Canada's Totalitarianism

 

Canada is gaining an international reputation for all the wrong things. Elon Musk has chipped in on Justin Trudeau’s “Online Harms Bill,” that “This sounds insane if accurate! Community notes, please check.”

Specifically, according to a tweet he reposted, it “will give police the power to retroactively search the Internet for ‘hate speech‘ violations, and arrest offenders, even if the offense occurred before the law existed.”

Is this true?

Apparently so. Community notes responded: it applies if “a person communicates or causes to be communicated hate speech so long as the hate speech remains public, and the person can remove or block access to it.”

So by the letter of the law, you are liable to prosecution, and penalties up to life in prison, if you have not taken down anything you might have written or tweeted in the past, that violates the new law. Including tweets or posts you might not remember.

This is especially problematic, because you can never be sure what violates the present law. Life in prison, for example, is the punishment for “promoting genocide.” But the definition of genocide has become elastic. Almost everyone is currently accused by someone of promoting genocide in one way or another. One can also be punished for anything “if it is motivated by hatred based on protected characteristics.” But who can define “hatred”?

And, speaking of human equality, why are only some characteristics protected, and not others? Definitionally, this is not “equal protection before the law.”

Since these protections are arbitrary, one must keep abreast at all times with what the current law says, and be alert for changes.

The safest thing, of course—the only safe thing; is to just keep your mouth shut on any topic that might be even vaguely political or controversial. This seems to be the intent of the legislation—shut up and do what you’re told.

So who gets to define “hatred”? Or “detestation,” or “vilification,” or ”genocide,”  or the like? That task apparently falls not to a court of law but to the “Digital Safety Commission.” Which means the accused will have no due process. No rules of evidence, no right to confront your accuser or cross-examine, no right to trial by jury of your peers, none of the traditions of our legal system, fought and died for by our forefathers over the years. You are judged by government bureaucrats. If the government identifies an enemy, nothing stops them from throwing him or her in prison for life. “Name the man, and I will find the crime.”

No actual crime need even be alleged. A person can, according to the bill, be placed under house arrest and cut off from all communication devices, if a judge decides he or she is likely to say something hateful in future.

No problem, the government reassures us. No need to worry. Any such judgement would have to be approved by the Attorney-General, and “these provisions would only be invoked in the most extreme cases.” In other words, just trust the government never to actually use the tools they are demanding.

An article in The Independent, a centre-left outlet, apparently doing its best to downplay the threat, quotes the Canadian Civil Liberties Association as saying “Generally speaking, laws don't have a retroactive effect... in Canada … it should not have a retroactive effect; that would be a bad interpretation of that provision, which [we] would stand against.”

In other words, we have to wait and see. The law certainly can be read to say this. The Civil Liberties Association must stand against this interpretation.

The Independent article even includes a veiled threat against anyone raising the alarm over this. Noting that Elon Musk has done so, it then cites a lawsuit against him for defamation, on the grounds of a similar prior post on X asking for information from “community notes” on a similar claim.

So even asking questions is risky. Especially if you’re not rich and powerful like Elon Musk.

Canada is worst, but similar attempts for force silence on the citizenry are rampant across the developed world. Something is clearly going on here.

Right now the Scots, the Irish, and the Dutch seem most determined to resist. And the polls in Canada have turned decisively against Trudeau.

But the way things seem to be going, does that even matter? Governments seem to be showing a growing disregard for their own people and the popular will. What do they know? Given that they are prepared to shut down open debate, will they even again allow a fair election?

Might Makes Wrong?

 

This tweet by Elon Musk caught my attention:

“The axiomatic error undermining much of Western Civilization is ‘weak makes right’. 

If someone accepts, explicitly or implicitly, that the oppressed are always the good guys, then the natural conclusion is that the strong are the bad guys.”

This seems to explain how so many are currently supporting Hamas, and its terrorist tactics, against Israel. 

