Character defamation suit in order?

Check out the rhetoric that the Sun's Michael Den Tandt uses to describe the Prime Minister of Canada:

The crows are coming home to roost for Prime Minister Stephen Harper, and a mangy bunch of birds they are. Will this provoke an election? Not likely. Not yet.

Harper must wake up some mornings and wonder where it all went wrong. Not long ago he was the Iceman, firmly in control of every teensy strand of his government, and seemingly managing it all with aplomb.

With Harper at the helm there were no mistakes. You didn't get charm, but you did get efficiency, intelligence and a ruthless instinct for political combat that made him more winner than loser.

Most Canadians were buying that package, when compared with the alternatives. We weren't warming to the man -- the piranha smile and assassin's eyes make that difficult -- but we were getting used to him. Harper and Stephane Dion, mano a mano? Dion was sure to emerge with two black eyes and his glasses fastened together with Scotch tape...

Assassin's eyes?

Why is it that bloggers need to be so careful, but MSM can say anything they want?

* * * *

Related: Police set to turn spotlight on Liberal officials - Globe.

HRC in the news again

The Ontario Human Rights Commission has ruled that Christian Horizons has violated the rights of a previous employee who had revealed that she was gay - Christians Horizons Rebuked (Record):

...The tribunal has ordered Kitchener-based Christian Horizons to compensate Connie Heintz, 39, and to end a prohibitive code-of-conduct contract for its 2,500 employees.

The contract, which all staff must sign, forbids workers from cheating on their spouses, having pre-marital sex or homosexual relationships, using pornography and "endorsing" alcohol or tobacco, among other things...

So Christian Horizons must now pay Heintz $23,000, plus interest.

That includes $5,000 for "the wilful and reckless infliction of mental anguish."

The charitable organization must also undergo "basic human-rights training for all employees and adopt an anti-discrimination and anti-harassment policy."

Personally, I'm on the fence on this one. If this was a case of a Catholic parish hiring a staff member who turned out to be gay, would they have the right to ask that person to resign?

Would they be forced to hire an openly gay person even if it conflicts with the church dogma?

It certainly indicative of the ongoing dichotomy between freedom of religion vs. the state.

* * * *

Update: Phantom weighs in here.

Saturday Update: Via Jack's Newswatch - MP wants religious agency's funding pulled - CTV.

Blog Chill

Is there a code of Blogging ethics and liability somewhere? From the Star Phoenix:

...Kate McMillan of Small Dead Animals is one of several named as defendants in a statement of claim filed by Richard Warman with the Ontario Superior Court on April 7. Others include Ezra Levant, The National Post and one of its journalists, Jonathon Kay.

In the statement of claim, Warman alleges he was defamed on a blog known as freedominion.ca. He alleges those comments were linked to or commented upon on other blogs, including McMillan's and The National Post's.

Those who picked up on the original comments did not take steps to determine whether they were true, Warman alleges.

Warman also states it is not enough for a site to remove comments and postings that are questionable, as The National Post did. The newspaper pulled the piece written for its blog that Warman found defamatory.

In its place, the newspaper posted a retraction and apology. However, Warman alleges the article was linked to and copied by others online by that point and The National Post and Kay should be considered responsible for those republications. Editors for The National Post had no comment about the statement of claim...

Two questions here. First of all, does this mean all bloggers can get into trouble if they link to stories on other blogs that turn out not to be true?

Secondly, in the case of the National Post, they are being sued in spite of a retraction and apology, supposedly because the story was picked up all over the internet. Personally, I just don't see how a story can be contained in this day and age.

And should it be?


In any case, some of my readers have questioned my apparently heavy-handed comment moderation policy lately.

The reason should now be crystal clear.

Elections Canada - Above reproach or undermining free speech?

Steve Maher's featured again on National Newswatch - this time with a somewhat more relevant piece than a previous one...

