Posted on 04/09/2004 5:14:40 AM PDT by Clive
In his long and colourful career, Burnaby MP Svend Robinson has taken full advantage of his right of free speech.
He has demanded the deletion of God from the Charter, accused the RCMP of brutality, heckled Ronald Reagan's special address to Parliament, and branded Israel a "terrorist state."
But most tellingly, throughout his 25-year crusade for gay rights, he has liberally branded his opponents personally as "hate-mongers" and "homophobes."
He once managed to call Liberal MP Roseanne Skoke hateful four times in three short sentences.
None of his opponents challenged his right of free speech. So why is he so hell-bent on taking away theirs?
And why is the federal Liberal government making sure he succeeds?
I'm referring here to Robinson's private member's bill, C-250, which will add "sexual orientation" to the hate propaganda section of the Criminal Code.
Even though it's Svend's personal bill, it has been rammed through the Commons, and almost through the Senate, by the Liberal government.
Under C-250, it will become a criminal offence (punishable by two years in prison) to "incite hatred" against gays (and other groups already listed) if the communication is "likely to lead to a breach of the peace."
No excuses are allowed under this section (319.1) of the Criminal Code. It doesn't matter if your statements are true, honestly held, or based on religious texts.
(A religious defence is allowed for the following section, 319.2. But it doesn't help if you are charged under 319.1.)
This means if any provincial crown prosecutor thinks your comments are over the line, and persuades a judge that your public remarks might (sooner or later) endanger persons or property in the protected groups, you're going to jail.
Defenders of this gag law can't imagine how it could inhibit free speech. They seem honestly convinced that we do not prosecute people in Canada for statements of opinion.
Well, Stephen Boissoin wrote a letter to the Red Deer Advocate criticizing promotion of the gay lifestyle in public schools and has been hailed before an Alberta human rights tribunal by a gay rights zealot at the University of Calgary.
Grant Hill, a medical doctor, warned Parliament about the health consequences of gay practices and was nationally denounced as homophobic. Three Toronto AIDS doctors filed a professional complaint against him (Hill was officially vindicated on his medical facts, but only long after his character was smeared and the media had lost interest.)
Hugh Owen, a Saskatchewan prison guard, was punished for publishing Bible references (not even excerpts) in a newspaper ad. Scott Brockie, a Toronto printer, was punished for refusing on religious grounds to work for a gay advocacy group. B.C. high school teacher Chris Kempling was punished for mentioning the health consequences of gay behaviour in a rural B.C. newspaper. I could go on.
Now it's true that these people were not charged criminally. But all of them, and many others, have been accused in strident language of "spreading hate."
And it isn't just gays who do this. We are informed almost daily by self-appointed spokesmen for this or that "identifiable group" that any criticism leads their members to low self esteem, drug problems, suicide and crime.
Get it? Criticism equals incitement to hatred, which leads to any number of breaches of the peace. This is the new theory.
Well, free speech is destroyed long before someone goes to jail. It vanishes the moment ordinary citizens feel exposed to arbitrary prosecution for voicing their honest beliefs.
So don't say, "It'll never get that far." It already has. And with Svend's new law in place, it's just a matter of redirecting "hate-mongers" from human rights commissions to the criminal courts.
All it takes to start is one zealous prosecutor and a weak judge -- hardly a rare combination.
Bill C-250 is a lot like the gun registry -- totally unnecessary and a lethal threat to our rights. Both should be scrapped and forgotten.
I....er, ah...oh, never mind. It's too easy.
Canada never had freedom of speech anyway. For most of it's history it's been very little more than an expanded Hudson's Bay Company. Why the homosexuals want to take over the place we can only guess.
Maybe it's the blankets, eh?!
They need to use a little more Vaseline on that Senate.
"Hate Crimes" is one of those- it sounds like an idea any decent person would support, but its real purpose is to squelch and silence opposition.
An interesting conundrum. The perverts are empowered and enabled by the rest of us. All of us, whether actively or by simply becoming spectators.
Even here at FR, it is assumed that saying certain words or stating certain beliefs is "not acceptable". One step away from "hate thought", that ultimate of all crimes.
"Laws" such as the proposed one are probably more responsible for negative thoughts and negative feelings among people otherwise disposed to live and let live, and ultimately contributing most to the inevitable future explosion. If the deviants don't lighten up, the resulting backlash among the normal will be harsh, long and quite final.
Not that the Black-Robed Tyrannts wouldnb't do their best to undermine it, as they have here in the US.
Now it's true that these people were not charged criminally.
It does seem that the PC thing is being taken too far in Canada, but I find it curiously vague that this article keeps say these people "were punished", but then states they weren't criminally charged.
If that's the case, I would like to know in what way they were punished. It seems very pertinent to the premise of this article, and the omission of that information seems striking.
This despite the hearing officer conceded in her decision that: "There is no question that Mr. Owens believed that he was publicly expressing his honestly held religious belief as it related to his interpretation of the Bible and its discussion of homosexuality."
Scott Brockie was fined $5,000 by the Ontario Human Rights Commission. On appeal, the court narrowed the court's decision to exempt people who refuse on conscientious grounds to support an activity that they find repugnant to the core beliefs of his religion but they left the decision and the fine in place because what Brockie had refused to do was to print letterheads for a gay and lesbian organization.
The British Columbia College of Teachers suspended Chris Kempling for one month for publishing his views on homosexuality in a series of letters to the editor of a newspaper, on the grounds that he was guilty of "professional misconduct or conduct unbecoming a BCCT member". Note that he was publishing outside of the school system but identifying himself as a teacher. The Court held that he has no right to protection under the Charter (which supposedly protects both freedom of speach and freedom of religion).
Lest you think that it can only happen in Canada, look at the witch hunt that is following Laura Schlessinger, the Rev. Kristopher Okwedy and the Boy Scouts of America.
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