Barry Neufeld and the Wages of Being Evil

Two BC Human Rights Tribunal (BCHRT) decisions came down last week, and they're important for a number of reasons.  Both are in the matter of Chilliwack Teacher's Association v. Barry Neufeld.  

Decision 10

Decision 11

This all goes back to when Neufeld was a School Trustee in Chilliwack and began actively publishing anti-transgender, anti-2SLGBTQ material online.  I won't spend a bunch of time tearing into Neufeld's claims - they are in the large the usual assortment of bogus claims about 2SLGBTQ people and transgender people in particular.  

The case as framed by the original complaint is interesting because the Chilliwack Teacher's Association (CTA) filed a complaint on behalf of a class of its membership rather than individual complaints.  Given that Neufeld was a person in a position of public power, this is a bit different than your average discrimination case involving direct attacks on an individual.  Neufeld appears to have used his position as a public figure to amplify his messaging, and it had direct impact on staff working for the Chilliwack school system who were members of the 2SLGBTQ community as a whole.  Consequently, what we have is a form of "class action" human rights complaint which is a bit unusual. 

My goal here is not to "relitigate" the decisions of the BCHRT - I'm certain that Neufeld will be appealing these into the courts with the assistance of any number of right wing legal agitprop organizations like Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms (JCCF) that routinely take on these cases both to grift donation money and in the hopes of driving a wedge into the existing body of case law.  The outcome of those appeals remains to be seen. 

However, I'm seeing a lot of people expressing "shock and outrage" over the amount of the awards, which runs to some $750,000.  However, I think a lot of people are misunderstanding the bigger issue.  Most discrimination cases involve actions that affect an individual, or possibly a couple of people.  

Here we have a case where the impact is much different because the actions taken by Neufeld affected teachers within the Chilliwack school system - not a single individual, but rather many individuals who were in the school system's employ at the time Neufeld was campaigning against 2SLGBTQ recognition in the schools.  

This is, to my knowledge, the first time in Canada that a discrimination case has been filed where the victims are not recorded as individuals who have been directly affected, but as members of a class of individuals who were directly and indirectly affected by the impugned activities.  This is what makes the amount of the fine so high.  Instead of the BCHRT assessing each case individually and handing out penalties, the amount is to be distributed by the CTA to its affected members.  This is not unlike a "class action lawsuit", where the amount of compensation per individual may not be a lot, but when there are a sizeable number of individuals in the Class, the gross amount can appear to be a "huge sum".  

Where this becomes interesting is in terms of its importance in future human rights case law.  It provides a means to pursue someone where they are attacking a class of individuals rather than actual individuals with their rhetoric.  In general, human rights law in Canada focuses on individual rights and has tended not to recognize attacks on identifiable groups very well.  

Neufeld made accusations in his publications that stated flat out that 2SLGBTQ people were pedophiles, or worse.  These aren't nuanced statements - they are cases where he deliberately associated 2SLGBTQ people as a whole with acts and behaviours that are both criminal and profoundly harmful to the victims.  It is not a small matter to accuse an individual of being a pedophile, it is no less harmful to accuse an entire class of people of such - especially from a person who is in a position of public power.

I have mused in the past about the need for some kind of "class libel" law in Canada where global aspersions against a class of people are often the tool of choice in justifying legislative attacks on those minorities.  In these cases, we often find - as we have seen with Barry Neufeld in BC, and certain pastors in Alberta, a tendency to claim that they are "merely expressing deeply held religious beliefs".  To me, these claims are the refuge of scoundrels - an escape hatch where anything can be justified by claiming it's "religious".  

"Deeply held religious beliefs" are fine - I don't actually care what a person believes.  However, there is a line that is crossed when those beliefs become justification for attacking the rights and freedoms of others in society.  If you want to believe that "all trans people are pedophiles", knock yourself out.  However, if you then turn around and demand that those same transgender people be banned from using public washrooms based on that belief, that's a different matter (especially when those "deeply held beliefs" have as much validity as claiming the world is flat).

Public figures need to understand that even if they "sincerely believe" something, there is a higher standard that they must hew to given their influence and sway.  Just because they "believe" something does not grant carte blanche to simply spew whatever they believe.  They have a duty and responsibility to ensure that their public utterances are in fact grounded in reason and fact, not supposition.  

Words continue to have great power, and can be used to cause great harm.  That is ultimately the underlying lesson here - and perhaps we have a precedent here that can be used in the future when other public figures use their position to foment hate and fear. 

You Do NOT Roll Over For Fascists

So, on Saturday, Jen Gerson published a column in the Globe and Mail titled “The Backlash Against Drag Artists Is Unfair, But It’s No Mystery Why It’s Happening”.  I read it on Saturday, it’s taken me the last couple of days to calm down enough to write a response to it. 

First, it’s the classic “tut-tutting” that the queer community has gotten over decades. More or less, it boils down to “don’t go too far, or you’ll upset someone”. I remember hearing that same argument being made in the 80s - which was basically “well, being gay isn’t a crime any more, you should be happy with that”. Now it’s “well, it’s (sort of) okay to be trans, but don’t let anyone know you’re trans because they might get upset about it”.

It’s condescending, and it’s garbage that basically boils down to “don’t do anything that will make the hardline religious nutcases upset” … and yes, it’s _ALWAYS_ coming from hardline religious nutcases. In my personal archives, the vast preponderance of anti-2SLGBTQ+ material comes from people who profess to be “Christian” (in particular) - and those archives now go back to the mid-1990s. The pattern is consistent.

The thing about these claims is that they tend to treat “rights as pie”, as if recognizing the validity of someone else’s existence is magically going to mean someone else “loses something”. That has never been the case. Never has recognizing the validity of another person’s rights resulted in someone else “losing” anything.

Gerson’s analysis basically says “well, fascism is on the rise, so you can expect to have your rights rolled back”. NO. WE. DO. NOT. History is abundantly clear what happens with movements like fascism. We should be clearly, and loudly demanding that our rights be respected, and our existence normalized in society.

Gerson might be willing to roll over to the fascists. I am not

Conservatives Are Dismantling Western Democracies

It's been a bit of a whirlwind lately, but there are some very disturbing patterns emerging in the politics of western democracy these days. At the top of the list, is what appears to be a steady effort on the part of conservative politicians to dismantle western democracies, and in particular the concept of individual rights.  

This is happening on numerous levels, and because each country is slightly different, the specific attacks are distinct.  The pattern, however, is what matters. In general, the attacks are either aimed at the judiciary, or at the rights of individuals, with a general approach of fomenting what will become constitutional crises. 

