Rory Leishman:
On Jan. 26, the House of Commons Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights delayed consideration of Bill C-9, the Combatting Hate Act. That is not sufficient: Parliament should defeat this freedom-stifling bill altogether and also repeal the anti-hate law provisions in the Criminal Code.
Government should not stifle the expression of any political viewpoint, no matter how vile. Experience in Canada and elsewhere has amply confirmed that empowering the police and the courts to censor speech is far too open to error and abuse.
As it is, devout Christians have particular reason for concern about Bill C-9. In leading off debate for the Conservatives on the bill, Larry Brock, MP for Brantford—Brant South—Six Nations, pointed out: “Christianity is under attack in this country.”
That assertion drew hoots of derision from some members of the House, yet it is manifestly correct. As Brock noted, there is compelling reason to believe that hate-mongering arsonists set fire to most of the 33 Christian churches that burned across Canada in the aftermath of the frenzy of anti-Christian hate whipped up by false and misleading reports in the secular mass media in May 2021 that a researcher had discovered the graves of 215 missing children near the former, church-run, Kamloops Indian Residential School.
Today, a pro-life Christian might faithfully obey the commandment of Christ to “love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you,” but if he publicly testifies that abortion is a crime that can never be justified, he is liable to be denounced as a hate-monger. And the same goes for any devout Christian who insists that marriage is the voluntary union for life between a man and a woman or that a biological male who thinks he is a female deserves compassionate treatment for a gender identity disorder.
To safeguard Canadians who express religious beliefs that conflict with what now passes for the conventional wisdom of the secular world, the existing anti-hate provisions of the Criminal Code exempt anyone who, “in good faith, expressed or attempted to establish by an argument an opinion on a religious subject or an opinion based on a belief in a religious text.” During committee hearings on Bill C-9, the Liberals and the Bloc Quebecois combined to eliminate this religious exemption from the legislation.
In defense of this blatantly anti-religious amendment, Liberal Justice Minister Sean Fraser maintained that believers have no reason for concern because: “Freedom of religion is a fundamental guarantee under section 2(a) of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Nothing in this amendment changes that.”
But can Christians really rely on the Charter for protection? Not at all. In 1985, Ian Hunter, one of Canada’s foremost experts on constitutional law, pointed out that in one of the first Charter cases, R v. Big M Drug Mart, the Supreme Court of Canada twisted the plain words of section 2(a) into meaning that the Charter guarantees “freedom from religion rather than freedom of religion.”
The censorship powers proposed by Bill C-9 and already conferred in the Criminal Code jeopardize the rights to freedom of expression of all Canadians, not just religious believers. In the United States all such legislation is unconstitutional and the same should go for Canada.
Instead of driving genuine hate-mongers underground, the law should permit them to spew their vile hatred in public so they can be readily identified, tracked, and roundly denounced.
Of course, any malefactor who moves beyond violent rhetoric in the abstract to the actual incitement of violence should be immediately arrested and charged. In dealing with law-breaking demonstrators, the police should immediately order them to desist and arrest those who disobey. Otherwise, a generally peaceful and law-abiding public protest is all too likely to escalate into an out-of-control mob.
In the end, there is only one effective means of combating hate: decent, law-abiding citizens must denounce, rebuke, shun and, if need be, boycott the genuine hate-mongers among us until these repulsive offenders get the message that their vile behaviour is absolutely intolerable in Canada.
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.