Today's column (Tories may only have succeeded in making themselves look bad) is fairly well-balanced, with plenty of scorn for both major parties in Canada. However, I find this paragraph disturbing:

...The Harper team instinctively attacks opponents, which is good politics, since it forces political rivals to spend half their time defending themselves. When the Tories go after independent officials, however, they look dishonest and mean, since to believe them, you are asked to believe that independent officials are corrupt. The standard of proof for that is higher than anything the Tories have offered...

Contrast that with David Frum's excellent editorial in today's Post - Elections Canad's campaign against free speech:

Yesterday on this page, Gerry Nicholls accused Elections Canada of being a power-crazed bureaucracy motivated by petty vindictiveness.

That's the optimistic scenario! Power-crazed bureaucrats can be restrained or replaced.

The more frightening possibility raised by this week's RCMP "visit" to Conservative party headquarters is that the Canadian bureaucracy has once again revealed a deep, sustained and highly ideological hostility to ordinary rights of free speech...

Frum goes on to outline how some of our supposedly non-partisan Canadian institutions like Elections Canada and the CHRC are undermining political free speech, and political freedom by extension! Please read the whole thing and then save it for future reference.

Canadians need to take off their rose-coloured glasses and take a critical look at those hallowed institutions that we seem to have placed on a pedestal. They are run by human beings.

And as such, they are not above constructive criticism and monitoring.

* * * *

Update: Check out Gerry Nicholls - Elections Canada vs. Free Speech.

Also see Dr. Roy - George Jonas on abolishing HRCs.

* * * *

Sunday Update:

Dr. Roy's found another good one here - The myth of the level playing field by Lorne Gunter.

This could quite possibly win some kind of award as the most objective editorial of the year. Lessons for everyone here.

This should make the hairs on the back of your neck stand up

Jonathan Kay warns of the OHRC's desire to increase its jurisdiction.

In a related article (Rights body dismisses Maclean's case), Tarek Fatah founder of the Muslim Canadian Congress weighs with these observations:

..for the Commission "to refer to Maclean's magazine and journalists as contributing to racism is bullshit, if you can use that word."

He said the Commission has unfairly taken sides against freedom of speech in a dispute within the Canadian Muslim community between moderates and fundamentalists.

"There are within the staff [of the Ontario Human Rights Commission], and among the commissioners, hardline Islamic supporters of Islamic extremism, and this [handling of the Maclean's case] reflects their presence over there," Mr. Fatah said, identifying two people by name.

"In the eyes of the Ontario human rights commission, the only good Muslim is an Islamist Muslim," he said. "As long as we hate Canada, we will be cared for. As soon as we say Canada is our home and we have to defend her traditions, freedoms and secular democracy, we will be considered as the outside."

Absolutely chilling - especially in view of today's events.

* * * *

Thursday Morning Update: This should make all bloggers wary of how our freedom to debate on the internet is in jeopardy - That's done.

National Post - Ontario rights commission dismisses complaint, sort of by Joseph Brean.

Saskboy is not impressed - Terrible news for the Canadian Blogosphere.

Thursday Afternoon Update: Jonathan Kay on the Ontario Human Rights Commission: Some interesting thoughts from a former government insider.


Interesting interview going on right now on the Gary Doyle show with the author of "Why we want to kill you".

Am I allowed to say that?


Tip from a reader - Muslim Canadian Congress shocked at OHRC decision to trumpet Islamic cause. Well worth the read, if you're concerned about Sharia law in Ontario.

BCL weighs in - "Sask. Blogs Aggregator: Striking A Martyr's Pose"

Here's another injustice for Dan McTeague to champion - The HRC

Liberal MP Dan McTeague does seem to like being in the limelight, and some of his causes are worthwhile.

However, yesterday he stated that "Foreign Affairs violated Brenda Martin's privacy rights by allegedly leaking a department report" according to Canadian Press.

