech and the question and answer session. But that's me -- always getting between some bureaucrat and their Valhalla.

My favourite part, though, was meeting so many supporters who had been following this issue for the past year. For 125 people to show up on a gorgeous Saturday morning for such a conference was a very encouraging sign that freedom of speech is deeply cherished in the great city of Halifax. 

Paul Schneidereit has another column pounding away at the insanity of Canada's human rights commissions, and their arrogant designs to be the government's official arbiters of what can and can't be published. An excerpt:

Observers have noted the B.C. Human Rights Code also provides for mandatory injunctions against repetitions of actions found out of bounds by the tribunal. That presumably means that if the tribunal finds against Maclean’s, the magazine will be prohibited from again publishing articles similar to Steyn’s in future. That’s a hefty – and subjective – censorship blanket the CIC’s call for "fairness" could provoke.

If HRCs think they can order a Christian pastor to publicly renounce his most deeply-held beliefs, what would stop them from ordering Maclean's to print some Islamofascist propaganda, too?

I wish that every journalist in the country could have attended that show trial in Vancouver. They would have been repelled by every sight: the hustlers and hucksters of the Canadian Islamic Congress, looking to hijack a private magazine; three radical activists sitting on the dais, as if they were some real judges; the hourly abuse of natural justice. I left there revolted; had I not had the real-time outlet of live-blogging, I think I would have either shouted out loud or vomited.

Oh well. Schneidereit will have his chance to watch such a kangaroo court first-hand, soon enough. They're coming for him now -- or at least his newspaper, the Halifax Chronicle-Herald, the largest newspaper in the Atlantic, and one of the most respected. But that doesn't matter; all that matters is that some thin-skinned complainer has complained about them. (Surprise! It's a jihadist!) I hate that his paper will now have to spend tens of thousands of dollars fighting this shake-down. But, on the other hand, I'm not sure how many more show trials can happen, with the wall-to-wall coverage that Steyn's received, before severely normal Canadians take to the streets in protest.

Nova Scotia's leading newspaper, the Chronicle Herald, is being hauled before that province's human rights commissions for -- you'll never guess -- publishing a cartoon. Here it is:

The cartoon, published April 18 in the Chronicle Herald newspaper, depicts a woman in a burka holding a sign that reads, "I want millions," and she says, "I can put it towards my husband's next training camp."

The cartoon by Bruce MacKinnon is a reference to Cheryfa MacAulay Jamal, a woman from Nova Scotia whose husband was arrested in 2006 in an anti-terrorism raid. Qayyum Abdul Jamal was released from jail after charges against him were stayed on April 15...

The Chronicle Herald hasn't just been taken to the NSHRC -- you'll recall that nut house from this previous post -- but they've actually been contacted by real police, too.

Leger said he first heard of the Islamic group's concerns when the newspaper was contacted by police.

I'm sure the Chronicle Herald will have a lot to say on this matter themselves -- they've been one of the newspapers leading the charge against the "thought crimes" provisions of human rights acts. Here are my first-blush reactions.

