Dear Fundagelicals:

If you think you need to self-censor your messages to avoid running afoul of Canada's hate crime statutes, perhaps you might want to rethink what your messages really are?

Of course, Daddy Dobson censoring his "radio show" is no big surprise. He'd claim he was doing that just to perpetuate the meme that hate crime laws are unreasonable. (Of course, none of these clowns will speak out against the violence that GLBT people are subjected to as a result of the fundagelical hostility towards GLBT folk - such as this piece of irrational garbage)

Finally, the reason for “indifference and confusion” is that the Supreme Court has legislated sexual orientation to be a Charter right. This newly coined “right” was “read” into the Charter by Justice Peter Cory in 1995. This new right of equality now conflicts with existing (Charter) rights such as freedom of the press and of religion (http://catholicinsight.com/online/features/article_788.shtml).

The last point answers at once the question why it is important, indeed necessary, in Canada to resist: our rights as citizens are at stake. This is true not only for Catholics and Evangelicals, but also for the Greek Orthodox, orthodox Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, Hindus and anyone who holds to a traditional understanding of marriage in natural law, both as individuals and as supporters of such institutions as school, church, synagogue, mosque and temple. ...

Wait a second here - just what rights are we talking about here? Somebody show me where it says that "freedom of religion" gives anyone the right to spew some of the absolute crap that Dobson is so worried about.

There's one of two possibilities here - either they haven't actually read the statutes - especially Sections 318, 319 of the criminal code. In particular, I would draw your attention to S. 319(3), which reads:

(3) No person shall be convicted of an offence under subsection (2)

(a) if he establishes that the statements communicated were true;

(b) if, in good faith, the person expressed or attempted to establish by an argument an opinion on a religious subject or an opinion based on a belief in a religious text;

(c) if the statements were relevant to any subject of public interest, the discussion of which was for the public benefit, and if on reasonable grounds he believed them to be true; or

(d) if, in good faith, he intended to point out, for the purpose of removal, matters producing or tending to produce feelings of hatred toward an identifiable group in Canada.

So, if you are establishing an argument based on religious texts, there is a clear exemption. (Of course, when spewing the propaganda points that such luminaries as Paul Cameron have vomited up, there's little that could be framed in terms of any scripture - bad science is still bad science, even when wrapped in Leviticus).

Thus, one must suspect that the bible thumping crowd that follow Dobson's line either knows damn good and well that their supposed "religious opinions" are well beyond the line and really are hate propaganda, or that they are utterly ignorant of the wording of S319 3(b).

In the first case, it's time to reconsider the messages being published, isn't it?

In the second case, it really is time to start reading the laws before making false claims about it.