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?

The CBC Indulges in Anti-Catholic Hate Speech

 

This CBC report is breathtakingly dishonest. 

The Vatican recently formally repudiated the “Doctrine of Discovery.” I hope they knew they were wasting their breath. Inevitably, the headline is not this, but that “the Catholic Church has not gone far enough.” Nothing will ever go far enough; there will never be either truth or reconciliation. There is a vast grievance industry and special interests to be fed.

The CBC’s premise for saying this is not enough is that the Vatican should have “rescinded” instead of “repudiated” the doctrine. As if this makes any material difference to any Indian. Indeed, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission asked for “repudiation”. But the goalposts move with every step towards reconciliation by the other side.

As the Vatican document explains, the Church cannot rescind the doctrine. It is not a Catholic doctrine. It is a legal theory, in international law, and in the US. 

“The legal concept of ‘discovery’ was debated by colonial powers from the sixteenth century onward and found particular expression in the nineteenth century jurisprudence of courts in several countries, according to which the discovery of lands by settlers granted an exclusive right to extinguish, either by purchase or conquest, the title to or possession of those lands by indigenous peoples.”

The Vatican has no control over courts or common law in the US or other countries.

But the “Doctrine of Discovery” had no place in Catholic teaching. To the contrary, as the Vatican document notes, 

“In the 1537 Bull Sublimis Deus, Pope Paul III wrote, ‘We define and declare [ ... ] that [, .. ] the said Indians and all other people who may later be discovered by Christians, are by no means to be deprived of their liberty or the possession of their property, even though they be outside the Christian faith; and that they may and should, freely and legitimately, enjoy their liberty and possession of their property; nor should they be in any way enslaved; should the contrary happen, it shall be null and have no effect.’”

Which the CBC report does not explain. It does not quote from the document; it ignores it. And it does not, as journalistic ethics require, include a spokesman for both sides, if there is some controvery over the Vatican’s statement.

This is rather like asking a politician “When did you stop beating your wife?” Then, if he answer that he never beat her, condemning him for refusing to answer.

It is anti-Catholic hate speech. Our tax dollars at work.

Sadly, the statement has given Pope Francis another opportunity to say something idiotic: “Never again can the Christian community allow itself to be infected by the idea that one culture is superior to others, or that it is legitimate to employ ways of coercing others.”

Of course one culture can be superior to another; why would one suppose otherwise? What is his argument? And if it is never legitimate to coerce others, police forces and parenting are immoral. 

How helpful is that?

Here, Let Me Fix That for You

 

If the shoe fits ...

This bit of conceptual art is in the atrium of the Art Gallery of Ontario. I came upon it after viewing their Andy Warhol exhibit. It is meant, the sign explains, to memorialize the children who died iin the Indian Residential Schools.

It is an embarrassment. However you might feel about the children who died in the Residential Schools—not a surprising number, after all; in those days, child mortality was high—this fails as art. It demonstrates no skill or craftsmanship. It lacks all originality—there are similar displays of shoes conveying the same message all over Canada. It gives us no new perspective on anything. It is not beautiful. It is hackneyed. It is also hate speech.

I have a simple solution. All that is needed in order to make it interesting and transgressive is to change the title. Here’s mine:

“Abortion.”

I urge the gentle reader to carry posters and a staple gun for the next time you see one of these displays.

London (Ontario) Murders

 

Every death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind. Every murder is murder, and there is no discriminating here. Each of us is equally valuable in the eyes of God, and each of us as citizens has a right to equal protection before and from the law.

So it is disturbing that, when someone who is not a Muslim kills a Muslim, it is treated very differently than when someone who is a Muslim kills a non-Muslim.

When someone ran down a visibly Muslim family in London, killing four, it was immediately identified as a “hate crime.” When a Muslim man opened fire on Toronto’s Danforth iin 2018, police insisted and still insist no motive could be found. 

You may argue that the circumstances were different. Perhaps so. In the first case, the perpetrator had at least one close Muslim friend, who insisted he had no anti-Muslim feelings. The perpetrator apparently belonged to no anti-Muslim organizations, there is nothing troubling in his social media, and there is apparently no manifesto. In the second case, ISIS claimed responsibility.

After the Danforth shooting, the authorities and media rushed to insist that, whatever else happened, the most important thing was that Muslims as a group must not be blamed.

In the wake of the London murders, authorities rushed to declare that all the rest of us, all who are not Muslims, are to blame. “This is our Canada.”

This difference in reaction and interpretation could not be more striking, and is obviously discriminatory. Either we are all and only responsible for our individual acts, or all groups must be held equally responsible for the actions of their members.

The authorities and media have called, in the present case, for immediate action against ideologies that promote such hate. They identify some such ideology called “Islamophobia,” which needs to be banned.

