“There is no right not to be offended”
The MP wasn’t Prime Minister Stephen Harper, or even Conservative. Despite the current high-profile cases against Mark Steyn, Ezra Levant and Alphonse de Valk, the government has been silent.
No, taking the lead in defense of our traditional freedoms was Liberal MP Dr. Keith Martin, a visible minority with a strong record of promoting human rights. It’s too bad he’s also a minority among MPs when it comes to defending the fundamental right to free expression. Dr. Martin has introduced a private member’s motion to repeal the section of the Canadian Human Rights Act that is allowing a quasi-judicial government agency to censor not only the media, but the average Canadian.
“This is a question of freedom of speech,” Dr. Martin said. “As a citizen of a free country, I am deeply concerned and disturbed by the fact that the bar of freedom of speech has been moved, quite significantly, in a way that is a serious violation in a serious democracy. People fought through two world wars to give us freedom of speech.”
Audio at the link.
Contrast this with the yellow journalism on display in this Canadian Press item. (Contact info)
The email for the Senior Supervising Editor Patti Tasko appears to be ptasko@cp.org
“You can’t expect all males to control themselves when the breasts are out”
When the concept of “multiculturalism” was introduced to Canadians, most assumed it meant “more pavilions at Folkfest”.
“it is good to see you have changed phrase “Iranian Pig” to “Fine Iranian Gentleman” . this is exactly what we do . we call the girl “victim” although we belive the “canadian bitch” is some thing she deserves .”
“Maybe you Canadians prefer pedophiles over breast kissers!
cover ur ass before affectedly boasting to be so prude. We are closely watching you, my host friends!”
“Hi Pigs!!
The following link shows the place that Farhood and all the other pigs came from. Tehran capital of Iran with 2500+ year of civilization and NO GAY or RAPER!!”
Reader Tips
Open Letter to Warren Kinsella … and by coincidence, shares nosedive!
Bookmark this link for daily developments in the Case of the Greatest Canadian Blasphemer.
Now is the time at the Flea when we fling aside the burka!
Yours on the comments.
A Reminder
That one person’s terrorist is Michael Moore’s freedom fighter.
We Didn’t Vote For The NDP
I know they’re new at governing, but I had hoped the days of spending our tax dollars prosecuting “shower curtain” cases were over.
Tony Blair’s Britain
Where the foxes caper unmolested, the government packs your school lunch, and “There never was an England”.
Patriotism should be avoided in school lessons because British history is “morally ambiguous”, a leading educational body recommends.
History and citizenship lessons should stick to the bare facts rather than encouraging loyalty to Britain when covering subjects such as the Second World War or the British Empire, the Institute of Education researchers said. Teachers should not instill pride in what they consider great moments of British history, as more shameful episodes could be downplayed or excluded.
The slave trade, imperialism and 20th century wars should be taught as controversial issues while students are deciding how they feel about their country, the report says.
Three quarters of teachers felt obliged to tell students about the danger of patriotism. The survey suggested neither pupils nor teachers wanted patriotism endorsed by schools.
h/t Texas Canuck
“I was vilified.”
OK, fine, but rebuilding a city that is mainly below sea level is — what’s the technical word for it? — oh yeah, stupid.
“Pim Fortuyn saw all this coming years ago”
Not very long ago, Oslo was an icy Shangri-la of Scandinavian self-discipline, governability, and respect for the law. But in recent years, there have been grim changes, including a rise in gay-bashings. The summer of 2006 saw an unprecedented wave of them. The culprits, very disproportionately, are young Muslim men.
It’s not just Oslo, of course. The problem afflicts most of Western Europe. And anecdotal evidence suggests that such crimes are dramatically underreported. My own partner chose not to report his assault. I urged him to, but he protested that it wouldn’t make any difference. He was probably right.
