It was good that MP Keith Martin attempted some resistance to the anti-free speech provision in the Canadian Human Rights Act. On January 30, 2008 he tabled motion M-446:

“That, in the opinion of the House, subsection 13(1) of the Canadian Human Rights Act should be deleted from the Act.”

Section 13 reads:

“Hate messages
13. (1) It is a discriminatory practice for a person or a group of persons acting in concert to communicate telephonically or to cause to be so communicated, repeatedly, in whole or in part by means of the facilities of a telecommunication undertaking within the legislative authority of Parliament, any matter that is likely to expose a person or persons to hatred or contempt by reason of the fact that that person or those persons are identifiable on the basis of a prohibited ground of discrimination.

“Interpretation
(2) For greater certainty, subsection (1) applies in respect of a matter that is communicated by means of a computer or a group of interconnected or related computers, including the Internet, or any similar means of communication, but does not apply in respect of a matter that is communicated in whole or in part by means of the facilities of a broadcasting undertaking.

“Interpretation
(3) For the purposes of this section, no owner or operator of a telecommunication undertaking communicates or causes to be communicated any matter described in subsection (1) by reason only that the facilities of a telecommunication undertaking owned or operated by that person are used by other persons for the transmission of that matter.”

Two points of resistance against the Canadian Human Rights Act and Canadian Human Rights Commission – and victims of it – are conservative journalists Ezra Levant and Mark Steyn.   Regardless of their views, it’s important to apply the principle of free speech protection to everyone. So all legislation that infringes on free speech should be resisted now because such legislation may endanger political dissent in the future.

You would be surprised if you started to list all the speech restrictions in Canada besides this. Most of the Canadian “Human Rights” Act makes a mockery of the concept of freedom and violates genuine rights – just like most legislation passed by governments. The result of all these different areas of legislation (speech, employment, environment, health, terrorism, education, communications, lifestyle, etc.) is to monitor our lives. We are so used to this now that I can’t even say this without sounding ridiculous to some. But the point of this website and the libertarian message is to help people wake up. I also know there are many who understand what I’m saying, especially considering the rapid growth of the Ron Paul freedom movement.

We are entombed by this system of controls, but many haven’t woken up to that reality yet. It’s literally impossible for us to consider ourselves free politically and economically in any meaningful sense – except that they don’t come knocking on our doors in the middle of the night and hang us from our ankles with our heads in buckets of ice water. See similar historical example here. And even that could change if Canada became involved in a full-scale war. Oh, yes, I am very “thankful” for the freedoms that I have, that the government “permits” me to say what I do and not stick me in a hole for it, just like I’m “thankful” to criminals for not terrorizing me. Thank you so much, government, for not being a totalitarian dictatorship! So go pat yourselves on the backs while governments ban everything, regulate everything and deduct from every pay cheque and transaction.

More and more people are going to understand that this authoritarian system has to be abolished. We should be pushing our society towards freedom. Do we even read this oppressive legislation and imagine applying it to our own personal decisions? Anything that you don’t want applied to yourself, don’t apply it to others! The choice of how we use our lives and property is up to us as long as we do not inflict harm on others. We can make good and bad decisions and pay the consequences socially and in the market, but the law should not punish us for decisions that we have a right to make. When people are being held back by discrimination and feel threatened by opinions, freedom is the real answer – not more laws. Freedom will give everyone more opportunities. Freedom means stop asking the government to invade others’ lives in order to force them to behave a certain way with their own property.

July 5th, 2008