Cdn-Firearms Digest Tuesday, November 25 2008 Volume 12 : Number 683 In this issue: National Post Letter: Our lazy border officers Ottawa urged to scrap hate speech law- National Post ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue, November 25, 2008 11:22 am From: "Breitkreuz, Garry - Assistant 2" Subject: National Post Letter: Our lazy border officers PUBLICATION: National Post DATE: 2008.11.24 EDITION: National SECTION: Letters PAGE: A13 SOURCE: National Post WORD COUNT: 121 - --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Our lazy border officers - --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Re: A Trail Of Smoking Guns, Stewart Bell, Nov. 17. Surely the inspection procedures of Canada Customs and Immigration are in great part responsible for allowing Chicago gun-dealer Uger "Mike" Yildiz to smuggle 234 firearms into Canada. Years ago, I was employed as a summer student with the Canadian Customs/Immigration Service at the Ambassador Bridge in Windsor, Ont. At that time, we were given very explicit orders to come out of our inspection stations to demand that all drivers entering Canada open their trunks for inspection. Over the past few years it has been my experience that the Canadian customs officers do not leave the comfort of their stations to inspect the trunks of incoming vehicles. In these more violent and dangerous times it would appear that a return to more rigorous border inspections should be mandatory. Robert Knuckle, Dundas, Ont. ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 25 Nov 2008 12:35:10 -0600 From: "David R.G. Jordan" Subject: Ottawa urged to scrap hate speech law- National Post Ottawa urged to scrap hate speech law http://www.nationalpost.com/news/canada/story.html?id=988228 Joseph Brean, National Post Published: Monday, November 24, 2008 Section 13, the controversial hate-speech provision in the Canadian Human Rights Act, should be repealed so that online hate speech is a purely criminal matter, according to an independent review by University of Windsor law professor Richard Moon. "The use of censorship by the government should be confined to a narrow category of extreme expression -- that which threatens, advocates or justifies violence against the members of an identifiable group," Prof. Moon writes in the review, released Monday, five months after it was commissioned by the Canadian Human Rights Commission. "My position, which differs from quite a few people, is that it's not practical to deal with what one might generously describe as group defamation or stereotyping through censorship. It's just not a viable option. There's too much of it, and it's so pervasive within our public discourse that any kind of censorship is just overwhelming," Prof. Moon said in an interview. "I've tried to connect what we restrict to violence." Jennifer Lynch, chief commissioner of the CHRC, called the report "one step in a comprehensive review" of her hate-speech mandate, which she described as "a hybrid of both regulation and education." "We can envision Section 13 being retained with some amendments," she said. She said the report was commissioned to introduce "fresh thinking" on the problem of Internet hate speech, which has changed drastically. "It's kind of like microwaving popcorn, you know? For the first while on the Internet, there was this little pop, pop, pop. And now, the popcorn is in full popping formation. It's just omnipresent, 24/7, popping up here, popping up there, and so it seems to make it difficult for measured voices to respond," she said. "The key thing here is that our commission exists to protect Canadians from discrimination, and I'm fervently going to uphold this core principle, and we're going to strive to find more effective means to protect Canadians from exposure to hate on the Internet," Ms. Lynch said. Section 13 is a federal law -- initially written for telephone hate lines but expanded in 2001 to include the Internet and, by extension, almost all modern media -- that prohibits the repeated distribution of messages that are likely to expose an identifiable group to hatred or contempt. Some provincial human rights commissions have similar laws that deal with printed material. Keith Martin, the Liberal MP who first proposed scrapping Section 13 earlier this year, called the recommendation "very courageous" and said it creates "a safe space" to discuss amending the Canadian Human Rights Act. "Now it's in Parliament's hands to do something to defend one of our true rights, freedom of speech," he said. "I think it must happen in this Parliament." At a recent convention, the ruling Conservative Party voted to make a repeal of Section 