The reason for the rise in gay bashings in Europe is clear – and it’s the same reason for the rise in rape. As the number of Muslims in Europe grows, and as the proportion of those Muslims who were born and bred in Europe also grows, many Muslim men are more inclined to see Europe as a part of the umma (or Muslim world), to believe that they have the right and duty to enforce sharia law in the cities where they live, and to recognize that any aggression on their part will likely go unpunished. Such men need not be actively religious in order to feel that they have carte blanche to assault openly gay men and non-submissive women, whose freedom to live their lives as they wish is among the most conspicuous symbols of the West’s defiance of holy law.
Multiculturalists can’t face all this. So it is that even when there are brutal gay-bashings, few journalists write about them; of those who do, few mention that the perpetrators are Muslims; and those who do mention it take the line that these perpetrators are lashing out in desperate response to their own oppression.
[…]
It’s very clear what’s going on here – and where it’s all headed. Europe is on its way down the road of Islamization, and it’s reached a point along that road at which gay people’s right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness is being directly challenged, both by knife-wielding bullies on the street and by taxpayer-funded thugs whose organizations already enjoy quasi-governmental authority. Sharia law may still be an alien concept to some Westerners, but it’s staring gay Europeans right in the face – and pointing toward a chilling future for all free people. Pim Fortuyn saw all this coming years ago; most of today’s European leaders still refuse to see it even though it’s right before their eyes.
h/t.
The Sound Of Settled Science
…. who has spent 25 years observing and predicting ice patterns in the Arctic, and now does the same remotely from Ottawa for shipping company Fednav, said that it is important to consider differences between climate change and decadal oscillations.
“Climate change is really slow, long-term creeping change over centuries,” he said. Decadal oscillations, on the other hand, are changes in energy patterns around the world that come and go at cyclical intervals, leading to hurricanes, causing various shifts in sea-level pressure and ice formation.
He said that scientists are still figuring out the relationship between climate change and decadal oscillations. “It’s not really well understood,” he added. Despite this, some media mistakenly report the effects of decadal oscillations as caused by climate change.
For example, though a recent report by CBC suggested that a huge ice fracture in the Arctic’s Beaufort Sea area may be attributed to climate change, Gorman dismissed the claim.
“I see this every year,” he said.
Reader Tips
A few items gathered while surfing –
The justice of settled science;
Findley said the ruling was among the first from a state appellate court to recognize the new research and reverse a conviction. At the time of Edmunds’ 1996 trial, doctors who raised such questions were viewed as extremists, he said. Now, they are in the mainstream.
Michael Yon is back in Iraq.
Abu Laith al-Libi
Add yours in the comments.
Lost
Three seasons on a deserted island, You’d think the fat guy would lose a few pounds.
“It’s a dark day for the Greek-Canadian community”
Possibly the darkest…
Some cynical individuals would claim that the Liberal Party of Canada is trying to make political hay by attacking PMSH for merely mentioning that just because two people are Greek, it doesn’t mean there is a conspiracy.
Yet others would claim that the mere mention of anyone’s ethnicity, particularly by conservatives, is a significant attack on that culture, brought on by political correctness gone amuck.
But not me…
When I heard Harper’s statement, I tore open my shirt and ripped the hair and gold chains off my chest. I tried to console myself by drinking Ouzo, breaking plates and yelling “Opa” in anguish.
I tried playing a soulful tune on my bouzouki, but as everyone knows, every Greek song starts off slow but speeds up near the end, so you can’t help but form and line and dance around the restaurant.
All kidding aside, the LPOC has always been big in ethnic communities, and this righteous indignation might be a way to show Canadian Greeks that the Liberals are still right behind them. But in reality, this faked outrage means nothing.
Greek Canadians do deserve an apology, but not from Stephen Harper.
We deserve an apology from a fellow Greek, Liberal John Cannis, trying to manipulate the opinions of hard working Greek Canadians on a comment from the Prime Minister that meant absolutely nothing.
To paraphrase Kate’s motto,”Liberal MP John Cannis, you don’t speak for me!”
Update (by Kate) – The pilaf thickens! A darker day for Stephane Dion…
If the Secretary General of the United Nations
“… writes a powerful defence of the Canadian military mission in Afghanistan and nobody reports it, is that the same as if he never wrote it at all?
It’s not an accidental oversight.
Full text here.