1. This was a cartoon that commented on a particular Muslim radical, who had issued particular political demands ("millions of dollars"). This is just the latest example of radical Islam attempting to criminalize criticism as "religious discrimination". The Chronicle Herald was clearly engaging in political commentary. Radical Islamists, and their useful idiots in Canada's human rights commissions, will do anything to silence their political critics.
2. It's embarrassing enough that rogue human rights commissions are taking on such clearly legitimate expressions of political opinion. But what is the excuse for real police calling the newspaper? When Calgary's resident jihadist, Syed Soharwardy, tried to get the police to arrest me for opposing radical Islam, they politely refused. They didn't even contact me -- they knew a nuisance complaint when they saw one. Why are Halifax police allowing their good offices to be abused? Don't they know the inappropriate chilling effect that will have on the media? Or is that their point?
3. Look at the identity of the official complainant here. It's not Mrs. Jamal, the money-grubbing wife of the accused terrorist. It's Ziaullah Khan, of Halifax's "Centre for Islamic Development". Here's Khan's angry rant about the honour killing of Aqsa Parvez, whose father killed her for, amongst other sins, not wearing a hijab. Khan doesn't focus his fury on Parvez's father, but on the "hatemongers" in the media for covering the horrible story. I'm surprised he didn't file a human rights commission back then.
4. Why is it that Khan, whose job description is the promotion of Islam in Halifax, has allied himself with the Jamals? It's because, regrettably, too many imams in too many mosques in North America are radical themselves, and even if they don't preach terrorism, they excuse it, or in this case, sympathize with the accused terrorist. If only the Khan's of this world were as eager and angry to speak out against Muslim terrorism, instead of media coverage, or Canadian counter-terrorism efforts.
5. But why has Mrs. Jamal herself not yet filed a defamation suit against the newspaper? Khan called the cartoon "libellous". If so, Mrs. Jamal could sue. But then she'd have to pay for her own lawyers -- not have the clowns at the human rights commission pay for them. And the Chronicle Herald would have centuries-old common law defences, such as truth and fair comment. Moreover, they'd be able to cross-examine Mrs. Jamal at length, not only about her demands for "millions of dollars", but about her knowledge of her husband's activities. No, better to stick with kangaroo courts and made-up "human rights", than to go to real courts.
6. Is it a coincidence that the Chronicle Herald, one of Canada's smartest critics of HRCs, has been targetted by one? Maybe. Or maybe their CEO, the mawkish Michael Noonan, is still smarting over the paper's amazing smackdown of him, and thought he'd mete out a little kangaroo court justice.
7. I hate the fact that the Chronicle Herald will now have to spend thousands of dollars fighting against this unholy alliance between fascist Islamist censors and weepy politically correct HRC bureaucrats. But, other than that unfortunate side-effect, I'm actually glad for this, in a dark, "the worse, the better" kind of way. The more people hear about these abusive HRCs, the more they realize the threat to our freedoms they have become, the more they realize that everyone is vulnerable -- not just conservatives like me and Mark Steyn, but anyone who dares to have an opinion -- the more there will be a demand for reform or abolition of these commissions. As with the offensive Barbara Hall of the Ontario Human Rights Commission, I hope that Khan's repugnant voice is heard again and again and again, for he discredits his cause more than any of his critics could.

UPDATE, via Robert: Here's some background on the lovely Mrs. Jamal herself.

I didn't know it until I read paragraph 4 this legal brief, but apparently I, Ezra Levant, have been relying on section 13 of the Canadian Human Rights Act -- the thought crimes provision -- for my "psychological security".

That's what the Canadian Jewish Congress, the Simon Wiesenthal Centre and, to Frank Dimant's shame, the B'nai Brith say. In paragraph 4 of their joint brief, they claim they're "representatives of the Canadian Jewish community" and that Canadian Jews "rely heavily on anti hate-speech legislation, such as section 13 of the Canadian Human Rights Act, for their physical and psychological security."

I admit I've been caught flat-footed by this. I didn't know that I was supposed to be a caricature of a thin-skinned Jew, a neurotic Woody Allen stereotype, a perpetual victim. But that's not being fair to Allen -- he works through his "psychological insecurities" using self-deprecating comedy, as so many Jewish comedians do. Come to think of it, I imagine he'd be a foe of section 13, if he knew about it. If he were Canadian, he'd probably even be charged under it. If you don't realize that Allen has his tongue in his cheek, his movies' outlandish characters and stories could come across as anti-Semitic. (Zelig is my favourite.) Allen himself could be convicted of "likely" spreading "hatred" against Jews.