Although not the first occurrence of this, the UK government's decision to exercise rarely used powers to deny royal assent to the Scottish Parliament's recently passed Gender Recognition Reform Act.  My first thought on this was "that's an odd move - exercising those powers in the UK is going to provoke a constitutional crisis.  Then I thought about it a bit further, and a few months ago, when Alberta's newly minted Premier Danielle  Smith was musing about an "Alberta Sovereignty Act", the topic of whether the Federal Government could exercise an equally obscure power called "Refusal".  

In both cases, the exercise of the power in question would trigger a political and constitutional crisis in both countries. Such a crisis would call into question both the division of powers, the role of the Federal level of government to intervene in the affairs of a lower level of government, and in fact with the judiciary had any power at all to mediate such a dispute. Such a crisis could in fact be serious enough to break the political consensus that had led to the constitutions of the respective nations being formed as they are. 

Let's consider for a moment that the objective in both cases is not in fact to assert novel powers, nor to overrule the legislation of an errant lower level of government, but rather it is to provoke the crisis that would allow the conservatives to dismantle the much more liberal constitutions - especially the civil rights aspects of those documents - which conservatives have for some time seen as an obstacle to their legislative agendas. 

Looking a little further, in Israel, a recently elected hard right government under Benjamin Netanyahu has promised to massively overhaul the role of the state's court system.  Conservatives have long argued that courts had become "activist" - usually in the context of the fact that much of their legislative agenda runs at odds with the concepts of individual rights. Here in Canada, Harper feuded with the SCC over matters like mandatory minimum sentencing, and lost on fundamental matters associated with the court's interpretation of the Charter. 

In the United States, the politicization of the courts by the GOP took hold under GWB, and during the Obama years, the GOP refused to allow any of Obama's nominees to the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) to be affirmed. This set the stage for a series of GOP candidates to be appointed under Trump, and then for the now-conservative aligned court to reverse course on abortion.  

Both of these moves are designed to ultimately place the courts firmly under the yoke of political masters, and to roll back much of the legislative and case law decisions that conservatives don't like.

Then in both Canada and the US, we are seeing provinces and states teeing up legislation designed to create conflict with their respective Federal governments. This isn't merely a case of "the usual grievances", as demonstrated in both Alberta and Saskatchewan, the provinces are attempted to assert unique powers to ignore Federal laws - not a good thing.  Ontario's conservative government has threatened to use the S33 "Notwithstanding" clause multiple times on matters where it seems capricious and unnecessary to do so. 

In both Canada and the US following their 2020 and 2021 elections respectively, extreme elements fostered by increasingly radical conservative politicians attempted to overturn the results of elections - in both cases by launching attacks on the seat of government itself, claiming in one form or another that the government was unjustly elected, or that it was acting against the people. This is no coincidence - the specifics of talking points differ, but the tactics of both were strikingly similar, with the Canadian Convoy occupation clearly drawing from the organizing and funding efforts around the US Capitol riots of 2021, and the Convoy shifting towards almost a siege model, instead of direct attack - clearly based on "lessons learned".  Mysteriously in both cases, the public backing of these events by conservative politicians is both prominent and not actively discussed in the news. 

How does this all tie together, you might ask? The same way it always does of late. Conservatives have been increasingly organizing with each other internationally through organizations like the IDU. I do not think it is a coincidence that there are direct and indirect connections to the IDU where these various activities are taking place.

Any one of these could be viewed as nothing more than a spat between levels of government, it comes at a time when political divisions are running high, and the far right has become increasingly emboldened. However, it seems increasingly unlikely when conservative politicians around the world are expressing suspiciously similar sentiments, and are making disturbingly parallel moves to address long standing conservative grievances. 

The Far Right's Scorched Earth Policy

The last few weeks has been a series of horrifying revelations for supporters of LGBT rights.  What it has unveiled is the "scorched earth" approach that the far right in the US is willing to pursue.

First it was Kansas's House of Representatives passing a hideous "Jim Crow" law, only to have their Senate balk at it.  Kansas, it seems was only one head of the hydra, with Arizona's state Senate passing a very similar law a mere week later.  As writers at Alternet point out, Republicans in several states are pushing similar legislation:

Republicans in Arizona, Oregon, South Dakota, Tennessee, Idaho, Ohio, Mississippi, and Oklahoma have now introduced bills that would also grant religious zealots the right the segregate their businesses against LGBT Americans. Significantly, all of these bills were introduced this year. 

These kinds of laws are naturally appalling to reasonable people.  These aren't reasonable people pushing this legislation.

At the same time, we have anti-gay activists Scott Lively and Peter LaBarbera getting together to push for Russia-style anti "gay propaganda" laws.   Okay, these two are to some extent seen as a bad joke in their home country.  That doesn't mean they can be safely ignored.  It's pretty well documented that Lively has been influential in both Uganda and Russia creating anti-gay legislation in recent years.  It is through the activism of people like these two that the "Tea Party" Republicans get the idea of who to demonize - and the target is LGBT people.

In Canada, these "right to discriminate" ideas have been soft-peddled under the rubric of "conscience rights" - especially with respect to the abortion debate, and until recently "Conscience Rights" were part of the WildRose Party of Alberta's platform - so it's not like Canadian political discourse is immune to the influence of these ideas.

The optimist in me wants to believe that this is the thrashing of a dying movement.  Unfortunately, I think it really tells us that the price of the liberty and equality that the LGBT movement has gained since the 1960s truly is eternal vigilance.  There will always be a significant and very vocal group of people who will be using LGBT people as the choice target for demonizing with their politics of fear and division. 

Creating Hierarchies of Rights

Recently, we have had a series of stories where there have been arguments put forth that there should be "exemptions" in non-discrimination laws for religious beliefs.

Yesterday's column by Licia Corbella in the Calgary Herald positively oozed with a smug sense of religious entitlement, and attempted to hold atheists responsible for the acts of some truly vile members of humanity's past.  The column ended with a claim that Christianity has been discriminated against.

Then, on Huffington Post, we find the owners of a bakery in Oregon shutting their doors in the wake of refusing to provide a cake to a lesbian wedding.

"I think [the state labor commissioner] is going to have decide what's more important: The Oregon State Constitution, or the statute that was passed in 2007," he said at the time. "They dropped the ball by not putting in any exemption for religious beliefs."