13 official party policy. Calls to Justice Minister Rob Nicholson, who voted for this policy, were not returned yesterday. Although it represents only about 2% of the workload at the Canadian Human Rights Commission, Section 13 has become a flashpoint for controversy, and Prof. Moon's recommendation to repeal it is sure to invigorate a debate about human rights law and free speech that has moved from the fringe to mainstream in the last year. That debate was initially focused on a series of failed human rights complaints against Maclean's magazine by the Canadian Islamic Congress -- whose national president, Mohamed Elmasry, coincidentally announced his resignation Monday -- but quickly expanded to include other cases of alleged hate speech, at the provincial and federal level. If it is not repealed, which would require an act of Parliament, Prof. Moon recommends that Section 13 be changed to more closely resemble criminal prohibitions on hate speech, applying only to messages that advocate or justify violence. He also suggested a national press council with mandatory membership as a potential alternate venue for complaints of discrimination, but acknowledged this "wasn't the core of what I was doing" and not fully thought out. Similarly, he proposed advisory boards to help Internet service providers deal with possible hate messages on their networks. The current legal test for violations of Section 13 is whether messages were "likely to expose" identifiable groups to "hatred or contempt." As it is now, neither truth nor intent is a defence, as they can be in libel law. Prof. Moon recommended that intent to advocate or justify violence be made a requirement for Section 13, replacing the test of "likely to expose." He considered the possibility of truth as a defence, but did not recommend it, fearful that tribunals could become forums to debate, for example, the veracity of the Holocaust, the genetic inferiority of blacks, or the dangers of homosexuality. Prof. Moon noted that the current complainant-driven system is unequal, in that only well-resourced and determined complainants can see their case through to a conclusion. In this, he was referring to Richard Warman, an Ottawa lawyer and former CHRC employee who has brought more than a dozen cases, far more than any other complainant. "In the absence of Richard Warman's activism, there's not much happening under Section 13. The lion's share of cases that go anywhere are cases that he's commenced. So to say that we will lose something significant if we repeal Section 13, well, it's not clear that we will. It seems to me that if we're talking about extreme stuff -- and some of the figures involved do make death threats, it appears -- maybe that's something the police should be dealing with," Prof. Moon said. He recommended that the CHRC receive only inquiries, not formal complaints, and pursue only those they feel are worthy. The CHRC can bring complaints of its own, but has done so only once. Ms. Lynch said she is "ready to do it." "We now have the benefit of experience to see the burden it does place on the complainant, so certainly if it's the will of Parliament to make that change, my sense is that we would be supportive of that," she said. Prof. Moon lamented the frequent "horrendous misdescriptions" of the CHRC's procedures, which have become a hot topic on many conservative blogs. "What's sad is the kind of attention, and the spill-over into mainstream media, that it gets," he said. His report is notable for some of the matters it does not address, such as the question of simultaneous complaints in multiple jurisdictions, online investigative procedures, and the potential for human rights tribunals to be hijacked as political platforms. Mark Freiman, legal counsel to the Canadian Jewish Congress and an authority in hate speech law, credits Prof. Moon for recognizing that section 13 properly deals only with "extreme radical discriminatory speech," but he said the report makes two fundamental errors. First, by proposing that section 13 be used only against expression that incites or justifies violence, as opposed to the current test of extreme vilification, Prof. Moon is "expanding the concept of justifying violence past any usable definition." "By looking at the violence, all you're doing is providing an alibi," he said Second, he observed that the criminal standard of proof, and the requirement to prove mental elements of the crime such as intent, are overly strict for hate speech prosecutions. "I think he's unwittingly making the argument for section 13. If you actually mean to protect communities, you can't do it through the criminal law," Mr. Freiman