YOUR INDIFFERENCE, THEIR MUZZLE
By Harmony Grant
18 Dec 07
Is the dam breaking? The NY Post published a
stellar piece called " Canada 's Thought Police" about
a prominent writer yanked before Canadian tribunals on hate speech
charges. The piece wonderfully alerts Americans to the nightmare
of hate speech prosecution in Canada , and warns that our own freedom
of speech faces the same Orwellian horror. "Speech cops in America
, too, are forever attempting similar efforts - most visibly, on
college campuses."
It's heartening that on Dec 17 this story topped the Post's list
of "most emailed" stories. Everyone should know. Another
paper, the Washington Times, recently published a biting
column by the indicted author, Mark Steyn, himself which leads
with hate speech stupidity in Australia, where Santas are told not
to say "ho ho ho" at Christmas.
I'm excited that hate speech stories are making it into these papers.
But still, that's only two papers, only one in the top ten of U.S.
circulation. You'd think the Canadian goons went too far by indicting
Steyn, who's hardly a backwoods KKK member. But humans seem willing
to allow any evils that don't harm them directly. In a poetic
piece for the Ottowa Citizen, columnist David Warren says Steyn's
case "should clang alarm bells right across Canada . Yet all we
have heard is a couple of modest tinkles."
Steyn, a prolific and widely published conservative, wrote a book
on Islam that became a Canadian number one bestseller. Five Muslim
law students want him silenced. They claim his thesis--Islamic culture
is incompatible with the values of the west--is wrong and exposes Muslims
to "hatred and contempt." Two thought police tribunals, the
British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal and the Canadian Human Rights
Commission, are going to hear the case. You might want to read Rebecca
Walberg's great
dissection of the HRC. A Canadian herself, Walberg warns, "Publishing
controversial articles and adhering to one's religion can now lead
to time-consuming, stressful, and expensive dealings with Human Rights
Commissions."
In his Citizen column, David Warren says not even Canadian conservatives
have truly opposed hate crime laws. Instead they legitimized the thought
police by lodging their own complaints against anti-Christian or -conservative
defamation--complaints that were predictably ignored.
Why would Christians or right-wingers expect assistance when defamed
with words? As I wrote in my last
article, even violent attacks on Christians and conservatives hardly
merit a mention. Conservative students at Princeton face death threats
if they speak up for traditional values. Last Friday one of them was
brutally beaten. You probably haven't even heard of this story! A Princeton
senior commented that the student body was "noticeably silent".
Imagine the outcry if the beaten student had been a gay rights, Jewish,
or black activist instead of a conservative.
But it's still astonishing. Most Canadians sit on their hands while
thinkers as mainstream as Mark Steyn are hauled before courts. Warren
rewrites a fitting quote: "First they came for the redneck trolls,
and I did not speak out because I was not a redneck troll. Then they
came for the male chauvinist pigs, and I did not speak out because
I was not a male chauvinist pig. Then they came for Mark Steyn, and
I did not speak out because I was not Mark Steyn. Then they came for
me, and there was no one left to speak out for me."
Another
Ottowa Sun columnist (I'm liking this paper!) named John Robson
also wrote against the hate speech case, with bitter sarcasm that
still makes you laugh. Robson wonders what he can even get away with
saying about the case. "All in all it's much safer to write
about daisies. Such pretty flowers. They are members of the Asteraceae family, the second-largest family of flowering plants after Orchidaceae...
None of them file hate speech complaints with aggressive paralegal
tribunals either. What's not to like?"
But maybe there's hope, maybe the US can hold it for a few decades
more. If only there could be more columns like the one in the NY
Post.
It would be even better if writers went a step further and pointed
out the Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith and the Jewish supremacist
activists who wrote up these laws in the first place.
We've already seen hard-core, militant erosion of Christian culture
and values in the US since the 1960s. The only question now is whether
we'll let our ancestors' values be actually made illegal. The conversation
about hate laws has begun. Let's keep it going!
Harmony Grant writes and edits for National Prayer Network, a Christian/conservative
watchdog group.
Listen to Ted Pike discuss hate bill defeat Dec. 6 with Janet Folger
and CWA's Matt Barber: Listen
Here!
"No More Wars for Israel" video featuring Ted Pike and
Iranian President Ahmadinejad, Watch
It Here!
Let the Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith teach you how they
have saddled 45 states with hate laws capable of persecuting Christians: http://www.adl.org/99hatecrime/intro.asp.
Learn how ADL took away free speech in Canada and wants to steal
it now in the U.S. Congress. Watch Rev. Ted Pike's Hate
Laws: Making Criminals of Christians at video.google.com. Purchase
this gripping documentary to show at church. Order online at www.truthtellers.org for
$24.90, DVD or VHS, by calling 503-853-3688, or at the address below.
TALK SHOW HOSTS: Interview Rev. Ted Pike on this
topic. Call (503) 631-3808.
National Prayer Network, P.O. Box 828, Clackamas,
OR 97015
