Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada
August 10, 2008
Dear Mr. Lemire:
This letter is to report the results of our investigation of your Privacy Act complaint against the Canadian Human Rights Commission (CHRC). You stated in a letter received in our office on July 8, 2008, that the CHRC failed to grant you access to personal information you sought to obtain under the Act.
Our investigation confirmed that the CHRC received your request for access to your personal information on April 18, 2008. … On May 15, 2008, the CHRC refused you access to the requested information …
… The investigation confirmed that the transcribed transcripts of this hearing was under the control of the CHRC at the time of your request and, as such, the CHRC was required to process it and provide you with your personal information where it exists, subject to exemptions.
Under the circumstances, I am of the view that your complaint that the CHRC denied you access to personal information is well-founded and the CHRC has been so informed….
Section 41 of the Privacy Act provides a right to apply to the Federal Court of Canada for review of the decision of a government institution to refuse to provide access to personal information. (goes on to describe the Federal Court Appeal process, etc)
Yours sincerely,
(signed)
Joyce McLean
Acting Director General
Investigations and Inquiries Branch

BCF explains;

This is the same trial transcript the Canadian Human Rights Commission claimed didn’t exist but then “doctored” and shopped around to journalists in an attempt to cover their lies.

Forwarded via email;

The Ontario College of Physicians and surgeons has posted a draft policy that has the potential to have a serious adverse impact on the exercise of freedom of conscience by physicians. It appears that this policy was posted on 26 June, 2008, without a news release to announce it. The deadline for responses is 15 August, 2008. I learned of this today as a result of a call from a concerned physician.
I will be e-mailing and faxing the College to ask that the deadline be extended, as most of the people most likely to be affected are probably unaware of this. It is unreasonable to post such an important document at the beginning of summer, without an announcement, and allow only six weeks for responses. The College could not have been unaware that groups like Canadian Physicians for Life would want to review and comment on the document.

From the news release;

The document responds to legislative changes, which, according to the Chair of the Ontario Human Rights Tribunal, will see a twenty-fold increase in hearings before the Tribunal – from 150 to 3,000 cases per year.
According to the College, the Tribunal may take action against a physician who refuses to provide or refer for procedures that he finds morally objectionable. The College strongly suggests that the physician’s freedom of conscience and religion will be ignored because “there is no defence for refusing to provide a service” in such circumstances.
In addition to the possibility of prosecution by the Human Rights Tribunal, the College states that it will consider the Human Rights Code in adjudicating complaints of professional misconduct, even though the College admits that it lacks the expertise and authority in human rights.

Key Sections of draft policy.

Free Dominion;

A year ago, this August 7, 2008 letter from Paul Fromm (which better explains what I have written above) would probably have had no significant impact on a CHRT hearing, but today it is causing amazing reactions.
As a start, for the first time in its history, the CHRC is backing off a Section 13 that they have taken all the way to a scheduled hearing. The CHRC responded to the Paul Fromm letter with two letters of their own to the CHRT informing the tribunal that it (the CHRC) would no longer be prosecuting this case and that they would not be attending the August 18 hearing in Hamilton.
But the hearing chairman, Athanasios Hajis, is not going to let them off the hook so easily. In a reply letter Mr. Hajis told the CHRC that he expects them to appear at the hearing and he expects them to explain exactly why they are backing out at this last possible hour.

[see pdf’s at the link]

I now realize that I was in Canada, where only politically correct speech is protected.
I was in Canada, the land of cultural relativism, where the most important value is tolerance. Criticizing any other country or culture is a breach of the now distorted policy of multiculturalism. Now, I would pay the price.
If I had only known how big a price.
A young man came in and sat in the second row. He picked up a copy of my book from the table, took a perfunctory look at it, and started interrupting me.
“You think all Muslims are terrorists,” he asserted.
“I do not,” I replied, as categorically as possible.
“Well, that’s what your book says,” he retorted.
It looked to me as if he had just taken a few glances at it, so I replied: “Have you read my book?” He paused and then said, “Part.”
I decided not to take him seriously and I continued. Another mistake.
Suddenly a man appeared, standing off to my left, and started into a rant. It was something about how the Americans and the Israelis are the real terrorists, and that democracy is really fascist. He was scary.
University of Waterloo Professor Dennis Stoutenburg was there and tried to calm the man.
“Sir, this is a lecture. Why don’t you sit down and listen?”
Another mistake.