said. Marvin Kurz, national legal counsel to B'nai Brith, similarly said Prof. Moon appears to be "trying to reinvent the wheel and struggling to do it. I think he realizes if we scrap section 13, the problem doesn't go away." Pearl Eliadis, a human rights lawyer and prominent supporter of the CHRC, said Prof Moon's clarification that Section 13 targets only extreme speech "makes explicit what the courts have already said implicitly." But she worried about the focus on violence as opposed to hatred. "These things don't come in watertight boxes," she said. "When we deal with genocide and ethnic cleansing cases in other countries, what does the international community say over and over again? We need a warning system. And one of the warnings is incitement to hatred." But she had concern about involving police in hate speech investigations. "I think putting people in jail for their words is troubling," she said. Prof. Moon said he does not know what the future holds for Canada's beleaguered human rights hate speech law. "I think that there always were problems with [Section 13]. My recommendations are not dependent on the current controversy. They rest upon my view that this is not the best mechanism for dealing with hate speech, understood in very narrow, extreme terms. It's more appropriately dealt with through a criminal process" Prof. Moon said. National Post jbrean@nationalpost.com - -- -- More On This Story Hate speech law creates 'political elite': lawyer http://www.nationalpost.com/news/canada/story.html?id=794950 Maclean's wins third round of hate fight http://www.nationalpost.com/news/canada/story.html?id=874166 Comment: A new low for 'human rights' http://www.nationalpost.com/news/canada/story.html?id=904735 Editorial: Steyn complainants don't understand freedom of speech http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/fullcomment/archive/2008/6/9/the-post-editorial-board-the-mark-steyn-complainants-don-t-understand-freedom-of-speech.aspx Ezra Levant: CHRC sets out to bury the Moon report http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/fullcomment/archive/2008/11/24/ezra-levant-ctrc-sets-out-to-bury-the-moon-report.aspx Moon report gets it right on hate speech provision http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/fullcomment/archive/2008/11/24/national-post-editorial-board-the-moon-report-gets-it-right.aspx RCMP not charging rights watchdog over hacking allegations http://www.nationalpost.com/news/canada/story.html?id=977900 Human rights process failed Muslims, says Elmasry http://www.nationalpost.com/news/canada/story.html?id=983139 Posted Podcast: Joseph Brean on the collision between free speech and human rights http://www.nationalpost.com/podcasts/posted/index.html Online hate speech police on firing line http://www.nationalpost.com/news/canada/story.html?id=987736 Read the full Report to the Canadian Human Rights Commission Concerning Section 13 of the Canadian Human Rights Act and the Regulation of Hate Speech on the Internet (PDF) http://www.chrc-ccdp.gc.ca/pdf/moon_report_en.pdf Ahenakew's anti-Semitic tirade played at retrial http://www.nationalpost.com/news/canada/story.html?id=988914 Related Topics Censorship http://www.nationalpost.com/related/topics/index.html?subject=Censorship&type=Topic Human Rights Policy http://www.nationalpost.com/related/topics/index.html?subject=Human+Rights+Policy&type=Topic Ottawa http://www.nationalpost.com/related/topics/index.html?subject=Ottawa&type=City Canadian Human Rights Commission http://www.nationalpost.com/related/topics/index.html?subject=Canadian+Human+Rights+Commission&type=Organization Jennifer Lynch http://www.nationalpost.com/related/topics/index.html?subject=Jennifer+Lynch&type=Person © 2008 The National Post Company. All rights reserved - -- -- Letters to the Editor [Sandbox Form] http://www.nationalpost.com/contact/letters.html?name=Letters&Subject=Letter+to+the+Editor... ------------------------------ End of Cdn-Firearms Digest V12 #683 *********************************** Submissions: mailto:cdn-firearms-digest@scorpion.bogend.ca Mailing List Commands: mailto:majordomo@scorpion.bogend.ca Moderator's e-mail address: mailto:drg.jordan@sasktel.net List owner: mailto:owner-cdn-firearms@scorpion.bogend.ca FAQ list: http://www.canfirearms/Skeeter/Faq/cfd-faq1.html Web Site: http://www.canfirearms.ca CFDigest Archives: http://www.canfirearms.ca/archives To unsubscribe from _all_ the lists, put the next four lines in a message and mailto:majordomo@scorpion.bogend.ca unsubscribe cdn-firearms-digest unsubscribe cdn-firearms-chat unsubscribe cdn-firearms end (To subscribe, use "subscribe" instead of "unsubscribe".)