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Rex Murphy was on fine form on the CBC last night. I especially liked this bit:
Where does the BC Human Rights Commission, the Ontario Human Rights Commission, the Canadian Human Rights Commission come into this picture? Has anyone been publicly whipped? Has someone or some group been hauled off to a gulag? Is there a race frenzy sweeping the land?
Why is any human rights commission inserting itself between a magazine, a television show, a newspaper and the readers or viewers? Is every touchy, or agenda-driven sensibility now free to call upon the offices of the state and free of charge - to them - not their targets - to embroil them in "justifying" their right to write and broadcast as they see fit?
Indeed. I've now heard from three different people that "sources in the Prime Minister's office" believe Maclean's will lose the case. Well, we'll see. The minute that the British Columbia HRC (the most reflexively PC in its dispositions) orders the country's biggest-selling general-interest magazine to remove an article from its website, run a rebuttal and pay money to the "plaintiffs", it won't be Ken Whyte and me on trial but the integrity of the system.
Meanwhile, I was heartened, considering it's a CBC crowd, by the robustness of the commenters. The only pro-"plaintiff" correspondents are trotting wearily through the same leaden talking points. Talal Awan:
Mr. Murphy’s segment, as a point of view clip, failed to convey the factual basis for the complaints and the circumstances surrounding the case against Maclean’s Magazine.
Er, actually, no one, either among the bullies at the Canadian Islamic Congress or their Osgoode Hall stooges, has disputed on a "factual basis" anything about the book excerpt. Not a fact, not a quote, not a statistic. It's all about "hurt feelings". Still, Elizabeth is on their side:
I would like to hear the perspective of the muslim students!!! It is my impression that they only asked for the right to speak!!! why is their perspective being ignored???
Gee, I dunno!!! Maybe they used insufficient punctuation!!!! Ever considered that, Elizabeth????? Sumera Sahar trots out the Canadian Islamic Congress version of events:
In defiance of "free speach" Macleans told those wishing to publish an article in response to Steyn's piece, that "Mcleans would rather go bankrupt than do so". Free speach is a cherised fundamental right unless it is demanded by those who seek to challenge the hate speach deteremined to protray Muslims and Islam in the most negative light possible.
In fact, Muslims who "seek to challenge the hate speach" had no difficulty getting their letters published or, in the case of Tarek Fatah and Farzana Hassan, a dissenting article. And as Kathy Shaidle points out:
There is no such creature as the "rights of communities to participate in media discussions" (??) except in your fevered, brainwashed minds.
Very true. But, in fact, neither the CIC bullies nor the Osgoode Hall students have ever made any effort to "participate in media discussions" - at least in the traditional sense of writing a rebuttal to my column. Instead, the Osgoode Hall guys came in with no alternative argument, only a string of demands, including a demand for money. Every self-respecting publisher in Canada or any other free society would do exactly what Ken Whyte did. Go on, try it. Go see the editors of Bathhouse Times and demand a five-page cover story arguing that the sodomites will burn in hell - oh, and you want monetary demages, too. Or drop a line to the lily-livered nellies at Law Is Cool, and demand the right of response to their incoherent effusions. Even those pantywaists would tell you to take a hike. This was never a (very belated) request for a right of reply, but a muscle-flexing stunt from the very beginning.
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