Today’s Lynch List

You know the drill.

First off, BigCityLiberal has the story on the American Political Science Association’s decision vis a vis Toronto: APSA And Canadian Human Rights Laws:

As I noted the other day, back in 2008 The American Political Science Association was presented with a petition from some of its members asking them to reconsider Toronto as the location of its 2009 general meeting due to concerns about Canada’s national and provincial Human Rights Commissions. After some consideration, APSA rejected this petition and will in fact be in town from from September 3-6.

Because I know followers of the Speechy Wars wanted…no, needed…to know the full story behind the APSA petition and its ultimate failure, I contacted Bahram Rajaee (APSA’s PR guy) and he was kind enough to direct me to the relevant documents.

It all makes for a (mildly) interesting read, but if you look at the petition itself and the response documents, you come across the following passage from the petition instigators:

…we… have some new information about an academic complaint of the sort that
might chill speech at the 2009 convention: According to Janet Ajzenstat, a respected Canadian political scientist, the Canadian Political Science Association is being asked to censure a session chair for allowing academic speech deemed offensive during a conference session. Without judging the details of the dispute, as reported it seems to be the sort of thing that is not imaginable under American or APSA norms — yet, it seems to us to reflect the rather different norms about offensive speech developing in Canada.

It turns out they were talking about the turmoil kicked-up at an August 2008 meeting of CPSA (The Canadian Political Science Association) in which Frances Widdowson, of Disrobing the Aboriginal Industry fame, presented a paper on “aboriginal methodology” that went down very poorly, with the Q&A afterwards ending in tears, lamentations, and cries of racism. At the time it was rumored that session chair Peter Russell would be censured for letting things get out of hand, a rumor Ajzenstat repeated to several of the people behind the petition, before later realizing that it was false (or at least “no longer true”).

More generally, APSA quickly realized that the Ontario Human Rights Code and the CHRA provisions for hate speech did not apply to academic presentations, and that the OHRC did not regulate published speech at all (only signs, emblems, and symbols). The petitioners seem to have mistaken section 13 of the Ontario Human Rights Code for section 13 of the Canadian Human Rights Act. In any case, my favorite part in the response of the Canadian Association of University Teachers to APSA’s request for clarification re Canada’s hate speech laws:

On the specific matter of human rights commissions in Canada, there seems to be a good deal of confusion and obfuscation in the materials being circulated about the threat posed to free speech and their relevance to a meeting of the APSE. For starters, none of the specific cases noted by the authors of the petition’s accompanying information piece (“What’s the Matter with Canada”) were heard by the Ontario Human Rights Tribunal, the only such body that would have jurisdiction over an event (unrelated to federal activities) taking place in Toronto. In this regard, the examples being used by the petition’s promoters are about as fair as us warning against travel to Massachusetts because Nebraska maintains the death penalty.

I’ve found a copy of the “information piece” mentioned above here, and I would just noted that if you quote David Warren as being an authority on anything, you are already in trouble.

Read it here.

Second, more on that Air Canada case. By Lindsey Wiebe, via Canada.com: Pilots’ mandatory retirement was discrimination: tribunal:

WINNIPEG — The Canadian Human Rights Tribunal decided Friday in favour of two Air Canada pilots who complained their forced retirement at the age of 60 was discrimination.

 “It’s a pretty significant decision,” said Raymond Hall, a now-retired Air Canada pilot in Winnipeg and lawyer who helped pilots George Vilven and Robert Neil Kelly in court.

 Vilven and Kelly were both forced to retire from Air Canada at the age of 60, and took their cases to the Canadian Human Rights Commission, the body that reviews cases of alleged discrimination when employees fall under federal jurisdiction. Both were referred to the tribunal.

 The tribunal initially rejected their complaints based on an exemption in the Canadian Human Rights Act letting employers defend mandatory retirement if the age is the industry norm, said Hall, and also rejected the argument that it was a breach of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

 A federal court disagreed, he said, and found mandatory retirement was a charter breach.

 The case was sent back to the tribunal to see if the breach was reasonably justified.

 The tribunal found otherwise, and decided Air Canada could not justify the policy.

Read the rest here. More from the Toronto Star, here ( scroll down ), the CBC, Canadian News, Immigration, Military, Music and More.

Third, more from Alberta in the aftermath of Bill 44. From the CBC: Alberta parental opt-out to take another year:

Alberta will wait another year before implementing the parental opt-out clause in Bill 44, Culture Minister Lindsay Blackett told The Canadian Press Friday, a day after he said the bill would take effect this fall.

The clause mandates school boards notify parents when sex, sexual orientation and religion will be taught in the classroom so they can pull their children out of a class if they so desire.