Which leads very nicely into the issue that I want to address.  Non-discrimination statutes usually end up existing because identifiable groups are being marginalized routinely by overt discrimination.

When someone makes a call for "religious beliefs exemption", what they are actually calling for is the right to continue imposing their religious beliefs on everybody around them.  This creates a false hierarchy of rights.

The point of civil rights is that they are equal across the board.  In order for this to be true, we must acknowledge them as clearly individual rights.  The notion of "Freedom of Religion" grants every person the free right to believe and worship as they see fit.  No problem.  What it does not grant anyone is the right to impose their religious beliefs on others who do not share them.

Similarly, non-discrimination laws, which often are based on gender or race but more recently have been written to include members of the LGBT community as well, essentially put into the language of law explicit protections for those who are often treated as second class citizens or have historically been denied full rights under law.

The problem that arises here is obvious.  The minute that there is an explicit exemption for one particular kind of right over another right, the law has created a hierarchy of rights where the very notion of equality itself precludes a hierarchy.

What is truly unfortunate is that so often religion is used as an excuse by those who engage in blatant discrimination.  Consider the following from the Oregon bakery incident.

In response to the complaint, Melissa Klein argued that turning away the couple was "definitely not discrimination at all." 

"We don't have anything against lesbians or homosexuals," she said in August. "It has to do with our morals and beliefs. It's so frustrating because we went through all of this in January, when it all came out."

Let me be utterly clear about this:  refusing service to someone based on a grounds such as the other person's sexuality is discriminatory.  Period.  It doesn't matter one iota that the refusal has its roots in that person's religion - especially when that person is running a business that serves the general public.  A bakery serves the general public, as does a florist.  The only way that I can see such a business getting away with such discrimination is if they structured themselves as some kind of "society" with restricted membership.  (How they would do that _and_ be a sustainable business is beyond me, but I suppose they could try)

The minute that laws are written which give "exemptions" based on other rights, we create an environment where Orwell's "Animal Farm comes to life, and some are more equal than others.

Reasons For A Boycott Of The Sochi Games

In light of John Baird's recent comments regarding Russia's recently-passed anti-gay laws which basically outlaw any "gay propaganda" (such as two people of the same sex holding hands), I'd like to spend a bit of time talking about why a boycott of the Sochi games, along with generally isolating Russia politically is needed right now.

Baird described how he saw the roots of the issue take hold during a meeting of G8 foreign ministers in May 2012. 

“I can recall being in Washington when (then U.S. secretary of state) Hillary Clinton was chairing the G8 foreign ministers meeting and we put, as part of our statement, support for sexual minorities. Russia put an asterisk beside it saying they were not on board,” he said.

“This did not just pop out of nowhere.”

 He's right about one thing - this didn't "pop out of nowhere".  While Canada's Foreign Affairs minister cannot point the finger at the source of this vile piece of legislation, I can.  Take a look south of the US border, in particular to one Scott Lively, who has been exporting the American evangelical version of homophobia since the 1990s.  In the mid-2000s, Lively made a speaking tour of Russia where he started the process of advocating for stricter anti-gay laws.

Make no mistake about it, Lively even goes so far as to try taking a significant amount of credit for the laws that Russia has recently passed in one of his columns for WND.

I am personally very pleased to see this development, having called specifically for legislation of this sort in my speaking tour of the former Soviet Union in 2006 and 2007. During that tour, which began in the Russian eastern city of Blagoveschensk and ended in St. Petersburg, I lectured in a variety of venues including numerous universities, churches and conference halls, and met with numerous government leaders at various levels of influence. Read more at http://www.wnd.com/2013/02/the-key-to-pro-family-victory-if-we-really-want-it/#O7T36fR8MIvCQfQ0.99 

Now, the fact that this is an export of the worst aspects of American-style religious evangelism is almost secondary to the discussion.  LGBT people in North America are well aware of who Scott Lively is, and just what he represents.

However, this is the first of the reasons that I am going to raise as to why something stronger than diplomatic arm-twisting is required.  Whether we like it or not, Canada's current government is rapidly becoming seen as no better than the US when it comes to foreign affairs.  The positions taken are ridiculously absolutist, and worse often end up tacitly condoning activities which the majority of its population do not approve of.  Both the United States and Canada need to be seen to be moving definitively against these laws for one basic reason:  failure to do so gives the extremists at home the excuse they need to push towards similar laws here.

Think I'm kidding?  Take a look at the tone of LifeSite's article on Russia's laws:

While Russians certainly do not want to encourage homosexuality, by no means do they criminalize homosexuality, nor do they discriminate against homosexuals, as some media have claimed. Homosexuals enjoy the same privileges as all other Russians, but they may not promote homosexuality as something positive among children in the same way as Mayor Bloomberg wants to eliminate sugary drinks, and Michelle Obama wants to get unhealthy foods out of school cafeterias.  

The media has been portraying the law as an unreasonable measure pushed by “radical religious groups.” But this cannot account for why the lower house of the Russian parliament approved the bill unanimously, with only one abstention. Russia can hardly be described as a religious nation, but the law has overwhelming support in the legislature.
Russians have consistently denied homosexual groups parade permits, sparing its children and the public at large the ludicrous and disturbing behavior on show in the squares and streets of Europe and America. 

Similarly the news reports have highlighted episodes where some LGBT persons were victims of violence, without highlighting that the vast majority of the demonstrators at the parliament while the law was being passed were in favor of the law, and that the violence had nothing to do with the vast majority of demonstrators. 

The law prohibiting the promotion of homosexuality among children simply codifies that Russia truly is interested in protecting its children, not that is interested in persecuting homosexuals. The fact is, that homosexuality is associated with almost a 20 times higher risk of HIV/AIDS, and other bad health statistics like higher incidence of drug and alcohol abuse, depression, and even suicide. It is no wonder that Russians want to protect their children from embracing homosexual lifestyles. 

What the articles authors conveniently leave out is that the definition of "homosexual propaganda" used in the Russian legislation is so broad that it effectively outlaws being gay.  Full stop.  The notion of propaganda includes holding hands, having or displaying the pride flag, or even just looking gay when it comes down to it.  Legitimate political advocacy, such as speaking out for human rights on behalf of LGBT people is considered propaganda, as is providing educational content.  In short, while being gay in Russia isn't strictly illegal, they have made any expression of homosexuality whatsoever illegal ... it amounts to the same thing.  (I'm not at all sure how these laws play when we are talking about the transgender population - especially transsexuals - I suspect it could get really nasty fast).