Well, as my insightful reader Gabby pointed out in comments, this is all a bit rich:

So now Ms. Martin's privacy rights have been violated?
Who splashed her story all over the MSM - press, TV, radio?
Who made sure her name was on practically every news report?
And which parties continuosly accuse the government of secrecy, lack of transparency, and unwillingness to release documents under the freedom of information requests?
So now that the government releases information, it's a violation of Ms. Martin's privacy?
A little consistency would be welcome.

Oh! the hypocrisy!

So, if you're concerned about privacy rights being violated, Mr. McTeague, how about shining a light on this abuse as reported in Jonathan Kay's excellent Post editorial this morning - A disaster for Canada's Human Rights Commission:

Privacy is another concept that the HRC seems to find confusing. The most scandalous disclosure to emerge on Tuesday involved the manner by which investigators logged on to Lemire's Web site.

In what appears to be a ham-fisted attempt to avoid revealing the commission's IP address, they tapped into the unsecured wi-firouter of a 26-year-old Ottawa woman who lived near the commission's 344 Slater St. headquarters. At Tuesday's hearing, a Bell Canada employee read out the woman's name, address and phone number to shocked audience members. A National Post reporter contacted the woman and found that she'd never heard of Lemire, Steacy, or his investigations. Unless she is secretly working undercover for Steacy, it appears that the commission cynically invaded the privacy of an innocent citizen in order to pursue an obscure Web-trawling vendetta; and then caused her name to be read out to the Canadian public, thereby identifying her as an unwitting conduit to neo-Nazi Web sites. One likes to imagine that the privacy commissioner will be having a chat with Dean et al. in coming days.

This is absolutely horrifying. Just think about it. The HRC is trolling and baiting using an innocent citizen's IP address, and then her name gets dragged into this abysmal, taxpayer-funded sinkhole of a Kangaroo Court!

To be fair to Dan McTeague, he has already come out in support of fellow Liberal MP Dr. Keith Martin's private member's bill M - 446. (Note how he says there is a "reversal of the presumption of innocence" in the clip. How ironic considering the Martin case where we talk about Mexico's horrible justice system!!)

I think we need Dan McTeague's help in getting this issue front and centre in the media.

Every citizen in Canada should be warned about how Free Speech is not given 'any value' by HRC's Dean Steacy.

Because when you think about it, aren't even Canadians like Brenda Martin more threatened by lack of free speech than anything else?

* * * *

Update: The Belleville Intelligencer is obviously not so intelligent.

Martin rally still on this weekend. How about a rally against the HRC, folks? Or are you not concerned about your right to free speech and being able to hold rallies?


CTV Update: Brenda Martin says 'leaked' report violates privacy.

Ottawa Citizen: Don't throw stones at Mexico by Gar Purdy.

Uncommon Truths - Brenda Martin: Ms. Damned if you do...

Puerto Vallarta Scene Forum - with postings by Deb Tieleman.

CTV W5 (background)

Privacy czar looking into ‘leaked' report on jailed Canadian - Globe.

Liberals blast Bernier over leak - Charles Rusnell.

Privacy czar will probe Brenda Martin report leak - CTV.


'Dozens' of people at rally - Globe

On regulating 'normal' conduct

Classic Steyn. Don't miss it!

* * * *

Tuesday Update: Mark Steyn has Letter of the Day in today's National Post - Why Don't You Sue Me?

...Yet there is no "presumption of innocence" in Section 13 "hate" cases. Au contraire, there is a presumption of guilt, which is why no one hauled before the CHRC under Section 13 has ever been acquitted -- with the exception of the "Canadian Nazi Party," which got off scot-free on the quaint grounds that it did not, in fact, exist. (The fact that Richard Warman, "human rights activist" and the CHRC's serial plaintiff, is reduced to suing entirely fictional entities tells you a lot about how necessary Section 13 is to the Queen's peace)

Alas, if you do have the misfortune to exist in what passes for the real world at the CHRC, then your chances of bucking the spectacular 100% conviction rate are a lot slimmer. So Maclean's and my book will be convicted because that's the only menu option available. Section 13 and its administration are a public scandal. I hope Canadians will support Dr. Keith Martin, MP, who has introduced a private member's bill calling for its abolition...