Read the rest.
(h/t soup)

Warren Kinsella’s new ally in the never ending struggle against hatery!
(Related… Catholic Insight might enjoy more support from certain quarters if they had the presence of mind to run the occasional teen sex pictorial essay. Educational ones, of course.)

The Alberta Human Rights Commission took only 900 days to grant their approval of a magazine publisher’s choice of news content;

“Look at his rationale for acquitting me: because the Western Standard met Gundara’s home-made tests of reasonableness. We published the cartoons in “context”; we published letters that “criticized” them; and my favourite, the cartoons weren’t “simply stuck in the middle” of the magazine. Gundara must have thought for ten whole minutes to come up with that list of journalistic do’s and don’t’s. And – phew! – he likes me. He really likes me!
Sorry again, I don’t give a damn if he likes me. In fact, it rather creeps me out that a whole squad of teat-sucking bureaucrats spent 900 days inspecting me and the Western Standard. I positively want to offend them. In fact, that’s pretty much the only test of my freedom: can I do exactly what Gundara says I shouldn’t? I’m not interested in publishing recipes or sports scores. I’m interested in bothering the hell out of government.”

(Editor’s Note: The above image is reproduced here for the sole purpose of offending. No editorial value or news worthiness is intended. No letters of criticism will be published. Thank you.)
Continue reading…

Ezra Levant has filed his statement of defence.

There’s something altogether too “informative” about this Margaret Wente column;

Fortunately [the creator of the Obama cartoon cover for the New Yorker] works in the United States, where the worst they can do is denounce you. Here in Canada, they can take you to a human rights commission. That’s what happened in April when Halifax’s Chronicle-Herald ran a political cartoon by Bruce MacKinnon. It shows a burka-clad figure identified as Cheryfa MacAulay Jamal, a woman who demanded a large amount of compensation after her husband was arrested in an anti-terrorism raid and later released. She holds a sign that says, “I want millions,” and her speech bubble says, ” I can put it towards my husband’s next training camp.” Outraged, a local Muslim group complained to the human rights commission, and, for good measure, called the police. […]
But it’s Europe where cartooning and Islam really don’t mix. In the Netherlands, eight police officers showed up recently to arrest an obscure cartoonist for sketching offensive drawings of Muslims that appeared mainly on his own website. He spent two nights in jail, and Dutch authorities are deciding whether to charge him with inciting racist hatred.

Wente shouldn’t have to expend column inches to fill in the background on these cases – they should have been reported on the front pages of every paper in the country and led every national newscast at the time they happened.
That’s what a responsible press would have done in the face of a force that threatens a fundamental right – but these aren’t responsible times in the media industry.

The Organization of the Islamic Conference, a group of 57 Muslim nations, has declared that Islamophobia is a menace and that any such defamation of religion should be criminalized and prosecuted vigorously. The OIC, which has growing clout at the United Nations, wants the UN to enact international “anti-defamation” rules that would forbid blasphemy. Islamic members of the UN’s Human Rights Council have succeeded in changing the mandate of the UN’s special rapporteur on freedom of expression. In addition to investigating cases of censorship and violations of free speech, this person will now “report on instances where the abuse of the right of freedom of expression constitutes an act of racial or religious discrimination.”

One can only hope that the when the times comes that the crocodile comes for them, the bite is neither swift, nor painless.

