Tag Archives: CHRC

News

Obama administration backs restrictions on free speech at the United Nations

1 Comment

Story from the Weekly Standard. (H/T Confederate Yankee via ECM)

Excerpt:

The Obama administration has marked its first foray into the UN human rights establishment by backing calls for limits on freedom of expression. The newly-minted American policy was rolled out at the latest session of the UN Human Rights Council, which ended in Geneva on Friday.

[…]In introducing the resolution on Thursday, October 1–adopted by consensus the following day–the ranking U.S. diplomat, Chargé d’Affaires Douglas Griffiths, crowed:

“The United States is very pleased to present this joint project with Egypt. This initiative is a manifestation of the Obama administration’s commitment to multilateral engagement throughout the United Nations and of our genuine desire to seek and build cooperation based upon mutual interest and mutual respect in pursuit of our shared common principles of tolerance and the dignity of all human beings.”

His Egyptian counterpart, Ambassador Hisham Badr, was equally pleased–for all the wrong reasons. He praised the development by telling the Council that “freedom of expression . . . has been sometimes misused,” insisting on limits consistent with the “true nature of this right” and demanding that the “the media must . . . conduct . . . itself in a professional and ethical manner.”

[…]Pakistan’s Ambassador Zamir Akram, speaking on behalf of the Organization of the Islamic Conference, made it clear that they understand the resolution and its protection against religious stereotyping as allowing free speech to be trumped by anything that defames or negatively stereotypes religion. The idea of protecting the human rights “of religions” instead of individuals is a favorite of those countries that do not protect free speech and which use religion–as defined by government–to curtail it.

Speaking as a Christian who values religious liberty, I would not use the power of the state to silence the free speech of people who “offend” me by disagreeing with me. That’s fine with me. In any case, these “human rights” laws are almost never used to defend the free speech of Christians. The fact that Egypt and Pakistan approve of Obama’s plan doesn’t fill me with confidence about who is likely to benefit.

Now might be a good time to review how restrictions on free speech worked out in Canada, where offended Muslims sue news publications and news magazines for citing the actual words of radical Imams or publishing the Mohammed cartoons.

Share

News

Video of Ezra Levant and Mark Steyn testifying against Canadian HRCs

Leave a comment

Videos from Blazing Cat Fur, provided by SDAMatt!

Watch the first one, and you’ll be hooked! They’re awesome.

Part 1: (Ezra goes first, takes 8 minutes, then Mark Steyn starts)

Part 2: (The rest of Mark Steyn’s testimony, 8 minutes, and then questioning starts)

The first questioner at the end of part 2 is a leftist Liberal party MP. He is extremely hostile! So it starts out very hot right away!

The remainder of the testimony is question and answer by the committee.

Awesome!

Blazing Cat Fur has a plan

Blazing Cat Fur has a round-up of reactions from around the blogosphere. Here’s someone who live-blogged it.

And he has a plan, too. Read this post and submit your questions for the Chief Fascist, Jennifer Lynch.

Excerpt:

Jay Curry has got the ball rolling. We are proposing to forward a list of reader submitted questions you would like to see the members of the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights hearing on Section 13 (1) ask Jennifer Lynch during her scheduled appearance.

We hope to do this formally with say a top ten list of reader questions e-mailed to each committee member but I also recommend you e-mail the committee members individually.

As Flea suggests you should make your questions short and sweet and back them up with publicly available evidence. You may submit your questions at the blog of your choice, or e-mail me – blazingcatfur@gmail.com if you wish. Thank you.

Previous posts

And here are some links to audio and video featuring Mark Steyn and Ezra Levant. (in reverse chronological order)

Share

News

Good news for the right to free speech in Canada!

5 Comments

Life Site News has the best post I’ve seen so far.

Excerpt:

The Canadian Human Rights Tribunal ruled today that section 13 of the Canadian Human Rights Act, Canada’s human rights legislation against hate messages, unreasonably limits the Charter right to freedom of expression.

[…]Popular conservative pundit and human rights commission critic Mark Steyn today said that the end of the hate speech legislation is near, calling today’s decision a “landmark decision.”  “This is the beginning of the end for Section 13 and its provincial equivalents, and a major defeat for Canada’s thought police,” he said. “It’s not just a personal triumph for Marc Lemire, but a critical victory in the campaign by Ezra Levant, Maclean’s, yours truly and others to rid the Canadian state of this hideous affront to justice.”

[…]The hate message section of the Canadian Human Rights Act (CHRA) has been the subject of growing criticism, having been accused of placing limits on the Charter right to freedom of expression.  High profile cases have been brought against conservative publisher Ezra Levant and columnist Mark Steyn, as well as numerous cases against Christians who have expressed their convictions against the homosexualist agenda.

The CHRC has admitted to using unethical methods within their investigations.  Notably, in a hearing during Lemire’s case, CHRC employee Dean Steacy testified that he and a number of colleagues regularly used an alias to post racist messages…  The CHRC was also investigated by the RCMP regarding allegations that they had hacked into a private citizen’s internet connection, though that case was dropped when it led the police to the American jurisdiction.

Until today, no respondent had won a human rights case brought to the Tribunal under section 13.  Further, about half of the section 13 cases have been brought by Richard Warman, and almost all of them in recent years.

Blazing Cat Fur has a huge round-up of blog reactions from the best Canadian blogs.

Here are some of the blogs from his round-up:

I took a look at the comments on BCF, and they are still pretty cautious, but excited.

This news was big enough to get picked up over at Hot Air by Ed Morrissey, who explains:

When government tells you what you can and cannot say in the political context, then free speech is essentially dead.  Section 13 created an enormously intimidating device for anyone who wants to argue their beliefs in the public square in Canada.  Even in just a “remedial” mode, it creates an atmosphere where people have to worry whether their speech will create a necessity to seek government approval, and the costs of defending speech become so onerous as to silence people.

The conservatives need to make this an issue in the next election, which is coming soon since the Liberals have announced that they are no longer going to back the Conservatives. Now is the time for bold action, Stephen Harper.

Further study