“Hate speech,” in the sense of inciting violence against any identifiable group, is already criminal in Canada. Those who resist further action singling out Islam for special protection fear it might involve making mere criticism of Islam as a religion or political ideology illegal. 

And there is another problem. The Quran itself, and the hadith, by a reasonable literal reading, call for Muslim supremacy and violence against non-Muslims. Not just the “jihad” concept, but any legitimate government must be run in accord with sharia law, with different rights for Muslims and non-Muslims. One is obliged to kill “kaffirs,” non-believers, as well as anyone who apostasizes from Islam.

One may well insist that such passages do not mean what they might appear to mean by said literal reading; but ambiguity is not allowed as a defense of hate speech elsewhere. The worst interpretation is always assumed.

In other words, if we are going to fairly enforce even the existing laws on hate speech, Islam itself would have to be banned.

I think it is a given that we cannot criminalize a major world religion. Not just for practical reasons, but because after the right to life, freedom of conscience is the most fundamental of all rights.

Accordingly, beyond the argument from freedom of speech, which is honoured in the US, and is supposedly guaranteed in the Canadian constitution, we simply cannot have hate speech laws, cannot ban even eliminationist hate speech. Troubling as it might seem to most, the alternative is worse. 

Especially for Muslims.

Words and Deeds

Speakers' Corner, Hyde Park, London

In our discussion last night, my friend Cyrus defended “hate speech” laws. I argued that the only speech that can legitimately be regulated is speech with clear material consequences, on the familiar principle that “my right to swing my fist ends where your nose begins.” Accordingly, slander, libel, fraud, yelling “fire” in crowded theatres, or incitement to violence should be outlawed—but no more.

Because, among other reasons, any speech that makes a point worth making is guaranteed to upset someone. No free speech, no meaningful discussion, no democracy, no human progress.

He countered that it was in practice difficult to distinguish speech inciting violence from speech that simply expressed an opinion. He offered the examples “blacks do not deserve to live” and “kill all the blacks.” Can we really clearly distinguish the former from the latter?

I do not see any difficulty here.

We have always made this same distinction in common law. It would be fairly unremarkable for someone to say, “Jack Poulson does not deserve to live.” A bit shocking, because it is a severe condemnation, but fairly acceptable in polite company. After all, we have a common phrase, “Jack Poulson is a waste of oxygen.” Same meaning.

But to tell someone to kill Jack Poulson we understand as incitement to action; if the listener follows through, the speaker is, like Charles Manson, guilty of murder.

A dramatic distinction, that we have always understood. No different for groups.

I could name people who I would say do not deserve to live. People whose net contribution has been to make the world a worse instead of a better place. That does not mean I would either murder them, or condone murdering them. Just as, if I said someone did not deserve their wealth, it would not be an endorsement of robbing them.

Immigrants Dislike PC Culture

Speaking last night with a first-generation immigrant from Iran. She has nothing good to say about Canada or the West or Canadian culture. But she also strongly dislikes political correctness. She laments the pervasive climate of censorship.

Her view is that it is due to Canadians having too few real problems.

An interesting thought.

The Canadian Genocide

My friend Xerxes recently wrote a column suggesting the NDP did something risky by electing a new leader with a darker than average skin tone, and of a minority religion. I scoffed: Canada has a good record of not voting along religious lines. And, I asked rhetorically, “When has skin colour ever been an issue here?”

Perhaps predictably, a SJW wrote back. To her, at least, skin colour is important.

“Since Europeans first arrived here, and right down to today. Early settlers deemed indigenous people fair game or enslaved them. Black people were imported to be slaves―more than most Canadians know― through the 17th and 18th centuries, and some were not freed until the 19th. Some Canadians may have espoused the abolitionist cause but that doesn’t mean racism vanished. Quite the contrary: blacks were effectively ghettoized (e.g., Africville in Halifax) and restricted as to employment (e.g., railway porter was about the best work for a black man) well into the 20th century.

“Indigenous people and people of colour still face discrimination in housing, hiring, and even medical treatment in our hospitals. And it’s not as if these facts are hidden from anyone who reads newspapers, watches TV news, or even shops at an average mall.”

In related news, the Dalhousie University students’ union has banned all celebrations of Canada Day for Canada’s 150th anniversary. “Canada Day,” they say, is “an act of ongoing colonialism.” A student council VP wrote on Facebook that “she would not stand with ‘privileged white people,’ or be proud of a country that is responsible for ‘over 400 years of genocide’ and ‘the stealing of land.’”

I oppose hate speech legislation. But if we are going to have it, this should be prosecuted as hate speech. The fact that it won’t be is an illustration of why hate speech laws are an awful idea. They are always going to be used as a club against groups already facing discrimination, not to protect them. They will only protect the already privileged.

In this case, the victims are “white people.”