Syed Soharwardy, (who originally filed, then dropped, a complaint against Ezra Levant over the republication of the Danish Mohammed cartoons) has issued statement on recent decisions by Canada’s human rights tribunals;

When I initiated my complaint against Mr. Levant, I saw human rights commissions as a non-violent means of resolving differences among Canadians. I was not aware of the controversies between the commissions and Canada’s faith communities. I am thinking specifically of my friend Fred Henry, the Roman Catholic bishop of Calgary. Upon learning about the difficulties he and other faith communities have encountered with the commissions, I withdrew my complaint against Mr. Levant.
One of the reasons I chose Canada as my adopted homeland is because of our country’s great respect for religious freedom. In Canada, I am free to be good Canadian and a good Muslim. There is no contradiction between the two.
In listening to the experiences of Bishop Henry and Pastor Boissoin, I realized how precious religious freedom is to our country and how easily freedom is lost.
Yes, I have often expressed concerns over Islamophobia. Some of the portrayals of Muslims in the media have been painful – so much so, that I worried when I set out across Canada on the multifaith walk against violence.
However, the reaction from ordinary Canadians could not have been more hospitable. Canadians of all races, colours, religions, and ages have welcomed me, a Muslim man with brown skin, into their homes, their neighbourhoods and their communities. They have walked with me, eaten with me and prayed with me. They have expressed strong concern for preserving our civil liberties – which includes freedom of speech and religion. They have also expressed a strong desire to end violence in Canada and around the world.
This experience has taught me that we can only end violence when we respect the freedom all Canadians.
There will always be pockets of Islamophobia in Canada, just like there are still pockets of anti-Semitism, racism and sexism. However, I have learned that the best way to dispel misconceptions between our various cultures and communities is for us to meet face to face and learn from each other similarities and difference.
This can only be accomplished in a society that respects freedom of expression, freedom of religion and all of our other democratic freedoms.

And good for him.

Not hate speech;

Abul Kasem: Islam decrees that they be slaughtered Islamically, just in the manner as animals are killed, that is, by beheading. In Sunaan ibn Majah (hadis number 4.3126) we read that the blood of animals is very dear to Allah, and therefore, one must slaughter animals to please Allah (hadis number 4.3167). Since non-Muslims are animals it is evident that Allah has a great penchant for the blood of infidels.

Related not hate speech: “Is a T-shirt claiming that “9/11 was an inside job” any less offensive than a 7-year-old girl with a swastika drawn on her arm? … How about kids wearing the ubiquitous T-shirts of the murderer Che Guevara? Or even listening to the fading shock star, Marilyn Manson….?”
Probable hate speech!

COMICS FOR FREEDOM RALLY to be held at The Comedy Bar (945B Bloor West) on Saturday, July 19 in Toronto. Canadian Comic, Guy Earle, is holding a benefit show, celebrating 40 years of stand-up comedy, to raise money for his impending Human Rights Tribunal. Guy is being taken before the Human Rights Tribunal based on his comebacks to a heckler during a Vancouver comedy night back in May 2007.
The show is UNIQUE in its format. 40 comics will hit the stage for one minute of raw, uncensored social commentary. Stand-up is the embodiment of FREE SPEECH and this show personifies our right to speak while we still can. The show, on July 19th, starts at 9pm and tickets will be available before the show and at the door for 20$. Comics are invited to register for the show at guyearle.ca. Supporters for the cause are invited to come to the show or donate at the same homepage. Come one, Come all, but REMEMBER there WILL BE offensive language!

CHRC dismisses complaint against Catholic Insight…

Friendly tips from the Alberta Human Rights Commission help desk;

Ask the church to get a signed consent form from everyone, parents and children, everyone, stating that they are not forced to attend and are there of their own free will. Later he added that this consent should be drawn up by a lawyer who is familiar with the Human Rights Laws.

Also…

The church needs to contact the police to make sure they do not view the program as bordering on criminal activity—need to show them the curriculum so they know what is going on and do not arrive on the scene.

Today’s decision by the Supreme Court of Canada about defamation law has shifted the balance from plaintiffs to defendants — in other words, towards greater free speech. The court calls it a modernization, which it is — phenomena like talk radio shows, partisan TV panels and the Internet were not around when defamation law was developing (it actually goes back 400 years). It also brings us more in synch with the U.S. approach to free speech, and breaks away from the European model of soft censorship.

RTWT.