Muslim Activist Fails Dale Carnegie Course Big-Time

More threats, more obnoxious posing, more inane ranting from a sock puppet sent to B.C to do Mohammed Elmasry's dirty work on behalf of stealth jihad. Not very stealthy. More like more of the same. Muslims have it bad? Let's see. How about going for dinner at a Muslim establishment? OK, and once you find Muslims have poisoned you with their own excrement sprinkled liberally on your food, maybe you want to go to a Muslim doctor.

And so on.

I met Dale Carnegie once, and he told me, "Dag, some people just aren't worth befriending." I asked if they were worth beheading. But, you see, I was joking. Seriously, I'd settle for some people just shutting their mouths for the next 100 years or so. I'm not going to get that lucky, though, am I?

Muslims told to demand equal voice in media

Laws against promoting hatred called useless

Joseph Brean, Published: Monday, June 09, 2008

TORONTO - Muslims must "demand that right to participate" in national media, Khurrum Awan, the primary witness in the Maclean's magazine hate speech hearing, told a weekend conference of the Canadian Arab Federation.

"And we have to tell them, you know what, if you're not going to allow us to do that, there will be consequences. You will be taken to the human rights commission, you will be taken to the press council, and you know what? If you manage to get rid of the human rights code provisions [on hate speech], we will then take you to the civil courts system. And you know what? Some judge out there might just think that perhaps it's time to have a tort of group defamation, and you might be liable for a few million dollars," he said.

On a discussion panel with Barbara Hall, Chief Commissioner of the Ontario Human Rights Commission, and Haroon Siddiqui, editor emeritus of the Toronto Star, Mr. Awan described his increasingly high-profile struggle "against particular elements in media that are misusing and abusing their responsibility" in writing about Islam.

Under the sponsorship of the Canadian Islamic Congress, and with the help of a small team of fellow recent graduates of Osgoode Hall law school, that struggle has so far involved complaints to the British Columbia, Ontario and federal human rights commissions over an excerpt of Mark Steyn's book America Alone in Maclean's magazine in 2006.

The only case to be heard so far, in B. C, concluded last week with a decision pending.

http://www.nationalpost.com/news/story.html?id=573457

Yeah, yeah, yeah. There's no law against being a total arsehole. If there were, Awan would get life in solitary. And the rest of us could breathe a little bit.

Some metaphysical moments hanging heavily....

All the action is happening at other blogs for now. I'm still sitting in the dark trying to think. Will have a post up later this evening. Meanwhile, see RS and Truepeers at the following links:

RS:

http://downtowneastsideenquirer.blogspot.com/2008/06/protest-against-bc-human-rights.html

http://downtowneastsideenquirer.blogspot.com/2008/06/five-feet-of-fury-blog-entered-as.html


Truepeers:

http://covenantzone.blogspot.com/2008/06/thoughts-on-seeing-human-rights.html

Let Us Do Nothing While Yet There Is Time.

As a great French philosopher once said, "I might not like what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it if I'm not busy that day."

When it comes to heroic rhetoric in Canada, there is no shortage of people trying to stop it. Speech heroic could be potentially harmful and hurtful to someone's feelings someday somewhere maybe potentially. Free speech, sometimes a good thing, is sometimes a bad thing. Sometimes "free speech" is Hate Speech.

You, as a private citizen, can't know all there is to know about the whole of the nation and Humanity, nor how the the world feels about various things that could be deemed insulting to them. How could you know about people's feelings, those from around the world, unless you were an expert in sensitivity and one trained in spotting racism and hate? Come on, you can't know all that. It takes an expert.

Lucky you, there is a collection of fine women and men who are expert in sensing hurt feelings and emotional harm done by hate-speech mongers, those writers and poets and bigots among us, those like that Canadian author Mark Steyn. Thankfully, among us walk investigators and adjudicators of Human Rights Commissions and Tribunals. Experts in finding hate wherever it lays, however deep, no matter how hidden from the lay person. Yes, B.C. has it's Human Rights Tribunal; and those who work for it, who work for you, have found Mark Steyn. Will they expose him as a hate-monger? Will we find the truth about hate? About Steyn? Only if the Human Rights Tribunal can do their work.

Mark Steyn is a best-selling Canadian author, writer of America Alone. America. Need we say more?