Which brings me to the second reason why I think that a boycott of the Sochi Games is a reasonable response.  Quite frankly, the IOC's own charter would justify yanking the Sochi Games entirely.

1. Olympism is a philosophy of life, exalting and combining in a balanced whole the qualities of body, will and mind. Blending sport with culture and education, Olympism seeks to create a way of life based on the joy of effort, the educational value of good example, social responsibility and respect for universal fundamental ethical principles.2. The goal of Olympism is to place sport at the service of the harmonious developmentof humankind, with a view to promoting a peaceful society concerned with the preservation of human dignity.

I think that when a country moves against its own citizens as blatantly as the Russians have, that country is in violation of the very fundamental principles in the first two clauses of the Olympic Charter.

Since the IOC has been reluctant to speak out against the Russian laws, especially since we have considerable reason to believe that these laws will be enforced against foreign athletes and spectators during the games,  speaking up with a boycott of the Sochi Games sends a message to both Russia (whose pride and honour is resting upon the success of the Sochi Games), and the IOC, that laws which unreasonably attack the freedoms and civil liberties of a nation's citizens are not acceptable and will not be tolerated.

I have heard others in the LGBT rights movement in Russia say that they do not agree that a boycott of the Sochi games is appropriate.  I disagree.  Isolating the Russian power structure, both through diplomacy and direct action against the state is a clear statement:  "You will not attack your own citizens without it being noted, and you will absolutely not endanger the citizens of any other nation either".

The third point that I would raise is that in today's era, it is long past time to take laws of this nature and expose them for what they truly are.  We've been through this before in recent history - whether we are discussing Stalin's overly heavy handed authoritarianism, or Hitler's maniacal "Final Solution".  Both boil down to the state attacking its own people.

Under no circumstances should the world look upon this and simply try to shrug it off.  This is criminal and it endangers otherwise peaceful members of the society.  Such a law is as unacceptable in Russia as it is in Canada, the United States or Uganda.

It is time for the world community to stand up and be heard ... before we have another genocide.

Rising Corporate Feudalism - Policy Versus Law

The story of Carla Cheney has been making the rounds for the last week or so.  The short synopsis is that she was fired from WalMart in Ontario for calling the police about an animal left locked in a closed vehicle.  

Superficially, this is not a particularly big story - she apparently violated company policy regarding how she interacts with customers and got fired for it.  Companies are free to create policy that regulates the actions of their employees - this is neither new nor surprising.  What is interesting is the intersection between the company policy and civil law.

Here we have a situation where public education programs are very clear - if you see an animal in distress, call the police or animal services.  Period.  In Ontario summers, leaving an animal locked in a car is leaving the animal in distress - heat and humidity in a closed car is an evil combination.  No pet should ever be subjected to those conditions.  Even leaving windows partially open is highly debatable.

WalMart's policy guidelines stipulate that the employee should bring the issue to the attention of a manager and let the manager deal with it.  Superficially, this doesn't sound unreasonable.  Until you realize that a busy manager is going to prioritize an issue like that based on all the other topics they are dealing with at the same time.  Further, we don't know if the rest of corporate policy enables the manager to act in accordance with local law, or if the manager is explicitly or implicitly discouraged from engaging law enforcement in such situations.

What is interesting here is that the corporation has a policy which essentially appears to overlap with existing civil law.  Were I, as a private citizen, to make the same phone call that Ms. Cheney did, WalMart would be unable to do anything about it.  However, in the context of the situation, WalMart saw fit to terminate her employment for "violating company policy".  This creates a situation where in some very fundamental respects, the corporation has placed its own internal "laws" (policies) above those of the state.  Further, they have also exacted a surprisingly harsh penalty for violating those policies - certainly one that far exceeds the penalties which would be applied to the animal's owner, for example.

This creates precisely the environment which I have been critical of in other posts on this blog - namely one of corporate feudalism.  As long as you abide by the rules of the corporation, you can get away with just about anything you like - at the price of sacrificing personal ethics as well as potentially ignoring local laws.

The same issue had started to emerge in the 1990s in the form of "whistleblower" issues.  People who found themselves observing wrongdoing within the walls of a corporation had no avenue to safely call out those actions without being terminated.  This provoked an attempt to solve the problem in the form of "whistleblower" legislation in a number of jurisdictions, but ultimately has not been adequately resolved.  Employees within a corporation are still held to a code of silence when their corporation acts maliciously.  This is little different to the oath of fealty that a feudal lord would demand of his followers - it acts in many respects as a law above the law which limits the ability of the individual to challenge that which they see as wrong.  Corporate policy, especially in multi-national entities has become a law above the law - used as an instrument to limit individuals' ability to do the right thing for fear of serious economic consequences.

If calling the police because you see an animal in distress is an offence that gets you fired, one can imagine that were Ms. Cheney to be witness to more serious fraud within the company that she could be subject to severe sanction within the company should she take the story outside of the company.

While I can respect the fact that companies, like individuals, have a right to protect themselves from unjust and inappropriate accusations.  However, I do have a huge problem with corporations creating policies which essentially place them above local laws.  When those systems become such that the individuals within a corporation are threatened with consequences should they step outside of them, even when they have witnessed the violation of laws.

When such threats exist, implicitly or explicitly, we have a situation where one agency is acting in a manner that is explicitly hostile to the rule of law as currently understood and is in fact creating a second set of rules which not only binds the individuals involved, but subverts the purpose of civil and criminal law in the first place.  That binding is one more step in the creation of a feudalism which is hostile to the individual and their freedom.

Signals In The CETA Negotiations

Harper has often revealed bits about his intentions when he is engaged in foreign affairs.  What has recently emerged during the CETA negotiations is particularly troublesome.

It seems that the Harper Government is objecting to a clause that ties back to the UN Universal Declaration on Human Rights.

The language on human rights in the Canada-EU framework is apparently very similar to the EU deal with Colombia and Peru, which allows either party to revoke any trade and investment benefits in the event of a serious breach of human rights by the other party. Canada objects to the idea that CETA, an economic agreement, could be suspended for violations of the political framework agreement.

The first article of the EU-Colombia/Peru agreement states:

Respect for democratic principles and fundamental human rights, as laid down in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and for the principle of the rule of law, underpins the internal and international policies of the Parties. Respect for these principles constitutes an essential element of this Agreement.

