Canada’s Western Standard Magazine / blog (which publishes Mark Steyn and Kate McMillan, among others) is being sued for publishing the Danish Mohammed cartoons.
I hate to keep beating this drum, but the Orwellian concept of “tolerance” driven by the implied authority within identity politics for a particular identity group to determine the parameters of acceptable speech relating to that group, is completely anathema to western classical liberalism—and in fact promotes the exact opposite of tolerance. Instead, it raises to the level of law the “right” of interpreters, in this case a Canadian imam (related: the swirly cone of Allah”
, not to be offended—which places the final social decision about what constitutes “acceptable speech” in the hands of politically motivated interest groups.
And the Alberta Human Rights Commission has shown itself willing not only to surrender to such pernicious nonsense, but to surrender the rights of the press to even argue their position on the matter. And it’s not happening just in Canada, either.
One thing is clear here: in their haste to show their intolerance of the supposedly “intolerant” dissemination of information, the Commission has provided interest groups with the incentive to file suits as a way to prevent other criticisms; because the financial burden of having to pay for the right of free speech necessarily acts as a material check on such speech.
What follows is the text of an email from the Western Standard’s publisher,
Ezra Levant:
Dear Western Standard reader,
Our magazine has been sued for publishing the Danish cartoons, and I need your help to fight back!
As you know, the Western Standard was the only mainstream media organ in Canada to publish the Danish cartoons depicting the Muslim prophet Mohammed.
We did so for a simple reason: the cartoons were the central fact in one of the largest news stories of the year, and we’re a news magazine. We publish the facts and we let our readers make up their minds.
Advertisers stood with us. Readers loved the fact that we treated them like grown-ups. And we earned the respect of many other journalists in Canada who envied our independence. In fact, according to a COMPAS poll last month, fully 70% of Canada’s working journalists supported our decision to publish the cartoons.
But not Syed Soharwardy, a radical Calgary Muslim imam.
He asked the police to arrest me for publishing the cartoons. They calmly explained to him that’s not what police in Canada do.
So then he went to a far less liberal institution than the police: the Alberta Human Rights Commission. Unlike the Calgary Police Service, they didn’t have the common sense to show him the door.
Earlier this month, I received a copy of Soharwardy’s rambling, hand-scrawled complaint. It is truly an embarrassing document. He briefly complains that we published the Danish cartoons. But the bulk of his complaint is that we dared to try to justify it—that we dared to disagree with him.
Think about that: In Soharwardy’s view, not only should the Canadian media be banned from publishing the cartoons, but we should be banned from defending our right to publish them. Perhaps the Charter of Rights that guarantees our freedom of the press should be banned, too.
Soharwardy’s complaint goes further than just the cartoons. It refers to news articles we published about Hamas, a group labelled a terrorist organization by the Canadian government. By including those other articles, he shows his real agenda: censoring any criticism of Muslim extremists.
Perhaps the most embarrassing thing about Soharwardy’s complaint is that he claims our cartoons caused him to receive hate mail. Indeed, his complaint includes copies of a few e-mails from strangers to him. Some of those e-mails even go so far as to call him “humourless” and tell him to “lighten up”.
Perhaps that’s hateful. But all of those e-mails were sent to him before our magazine even published the cartoons. Soharwardy isn’t even pretending that this is a legitimate complaint. He’s not even trying to hide that this is a nuisance suit.
Soharwardy’s complaint should have been thrown out immediately by the Alberta Human Rights Commission, just like the police did. But it wasn’t. Which is why I’m writing to you today.
According to our lawyers, we will win this case. It’s an infantile complaint, without basis in facts or law. Frankly, it’s an embarrassment to the government of Alberta that their tribunal is open to abuse like this.
Our lawyers tell us we’re going to win. But not before we have to spend hundreds of hours and up to $75,000 fighting this thing, at our own expense.
Soharwardy doesn’t have to spend a dime – now that his complaint has been filed, Alberta tax dollars will pay for the prosecution of his complaint. We have to pay for this on our own.
Look, $75,000 isn’t going to bankrupt us. But it will sting. We’re a small, independent magazine, not a huge company with deep pockets. All of our money is needed to produce the best possible editorial product, not to fight legal battles. This is clearly an abuse of process designed to punish us and deter other media from daring to cross that angry imam in the future.