I'm not the only Jew who didn't get the groupthink memo from our so-called "representatives". It seems that Jonathan Kay, George Jonas, David Frum, Kevin Libin, Michael Ross and Karen Selick of the National Post (not to mention the Asper family), Edward Greenspon of the Globe and Mail, Charles Adler of Corus radio, Ellen Seligman of PEN Canada and Alan Borovoy of the Canadian Civil Liberties Association aren't fulfilling the official stereotype either. Neither are Noam Chomsky or cartoonist Art Spiegelman or blogger Pamela Geller, but they're not Canadian. I'm not sure if Paul Schneidereit of the Halifax Chronicle Herald is Jewish, and Mark Steyn, Michael Coren and Christopher Hitchens may have some Jewish ancestry but they say they're not members of the tribe, so maybe their anti-section 13 heresy is permitted.

Each of the aforementioned individuals has come out against section 13. But that's the problem: they're individuals. The Official Jews, the Professional Jews, the Jews Who Are Jews for a Living, say that we're all just one big blob of "Jews" who think as we're told to think by them.

And what about Heather Reisman, patron of one of Canada's biggest and most active synagogues, Toronto's Holy Blossom? This Wednesday she is hosting a book launch -- not a book burning -- for Steyn's paperback edition of America Alone. Apparently Reisman isn't aware that Steyn's book is a section 13 crime, denounced (without a trial) by the Ontario HRC's czarina, Barbara Hall, and is about to be subject to a trial in B.C. next month. The CJC's Bernie Farber has less than 72 hours to tell Reisman to start feeling psychologically insecure!

If Canada's Official Jews want to claim that they're "psychologically insecure", they can knock themselves out. It seemed to work for Giacomo "Serenity now!" Vigna. But perhaps they'd be so kind as to speak for themselves, not for the rest of us. Now I know how Clarence Thomas and Colin Powell must feel when they hear Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson speaking "for Blacks".

There is one useful element to their psychobabble dressed up as a legal brief. It is proof, in their own writing, that section 13 is being abused in ways that were never contemplated -- let alone permitted -- by our Supreme Court when they last assessed section 13 in 1990. To protect Jewish "psychological security"? So that's all it takes to trump our fundamental freedom of speech, as enshrined in the Charter of Rights, Bill of Rights, and 800 years of common law?

If you're a Jew (or know of a Jew) who has spoken up against the thought crimes provisions of Canada's human rights laws and I've inadvertently left you off of this list, e-mail me, and I'll add you. And why not e-mail your "representatives" at the CJC, B'nai Brith and (weirdly, as if they're some sort of political body) the Simon Wiesenthal Center at the same time.

Tell them that we all know they need some sort of "crisis" to write about in their endless fundraising letters. But perhaps they might find some other, real, threats to Jewish security -- oh, say, a synagogue or school torching -- and leave the "psychological security" schtick to Woody Allen or Jerry Seinfeld.

ADDENDUM: It's not just that Jews are opposed to section 13. It's that anti-Semites are in favour of it -- and are using it as a weapon against us. Look at the character of the men who have recently been filing complaints under section 13 and its provincial analogs. Mohamed Elmasry, the terrorist-supporting president of the Canadian Islamic Congress, filed three complaints against Judeophile Mark Steyn; Syed Soharwardy, the infidel-hating president of the Islamic Supreme Council of Canada filed a complaint against me (and, though he later dropped it, the Edmonton Council of Muslim Communities picked it up); and even Richard Warman, Canada's most prolific section 13 complainant, has admitted under oath that he went online, under a secret codename, and posted comments on white supremacist websites, signing off with Nazi shorthand for "heil Hitler".

Warman is now suing not only me, but the Zionist National Post and its editor Jonathan Kay, as well as four of Canada's most pro-Israel Gentile bloggers, Kathy Shaidle, Kate McMillan and Connie and Mark Fournier. Section 13 doesn't give "the Jews" security. Section 13 is being used to silence "the Jews" and our righteous Gentile allies. If anything, it makes me "psychologically insecure" to know that section 13 is being supporting in my name even as Alberta's own version of section 13 is being used against me.

I know that the CJC is beyond redemption. And the Wiesenthal Center is really just a museum and a gift store. But I still hold out hope from the B'nai Brith. Does Frank Dimant even know what his organization is doing? 

