The Phantom Menace

While I frequently deride the Ottawa Citizen for being the looney bin of the Postmedia newspaper empire (formerly the CanWest media empire, before the company brightened my day by going broke), it has to be said that a glimmer of sanity is occasionally seen from the paper, despite its propensity for American-style wingnuttery.

While the wording of this piece by Dan Gardner is occasionally unfortunate (as I discussed in this post from 2008), the diction doesn't negate the importance of the point he makes. Nor does it make his shots at professional bedwetter Mark Steyn any less delicious.

Anyhow, here is the article.

Shorter Mark Steyn

Article: Tamil questions that can't be asked

Just because I engage in fearmongering directed at visible minorities and incessantly mourn the death of white European culture does not mean that I am a racist.

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As an aside, it's interesting to note the sleight of hand that Steyn uses when discussing the Tamil population of Toronto:

News reports suggesting that Toronto is home to “200,000 Tamils” prompted a lot of pooh-poohing about inflated figures and unreliable statistics. And surely they are. I doubt there are verifiable numbers on the Tamil population of Ontario. But, even if they’re half that 200,000, it would seem to be more Tamils than anyone might reasonably need—or indeed, even if you did need them, more than you could reasonably expect to acquire. A six-figure population of Germans, Russians, Chinese, Indonesians, sure. But Tamils are a small minority (15 per cent or so) of the population of a small island of 20 million people on the other side of the world. Yet Canada has somehow managed to preside over a bigger population transfer than the British did when they ran both Sri Lanka and India and imported a massive Tamil population from the mainland to work on tea plantations. The largest Tamil city in Sri Lanka is Jaffna, population 85,000. Is Toronto now the largest Tamil city in the world? And, if so, why?

The largest Tamil cities in the world are, without a doubt, in India, with its 60,000,000 Tamil-speakers, the majority of whom are, without a doubt, ethnically Tamil. Toronto not even close to being the largest Tamil city in the world, but Steyn would like you to imagine that to be the case, because if you are as obsessed with racial purity as he is, you might just find his argument convincing.

Them Mozlems is still a-coming! Episode 3

Though not usually as entertaining as the lunacy that is still largely restricted to the internet, today's National Post editorial has a lot between its lines.

"Like many other media outlets, the National Post editorial board believes Section 13(1) is an unjustifiable infringement on free speech. We have therefore endorsed a proposal by Liberal MP Keith Martin that 13(1) be stricken from the law books. As a result, we have drawn the ire of critics who claim we are attacking a crucial tool needed to fight hate. These critics include the Canadian Jewish Congress (CJC), a leading advocate of powerful anti-hate laws."

I'm not a fan of restrictions on speech either. I'm actually quite willing to give every crackpot and hate-monger a soap-box if it means that I can keep mine. So far, so good.

"Earlier this month, members of this editorial board sat down with the CJC to discuss this issue. As expected, no one on either side changed their mind. "

As would be expected of passionate advocates of opposing ideas. Do you hear me? We disagree. Our disagreement was big, and strong! It was, like, THIS BIG! *stretches arms to show the bigness of the disagreement*

"But we were impressed to see the CJC. . . "

Surprise!

"acknowledge that, in certain cases, the current system had been improperly exploited to advance meritless complaints. We were also impressed that the CJC is mulling the possibility of endorsing changes to Section 13(1) that would require the attorney-general's approval before complaints could go forward."

More specifically, the CJC suggested a provision under Section 13(1) that would read:

C - The above provisions apply to, but are not limited to, vulnerable groups targeted on the basis of religion, race, gender, sexuality, disability, or age.
a) Except for Muslims.

Ok, maybe not. I am the biggest CanWest-Global hater I know, but at least the Asper rag is making some pretense at being consistent. What would the CJC say if this were a headline in Maclean's?

"The future belongs to Jews.

The Jews have youth, numbers and global ambitions. The West is growing old and enfeebled, and lacks the will to rebuff those who would supplant it. It's the end of the world as we've known it."

That's what Maclean's published, except that I've made two substitutions. See if you can spot them. Is this "hate-speech"? You could make an argument either way. Would the CJC call a complaint about it "improper exploitation of the system to advance a meritless complaint?" Unlikely, given that they would probably be the ones initiating it.

I'm willing to tolerate hate-mongering - in fact I'd rather it be done in public, where it can be properly mocked, then let it be driven underground where it will seek other ways of expressing itself. Freedom of speech includes the freedom to make an ass of oneself, so long as the freedom to point it out is equally preserved.

If we ARE going to have laws about it though, they have to protect everybody. If they don't, then they themselves become a form of unfair discrimination.