Ivison: Free Speech not just about Nazis. Please read this whole editorial. Very illuminating.


A vous M. Kinsella.

What's this? Warren's right to Free Speech has been denied by the National Post? How utterly ironic.

Keith Martin stands up to the school-yard bully

Despite desperate intimidation tactics employed by the Prince of Darkness, Liberal MP Keith Martin withstands the onslaught. This is one gutsy politician.


All we have to do is coax him to move to Ontario, join the Progressive Conservative Party, and presto! - We have our replacement for John Tory!!!

* * * *

SDA - "There is no right not to be offended".

This is priceless! From the Globe's Blogolitics - Quotes of the Week:

• Liberal spokeswoman Leslie Swartman on a Liberal MPs private member's motion: "This is not the position of the Liberal Party of Canada or the Liberal caucus or Mr. Dion," said Swartman. "We support the Canadian Human Rights Act and will not entertain changes to it such as this."

Only in Canada.



Warrenkinsella.com (I'm not linking to it) on Keith Martin (Feb. 1):

...although some of his constituents might also say they voted for a party's candidate, and not simply a solipsistic oddball who adheres to his party's platform only when it suits him. Then again, Keith Martin has been a Reformer, a Canadian Alliance candidate, an independent, and now he's allegedly a Liberal. If he decides to run under yet another party's banner in the next election, good luck to him. He'll need it.

Nice.

Having no frontal lobe, I had to google solipsistic - The jokes write themselves.

* * * *

Martin Rayner a.k.a. Red Tory is guest blogging at Scott's - Ending "Hate Speech". Not a bad post until you get near the end.

Dr. Roy links to a Gazette article that shows that MSM is finally starting to wake up.

What the Ezra Levant and Mark Steyn coverage reveals - Deborah Gyapong.

Free Speech - where's the MSM? - Just Right.

Sunday Update - Dr. Roy: Women take complaining Imam to HRC.

Monday Update - Ezra Levant: Today's Globe and Mail. Good for them!

Feb. 9 - Michael Coren: Hate Debate.

M-446: Kinsella not a big fan

Warren Kinsella in an Open Letter to the Liberal Party of Canada regarding MP Keith Martin's motion (Post blog):

...Some of us were pretty surprised by Keith Martin's move, he being a Liberal Member of Parliament and all. It didn't seem to be particularly consistent with past Liberal "values" or positions. So, what say you, Messrs. Dion, Ignatieff, Rae et al.? Do you agree with this bald-faced move to gut human rights legislation, by one of your supposed human rights experts?...

(Note the use of the royal "we" further down in the article. Ahem, ahem)

* * * *

Update: This will make Warren happy! - BCLSB - Liberal Party speaks out on Keith Martin.

Lorne Gunter - The right to be loathsome.

Kudos to Keith

A huge non-partisan congrats to the Hon. Keith Martin for introducing his important private member's motion M-446.

Please show your support to this eminent Canadian politician and ask your own MP to help push this forward.

In today's National Post, John Ivison also mentions Dr. Martin's role in brokering a way for the Liberals to heal the divisiveness within their caucus regarding Afghanistan and still save face:

...This refinement in Liberal policy was discussed at yesterday's caucus meeting and emerged from a suggestion by B.C. Liberal Keith Martin that the Liberals propose hard targets, in numbers and timelines, for the development of the Afghan army, police, judiciary and correctional services. The imposition of timelines would satisfy Liberal concerns that Canada not be engaged in a "never-ending" war. But their adoption would also be in accord with Prime Minister Stephen Harper's belief that our contribution should be reviewed within two to three years...