I've been focused on the Canadian Human Rights Commission, because they are by far the most abusive in the country, they're the biggest, and they're the one most likely to be brought to heel -- if the federal Conservatives can be convinced to do the right thing. Alberta's HRC is dangerous, too, because they have actually gone farther than the CHRC in terms of limiting freedom of religion and speech (see paragraph 357 here) and their cartoon suit against me, now grinding into its third year.

But there are fourteen different HRCs in Canada at the federal, provincial and territorial level. I don't think there is a sane one amongst the bunch.

Last week I wrote a bit about Nova Scotia's HRC, and their three-year hearing about whether an Arab man's "human right" to watch Al Jazeera trumped his condo board's rule -- and the man's own signed contract -- to forbid big satellite dishes on the building (by the way, the satellite remained up throughout the dispute).

Well, it wouldn't be seemly for a prairie boy like me to be taking on Halifax's human rights nannies all by myself! Here's the Halifax Chronicle-Herald's Paul Schneidereit, bringing some hometown scrutiny to the NS HRC. An excerpt:

[NS HRC CEO Michael] Noonan claimed it’s the media that say human rights commissions are out of control. Actually, two of the men responsible for helping create human rights commissions in the first place – Alan Borovoy, Canadian Civil Liberties Association general counsel, and Irwin Cotler, former federal Liberal justice minister – have both said the commissions have gone off the rails in their efforts to censor free speech.

Noonan also accused the media of taking an "extreme" example, like the human rights complaints against Maclean’s, and using it to "divert public attention from the dirty little secrets hiding under the carpet of Canada’s grand multicultural tapestry." Huh? If the Maclean’s case is so extreme, why did both the federal and B.C. human rights bodies decide the case was worth investigating? Is Ezra’s case also extreme? How many "extreme" cases should the media ignore before it’s OK, according to Noonan, to complain? The second part of his allegation, frankly, is bizarre. Is he implying the media have cried foul about free speech being squelched to cover up real discrimination elsewhere? If so, that’s insulting and offensive. But, hey, it’s a free country … I think.

Noonan’s claim freedom of speech is concentrated in the hands of a powerful media elite is demonstrably wrong. He and the Osgoode Hall students who objected to the Maclean’s piece had their opinions printed by this paper. The Internet is full of opinions on this topic, just a Google away. Noonan said Maclean’s is to blame for the complaint (didn’t he say it was "extreme?") as it wouldn’t run the dissenting views of the Canadian Islamic Congress. But Maclean’s side of the story is different. They say they refused to be dictated to on the response’s length or layout, or whether there’d be cover art.

Those defending human rights bodies just don’t get it. 

This article in yesterday's National Post, by former Mossad agent Michael Ross, puts Canadian human rights commissions and their petty, vindictive work into perspective. There are real hate crimes in the world, but hate is the adjective, and crime is the noun. In Canada, we have it backwards -- hate is the noun, crime is the adjective. A real "hate crime" is a terrorist attack. Writing racist words on a website may be hateful, but it's not a crime.

Paul Schneidereit of the Halifax Chronicle Herald met with Irwin Cotler during the latter's visit to Halifax, and put questions to him about the human rights commissions and their failures. Like me, I think Schneidereit was underwhelmed with Cotler's response.

Finally: tune into the Rick Mercer Report tonight. I have it on good authority that Rick's rant will be on the subject of HRCs. That's an important media and political milestone in itself -- a sign that the subject is starting to enter the mainstream of Canadian discussion, not just the hyper-political world of blogs or the Parliamentary precinct. More than that, when the HRCs are the subject of humour and ridicule, it's a sign of how badly they've lost the argument. I can hardly wait to watch it!

Paul Schneidereit has become a leading voice calling for reform of Canada's human rights commissions. Here is what must be at least his third column on the subject, in Halifax's leading daily paper. Schneidereit reminds us that it wasn't too long ago that the Supreme Court of Canada, in a razor-thin 4 to 3 decision, upheld the section 13 thought crimes provision of the human rights act, but with this proviso:

...[the majority of judges wrote that] there was "little danger that subjective opinion as to offensiveness will supplant the proper meaning." But exactly what the majority said would not happen, in fact has.