In a tolerant society, how can we tolerate hate? How can we tolerate Steyn? How can a tolerant society tolerate Steyn's hate-speech? Who will stop him?

Mohammed Elmasry, head of the Canadian Muslim Congress, he who unsuccessfully attempted to bring Shari'a law into the family court system of Ontario in 2005, is hurt, is deeply hurt, by Steyn's racist and islamophobic book. Elmasry has filed a complaint against Mclean's magazine for republishing part of Steyn's book. Hate speech. The B.C. Human Rights Tribunal will hold a hearing to decide what to do, will decide for us if we as a society can tolerate such writing in this nation. They are Human Rights experts. They know hate speech.

You? Not so much.

What about referring to an ethnic group as the Sons of Apes and Pigs? What about advocating wife beating? What about advocating the murder of homosexuals? How about advocating in public the killing of civilians in war? You see, you might think these are bad things, but you would be mistaken-- because of you not being an expert; and you might not realize that such as above is commanded by Allah in the Koran. Elmasry advocates tKoranic things, it's true, but it is Steyn who is the hate-monger. It takes an expert to understand these things, which is why we have the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal to think for us. You don't know the fine details of hate. How could you? It takes an expert to understand. It takes a hearing.

That hearing is occurring now in Vancouver. Hate-speech? It could happen to you.

Let us be thankful that bureaucrats trained in understanding things for us have taken on such an arduous task. Praise them. And let us do nothing while yet there is time.

For more details, please search:
http://covenantzone.blogspot.com/
Or: http://nodhimmitude.blogspot.com/

The Soul selects her own Society--

The Soul selects her own Society--

Then--shuts the Door --

Human Rights for Hate Mongers?

Free speech or hate speech? Have you done or said something wrong? Are you a hate monger? If someone accuses you, what then?

Are you tolerating things you honestly don't like? Are you silently putting up with behavior that actually upsets you deeply? Are you nervous about saying so? You'd be right to fear, right because you could end up ruined for complaining aloud. You could be grabbed by Canada's Thought Police. You, a normal person, could be destroyed financially, socially, by law, all for saying the wrong thing in public.

Welcome to the State of Fear.

Mark Steyn, Canadian author, author of America Alone, maybe he's a hate-monger. He wrote a book. Someone complained. Now there is a hearing. The State will decide if Steyn is a hate criminal. Like you, he has opinions. He put his in print. He will be on trial for it. He will face the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal. Hate crime. He will face the State of Fear.

Are you nervous about a remark you once made? Afraid someone will take offense? Concerned that you've said something you shouldn't have? That would be normal. That would be life in a Velvet Fascist police state where things are really, really nice-- or else!

Did you say something you shouldn't have? You didn't mean it, right? Are you scared? That'd be normal. In a State of Fear.

Writers and poets throughout the land, the times they are a'changing. You can't say that. You'll be reported.

Are you a Nazi and a racist? Does it matter what you are so long as someone accuses you? What could you do about it? Who'd risk defending you? Could you defend yourself? Aren't you guilty for just being alive? Don't you feel guilty?

All of our lives and our history, it's all so evil. Shouldn't we pay? Aren't we all guilty of something? Aren't you?

There is a religious movement in Canada that works to save you from your sins, even those you won't acknowledge, even ones you're not aware of. You are guilty because you are a sinner. So says the Religion of Human Rights advocacy, a government religion, a state religion, a religion of bureaucrats in offices, of clerks forever probing. Accusing. Finding hate. Finding -- you.

You said....

Remember that remark? that joke? that look you gave? Someone might, and it might come back to haunt you. In a State of Fear.

Your private life is not private in a State of Fear.

The government, the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal, investigators and prosecutors of hate crimes, are forever searching for things of evil intent, for evil thoughts and deeds. For hate crimes. Maybe-- for you and what you said.

We all commit thought crimes. We are all guilty. Even you. It doesn't take much. Sometimes it takes nothing at all to be branded a hate monger, a racist, a thinker of bad thoughts. It's a crime.

Mark Steyn, a Canadian author, is so charged, and he is guilty-- just as you are. He faces ruin, as could you. The Thought Police. Clerks of the Human Rights Tribunal. Who is Mark Steyn? A man like you. It's his time to face the courts. He is guilty of thinking, of writing, of expressing opinion.