Article 8.3 of the treaty says:

Without prejudice to the existing mechanisms for political dialogue between the Parties, any Party may immediately adopt appropriate measures in accordance with international law in case of violation by another Party of the essential elements referred to in Articles 1 and 2 of this Agreement. The latter Party may ask for an urgent meeting to be called to bring the Parties concerned together within 15 days for a thorough examination of the situation with a view to seeking an acceptable solution. The measures will be proportional to the violation. Priority will be given to those which least disturb the functioning of this Agreement. These measures shall be revoked as soon as the reasons for their adoption have ceased to exist.

If you are puzzled by this roadblock, so are others.  Apparently, The Harper Government is objecting on the basis that this somehow an "infringement" on sovereignty.

The first thing that goes through my mind on this is that Harper is full of nonsense.  Canada has always been a supporter of the UN Universal Declaration on Human Rights, and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms is considerably broader than the UN Declaration.  To say that a trade agreement which contains a clause that obliges the signatory governments to actually abide by those human rights principles is an infringement on sovereignty is silly.

Unless you are Stephen Harper, of course.  We should note that Harper has always viewed the Charter as something of an impediment, especially with respect to the Conservative "tough-on-everyone-but-Conservatives" crime agenda.

Should Canadians be wary?  Oh yes, they should.  Harper has already passed quite a bit of legislation which is, at best, sketchy with respect to the Charter.  Is he moving to erode rights and freedoms?  Absolutely.  Remember Vic Toews' internet spying bill?  I don't think it's entirely dead within Harper's designs.

Reviewing The Senate Debate Speeches On C-279

The Senate debate on Bill C-279 has been bubbling along for the last few weeks.  For a variety of reasons, I haven't had time to sit down and compose my thoughts on what I have observed, but now that the bill has passed second reading and been passed on to committee, we have the full transcripts of the debates posted in the Hansards.

http://www.parl.gc.ca/Content/Sen/Chamber/411/Debates/151db_2013-04-16-e.htm
http://www.parl.gc.ca/Content/Sen/Chamber/411/Debates/162db_2013-05-09-e.htm
http://www.parl.gc.ca/Content/Sen/Chamber/411/Debates/165db_2013-05-23-e.htm
http://www.parl.gc.ca/Content/Sen/Chamber/411/Debates/166db_2013-05-28-e.htm
http://www.parl.gc.ca/Content/Sen/Chamber/411/Debates/167db_2013-05-29-e.htm
(I find it easiest to find the actual debates by searching for 'C-279' in the page once it is opened)

Senators speaking on C-279:

Grant Mitchell, Liberal, AB
Mobina S.B. Jaffer, Liberal, BC
Hugh Segal, Liberal, ON
Donald Neil Plett, Conservative, MB
Pierre Claude Nolan, Conservative, QC
Nancy Ruth, Conservative, ON
Lillian Eva Dyck, Liberal, SK
Don Meredith, Conservative, ON

As one might expect, the major speeches divide roughly along party lines, with the Liberal senators speaking in favour of Bill C-279; and the Conservative senators speaking against it.

I'm generally in favour of C-279 in spite of some difficulties that I have with the scope of the legislation and amendments that have changed it from its original form.  So, I will not spend a great deal of time on the speeches which are in favour of the legislation - they simply reiterate points that I consider basic to the discussion - namely the reality that Canadian law can, and should, provide protections for all Canadians, and move to act where various groups find themselves subject to discrimination and persecution.

As has been shown many times in the past, the law can be an effective agent of social change - but only where the law is used to ensure greater freedoms for those who are the most disadvantaged in society.  When the law is used to constrain people's rights and freedoms - and reinforces suspect social proscriptions in society, those proscriptions inevitably fail.  For example, until 1967 it was not just immoral to be a homosexual in Canada, it was in fact illegal.  By removing it from the criminal code, Pierre Trudeau started the process of social change in Canada which we see the results of today in a youth which no longer considers it to be a big deal for someone to be openly gay.  It has taken some four decades for that change to take root, but the result is clear and gay people in Canada are much more open about their lives and do not live in fear of being jailed simply for loving someone.

Did the laws which criminalized homosexuality have the desired effect of making homosexuality disappear?  No.  They simply drove it underground, and ultimately made social, economic and criminal pariahs of people.  Homosexuality did not go away, it simply hid itself.

Much of the debates around C-279 is based upon either fear-mongering or the conflation of unrelated issues with what C-279 is intended to address.

On Psychological Care In Managing Gender Dysphoria

This will be a somewhat lengthy post.  In part, because I find the space I am about to discuss multi-faceted, and the discussion around each facet of the conversation is non-trivial.  The involvement of mental health professionals in the process of Gender Transition (I will use the term "transition" from here on in) is complex and the subject of many strongly-held opinions within the transgender community.    This essay will be my attempt to lay out for readers my perspective on things.

Readers should note that these are my opinions today.  Time, evidence and rational counterpoint may well convince me to revise my position.

[Warning:  Lengthy Essay Follows The Jump]

Dog Whistling To The Base

So, the HarperCon$ want to emulate G.W. Bush once again - this time by creating an office for religious freedom.

The Tory platform, unveiled Friday, calls for the creation of special office of “Religious Freedom” within the Foreign Affairs Department in Ottawa.

The function of the new office would be to “monitor religious freedom around the world, to promote religious freedom as a key objective of Canadian foreign policy.”

The new office would ensure that Canada protects “vulnerable religious minorities” abroad and would target them in refugee resettlement, or other programs through the Canadian International Development Agency.

I'm going to disagree with Ignatieff's apparent endorsement of this proposal. Not because I necessarily disagree with the concept of evaluating fundamental freedoms in foreign lands as part of our foreign affairs platform, but because of the longer range implications of this "special office".

First of all, I think for this to be a meaningful part of our foreign affairs platform we need to take steps to ensure that we are talking about all of the fundamental freedoms that are enshrined in Canada's Charter of Rights and Freedoms, not just Freedom of Religion. I do not accept the supposition that freedom of religion deserves special status or profile in our foreign affairs.

Second, this is a play to "the base" of extremist religious lobbyists in Canada who have squawked and complained for several years now that their "freedom of religion" at home is being unreasonably constrained by a series of human rights rulings.