But given this example, it is not exactly “might makes wrong.” Israel is not that mighty: pitched against Hamas alone, it is more powerful, but the broader reality is that Israel is a small state surrounded by much larger enemies. Hamas sought to provoke a larger conflagration, and simply lost that gamble, so far.

So it is mot quite that Israel is more powerful. The precise formula seems rather “success makes wrong,” and “failure makes right.”

One persecutes the Jews, for example, not because they are powerful. They are still always and everywhere a vulnerable minority. It is because they are, individually, more successful. 

Such a formula is obviously destructive to the common good. If all success is condemned and punished, everything will fail in time.

There is a kernel of righteousness in the “weak makes right” argument. Those who crave power are more likely to achieve power. Those who crave wealth are more likely to achieve wealth. And these are vices. Accordingly, it stands to reason that the rich and powerful are more likely to be immoral, as a group, than the poor. Hence the Beatitudes: “blessed are the poor in spirit…”

However, assuming that someone is immoral because they are rich and powerful, or moral because they are poor and weak, is prejudice. As Musk goes on to say, this is no substitute for making moral judgements.

Cain killed Abel because he was more successful. God did not exempt the poor in Sodom and Gomorrah, or Nineveh, or Canaan. 

Those supporting without question the notion that “weak makes right” are simply possessed by the vice of envy.

Ukraine Endgame

 

Elon Musk has publicly proposed a peace plan for Ukraine that would give Russia all that it currently demands. The annexation of Crimea formally recognized; Ukraine guarantees it will not join NATO; referenda are held, presumably under international supervision, in the Donbas, and Russia withdraws if they lose the vote, annexes if they win.

The argument given for this pro-Russian settlement, even while Ukraine is winning in the field, is that, realistically Ukraine is not in the end going to defeat a country three times its size.

I disagree. 

That sounds right if this is a war between Russia and Ukraine--although Afghanistan managed to fight the Russians off, didn’t they? But what if it is a war between Ukraine and Putin? What if the Russian people or even the Russian oligarchy are not solidly behind this war? Couldn’t Russian popular opinion force an end to the war?

It is absurd to ask Ukraine never to join NATO. The very fact that Russia has invaded, for a second time in a few years, proves they need a security guarantee. NATO is the only option.

Referenda in the disputed territories is a good solution—but under international mandate, after a Russian withdrawal. If before, it is likely the Russians will simply refuse to withdraw if they lose.

There is much talk of Russia deploying tactical nuclear weapons. And, if they do, how could the West respond?

I think General Petraeus has the right idea: NATO sends in the bombers and, using conventional munitions, bombs every Russian troop concentration in Ukraine, every supply depot, and every Russian warship on the Black Sea. They maintain air superiority and bomb whatever moves.

Some insist Petraeus cannot be serious. This, after all, would be direct war between Russia and NATO. This would be World War Three.

Yet why are we afraid of direct war between Russia and NATO? Russia cannot handle Ukraine acting alone. The quickest way to end this war would be to send in NATO to make the defeat quick and decisive. Many lives might be saved. NATO would establish itself as a vital guarantor of international security. The world would be a much safer place.

The only argument against is that direct conflict between nuclear powers might lead to nuclear war.

But if Putin uses nuclear weapons, that argument is gone. We are already in nuclear war. A swift and overwhelming response is the only way, then, to prevent more nuclear wars in the future. Nations must not discover they can go nuclear without repercussions.

Elon Musk on Ultimate Reality

Elon Musk is right, except for his arbitrary identification of physical reality with “base reality.” Take that away, and there is no real philosophical problem. It does not matter whether what we perceive is mental or physical in origin. Ask Bishop Berkeley. Material reality is an unnecessary assumption, and in the end, as Musk points out, an untenable one.

All that really matters is whether God exists. If he does, we can be confident that our experience is ultimately meaningful. If he does not, it equally does not matter whether we perceive “base reality” or some computer simulation: either way, nothing means anything.