You, poet and maker of your mind and life, choose, and shut the door. In a State of Fear, bureaucrats kick it open and expose you. You are guilty.

B.C. Human Rights Tribunal. It's not about Human Rights. It's not about fee speech. It's about fear. A State of Fear.

http://covenantzone.blogspot.com/
http://nodhimmitude.blogspot.com/

Everything old is tired again

Some good ideas have their day and then fade away. And then sometimes everything old gets tried again.

Censoring Nazis was a terrific idea.

I'm all for it. I think Nazis should be fought till they're defeated and the ones responsible for major crimes should be hanged. I'm a tad liberal when it comes to defining major crimes, but there is the legal system to even out my attitude. So we might see daylight while walking down the street after all. Courts are a moderating influence on folks like me. Except when folks like me are in charge. Then they're more like kangaroo courts with a strong bent toward revenge rather than sense and justice. Even worse than that, though, would be a court with a mission to seek out and destroy all hints of crime, even if those crimes haven't yet been committed. Thought Crimes. Crimes hunted down and expunged before they happen. Hunters in offices seething with righteous rage and moral fury. Clerks with fire in the eye and a determination to-- git 'em.

We got them already. Nazis are done. We got them years before I was even born, and I'm an old guy. They got got when Dietrich was one of the hottest babes on the planet. Getting Nazis was a great idea then. We got them. We hanged some. Not enough, but we hanged some and made a point. I like it. We got 'em. And then we moved on.

But now, way too many years later, we have people still hunting Nazis. There are lots of folks in the world who are bad enough to feel good enough about hanging to feel some enthusiasm for it. But mostly we don't go after folks who deserve hanging. We find instead we have heresy hunters, creepy little clerks in offices who are so wrapped up in their little dramas of the mind that they've completely lost sight of the world the rest of us live in. We get the same drama with a whole new cast and a whole new set, and the plot doesn't make any sense at all.

Deitrich against Hitler. Yeah!

Cherie Blair against 'discrimination"? Uh....

BC human Rights Tribunal against Mark Steyn?

You get the picture.

Mark Steyn. Not Alone.

A well-known Canadian author is soon to be brought before the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal in downtown Vancouver. The writer is accused of being a hate-criminal. His right to express opinions is on trial. So too is your right to read and to speak and to openly express yourself. Freedom to speak, to write. There comes a trial. Gaggles of government employees in offices across this nation have decided that it's up to them to decide who can speak and what the the public can say. If one offends the bureaucrat, then there is the Star Chamber awaiting. Mark Steyn will make his appearance in Vancouver's on Monday morning because he wrote words. He will be on trial for writing. He will not be alone.

Hate speech. It's a crime. Free Speech? That's a crime too. If the government decides you are a hate-criminal....

Who is Mark Steyn? Surprisingly, many intellectuals in Canada have never heard of this best-selling and prolific author. He's not Michael Moore. He's not Noam Chomsky. He's a thinker and writer under state assault. He's a funny guy, a clever guy, a Canadian guy who writes books. One tiny group of ideologues in government don't like him-- automatically don't like him-- because he's not automatically a Noam Chomsky. So the government is going after him, attempting to destroy his abilities in Canada to speak and write. The bureaucrats in the Hate-Speech industry just don't like him. It really doesn't matter what he writes. They don't like him anyway, and that's enough to fire hate-speech charges at a man who is many things most Canadians would admire, if they knew of Steyn and had read his works. He's pretty much like you or me. He's not a radical; and the government workers in the Hate-Speech Suppression industry are upset about him. Who is Steyn? He's a funny guy who writes books. The wrong kind of books. You'd probably like him if you knew him.

There are Canadians of many sorts who meet weekly at the city's main library in Vancouver each Thursday evening to discuss issues related to government and politics and culture. We meet in the atrium from 7-9:00 p.m. for coffee and discussion and the sharing of ideas. It's something of a miracle we haven't been arrested for it. We speak freely. This evening we'll sit as we have for two and a half years now, and this evening we'll sit with Mark Steyn, if only in spirit. Mark is not alone. Tonight we are all Mark Steyn.

If you are Mark Steyn too, feel free to sit with us in the Covenant Zone. We're outside Blenz coffee bar in the lobby of the library. We're identifiable by our blue scarves and -- books!. We support free speech. We support Mark Steyn. He is not alone. You're not alone.