(Reminder: For informed analysis and coverage of Afghanistan that the self-admitted Liberal waterboys in Canadian media can’t be bothered to provide, bookmark the Torch.)
Keith Martin, MP
M-446 — January 30, 2008 — Mr. Martin (Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca) — That, in the opinion of the House, subsection 13(1) of the Canadian Human Rights Act should be deleted from the Act.
Thank him here, and then write your own MP and urge them to do their part to push this motion forward.
New: First they came for the magazine editors…. “Three complaints have been filed with the Canadian Human Rights Commission against the Christian Heritage Party and its leader, Ron Gray…”
Apartheid High
Streamlining the “school-to-jail pipeline”, an Afrocentric school in Toronto receives approval. And not a moment too soon!
2001-2002 statistical data from the [Toronto District School Board] indicates the percentage of students from specific geograpical locations at risk of not graduating:
– 45% of Western African, Central and South American students at risk
– 39% East African
– 24 % of South Asian
– 23% Eastern European
– 16% Eastern Asian
Watch for the next step in this brave new social scheme – redefining academic standards to “normalize” Afro-achievement.
More here, here and here – “where race and failure are the only criteria for entrance”.
And here (from Jan. 26th);
My black special ed students were quite a challenge. I set and upheld high standards and my students all improved markedly, both behaviourally and academically. But, as I said, this took constant vigilance and intervention on my part, with no to negative pull from their usually single mothers. This group is now in another class, with a much less experienced teacher. Their behaviour has deteriorated rapidly. Very sad.
I also taught summer school in an inner city school with many black kids, many of the girls wearing hijab. The insolence, sense of entitlement, and plain bad manners of a good number of these kids was most disturbing, not to mention that, academically, the standard was pretty low. (One “hijabbed” young miss, about 10, refused to stand for “O Canada”: “It’s not my country.” That only happened on the first day as I made it altogether clear that sitting for the national anthem was NOT an option.)
It’s occurred to me that an all-black school—presumably for the most troubled and troublesome kids—would be hell (for the all black teachers, I suppose) to work in UNLESS it set a very different standard from most public schools: uniforms, high behavioural and academic expectations, upheld on a consistent basis. In other words, Tough Love. I don’t, however, see that happening. E.g., I saw a panel discussion on TVO about the Falconer Commission: Board Director, with her pasted on smile, slogan spouting head of the union, two almost inarticulate parents, one white, one black, a yappy, chip on the shoulder, black trustee, and John Snobelen. As no one was willing to actually diagnose the problem, the solutions they suggested were mere bromides. The problem for most of the problem kids? The accepted family structure of many kids by many fathers, with no dad around the home sets these kids up for failure from the start. Their mothers are often very young, uneducated, inarticulate, chip on the shoulder women who are not able to provide the security and role modelling necessary to socialize their kids. Any school for this type of kid would have to be built on a philosophy of high structure and non negotiable authority, consistently and seriously enforced. I believe any “solution” which overlooks this is not going to make much of a difference.
Racist!
There. I saved you the trouble.
Reader Tips
That Andrew, such charm.
That Andrew, such political instinct.
Something in the air at Air Canada.
Why we want you privatized, Mr. Cruikshank.
Add yours in the comments.
“Fallujah pride is like Texas pride”
“His family was killed by Al Qaeda,” a Marine added helpfully. “They were killed because he’s a police officer.”
The Iraqi Police officer nodded.
“He went out all by himself and killed the people who did it,” the Marine said.
Snow Angels
“My youngest brother at the tender age of three days old was tossed out of the window of a trappers cabin in the middle of winter up by Nelson House, Manitoba. His parents were drunk and decided they didn’t want him anymore. Some merciful soul picked him up and saved his life and he was adopted into my family. “
Y2Kyoto: Snowball Beats Odds
Temperatures reached their lowest point in 30 years, plunging to -2C in the capital, Riyadh, and to -6C in mountainous regions blanketed by snow.
At least 10 people have died in the country as a weather system driven South from Siberia sent temperatures plummeting.
h/t reader James.
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