The constituents of Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca must feel very proud of their MP.

* * * *

Update: Out of curiosity I meandered over to Liblogs to see the reaction:

Not very favourable here - BCLSB: Liberal MP Moves To Ensure Nazi Rights! The rest likely prefer to ignore it and hope it will go away.

Via Bourque - Ready to quit Afghanistan, PM tells Bush: Reuters.

Mike Brock: Hope, thy name is Keith Martin. With a whole bunch of links, including JR's.

Catprint in the Mash - M-446

On censorship and the future of the HRC

One more journalist has broken the 'code of silence'. Lorrie Goldstein points out the problems of the evolving powers of the HRC - Stop these attacks on free speech:

...As Alan Borovoy, general counsel for the Canadian Civil Liberties Association wrote recently, "during the years when my colleagues and I were labouring to create such commissions, we never imagined that they might ultimately be used against freedom of speech."

Censorship, he said, "was hardly the role we had envisioned for human rights commissions."

Sadly, censorship is increasingly the role they envision for themselves...

As Lorrie points out, these Human 'Rights' Commissions actually involve a process that entails less 'rights' for the defendants than a regular courtroom, where they would normally be able to avail themselves of various legal benefits that are part of our free and democratic society - and which also includes the assumption of innocence until proven guilty.


How to deal with this lunacy? I would suggest starting with your MP. Write letters to the editor. Call in on talk shows.

Speak out now, while you still can.

* * * *

Related: Jack's Newswatch - Murphy: Coming to a human rights commission near you.

Dr. Roy - The enemy is us.

Just Right - HRC colluding with Warman?

Lorne Gunter - Suicide by tolerance.

Free Mark Steyn... "and free Canadians from the thought police and "human rights" commissars."

* * * *

Tuesday Update: National Post letter by James Morton, president, Ontario Bar Association, Toronto:

...If we as a society do not want administrative tribunals to censor the media the answer is to remove that power from human rights tribunals. MPs and MPPs get very little public input for law reform and listen carefully when voters ask for legislative change. Perhaps the legislation should change. That said, we ought not to blame those who follow the existing rules to seek redress for the wrongs they perceive as being perpetrated against them.

Exactly.

Why the code of silence?

Alberta Ardvark has an interesting discussion going on regarding the deafening silence from most of MSM regarding a few outrageous HRC complaints currently being fought - WTF is wrong with the media in this country.

Various theories have been proposed. This anonymous comment may be the closest to the truth:

The MSM does not see a problem with the HRC's because they know they are all stacked with people who think the same as they do. Only white people can be racist and so only those cases will be prosecuted.

In today's Ottawa Citizen, David Warren concludes his column (Fighting for Freedom) with this observation:

...For there is something even more seriously wrong in Canada, than HRCs, when these appalling cases are getting more attention abroad than here at home.

Very few Canadian newspapers are courageous enough to go out on a limb and publish a factual story if there is even the slightest chance that some 'victimized' minority might be offended. Or else they torque the wording to make sure that the article is politically-correct.

My suggestion would be to put your money where your values are, and consume your media accordingly.

Unless of course you happen to feel that some folks are more equal than others.

* * * *

Related: Stephen Taylor - Jason Kenney opines on HRC/Canadian Islamic Congress case against Steyn. This is a classic!

Monday Update: The Globe joins the push for free speech in Canada and allows Ezra to opine in a web-exclusive comment - What a strange place Canada is:

...Early in her interrogation, she said "I always ask people … what was your intent and purpose of your article?"

It wasn't even a question about what we had published in the magazine. It was a question about my private thoughts. I asked her why my private feelings were of interest to the government. She said, very calmly, that they would be a factor taken into account by the government in determining whether or not I was guilty.

Officer McGovern said it as calmly as if I had asked her what time it was.

When she's doing government interrogations, she always asks people about their thoughts...