I suspect that this "office" will be given a mandate that will oblige it to evaluate the "Freedom of Religion" in foreign lands with respect to Canada's practices. Conveniently, it will have to "measure" freedom of religion in Canada in order to create a meaningful benchmark. You can pretty much bet that the "findings" of said measurement will be used to argue that Canada's Human Rights system is "not adequately safeguarding" religious freedoms - [particularly where "christian" beliefs about sexuality are concerned. Just about all of the cases involve "christians" discriminating against GLBT people]

This "initiative" is actually the HarperCon$ setting up yet another "wedge issue" - in this case, it is intended to be used to begin the process of undermining Canada's human rights law and the agencies that enforce it. The only people who have been squawkingabout this are the fundamentalist religious right wingnuts who seem to believe that it is their right to insist that they be able to project their moral code onto others who do not share their beliefs - and thereby forget the interesting paradox of the very notion of Freedom of Religion - namely that it includes Freedom _from_ Religion as well.

Alberta's Bill 17 - Alberta Health Act

I'm not even sure that some key aspects of this legislation are sustainable under Canada's current legal frameworks.

In particular, I'm looking at sections 10 and 11 of the legislation, which appear to be an attempt on the part of the government to prevent Albertans from seeking redress in the courts should the Health department do something egregious:

Proceedings not subject to review

10 A decision or action of the Minister, the Health Advocate or any employee or agent of either of them shall not be questioned,
reviewed or made the subject of a proceeding in any court by application for judicial review or otherwise, and no order shall be made or process entered or proceedings taken in any court by way of injunction, declaratory judgment, prohibition or mandamus or otherwise to question, review, prohibit, restrain or compel the Minister, the Health Advocate or any employee or agent of either
of them.

Liability
11 No action lies against the Minister, the Crown in right of Alberta, the Health Advocate or any employee or agent of any of them for anything done or omitted to be done by that person in good faith while carrying out that person’s duties or exercising that person’s powers under this Act or the regulations.

Just thinking out loud here, but this looks distinctly like Alberta is trying to exempt itself, and its actions under this act, from judicial review and scrutiny. Further, they are trying to take away from Albertans, the right to challenge the government's decisions with respect to Health Care.

Given that within the constitution there are guarantees access to the courts for redress, one might suspect that Sections 10, 11 of the proposed Alberta Health Act are in fact in violation of Canada's Constitution and Charter of Rights:

24. (1) Anyone whose rights or freedoms, as guaranteed by this Charter, have been infringed
or denied may apply to a court of competent jurisdiction to obtain such remedy as
the court considers appropriate and just in the circumstances.

There is another question that we should be asking ourselves. Why is it that the government feels a need to attempt to exempt its decisions from scrutiny? Just what has the government got up its sleeve that it putting in place an obvious legal obstacle to challenging its decision making in this arena?

Public Religion

This article in the G&M was brought to my attention in an e-mail last night. In the email, a comment to the effect of "my fear is that one of these groups will try to claim that their rights supercede everybody else's.

Unfortunately, they already do. People like Charles McVety come to mind almost immediately as examples of people who argues that his rights as a christianist take precedence over others:

Charles McVety, who heads up the right-wing Institute of Canadian Values, issued a statement Friday saying Delic's invitation to speak is an insult to the Canadian Forces soldiers who have died in Afghanistan.

"This will shock the conscience of Canadians of good faith, dismay military families whose children have made the supreme sacrifice, and undermine the credibility and morale of our armed services in the eyes of allies and enemies alike," McVety said in the statement on the association's website.

(By the way, here is the text of the cancelled speech ... it's just so inflammatory, isn't it?)

But, as the GLBT community has known for decades now, it goes much, much further than that. So-called "christians" regularly try to hide behind the skirts of "religious freedom" to justify discriminating against GLBT people. Consider the relatively recent case of William Goertzen - a landlord in Yellowknife who cancelled a lease agreement and stole the damage deposit from a gay couple once he learned that they were homosexual.

However, the details of Goertzen's case are pretty basic - GLBT people have encountered them many times before. It's what the extreme "christianists" argue about these cases that says so much.

Those who advocate “fixing” Canada’s human rights commissions and tribunals rather than abolishing them, do so because they believe the original purpose of these agencies was legitimate.

What was the original purpose? To provide recourse for tenants, employees and consumers who believed they were being discriminated against on the basis of the politically-defined criteria for which “discrimination” was banned. “Sexual orientation” was later added to that list of politically defined groups.

This complaint against Mr. Goertzen fits within the framework of this original purpose for Canada’s HRCs. All those who support simply “fixing” the HRCs, including various Christian groups, have to take a position against Mr. Goertzen.

ChristianGovernance calls for the complete abolition of these discriminatory, anti-democratic institutions. Their original purpose was wholly illegitimate for a free and democratic society. It was an expression of socialism – strident group rights theory. It was predicated on Marxist class warfare theory.

Mr. Bloedow is so dead wrong here it's not even funny.

The irony here is that what he's really arguing for is a 'tyranny of the majority' scenario where minority groups who have at best limited voices in the public sphere. Apparently he has long ago forgotten the violations that early Christians experienced at the hands of the Roman majority of the day.

o when the Northwest Territories HRT ruled against Mr. Goertzen, they awarded the complainants $13,400. Now, of that $13,400, only $1,500 was for punitive damages. The other $12,000 – $6,000 to each complainant – was an expression of Daddy-Mommy-surrogacy – it was for hurt feelings: “injury to the men’s ‘dignity, feelings and self-respect’,” to be specific. This kind of decision bears witness to the effeminization of our culture. The injustice of this kind of typical HRT decision is also stunning. Well, it should be!

No, Mr. Bloedow, those are punitive damages - it's an economic expression of the impact of Goertzen's discrimination and theft. Mr. Goertzen did offend the dignity of those individuals - quite directly. Mr. Bloedow seems to not understand that discrimination issues often have impacts that are difficult to measure explicitly. However, it so often seems that violators do not understand anything that doesn't affect their pocket book.

Contrary to Mr. Bloedow's assertion that we are talking about 'hurt feelings', the fact is that it goes far beyond hurt feelings, and extends into the very ability of minority populations to be full participants in society. Superficially, Goertzen did little more than refuse to rent a property to a gay couple. Implicitly, he sent a much deeper message - namely that his personal problems with the idea of homosexuality give him the right to not only judge others negatively, but to arbitrarily deny them access to goods and services in the commercial arena.

Whether we are to examine it from the perspective of situations like Goertzen's actions, or McVety's bleating about a (*gasp*) Muslim Imam addressing the Armed Forces, it comes down to the argument being made is always fundamentally about "Christians" (more appropriately, "christianists") demanding that their religious beliefs be sufficient justification for limiting the participation of others in society.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again - Rights and Freedoms in this country live in a state of mutual tension. So far, it seems to me that it is not an unreasonable limitation on the exercise of any freedom that it not be used to arbitrarily limit the freedoms and rights others.