Let us look at the claims in turn.

“Early settlers deemed indigenous people fair game or enslaved them.”

Early settlers came to trade with the Indians. You do not get far by killing or enslaving your suppliers or your customers.

Slavery was endemic to native cultures. The early European settlers stood apart in not practicing it.

Indian warfare was nearly constant, and there was no such thing as a non-combatant or a civilian. The arrival of European civil society in any area ended the killing and brought peace.

“Black people were imported to be slaves―more than most Canadians know―through the 17th and 18th centuries.”

No slave ship ever landed at a Canadian port.

There were been a handful of domestic slaves in Canada before the 19th century, but then, at that time, there had always been slavery everywhere. Even then, European Canada would have stood out as a place in which slavery was almost unknown. That is, among the European population. Slavery was always common among the indigenous people. When the Europeans extended their jurisdiction, it was banned.

In 1793, Upper Canada (Ontario) distinguished itself as the first British colony anywhere to outlaw slavery. And in this, the British Empire as a whole was ahead of the rest of the world. The colonies of British North America were, from then onward, the great refuge for slaves from the USA. The original black population of Nova Scotia was American slaves freed by the British during the American Revolution, and given land.

“Blacks were effectively ghettoized (e.g., Africville in Halifax) and restricted as to employment (e.g., railway porter was about the best work for a black man) well into the 20th century.”

I remember Africville. It was torn down, on the grounds that it was a ghetto, in the 60s, during the civil rights movement in the US, and its residents given new, purportedly better, housing throughout Halifax. In those days, this was supposed to be the progressive thing. Segregation was an evil. And Africville lacked amenities.

More recently, the descendants of the residents of Africville have demanded, and gotten, a formal apology and financial compensation for this effort. They now say they actually wanted to all live together in Africville. Segregation, they now say, was their preference. I note our correspondent is a bit behind on the official line here.

As to railway porter being the best work for a black man, there were never laws restricting employment of blacks in Canada. That was in the US South. In the absence of law, such discrimination in employment is not plausible. The free market would fairly soon put anyone who discriminates out of business, unless it was by mutual consent. It is simply unwise to turn away customers, and unwise not to hire the best person for a job. It will cost you money. If railway porters tended to be black, I also note that jewellers and travel agents in Canada have tended to be Dutch; restaurants tended to be Chinese or Italian; policemen and journalists tended to be Irish. Surely this is just as much, or as little, proof of discrimination.

“Indigenous people and people of colour still face discrimination in housing, hiring, and even medical treatment in our hospitals.”

It is indeed a blot on our record that we pay attention to ethnicity here, and discriminate, but we discriminate in favour of aboriginal people, not against them. Treaty Indians get free health care, free post-secondary education, tax breaks, are exempt from hunting and fishing regulations, and so forth. There are legal requirements to discriminate in their favour in employment. This is wrong, but it is in favour of indigenous people, not against them. The government wanted to eliminate all these distinctions back in 1969, and the indigenous leaders rose up and refused.

It is true that indigenous people do less well on measures of income, education, and health than the general population. This does not mean they have been discriminated against by some other ethnic group.

“Canada Day is an act of ongoing colonialism.”

It is the reverse: it marks a moment when we Canadians chose to take more of our own affairs in hand, rather than leaving them to our colonial masters. Confederation was not independence from Britain, but at the time and long before, many understood that it had this eventual implication. The new federal government was taking upon itself powers that previously had resided in London.

How can this possibly be construed as colonialism?

“she would not stand with ‘privileged white people.’”

What she is saying is that, to be Canadian, to her, is to be “white.” And she refuses to associate with “white” people. The quote marks, to be clear, are there because this woman called Canadians “white people” and “privileged.” This is a racist viewpoint, and it is hers. She has no right to ascribe it to her fellow Canadians. She is demanding segregation and demanding that she not be considered Canadian. Let’s be clear on where the discrimination and the racism is coming from.

“A country that is responsible for ‘over 400 years of genocide’”

Genocide was the usual form of war among aboriginal groups: the elimination of the Huron by the Iroquois is one well-known and well-documented example. But as far as Canada goes as a political jurisdiction, or British North America or New France before it, there has never been a genocide towards any group, before or after Confederation. Let’s hope that record holds. I have my concerns, because the attitude we see more and more of about “white people” is similar to the things said about Jews back in early-20th century Europe.

“‘The stealing of land.’”

This again is the opposite of the truth. Whether native groups had any legal title to land is dubious: they did not, by any established standards of European law or British common law; and land ownership was not a concept known to aboriginal societies. Nevertheless, the British created this right, and were scrupulous about buying out their hypothetical interests in the land at an agreed-upon price in Canada. They deserve credit for this act of altruism. They could, of course, have simply taken the land. They did not.