VPL 7-9:00, outside Blenz in the atrium. Covenant Zone. Tonight.

Who Is Mark Steyn? You might Never Know.

Monday morning at 8:00 we'll be outside the courthouse on Robson st. here in Vancouver to protest in favor of Steyn's rights and yours to speak freely.

Here in Vancouver Canada a famous and entertaining writer, Mark Steyn, will be making a special guest appearance before a kangaroo court held by Death Hippies who don't like the fact that Steyn wrote poo-poo words. No, not dirty words that would get his mouth washed out with soap, I mean other poo-poo words that the nanny-state doesn't like. Nothing naughty. In fact, Steyn's a very bright and articulate intellectual. It's that, you see, he's not behaving himself on the playground of the nation to the satisfaction of the p.c. minders here. They are very upset with Mr Steyn, and he's been called to the principal's office. I know it's the principal's office because the princi-pal is my "pal." Steyn is called before the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal to get spanked. He was a bad boy. To which I say, "Fuck off!"

Like so many people today, Steyn wrote something the government has decided they can be upset about. It really doesn't matter what it is that upsets the government. Who the hell do they think they are to tell the people what to say or what to think? Personally I think, and I even write it: The government can fuck off! Bad boy that I am, I just don't care that a gang of bull-shit bureaucrats who aren't elected by anyone at all can haul a writer into a court of quasi-legal standing in the community and harass and bankrupt anyone as they please. They do it to Steyn, they might do it to me, and they'll come for you too someday. I don't really care what they do to you. You might be no good at all and have nothing to say that anyone wants to hear. You might be a rotten bastard altogether, and I might be happy to see you suffer. But even so, I think I have to stick up for you so the government doesn't get into the groove and come for me next or maybe my friends. I help you so I can do good for a guy I do like and tend to protect, he being me. Your free speech is my free speech.

Free speech. I'll be defending Steyn's and yours and that of my friends and the free speech of people I don't know and some I don't like. I'm doing it for myself. Yeah, OK, I'm doing it for the world too, cause that's the kind of guy I like to be though of as.

Don't let the government get away with this crap. No one elected the thought police. Even if someone had, they would still have no place in a democracy and they would be rightly turfed at any cost. The thought police of the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal are bad and the work they do is evil. I kid you not, these people are evil. This, friend, is Velvet Fascism, and fascism not less for being "nice."

Monday morning at 8:00 we'll be outside the courthouse on Robson st. here in Vancouver to protest in favor of Steyn's rights and yours too to speak freely. Meet us there. Free speech is an essential aspect of democracy. We're losing it. The thought police are going crazy, and we have to stop them somehow. They won't stop of their own accord. They're out of control, and we have to stop them. Government sponsored psycho baby-sitters have tied up the parents of the nation and we're being tortured in the basement for our own good. No, I really don't like it. Monday morning, Robson st. at 8:00.

Here's the upscale version of why;

http://covenantzone.blogspot.com/2008/05/we-are-all-mark-steyn-call-for-slogans.html

Blazing Cat Fur's Smokin' Blog

This is what you might think you get at Blazing Cat Fur:

It's not "right wing" - it's pro-war, pro-U.S., virulently Islamophobic, McCarthyite - and that's just after 3 minutes of reading the front page...

Phrillie, how did you happen on that blog? It is truly repulsive.

In my own defense, I was once given an award as the Internet's worst blog. But I admit, I cannot compete with this photo:

http://blazingcatfur.blogspot.com/2008/04/rights-commission-wrong.html

See above for the heart-rending story. Hey, do it while you can. The way the Left dhimmi fascists are performing here we might all end up in jail -- with no Internet. Yoiks!

What Price Free Speech?

Canada. The question here is of censorship: Is it good or is it bad? The question is for a small minority who even care at all. Most not only don't care about the question, they don't even realize it's being asked seriously in this country in our courts and in our daily practical lives. Most people, if forced to say, will say what they think their friends and neighbors would say, having no real idea at all of the nature of the debate. Such is the nature of democracy. It does truly suck but it's better than any alternative to it.

The following quotation by haliburton Jan 05 2008 5:42 PM, comes from a George Jonas column in the National Post Newspaper.