It Only Makes Sense If You're Insane

So, it seems that Ann Coulter wants to file a human rights complaint in Canada ...

Inflammatory right-wing pundit Ann Coulter took aim at a University of Ottawa administrator Monday night, saying an e-mail from the school warning her to use “restraint, respect and consideration” when addressing Ontario students during a speaking tour this week made her a victim of a “hate crime.”

Speaking to students and academics at the University of Western Ontario Monday, Coulter said the e-mail sent to her Friday by Francois Houle, vice-president academic and provost of the University of Ottawa, targeted her as a member of an identifiable group and as such, she will be filing a complaint with the Human Rights Commission alleging hate speech.

Kind of makes you wonder just what Ms. Coulter's speech was going to be, doesn't it? But then, like a lot of the extreme right wing in the US - and Canada for that matter - Ms. Coulter is well known shooting from the lips and not really paying attention to facts or reality.

... and right on cue, we find Ezra Levant on the stage:

Ezra Levant, lawyer and former publisher of the Western Standard magazine, spoke before Coulter on Monday and called Houle’s letter a “veiled threat.”

Why yes, Ezra, only you could possibly take a bit of advice given to someone who may not be fully cognizant of Canada's laws and interpret it as a 'threat'.

Of course, Ms. Coulter opens her yap during her speech and says the following:

“A word is either offensive or it’s not. In a world of political correctness, all words are banned unless they’re used against conservatives.

Ummm...no. It doesn't work that way, Ann - and you know it. The e-mail you received encapsulated the concept in three words: “restraint, respect and consideration”. It's not like your track record for saying amazingly ignorant things in public isn't well known in Canada.

If the notion of speaking in a manner that respects others, and being asked to do so, is 'discriminatory' against them and a form of hate crime, it does make one wonder just what they had in their minds to say in the first place.

The Fruits of Harper's SoCon Agenda

We could have written this report back in 2006 when the HarperCon$ went after cutting programs that benefit women and minorities.

Make no mistake about it - Harper will continue to dismantle everything that makes Canada a better place to live if he's given the opportunity. His government doesn't just misunderstand what equality and rights are about - they are blatantly hostile to the very notion.

Whether it is the blatant attacks on equality that his government has made, or the bungling of the cases of Canadians who find themselves mired in a foreign country's legal system - often until public outrage forces the government to take corrective steps, this is a government which ignores, and supresses facts which contradict its ideologically driven agenda. (and, as with other things, women are more often victims of domestic gun violence ... which was precisely why the gun registry was put in place originally)

H/T: Luna @ Feminist Christian Socialist

For Canada's Women...

Consider carefully when Harper won't include a full range of women's health options on the world stage ... apparently at the urging of Canada's religious right wing.

Remember that this is the same man under whose governance cutbacks have disproportionately affected women - both socially and economically.

Harper, and the extremists in the ReformaTory base, would happily dial Canada's society back to pre-WW II era social structures - where women were treated essentially as doormats.

The "anti-abortion" movement is is more about regulating women's sexuality than it is anything else. These same people are also actively opposing contraceptives and comprehensive sex education. All of which are part of ensuring that a woman is able to control her fertility.

If Harper is unwilling to present a comprehensive platform on the world stage, can you imagine what he'd do in Canada if he wasn't constrained by the limitations of a minority parliament?

Privilege To Oppress

I've been engaged lately in a very interesting conversation about how social privilege can be used as a source of oppression lately. It has been primarily from a feminist perspective, but today's traipse through right wing blog No Apologies revealed a very interesting pattern of assumed religious privilege being used to justify oppression of both women and GLBT folk.

Consider the following:

Hateful attack against Truro’s Christian mayor
The Status of Women Must Be Abandoned
'I'm a pariah' says Muslim scholar who is gay
Calgary favours homosexuality over Christianity

All of these articles are arguing in one form or another that articles of specific religions are essentially a legitimate reason for limiting the lives of others.

Consider the following:

...They further expressed their shock and amazement at the City’s response, since the City authorized a flag raising ceremony on the masts of City Hall and a proclamation just three months prior for homosexuals. The church feels that the requests were the same and that the only difference can be found in the message. Street Church states that the City now officially endorses homosexuality and firmly opposes Christianity in the public square.

There's a couple of points of interest - first is the claim that because the City of Calgary chose to recognize 'Pride Month', that it should also recognize a religiously-centered celebration. This is a false equivalence, since different faiths have substantially overlapping Calendars (especially around the Winter Solstice).

The city's response (posted at Pawlowski's Streetchurch website reflects this:

The City of Calgary recognizes multiculturalism and our pluralistic society, and we celebrate our city’s diversity and the benefits this offers our community by enriching the lives of all Calgarians. The City recognizes several important cultural and religious events in the community including the Menorah Lighting, Eid celebration and the annual Nativity scene. However, while we allow the celebration of faith-based events at City Hall, we do not issue proclamations for religious or spiritual leaders nor do we raise a flag in honour of a specific religion.

This makes sense when you consider the fact that not only does Christianity hold major celebrations during December, so do other major faiths such as Judaism, and arguably most pagan faiths do as well. For the City of Calgary to specifically recognize one of these faiths over another is to send a negative message to the citizens of Calgary who do not profess that faith. Religion is deeply personal, and highly contentious at the best of times. For the City to remain more or less silent on the subject is quite appropriate.

Yet, at the same time, while these same people are crying out about how their particular faith is being "persecuted" (how a faith that is nominally practiced by the majority of our population can possibly argue that it is being 'persecuted' is beyond me, but they do), the same people have used the doctrines of their particular faiths to argue quite loudly that GLBT people should be held as less than equal participants in our societies.

Consider the following comment:

Good for Mayor Bill Mills to stand up to this pervertion.

It is very interesting from the perspective of considering the notion of socially organized oppression in the context from which feminism argues. The claim is, in essence, that it is a horrible thing for GLBT people to be treated as equal participants in society. Yet, the religious argument against homosexuality doesn't recognize that it is the flip side of the persecution claim that they make routinely.

Similarly, there is also an emerging argument from right wing political christianity that claims that feminism has "gone too far", resulting in commentary like this:

Something is wrong with that picture, now we have woman taking care of the men, broken homes, and nothing going right. Our society has been vilified. Even though men are physically stronger many times than woman we have woman taking mens jobs, but still not getting paid as much.

"Men's jobs"??? Really - I didn't know there was such a thing any more.