That's a keen observation; those who argue that section 13 is a constitutionally valid infringement on speech ignore how the human rights commissions have run wild with the narrow powers granted to them by a narrow decision of the court. It seems likely to me that if Mark Steyn's case or my case -- so clearly outside the small ambit granted by the court -- were to come before the court again, they'd put the commissions back in their place.

My case or Mark Steyn's might just come to that; with a 100% conviction rate at the federal HRC, it's doubtful that we'll be acquitted at the first instance. It is good to know that Schneidereit's views will be represented at any such appeal; he is the past president of the Canadian Association of Journalists, which promised to intervene legally should either of our cases go to a full-blown hearing.

Hard on the heels of PEN Canada, the Canadian Association of Journalists issued a very clear statement today demanding amendments to human rights statutes, to stop their prosecution of thought crimes. I was going to excerpt from it, but it's all great -- I'll post the whole thing here:

CAJ urges changes to human rights laws

    OTTAWA, Feb. 22 /CNW/ - The Canadian Association of Journalists is

calling on federal and provincial governments to amend human rights

legislation to stop a pattern of disturbing attacks on freedom of speech.

    Two recent cases spotlight the dangers of allowing state-backed agencies

to censor speech based on subjective perceptions of offensiveness - MacLean's

magazine, which is facing complaints in two provinces and nationally for an

article by syndicated columnist Mark Steyn, and Ezra Levant, the former

publisher of the Western Standard who is now before the Alberta Human Rights

Commission for his decision to publish the Danish cartoons of the Islamic

prophet Muhammad.

    "Human rights commissions were never intended to act as a form of thought

police," said CAJ President Mary Agnes Welch. "But now they're being used to

chill freedom of expression on matters that are well beyond accepted Criminal

Code restrictions on free speech."

    The CAJ supports Liberal MP Keith Martin's private members motion to have

section 13(1) of federal human rights legislation, the clause dealing with

published material, repealed. Similar provincial legislation should also be

amended as required.

    "The lack of political leadership on this issue, apart from Mr. Martin

and a few others, is appalling," said Welch. "Even people who helped create

human rights commissions have said they were never meant to act as censors.

Since a number of commissions have accepted these complaints as worthy of

investigation, there clearly needs to be government direction to stop the

ongoing erosion of one of Canada's most fundamental rights."

    The CAJ believes that laws of libel and slander, hate speech and other

provisions found within the Criminal Code provide sufficient restrictions on

freedom of speech. Human rights commissions, which are not bound by the same

rules of evidence of the courts, have become last-ditch end-arounds for those

who want to silence commentary they disagree with.

    "Whether you agree with Steyn or Levant is immaterial. If they're

breaking no laws, they should have the right, in our democracy, to speak

freely," said Welch.

    The CAJ will be monitoring the investigations in these two cases and

plans to intervene if the process moves to the tribunal stage. The CAJ,

however, strongly urges the Canadian human rights commission, as well of those

of Alberta, B.C. and Ontario, to simply dismiss these complaints completely.

    The Canadian Association of Journalists is a professional organization

with some 1,500 members across Canada. The CAJ's primary role is to

provide-public interest advocacy and high quality professional development for

its members.

That's clear and forceful thinking; I've bolded a few of my favourite passages. I'm particularly impressed that the CAJ is promising to intervene on behalf of Steyn and me, should our cases go to a full tribunal hearing.

The CAJ has been good on this issue for a while; two years ago, they invited me to speak to their annual convention in Halifax about the Western Standard's decision to publish the cartoons. That showed courage in itself. The CAJ's past president, Paul Schneidereit, has written several great columns on the subject. And the new president, Mary Agnes Welch, is certainly no slouch either.

What a pleasant contrast the CAJ makes with the so-called Canadian Journalists for Free Expression, which is still hiding under their desks. They've made bold statements about press freedom in Tunisia, Guyana and Somalia, which is probably why they've been too busy to look out their own window.