One of the leaders in Canadian human rights law, Alan Borovoy, was so disturbed by Soharwardy’s abuse of the human rights commission that he wrote a public letter about it in the Calgary Herald on March 16th. “During the years when my colleagues and I were labouring to create such commissions, we never imagined that they might ultimately be used against freedom of speech,” wrote Borovoy, who is general counsel for the Canadian Civil Liberties Association. Censorship was “hardly the role we had envisioned for human rights
commissions. There should be no question of the right to publish the impugned cartoons,” he
wrote.Borovoy went even further – he said that the human rights laws should be changed to avoid this sort of abuse in the future. “It would be best, therefore, to change the provisions of the Human Rights Act to remove any such ambiguities of interpretation,” he wrote. That’s an amazing statement, coming from one of the fathers of the Canadian human rights movement.
I agree with Borovoy: the law should be changed to stop future abuses. But those changes will come too late for us – we’re already under attack. The human rights laws, designed as a shield, are being used against us as a sword.
We will file our legal response to Soharwardy’s shakedown this week. And we will fight this battle to the end – not just for our own sake, but to defend freedom of the press for all Canadians.
Do you believe that’s important? If so, I’d ask you to help us defray our costs. We’re accepting donations through our website. It’s fast, easy and secure. Just click here.
You can donate any amount from $10 to $10,000. Please help the Western Standard today—and protect freedom for all Canadians for years to come.
Yours gratefully,
Ezra Levant
PublisherP.S. Remember, Soharwardy’s complaint will be prosecuted using tax dollars and government lawyers. We have to rely on our own funds – and the generous support of readers like you.
P.P.S. Please help us now [by clicking here]
If you have the means, please help support the Standard‘s cause.
****
(thanks to Dan)
related: “Danish Muslims sue newspaper that printed prophet cartoons”
Heck, if the lawsuit is not tossed by the courts then maybe people should file lawsuits for every possible offense.
Everytime the word God is written by a paper…sue due to the insult.
Everytime some newspaper publishes a story about Christians or any religion (pro, con, indifferent, tangent to the main story)…sue due to the insult.
Everytime a public person that has ever offended you enters a church, graveyard or any ‘holy’ ground…sue due to the insult.
Everytime a can of Spaghetti is put on a grocery shelf…sue due to the insult to the new spaghetti religion.
Sue the bookstore Boarders for putting the Koran (as a matter of policy) on a higher shelf then the Bible (or any other holy book).
and on and on and on….
That sounds like a lot of work
Maybe the ripe sucks (read Canadian Taxpayers) that fund this idiocy might wake up and say something to the effect of – “Maybe we shouldn’t let this happen again?”
I won’t hold my breath waiting…
Western Canuckians [i.e., those not from Ontario or Quebec or the Vancouver area of BC] tend to have more collective sense than the Liberal Canuckians. It’d be doubtful that this would get too far in Alberta. Toronto, maybe.
…if you want to write to Syed Sohowardy, you can do so here:
not that i’m advocating e-bombing him or anything, (may allah perish the thought)
There’s no reason on earth why that defense should cost 75K. Sorry, but this is maybe 10K US at most.
It’s not like there’s going to be a long discovery or multiple depositions. You walk in and ask the judge to dismiss.
Do you have experience in Canadian courts, Sponge? I suspect you are closer to the mark, but from the way some of my Canadian colleagues (in the Canada division of the Mega-Goliath Insurance Corporate-OmniBorg company I work for)behave, I think their expenses might be a shade higher than 15K Canadian dollars.
The damnable part is that if this were a private suit, the plaintiff could get socked for costs. Not this way.
*There’s no reason on earth why that defense should cost 75K. Sorry, but this is maybe 10K US at most. *
Err, no offense man but speaking as a lawyer, if they can get this thing done for 75k, they should consider themselves lucky. Obviously, it depends on the quality of the representation but still..
Its not as simple as going into court and asking for a dismissal and even if it was, there are a ton of variables to factor in, especially if the judge denies the motion.
If this gets thrown out by the court as baseless, some enterprising Canadian politician should push for a law (federal or provincial, whichever is appropriate under Canuckistani federalism, which I don’t understand well enough to know which is more apt) such that, since the State pays for prosecute such cases, it should also pay the costs of winning defendants.