Thought Police. In Canada.

We are not making this up.


Fox News - Iran warns Netherlands not to air controversial 'Anti-Muslim" film.

Tuesday Update - Colby File: Does Ezra Levant have a point?

Another case for the HRC?

Warren Kinsella seems a bit offended by the tone of today's National Post editorial.

He finds it too angry. I knew we had "thought police" in Canada, but emotion police too?

Warren dredges up that tired, old Mike Harris meme, in an attempt to chastise the Post for displaying 'explosions of anger'.

What he doesn't seem to realize is that any so-called anger or frustration isn't directed at the natives, but rather at his beloved Premier, for shrugging his shoulders and abandoning the developers without any kind of tangible support.

* * * *

Friday Update: Six Nations shirking rule of law: Developers. (Post)

"Where the hell is the law and order here?"

For some reason, only part of the print article appears online. An important paragraph has been omitted:

But developers say if they don't pay, the Ontario Provincial Police and the Ontario government won't step in to help them when their projects are taken over by an occupation.

This is what you elected, Ontario. Congratulations.


Great letter in Friday's Post:

The Grand River Haudenosaunee problem might be resolved by allowing a 100% tax credit to developers and other property owners forced to pay protection money to native bands. The resulting loss of tax revenue, plus any policing costs, would be deducted from the nominal $9-billion paid by the Canadian taxpayer to aboriginals every year.

This arrangement would keep defenceless property owners from being harmed via direct intimidation by native protesters and place the onus to resolve the conflict back with the government.

Roger Jones, Thornhill, Ont.

- A very creative solution!

* * * *

BTW, Irene Mathyssen better not check out Warren's blog. She may be offended.

Regarding our HRC's - This is a slam-dunk: David Warren - The closed minds of today's intellectuals:

"I think the Pope's visit is not a good thing because science doesn't need religion. The university is open to every form of thought but religion isn't," said Andrea Sterbini, a computer-science professor who was one of 67 academic signatories of a document protesting the pope's visit.

In those two sentences my reader may see exposed the grounding assumption of every politically correct proposition in the postmodern, so-called liberal mind. The speaker assumes there is an official "open-minded" position that must be protected by law or force. He then insists on banning any deviation from this official "open-minded" position...

Do not miss this op-ed

David Warren on the current attack on freedom of speech in Canada - Victims of the Revolution (Ottawa Citizen):

...From the above we may begin to deduce that there are two classes of Canadian writers (including journalists, authors of books, and contributors to the Internet) who should not, at this moment, feel threatened with the loss of their freedom. These are gay activists and fanatical Islamists. I would guess that radical feminists are also pretty safe -- for the moment. And perhaps also those who harbour deep racial resentments against people with white skins. Everyone else is a fair target...

Will he be the next one?

* * * *

Update: More good reading here, courtesy of Hunter - Too many rights make a wrong, by Australian Janet Albrechtsen:

It was one of those rare, particularly sunny days in Vancouver in September when, addressing an audience at the University of British Columbia, I suggested that multiculturalism and its partner in crime, moral relativism, were leading to the demise of Western values.

"But you must understand," implored a well-intentioned woman in the audience, "multiculturalism is Canada's gift to the world."

If Australia is set to follow Canada, then thanks, but no thanks. Call me ungrateful, but we should have returned the gift to Canada long ago. I say that as someone who has long adored Canada. Its politics may be as dripping wet as Vancouver, but the people are warm and funny, and there is something sweet about the US's insecure, slightly wimpy northern neighbour. Yet there comes a point when weakness morphs into a reckless death wish....

Just Right - "Oh, Canada, where are you taking us?"

Thursday Update - SDA - Mark Steyn: "So let's see if I understand this..."

Dangerous to be right...

Kudos to Lorne Gunter for this excellent smack-down of the "Human Rights" Commission (Alberta's gauntlet of bias), and to the National Post for publishing it.