On Thursday, Blackett insisted the bill would be proclaimed and implemented this fall, despite a request by Education Minister Dave Hancock to delay it. But he now believes that school boards need until the start of the 2010-11 school year to put formal procedures in place.

“We still have some bylaws to write and it makes sense for all of us to take the proper time to get that right,” Blackett told The Canadian Press. “Our intention is certainly not to get school boards before the Human Rights Commission.”

The delay came as great news to the province’s teachers who opposed the opt-out clause over fears it could leave teachers vulnerable to human rights complaints.

“We need time to work with the government and work with boards to develop good policies so that we can keep teachers in front of kids, not in human rights tribunals,” said the president of the Alberta Teachers’ Association, Carol Henderson.

Deciding what is considered proper notice for parents is one issue still to be worked out.

Blackett’s change of heart came after both he and Hancock publicly expressed contrary opinions about the bill’s timetable.

In a conference call with reporters Thursday, Hancock said he had told Blackett proclamation of the bill should wait because it was taking time to work out new rules with school officials.

“I have said to him that our process will not be ready for this school year and perhaps next school year is a good time to implement it and we’re in the process of developing the protocols that we need and that’ll take a little bit more time,” Hancock said.

Along with being the culture minister, Blackett is the minister responsible for human rights legislation in Alberta. He had insisted the bill would go ahead this fall despite what Hancock thought.

“He’s got to deal on a daily basis with the ATA (Alberta Teachers’ Association) and the ASBA (Alberta School Boards Association),” Blackett told CBC News. “But the law will be what it is and I understand his sensitivity, but as a caucus we were pretty strong and firm on what we wanted to do and we’ll go forward with this.”

Read the rest here. Also noted by Closet Conservative, and the Canadian Press.

Fourth, Is Anybody There? writes about Alphonse De Valk: A Faithful Priest is Under Attack:

I have a friend… oh, but, gentlemen. He’s a friend of yours too.– Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Notes From Underground

HERO PRIEST: Fr. Alphonse de Valk

Hey Catholic peoples !

Perhaps you may consider helping Fr. Alphonse de Valk, editor of Catholic Insight, an orthodox Catholic magazine based out of Toronto, Canada.

THE SITUATION

Readers may be aware that Catholic Insight is under investigation by the Canadian Human Rights Commission in Ottawa after a complaint was filed over our coverage of the homosexual issue. The Canadian Human Rights Act, under subsection 13(1), categorizes as a “discriminatory practice” the communication by individuals or groups of messages “likely to expose a person or persons to hatred or contempt.” Hatred and contempt are not defined, allowing anyone to file a complaint on the flimsiest of grounds. These messages then become “thought crimes.” While the legal expenses of human rights complainants are funded from the public purse, those of defendants are not. We need to engage legal counsel and defray expenses for additional staff time, publicity, correspondence and so on. Our regular fundraising appeal takes place only once every two years. However, at this time, we must make a special request for funds in light of the unexpected new demands being made upon our budget. If you are able to help, please send your cheque or money order to Catholic Insight, P.O. Box 625, Adelaide Station, Toronto, Ontario, [Canada] M5C 2J8. For a credit card donation, you can call us at (416) 204–9601 or e–mail admin@catholicinsight.com. Catholic Insight is fighting to preserve the rights to freedom of expression, religion and the press as guaranteed by our Constitution. God bless you for your support. [PayPal also available.]

 

TH2 COMMENTS: Although its circulation is relatively small, Catholic Insight IS Canada’s national Catholic magazine, in terms of its adherence to orthodoxy. Canada’s oldest English–speaking Catholic periodical/newspaper is The Catholic Register, although now it promotes a wishy–washy, borderline–dwelling Catholicism, and I can think of one histrionic radical still on its writing staff. In contradistinction to this squeamish neutrality, the courageous Fr. de Valk and his team are fighting the good fight. Ever since Pierre Elliot Trudeau (1919–2000) became Prime Minister in 1968 – a notoriously bad Catholic, his instituted policies (e.g. Gallicanism, Mulitculturalism) have led Canada on a downslide along the road called Fabianism (see definition in Note 2, EOS–2). This has devolved to such a degree that Fr. de Valk / Catholic Insight has been accused of a “hate crime” (read thought crime, Orwell 1984) when he published writings – wholly in line with the Magisterium – against homosexualism.

If unable to contribute, your prayers for this good, holy and longsuffering priest would still be appreciated. Fr. de Valk is one of my heroes, and if you read about his plight (see links below), then, Catholic peoples, he might become a hero of yours too.

Read it all here. Also noted by The Heresy Hunter.

Finally, just for giggles; meanwhile, up in Canada; Ezra Levant on CFRA radio; Green Eggs and Topham;