We Beg To Differ
And, sad to say, begging is what we're reduced to. Through no fault other than our own, as enlightened secular and liberal societies, bendingarse backwards to accommodate one and all. In the process truncating our own liberties, most particularly that of free speech. Freedom of expression, that much-vaunted and under-valued spear-bearer of a free society is guaranteed to Canadians under our Constitution.Which should surely pull rank over the come-latelies of provincial human rights commissions? Evidently not.
We've the example of a few years past when the world of Islam ran amok in violent outrage over the publication of a few witty cartoons in Denmark, illustrating the hypocrisy of Islam as a religion of peace. The sardonic depictions of the Prophet Muhammad brought the wrath of ignorant Muslims down upon the unwary heads of the West in denunciations violently threatening in nature.
Which also had the unfortunate effect of encouraging the murders of individuals both Muslim and otherwise, in the wrong place at the right time.
And when the now-defunct The Western Standard demonstrated the further temerity to reprint those cartoons at a time when most publications in the West were cowering in terror, it earned them the potential for censure from the Alberta Human Rights Commission. These commissions born out of a sense of responsibility toward those who required protection, as visible minorities, from the ill-will of the majority.
Representing a defence against race-based discrimination in the seeking of employment, in rental of living accommodations, and other blatant and unforgivable instances of refusing the expectations of acquiring a normal lifestyle in a white-dominated society to people of colour. As such, the commissions had a vital role to fulfil. And, as is the case with trade unions whose time has come and gone, leaving them with little to fill their dockets with, they've turned their jaundiced eyes elsewhere for justification of their role in society.
The most recent abuse against freedom of expression in Canada takes the form of the Canadian Islamic Congress crying foul against the publication in Maclean's magazine of an excerpt from a recently-published book by Mark Steyn. They feel they have a legitimate right to contest the publication of an article they contend misrepresents the values of Canadian Muslims, their community and their religion. Step up to the civil courts and file a grievance.
Instead, they've gone to the human rights commissions to go to bat on their behalf. Cost to the taxpayer, not to the Congress as would be the case had they optioned court action. Neatly pinioning Canadian society in a way that those who originally championed the birth of those commissions never imagined. Leaving them now to lament the direction the commissions have taken upon themselves, effectively breaking Canadian law in defense of the indefensible.
For with a free press and freedom of expression being stifled in this way we face the pathology of overarching accommodation coming home to roost. When MarkSteyn , through his writing, pointed out the high birth rate among Muslims, and that Muslims, crudely speaking, host an internal body "hot for jihad", he was merely speaking the obvious, as the record demonstrates amply.
That the combination of those two effects could conceivably result in a surrender of our democratic way of life to a fundamental,strictured , faith-based one is a possibility, given sufficient time and opportunity. For in life anything is possible, and given the direction that militant Islam has taken over the past several decades, there is much food for thought and no little apprehension for the future.
In Canada newspapers, magazines and others in the publishing business are free to publish what they will, as long as it conforms to certain social mores and the laws that protect the entire society from blantent excess or hate-filledpropaganda . A conjecture of a social nature taking into account precedents and certain realities does not quite fit the category of inciting to violence and hatred against an identifiable group.
The identifiable group in question has itself incited, through the actions of a rabid minority and the inaction of a responsible majority, suspicion and fear on the part of the West and the majority population within Canada.
That the Canadian Islamic Congress feels it is somehow entitled to demand the 'right' to an equal-length rebuttal to the article they so dispute, in the very same magazine, and to 'demand' the 'right' to option its cover as well, simply proves the point the disputed article leads toward.
That theistically honour-bound mujaheddin by Islamic standards represent terror-based blood-lusting jihadists by Western experience. Inducing terror and compliance through psychological bullying is yet another way in which extremists seek to silence those who critique their thuggish ways.
Labels: Canada, Traditions, Troublespots
posted by Pieface @ Monday, January 07, 2008
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