So Ezra decided to take advantage of the ancient Anglo-Saxon right to free expression and published the cartoons.

What he was reminded of, almost immediately, is that Canada is no longer an Anglo-Saxon nation. Gone is the robust belief held by our ancestors for 800 years that the citizen is sovereign, that he is free to do as he wishes unless the state can show unambiguously that there is an overriding need to limit his liberty temporarily. It has been replaced by the continental notion that nothing is allowed unless it is expressly permitted by the state. The belief that the citizen owes the government an explanation of his actions, not the other way around, has gripped our politicians, bureaucrats, judges and professors...

Indeed. Sometimes we forget that the government is supposed to work for us. Read the rest of Gunter's article and find out what a travesty of justice the HRC actually is.


And we continue to enable its existence with our silence.

Free speech vs. hate speech

Very interesting editorial in today's National Post (Alberta's Thought Police), concerning the human rights hearing against Stephen Boissoin, a "former youth centre pastor who wrote to the Red Deer Advocate in 2002 to complain about the presence of literature about homosexuality in school libraries".

The item that appears to have been most objectionable was the statement that gay activists were "spreading a psychological disease" and are "just as immoral as the pedophiles, drug dealers and pimps that plague our communities."

The complaint was filed by Darren Lund, a heterosexual professor.

Even more interesting is that the gay-rights organization, Egale is not supporting this challenge:

Apparently, EGALE, after 20 years of courtroom triumphs, does recognize limits to how far the law can or should be used to suppress opposing views. Not every interest group is so willing to stand behind higher principles when an opportunity for publicity comes along.

But is Egale in fact so principled, or is simply a matter of expediency?

Macleans filed this story yesterday - Why the country's leading gay rights group is sitting out a fight against homophobia:

...In 2005, the group declined to support Lund's human rights complaint, arguing instead for Boissoin's right to free speech...

However -

...In the two years since its original decision, Helen Kennedy, EGALE Canada's new executive director, says the organization's board of directors have changed and, were it up to her, EGALE would reverse its stance. “Based on the facts that I have seen of the case to date... I would recommend to the current board that we reverse that decision and that we support the professor in his quest," she says.

What’s stopping them? According to Kennedy: "We don’t have a board meeting scheduled in time to discuss this. Because of vacations, etc., we haven’t convened a meeting.”

Interesting.

Anyway, the Post appears to be of the opinion that this claim against Mr. Boissoin be dropped in the interest of freedom of speech.

...What may be most objection-able about Prof. Lund's complaint, however, is the way he is trying to use a single, unverified gay-bashing assault that happened in Red Deer two weeks after the letter's publication as evidence that Mr. Boissoin's declaration of "war" against the gay rights movement had the effect of inciting hatred. No charges have been laid in the assault, so this tactic creates the steepest kind of slippery slope imaginable.

It could lead to a critic of Islamist terrorism being held specially culpable for "hate speech" just because a mosque was, by chance, later defaced by drunken vandals. An opponent of the Pope who wrote an editorial against him would have to hope there were no unexplained fires in Catholic churches nearby for some indeterminate period...

If Lund wins this case, then the next logical step would be to ask what is the necessary waiting period wherein any related 'acts of hatred' occur, and within what radius of the particular paper's location, and do any charges have to be laid for it to be considered 'inciting hatred', etc.

Comments welcome.

* * * *

Update: More HR issues at Big City Lib Strikes Back - More on Free Dominion Human Rights Complaint. Watch this one folks. It involves cyberspace and could have implications for all of us.

BCLSB links to Big Blue Wave - Human Rights Complaint Against Free Dominion - Details!

Canada Free Press weighs in here - Free Dominions' Light Shines Strong.

Relapsed Catholic - Details emerge re: the secular fatwa against Canadian Conservative Website.

Kathy links to this great column in the Calgary Herald - Free Speech and the Charter of Rights.