And if that’s already the case, well, Advantage: Canadia.
Sure there is, and far be if from me to agree with a loyyer, but Matt’s spot-on: what if hizonner doesn’t dismiss? You’ve agreed to trial, moved for dismissal, motion denied … start the case.
But you don’t have one. You counted on summary dismissal, and hence only paid loyyers to prepare same.
You can’t now ask [well, you can ask, but do you really think hizonner will grant?] for a continuance immediately after having agreed to trial: “oh, well, see judge … we didn’t really prepare a case since we thought you’d be rational enough to dismiss…”
Plan A is motion to dismiss; but you need a Plan B and probably a Plan C already fleshed out before going to court.
I read a letter to the editor in National Review (by a Canadian, no less) that sorta gave me an epiphany regarding “Tolerance”.
This guy really hit the nail on the head. He said that we say too often, “I respect your right to your opinion.” When in fact we are saying basically that one respects ones right to wear a differnt type or color of shoe. You are not respecting the “opinion” because obviously you disagree.
Saying nothing regarding the opinion would be “tolerance” of the “erroneous opinion”. What the man said was that tolerance is simply recognizing an erroneous position (or opinion) and saying or doing nothing about it. That one “tolerates” when the evil (or wrong) is less than the evil (or wrong) that would ensue with the disagreement.
Tolerating the restraint on free speech that Islam is dictating certainly would result in more evil than that which will result in confronting it.
If you get National Review (The Hell with them Hawks) this letter is an excellent read. I’m sure I didn’t do it justice.
Hmmm.
Any way someone can file a grievance with this idiot commission against the imam?
Man, if there was ever an argument for loser pays, this is it.
:peter
I say they’ve made their bed, now let them be slaughtered like the infidels they are in it.
Isn’t this the country that gave serious consideration to allowing sharia courts in muslim neighborhoods?
Welcome to Canuckistan.
Then Mr. Borovoy, Esq., is either a fool or a liar.
I would say fool, not liar.
Jeff, you can’t beat the drum enough!
Hmmmm.
You’re not going to believe this, what a complete coincidence, but the sacred name of my Animist Spirit Guide is … “Soharwardy”.
So…. This Human Rights Commission in Alberta ….
What’s their number?
When I hear the term “human rights commission”, or any of its manifestations, my first thought is which humans rights are they concerned about.
I’m with Al Jackson.
They’re in the hole they dug.
Went to the linked site intending to support the cause, but the page in not secured. I am not about to send my credit card info to a foreign land via unsecured webform.
Other beware, until they fix this problem, it is not a good idea.
Just what the world needs, a bunch of lawyers telling us why a stupid fucking nuisance suit ought to cost more.
Seriously, though, there’s lots of ways to derail a nuisance suit before you ever have to start preparing for trial, especially when no facts are going to be in dispute. I appreciate the input of esteemed barristers with far greater knowledge than my own, but when it comes to taking shit for saying outrageous stuff, I bring a fair amount of knowledge also.
“I hate to keep beating this drum, but the Orwellian concept of “tolerance†driven by the implied authority within identity politics for a particular identity group to determine the parameters of acceptable speech relating to that group, is completely anathema to western classical liberalismâ€â€and in fact promotes the exact opposite of tolerance.”
It’s a pretty important drum.
“He (the imam) briefly complains that we published the Danish cartoons. But the bulk of his complaint is that we dared to try to justify itâ€â€that we dared to disagree with him…Borovoy went even further – he said that the human rights laws should be changed to avoid this sort of abuse in the future.”
Basically, this is the position of the Left in America. That only a certain kind of speech/expression is “free”.
To the extent these sundry wacko imams can stir up this stuff and draw attention to themselves (see Denmark, Norway), it’s another chink in the armor of sanity everywhere.
Which insidious chipping away is the point.
There’s no “abuse” if Canadian law simply summons the cojones to laugh Soharwardy out of the courtroom.
Norway’s wacko mullah.
http://www.aftenposten.no/english/local/article1247400.ece
far from be it for me to promote “intolerence”, but someone shld take these assorted mullahs and imams and send them to their merciful allah.