Dean Steacy is an INTERNET "investigator" for the Canadian Human Rights Commission and Barbara Kulaszka, a lawyer representing a website owner)

MS. KULASZKA: " Mr. Steacy, you were talking before about context and how important it is when you do your investigation. What value do you give freedom of speech when you investigate one of these complaints?"

MR. STEACY: "Freedom of speech is an American concept, so I don't give it any value."

MS. KULASZKA: "Okay. That was a clear answer."

MR. STEACY: "It's not my job to give value to an American concept."

****

Here's a bit more, by Tristan Emmanual, from World Net Daily:

It's not that Steacy rejects "freedom of speech." He simply doesn't believe in the concept of a pluralistic democracy where people actually have a constitutional guarantee that the government won't be able to silence them just because someone like Steacy says so. And the reason he rejects the concept of democracy is because in his world, and in the world of his cadre of "hate-crusaders," it is only his definitions that matter, not ours.

Crusaders such as Steacy are working to "cleanse" the Internet of critical opinions, ideas, and speech they don't like. And unfortunately for Canadians, they have the authority to assess fines of up to $50,000 and incarcerate would-be "haters."

****

There has to be some record of this dialogue actually taking place, right? I won't just accept someone's word for it, even if it's on the Internet. Should I take Mark Steyn's word for it? No, not just because.. Here is what he writes on January 06, 2008 at NRO Weekend:

At the National Review/Thomas More College event in New Hampshire last night, several NR readers were kind enough to enquire about my prospects of "victory" against Canada's "Human Rights" commissars. I think they're best summed up by this exchange from the Warman vs Lemire hearing before the Canadian Human Rights Commission (page 4793). [pdf] Dean Steacy is the principal "anti-hate" investigator of the HRC....

****

Page 4,793. Just in case you didn't down-load the pdf and didn't read the page in question, you might well wonder who Mark Steyn is and why I would trust his reference. Let's see:

[Steyn is] a vile little piece of work that writes for Maclean's under the name Mark Steyn. Steyn is yet another of the "chickenhawk" crowd - pro war, pro American aggression, and desperately phobic of the "brown-skinned menace" that he predicts will overrun Europe in a few generations. (I won't go into the details of Steyn's bird cage liner book - if you really want to read it, find it in the library or a used book store ... or at the bottom of a parrot cage)

Apparently, Mr. Steyn finds himself subject of a human rights complaint....

****

Oh well. We should all be thankful we have the Canadian Human Rights Commission to save us from ourselves. We are not worthy. They do it for us anyway. How lovely.

Because very few people care about the question of free speech and democracy in general we end up with abuse by neo-fascists from the Left, not different really from neo-fascists from the Right. Some concerns end up in the middle, such as the one below.

Should we enable our determined violent enemies to organize themselves using our technology? We have a lot to think through. We won't make any serious moves til the majority of people are in some kind of agreement about whatever we do. It might take years before the people in general in the West conclude that Islam is a serious danger that must be confronted seriously. We in the meantime can look at what we think about our own positions. This piece is a concerned person's questioning. We can all do so of that to our advantage. Then we'll act in some way.

Bravo, Geert Wilders

" 'It is difficult to anticipate the content of the film, but freedom of expression doesn't mean the right to offend,' said Maxime Verhagen, the Netherlands Foreign Minister."
http://poligazette.com/2008/01/21/anti-islam-movie-cause-for-great-concern/

A marginal Dutch politician, Geert Wilders, is close to releasing for the world's viewing a ten minute movie about the Qur'an. So what.

"During a visit to the European Parliament in Strasbourg last week, Ahmad Badr al-Din Hassoun, the Grand Mufti of Syria, said that, were Wilders was seen to tear up or burn a Koran in his film, 'this will simply mean he is inciting wars and bloodshed ... It is the responsibility of the Dutch people to stop him.' "
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/world/story/0,,2243805,00.html

Well, how about 'what' being that the Grand Mufti of Syria is making death threats in the statement above? He's free to threaten the Western world, and we're free to ignore him. However, it'll be damned hard to ignore dead bodies and burning buildings and whatever else Muslims have in store if Wilders' film hits the aether. So whadda ya do? Do you stop Wilder's from provoking the collective insanity that is the Muslim ummah? Where do you stop? Do you ever stop? Will we in the world at large be forced to become Muslims ourselves from fear of risk of offense to Muslims if our very kuffar nature offends them? We've already allowed ourselves to be placed unwittingly in a state of high dhimmitude by our politicians and intelligentsia. Many of our fellow citizens through natural conformity to the prevailing norms of sociable conduct perpetuate the dhimmitude. So, where does it end? Does it end?