However, this is again a situation where a position is being staked out that is rooted fundamentally in a scriptural understanding of "the differences between men and women". In this situation, it is fairly clear that again, a scriptural understanding is being used to limit a person's ability to contribute to society fully.

Both are ultimately examples of asserted privilege on the part of the claimants - they believe fully that they are "in the right" of the matter, and do not appear to understand how they are in fact imposing their beliefs on others in a manner that limits both the value and the validity of individual, lived experiences.

Under All The Bluster ...

Is a reality.

The HarperCon$ have struggled mightily to silence Richard Colvin, failing that they then attempt to discredit not just what he says but the man himself.

Peter Mackay's attempt to discredit Colvin's sources and interviews is an interesting exercise in missing the point:

"There has not been a single, solitary proven allegation of abuse involving a transferred Taliban prisoner by Canadian forces,” he said.

However, there is considerable evidence out there of prisoners being turned over to the Afghan government, and being tortured.

We also know that we suspended prisoner transfers at one point, and the HarperCon$ tried to cover up the reasons for that.

So ... what precautions, if any, did the HarperCon$ order Canada's Armed Forces to undertake regarding the handover of prisoners? I'm putting better than even odds that the sum total of those precautions was nothing. In short, they continued to do exactly as Bush II did, and turn a blind eye to the abuse that prisoners were (and likely as not, are) being subjected to when turned over to the Afghan authorities.

In short, through a series of acts of omission, the Canada has become complicit in what are internationally recognized as war crimes - and Harper will do just about anything to cover it up.

I'm not saying that everything that Mr. Colvin has said is true - but the viciousness of the government's response, along with the desperation that has been quite apparent in their actions to suppress the current (and very limited) inquiry, leaves something lying about that does not pass the "smell test".

If it takes a judicial inquiry - and one that is unfettered by desperate politicians trying to save their electoral hides in particular - then we should undertake one on Afghanistan immediately. Canada cannot, and should not, ever be party to war crimes - or even have the appearance of being party to them.

Iran as a Case Study in GLBT Politics

Iran is interesting from the perspective of GLBT politics for a number of reasons. First, it has flipped the roles of the Transgendered part of the GLBT spectrum and the GLB. Being homosexual in Iran (and getting found out) carries a death penalty; meanwhile the country seems ironically almost enlightened when it comes to transgender rights - creating a situation where GLB equality movements have to find a way to build on transgender rights in Iran.

In many respects, Iran is the example that shows why politically GLBT equality are inseparable even if they are somewhat distinct. Iran uniquely creates a situation where in many same-sex couples one partner will transition and have GRS - regardless of whether they identify internally as a member of the opposite sex.

This creates a situation for the person who transitions which is as devastating post-transition as transsexuals in Western societies experience before they transition. A common aspect of transsexual narratives prior to transition is a fervently expressed sense of distress over the disjoin between their body and their identity - it leads many into self destructive behaviours and even suicide. Yet, for the homosexual in Iran, transition may indeed be the only option in order to keep body and soul together.

I'd be very, very curious as to what the suicide rate among post-operative transsexuals in Iran is, and how that compares with the suicide rate among pre-operative transsexuals in other countries.

Returning to my opening point though, it seems to me that the situation in Iran holds a mirror up to the GLBT movement in western societies, and is an object lesson in why Transsexual equality must be a part of the overall GLBT equality drive - even though the objectives and needs are somewhat different. Fundamentally, if one excludes the other, we end up in a situation where some percentage of people end up living in lives that don't really fit them simply to ensure their survival. In Iran, it's GLB people transitioning in order to live with their chosen partners; in Western societies it is no doubt a sizable number of transsexuals who never even attempt to transition out of fear for the consequences.

As long as the GLBT movements allow laws to exclude one subgroup or another, this situation continues to be perpetrated and exacerbated. Further, the hostility of religious extremists towards GLBT people places all who fall under that umbrella at risk from maliciously designed laws and ballot initiatives.

I Smell More HarperCon BS

So ... Athanasios Hadjis has argued that S. 13 of the Canadian Human Rights Act is unconstitutional.

Interesting ruling that - especially since it flies in the face of Canada (Human Rights Commission) v. Taylor, [1990] 3 S.C.R. 892 from the Supreme Court of Canada in 1990, which reads:

Held (La Forest, Sopinka and McLachlin JJ. dissenting in part): The appeal should be dismissed. Section 13(1) of the Canadian Human Rights Act is constitutional.



Per Dickson C.J. and Wilson, L'Heureux-Dubé and Gonthier JJ.: The activity described by s. 13(1) of the Act is protected by s. 2(b) of the Charter. Where an activity conveys or attempts to convey a meaning, through a non-violent form of expression, it has expressive content and thus falls within the scope of the word "expression" as found in the guarantee. The type of meaning conveyed is irrelevant. Section 2(b) protects all content of expression. In enacting s. 13(1), Parliament sought to restrict expression by singling out for censure particular conveyances of meaning. Section 13(1), therefore, represents an infringement of s. 2(b).



Hate propaganda messages against identifiable groups, such as the ones dealt with by s. 13(1), do not fall within the ambit of a possible s. 2(b) exception concerning expression manifested in a violent form. This exception speaks only of physical forms of violence, and extends neither to analogous types of expression nor to mere threats of violence.



Section 13(1) of the Act, which is sufficiently precise to constitute a limit prescribed by law under s. 1 of the Charter, constitutes a reasonable limit upon freedom of expression. First, Parliament's objective of promoting equal opportunity unhindered by discriminatory practices, and thus of preventing the harm caused by hate propaganda, is of sufficient importance to warrant overriding a constitutional freedom. Hate propaganda presents a serious threat to society. It undermines the dignity and self‑worth of target group members and, more generally, contributes to disharmonious relations among various racial, cultural and religious groups, as a result eroding the tolerance and open‑mindedness that must flourish in a multicultural society which is committed to the idea of equality. The international commitment to eradicate hate propaganda and Canada's commitment to the values of equality and multiculturalism enshrined in ss. 15 and 27 of the Charter magnify the weightiness of Parliament's objective in enacting s. 13(1).

There can be only one motive to this decision - and that is to provoke another costly round of appeals through the court system with the objective of overturning Taylor.

In short, the Con$ are busy pandering to their base of extremists. Yes, I suspect strongly that there has been political interference in the CHRC process which is supposed to be held at arm's length from the government - Harper has shown repeatedly that he has no respect for anything that might constrain his powers.