"New efficiencies" from The People's Commissariat of Human Rights,

...People's Province of Ontario section. Rex Murphy, in the Globe and Mail, elucidates definite divergences in the Commissariat's views from a Whig interpretation of Western jurisprudential history (full text payers only):

[...]

The [Ontario Human Rights Commission's] press release...went on, seizing the educative moment, to light into Maclean's for its “Islamophobia” over “a number of articles,” illustrating a “type of media coverage [that] has been identified as contributing to Islamophobia and promoting societal intolerance towards Muslim, Arab and South Asian Canadians.” More, it regretted that in Ontario, with the statute as written, it is not “possible to challenge any institution that contributes to the dissemination of destructive, xenophobic opinions.” Meaning Maclean's and whatever of that ilk trails in the familiar and long-tenured magazine's presumed xenophobic and racist wake.

I'm not a lawyer, so I merely ask the question: Is it normal when declining a case (or, in this case, a complaint) for a commission, court or tribunal to then deliver a guilty verdict? For that's what the press statement, directly, or by forceful implication, did.

And hasn't it always been in free society a human right (old-fashioned, I know) not to be judged without a hearing? But here there was no hearing. Neither Maclean's nor Mr. Styen made a case or presented arguments. And yet the commission's release damned them in harsh and condemnatory language that was a verdict in everything but name.

Furthermore, it did so before – mark that, before – two other tribunals, which, we presume, listen to and read this HRC's words, have themselves even begun proceedings on the same complaint. Do judges in real courts act this way? Do they telegraph verdicts to other jurisdictions? Do they make up what they are delighted to call their minds in vacuo? Do they decline cases, then pass judgment anyway, and issue stern and rebuking releases?

From all this, I determine that human rights in Canada are not only multiplying. The tribunals that police them are pioneering new efficiencies, bypassing ancient procedures and, in the sharp glory of a noble cause, working amputations and abbreviations to the tired old concepts of free speech, free thought and a free press.

Vive le Canada libre!

The second press release on the Commission's website (as of April 12) starts:

OHRC marks opening of fishing season...

All depends on what one is trolling for.

Mark C.

Posted by markc at April 13, 2008 10:34 AM