There is a rush recently to silence anyone who criticizes Islam, notably in the case of Ezra Levant, Maclean's Magazine, Mark Steyn, and many more, including the Dutch politician Aayan Hirsi Ali, co-maker of the Dutch film Submission, the showing of which got Theo Van Gogh killed by a Muslim. Now Wilders is on the verge of showing a film of his own, one the Mulsims are already protesting, one the Grand Muffy of Syria is threatening violence over.

What do the Dutch say? Here's a fine piece of analysis from the national broadcasting corporation:

Wilders and the Dutch image

Dutch woman in Bahrain fears film's repercussions

By Conny van den Bor*

22-01-2008

It has been bothering Marjo Rashid-Stals for weeks. It has been giving her stomach aches. And now that Geert Wilders' anti-Qu'ran film is about to come out she's had enough.

So she has written a letter to the Dutch government pointing out that as a Dutch citizen in Bahrain she is afraid of the repercussions the film could have for her. She is also afraid of the Netherlands' image. This is part of the letter she has written to the Dutch government:

"I'm deeply ashamed. Will I soon have to apologise for an entire country?

.
..my heart fills with fear when I think of what will happen after the release of Geert Wilders' film. What will happen with the so-called dialogue between the West and the East? What will become of our image in the Islamic world?"

Marjo feels powerless. She has been living with Arab people for years.

How should I react towards people who feel insulted by Wilders' film? How can I defend myself if I am deeply ashamed? I can only offer my excuses and attempt to explain that not all Dutch people are like Wilders. But should I have to apologise for an entire country?"

"Is there anyone left who still believes in something? I beg the government to do something before it is too late."
http://www.radionetherlands.nl/thestatewerein/otherstates/080122-wilders-dutch-image

The whole piece is sentimental, a phoniness permeating its every line; and it is a call to cowardice and self-pity. The official narrator chides the reader for not doing enough to stop Wilders from being a bad person. That's the official Dutch line. If this, dear reader, is what you want from life, to be forever treated by your government like a kindergaartener, then do nothing while the government slowly but silently smothers you in blankets that will keep you immobile till the end. It is a velvet fascism. It is a fascism nonetheless. If you don't resist it, you will become enveloped in it. You might not like it.

Free speech doesn't give one the right to offend anyone. Friend, what do you make of a government that comes up with a position like that?

There is certainly a lot of free speeech going on in the Arab world, at least concerning Geert Wilders: [T]he populist MP can claim 66,000 hits on the Arabic-language version of Google, most of them concerning his controversial statements about Muslims and the Qu'ran.
http://www.expatica.com/nl/articles/news/RNW-Press-Review-_-Tuesday-22-January-2008.html

Me? I'm going to watch some video.

Death Hippies Censor and Ban

"For a government bureaucrat to call any publisher or anyone else to an interrogation to be quizzed about his political or religious expression is a violation of 800 years of common law, a Universal Declaration of Rights, a Bill of Rights and a Charter of Rights. This commission is applying Saudi values, [Saudi blogger arrested] not Canadian values."

Ezra Levant, quoted at Covenant Zone.

Free speech in Canada and the world generally is today under attack, not just from the usual suspects, not just from obvious totalitarians like Stalinist-style communists or Chinese obscurantists or Third World dictators, as always, but from those who, not so long ago, marched for civil rights for the masses, for ethnic minorities, for women, for the "marginalized" in general, i.e. from the Left. That should come as no surprise, so long as we know the roots of the Left, it then being inevitable and obvious. The Left! What a miserable and vicious joke it is to look to them for anything but hatred and evil manipulations. Question their moralisms, their self-adorned holinesses, their pretentious and affected concerns for the people, and you will see dirty little grubs who want nothing more than power and glory, even if it is tinsel thin. Offend the Leftist phantasy of their gnostic insight, of their perfect vision of how we all should live and think, and then, friend, you might well find yourself in a courtroom trying to defend yourself without a hope in Hell; or you might just find yourself sitting on the street corner, your possessions slung from a rope over your shoulder, homeless and freezing, nowhere to go since the likely places are barred to you, as in the case of William "Bill" Simpson in Vancouver, Canada. Say the wrong thing, publish an offending piece on the Internet, link to a blog the povertarians don't want you to see, and you might find yourself in prison, as Lionheart faces today in Lutton, England. Lionheart is a British blogger who writes that he is under threat of a seven year prison term for blogging in such a way that the police in Lutton are waiting his return to the country to arrest him. About Lionheart's case there is a nifty comment here from an otherwise uninformed and thoughtless Lefty. Even he gets it:

Surely the bigger issue here isn't whether or not he actually goes to chokey, it's the fact that we now live in a society in which he credibly could.

I'm an artist by trade. I don't draw political stuff, but if I did I would consciously avoid anything to do with Islam etc for two reasons (a) a muslim might kill me and (b) I might fall foul of the "religous hatred" laws.

It's almost beyond belief that we're now in a situation where these things are credible threats. I'll be honest here. I don't like Islam very much, and the more extreme it is the less I like it. The same goes for Christianity, Hinduism, Sikhism, Buddhism, Wicca, Scientology, Greenism, Socialism, Conservatism, Fascism, Syndicalism, Anarchism, Thatcherism and Gordon Fucking Brown, because I don't like ideologies, period, because the more extreme they get they inevitably end up with somebody saying "well, we have no choice, we're going to have to start killing people".

The fact that we now have laws preventing people even criticising approved ideologies scares the daylights out of me.

Posted by Ian B at January 4, 2008 08:14 PM

I know Gordon Brown isn't actually an ideology. I just don't like him very much.

Posted by Ian B at January 4, 2008 08:16 PM

Back in Canada, in Alberta, Ezra Levant is being harassed by the Albert Human Right Commission.

"Today at 2 p.m. I will appear before an Alberta "human rights officer" for an interrogation . I am being interrogated for the political crime of publishing the Danish cartoons in the Western Standard nearly two years ago."

Ezra Levant, quoted at Covenant Zone.
Being a Jewish pubisher of a conservative magazine is only slightly more offensive to the professional Leftist than is linking to a blog that exposes some of the Carnegie Centre staff in Vancouver, Canada as lazy, manipulative, and fascistic. Well? Why is Simpson out on the street? A Star Chamber proceeding against Simpson resulted in his removal from a community centre for the city's poorest denizens. The claims trying to justify Simpson's removal, his banning from the centre, change with the wind, it seems. What doesn't change is that Simpson is still on the street. The povertarians are still inside the building manipulating the poor.

"I have no faith in this farcical commission. But I do have faith in the justice and good sense of my fellow Albertans and Canadians. I believe that the better they understand this case, the more shocked they will be. I am here under your compulsion to answer the commission's questions. But it is not I who am on trial: it is the freedom of all Canadians."

Ezra Levant, quoted at Covenant Zone.

Ezra Levant, Maclean's Magazine, Mark Steyn, Lionheart, William Simpson. When will your name be on the list? I keep hoping I'll be on it. My freedom is worth going to jail for. Your freedom is worth me going to jail for. The question is, what is your freedom worth to you?

Ezra Levant is on trial for republishing twelve cartoons from a Danish paper. He's not on trial in a court of law but in a Death Hippie mockery of a court, one that has some legal powers to fine him and wreck his life. Levant published some cartoons that some Muslims feel they can make a scene over. This is an obvious direct attack on all Canadians who value liberty. Not all Canadians do. I value free speech. I don't mind going to jail to defend my right and yours to say and write any obnoxious thing I choose to. I don't like Islam, and so what? Islam is a fascist poligion. There is nothing in it for me to like. Like its later cousin, Nazi-ism, Islam is a fascism that I work to destroy, just as Islam works to destroy my freedom. and yours. The very same kind of povertarians who hound William Simpson are to be found in the Human Rights Commissions in Canada. To give a fine chance to anyone who cares to complain to them about me, I present a lovely portrait of the founder of Islam, the man who at 54 years of age married and had sex with a nine year old girl, Aisha. Here is the perfect man, according to Islam: Mohammed.