What a strange place Canada is
EZRA LEVANT

Special to Globe and Mail Update

January 21, 2008 at 12:32 AM EST

A few days ago, I was interrogated for 90 minutes by Shirlene McGovern, an officer of the government of Alberta. I have been accused of hurting people's feelings because, two years ago, I published the Danish cartoons of Mohammed in the Western Standard magazine.

Ms. McGovern's business card said she was a "Human Rights Officer." What a perfectly Orwellian title.

Early in her interrogation, she said "I always ask people … what was your intent and purpose of your article?"

It wasn't even a question about what we had published in the magazine. It was a question about my private thoughts. I asked her why my private feelings were of interest to the government. She said, very calmly, that they would be a factor taken into account by the government in determining whether or not I was guilty.

Officer McGovern said it as calmly as if I had asked her what time it was.

When she's doing government interrogations, she always asks people about their thoughts.

It was so banal, so routine. When she walked in, she seemed happy. With a smile, she reached out her hand to shake mine. I refused — to me, nothing could have been more incongruous. Would I warmly greet a police officer who arrested me as a suspect in a crime? Then why should I do so for a thought crime? This was not normal; I would not normalize it with the pleasantries of polite society.

This was not a high-school debating tournament where Human Rights Officer McGovern and I were equals, enjoying a shared interest in politics and publishing. I was there because I was compelled to be there by the government, and if I answered Officer McGovern's political questions unsatisfactorily, the government could fine me thousands of dollars and order me to publicly apologize for holding the wrong views.

I told her that the complaint process itself was a punishment. Even if I was eventually acquitted, I would still lose — hundreds of hours, and tens of thousands of dollars in legal bills. That's not an accident, that's one of the tools of these commissions. Every journalist in the country has been taught a lesson: Censor yourself now, or be put through a costly wringer. I said all this and then Officer McGovern replied, "You're entitled to your opinions, that's for sure."

But that's not for sure, is it? We're only entitled to our opinions now if they don't offend some very easily offended people.

One of the complainants against me is someone I would describe as a radical Muslim imam, Syed Soharwardy. He grew up in the madrassas of Pakistan and he lectures on the Saudi circuit. He advocates sharia law for all countries, including Canada. His website is rife with Islamic supremacism — offensive to many Canadian Jews, gentiles, women and gays. But his sensitivities — his Saudi-Pakistani values — have been offended by me.

And so now the secular government of Alberta is enforcing his fatwa against the cartoons.

It's the same for Mohamed Elmasry, the complainant against Maclean's magazine for publishing an excerpt from Mark Steyn's book, America Alone. Egyptian-born Elmasry has publicly said that any adult Jew in Israel is a legitimate target for a terrorist attack, a grossly offensive statement.

Both the Canadian and B.C. Human Rights Commissions are now hearing his complaints against Maclean's.

How did it come to be that rough and, I would say, bigoted men such as Mr. Soharwardy and Mr. Elmasry could, by simply claiming that their tender feelings were hurt, sic a government bureaucracy on a magazine, or anyone for that matter?

On this point, I agree with Mr. Soharwardy and Mr. Elmasry: I blame the Jews.

A generation ago, illiberal elements in the "official" Jewish community pressed Canadian governments to introduce laws limiting free speech. The targets of those laws were invariably poor, unorganized, harmless neo-Nazi cranks and conspiracy theorists such as Ernst Zundel and Jim Keegstra — nobodies who were turned into international celebrities when they were prosecuted for their thought crimes.

But now come Mr. Elmasry and Mr. Soharwardy and their ilk, using the very precedents set by the Canadian Jewish Congress.

Before Mr. Soharwardy went to the Alberta Human Rights Commission, he went to the Calgary Police Service and demanded that they arrest me. He's done that three times now, and they've rejected him every time. But he only had to ask the willing enforcers of the human rights commission once.

What a strange place Canada is in 2008, where the police care more about human rights than the human rights commissions do, where fundamentalist Muslims use hate-speech laws drafted by secular Jews, and where a government bureaucrat can interrogate a publisher for 90 minutes, and be shocked when he won't shake her hand in greeting.

Ezra Levant, an Alberta lawyer and author, was publisher of the now-defunct Western Standard magazine from 2004 to 2007.
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But I still feel that I must point out something that is quite obvious and you are probably aware of that.

Only the most compelling circumstances, such as fraud or direct incitement to violence, justify any infringement upon it

Even if all the people in the world would agree, that the only time censorship would be allowed is when the speech is (i) a fraud and/or (ii) direct incitement to violence, then there would still be huge arguments over free speech since people would never agree 100% of the time if either of those rules is applicable to any given situation. You could see fraud and therefore demand censorship where I see it not and demand free speech.

Muslims Against Sharia are proud to be the first Muslim group to publicly support Ezra Levant and denounce HRC inquisition.

Proceedings against Ezra Levant are nothing short of ridiculous. HRC legitimizes radicals' claims that Islam cannot be criticized and Freedom of Speech only applies to radical Muslims.

But Ezra Levant is not alone. The latest casualties of Islamofascist-Dhimmi Axis Assault on Free Speech include Dr. Rachel Ehrenfeld, Fouad al-Farhan, Joe Kaufman, and Mark Steyn. Are you going to be next? http://muslimsagainstsharia.blogspot.com/2008/01/islamofascist-dhimmi-axis-assault-on.html

First Nations (I guess this means Native Americans?)

Here that's become the politically correct term for those Canadians whose ancestors came via the Bering Strait a good many millennia ago, rather than by boat across the Atlantic or Pacific.

It's unfortunate that Columbus' navigation error resulted in a confusing name for the people then living in the Americas. Personally I think the anthropological term amerindians is the least bad name.

Jim Baerg 51°N 114°W

It's still not right to allow anyone to be harassed for their views by the government or any other entity, no matter how odious those views are. I liked Ebonmuse's point that free speech allows the airing of concerns before they spill over into violence and extremism - it also allows a responsible, intelligent governing body (ha!) to keep its finger on the pulse of its citizenry.

Yes, the Bush Administration has committed atrocities of civil rights violations. Yes, the free press in America is in serious danger from the consolidation of news outlets into mass media conglomerations. However, there is a vigorous, totally legal trade in independent press outlets and weblogs which allow citizens to stay informed. If nothing else, there's always National Public Radio - which is largely government funded!

I'd like to note that this article is about an investigation, not a trial. At this time, we're talking about the state paying attention to one of it's citizen's (Syed Soharwardy) complaints, not about a state steam-rolling free speech. This is the part of the process preceding trial - the part where the state is invoking the accused citizen's right to due process & to confront and refute the charges.

...Once the investigation concludes, if the state sanctions Levant, we can get angry about Canada's suppression of free speech.

With all due respect, Crosius, you're completely missing the point. The free-speech issue here has little to do with whether Levant is ultimately convicted by the commission or not. The far more serious problem is that there was an investigation in the first place. Simply because Levant published an idea that offended someone, he found himself hauled before a council of bureaucrats who demanded to know why he said what he said, and who are entitled to punish him if they don't like the answers he gives. The very existence of such a power is deeply wrong and unjust, regardless of whether it's actually used in this instance or not.

That is the root problem: the mere existence of such a body exerts a powerful chilling effect on all people's free speech. As Levant notes on his site, he's already spent thousands of dollars and enormous amounts of time defending himself against these frivolous allegations of non-crimes. Even if he's acquitted, those resources are spent. Whether he's convicted or not, the message has already been broadcast loud and clear: say anything that offends anyone, and you too might end up before this tribunal and have to spend the time, effort and money defending yourself.

The mere existence of this inquisition is an insult to justice, even if it ends up making the "right" decision. A rational government's response would have been that there is no justification for launching an investigation in the first place, because the expression of ideas is not a crime.

You are perfectly correct in that the character of the person is not the issue. What I meant was that he has in other cases come down firmly on the other side - his principles change depending on whose speech we're talking about. Try making a perfectly reasonable criticism of Israel for example and watch the rending of garments and gnashing of teeth.