Thus far, Ezra's strategy has been brilliant. But you are absolutely right. Encouraging the Americans to condemn our HRCs is a sure fire way to get Canadians to circle the wagons to defend them. A major faux pas in my opinion.
Posted at 2008-07-12 09:42:35 [PermaLink]On the face of it that would seem to be reality but lets not forget that we have a relatively open border, info of all kinds flows BOTH ways.
American magazines and newspapers are readily available, TV programming is pervasive, and ideas don't stop at customs for censorship. I didn't get the impression that Levant wanted the Americans to do anything about OUR problem but rather watch and learn from our HRC debacle, and take defensive action on their OWN behalf. The old saw "Knowledge is half the battle." couldn't be more to the point than in this case.
Ezra was playing canary to Congress's coal mine.
Following on my original statement, yes, we don't like being TOLD what to do, but we're not totally thick. If Canadians see the US taking strong action to preserve individuals' rights, than compare that to our own declining position, we WILL fight back. That's happening now, here (Canada) AND in Britain.
For that we can thank the 'soft jihadists' who've pushed a wee bit too hard too fast.
(See Damian's post re Soharwardy)
Whoa -- I wish I hadn't followed that link to the blog with the Myers post. The blogger's take is obnoxious enough, but the comments section is a toxic stew of hatred and intolerance. The irony is that the posters are probably all good little liberals who condemn intolerance -- in others, anyway.
I can't wait for Myers' follow-up stunt, It's Just A Freakin' Meteorite, in which he goes to Mecca concealed in Muslim garb and attacks the Black Stone with a sledgehammer. Well, he hasn't actually said he'll do this, but Big Brave Boy Who Mocks Those Silly Religious Things will surely take the next step. . .
Do you really think Canadians are so narrow-minded and reflexively anti-American as your last paragraph indicates? Maybe they can even blame Bush, the ultimate EVIL American.
If ANY Canadian is so stupid as to DEFEND the so-called human 'rights' collectives because EVIL Americans may object to them, then that Canadian deserves to be ruled by these kangaroo courts.
terrence,
"Do you really think Canadians are so narrow-minded and reflexively anti-American as your last paragraph indicates? "
Umm. Was that rhetorical?
"If ANY Canadian is so stupid as to DEFEND the so-called human 'rights' collectives because EVIL Americans may object to them, then that Canadian deserves to be ruled by these kangaroo courts."
Welcome to the world outside the US where knee-jerk intolerance is paraded as tolerance and burning an American flag or president in effigy is the pinnacle of enlightened free speech but printing cartoons mocking Mohammad is hateful.
Hey, I just realized...the last time I made that comparison on another blog...I was banned shortly thereafter...You know who you are.
"... after thirty years of prosecuting people who were critical of Jews, now Canada’s human rights commissions are being used by radical Muslims..."
What did you expect?
"What did you expect?"
Little gnomes wearing "Dion 4 Me" pins, lost in the Kootenays whilst on their way to Ottawa for the next "Listen To The People LPC Leadership Convention".
What else should we expect?
Cheers
If Canadians really are that pathetic, Damian, then they can go screw themselves. But I say that all the time anyway.
This is about protecting the blogosphere, not Canada, which is pretty much a write off anyway for the reason(s) you hinted at.
Ordinary Canadians only care about Timbits, lottery tickets and big screen tvs. If they don't already know about the HRCs, that's because they don't want to know or care and never will, so any developments in the campaign (such as American support) won't matter anyway.
People who don't know about the HRCs by now either don't want to know or are really stupid/preoccupied/lazy and would be negative assets were they to get on side at this or any other future point.
Like Meech Lake and so forth, the campaign for and against the HRCs will be conducted by about 1% of the population while the rest are swatting black flies at the cottage or running the office hockey pool.
Ezra has so far proven himself to be quite successful by doing all the things Canadians "aren't supposed to do": being rude, fighting back, being a (gasp!) "shameless self-promoter", getting litigious, and slaying sacred cows.
He's ignored good little Canadians' timid "advice" on how to behave -- and now he's the one addressing Congress, etc.
Funny thing, that.
Bit of a dichotomy here. On the one hand, Folks here (me included) fret about the multicult. nature of our society, and how the various ethnic groups aren't melding into a homogeneous society. On the flip side, there's a tendency (here) to refer to "Canadians" as so many sausage links, interchangeable and undifferentiated.
Perhaps that's more of a problem than anyone wants to acknowledge. One response to the HRCs DOESN'T necessarily appeal to all. Why would a newly minted Sikh family surf to Ezra's or Damian's blog? What would be the attraction? Same for an orthodox Mennonite family, or a wealthy Hong Kong-now-Canadian business tycoon?
I don't speak Hindi, German, or Mandarin; why would I visit THEIR cultural touchstone-blogs?
The Catholic crazies are trying to get Myers fired for speaking out re the fact they went nuts when a guy tried to steal their holy cracker.
And you're cool with that? That whole free speechy thing doesn't go too far with you does it? You got a bitta muslim in you, there, boyo.
Kathy is wrong. The reason Canada and the rest of the Anglosphere lead the world in freedom and prosperity, tend to avoid going off on damaging ideological boondoggles and are resilient in correcting excess when they do is because the majority is more concerned with things like kids and hockey and black flies than ideological purity and rigour. The great, decent, muddled Canadian middle may be maddeningly inconsistent and hold confusing and conflicting views simultaneously, but they are well-grounded in common sense, keep extremism in check and have good intuitive BS meters. Ideas and principles are great and necessary, but they are dangerous, potent brews as well and the average person probably has more to fear from rule by rationally deduced intellectual consistency than anything.
One good example would be our tendency to become insulted, enraged and defiant when criticized for our politics by Americans and then to go home and silently mutter: "What the *^%# are we doing?"
I thought BCL understood the difference between criticism and censorship, but I guess I was wrong. (For the record, no, I do not think Myers should be fired. Sorry.)
Posted at 2008-07-13 14:43:49 [PermaLink]"The reason Canada and the rest of the Anglosphere lead the world in freedom and prosperity, tend to avoid going off on damaging ideological boondoggles..."
And you're Marie of Romania, right?
Until Harper got in, the last *40 years* have been a damaging ideological boondoggle, a watch-the-hand exercise in pretend cultural revolution that served no purpose but to make us feel smug.
I agree with Kathy. If we are actually willing to abdicate our right to express what's on our mind simply to demonstrate that we're better than Americans, we're hooped. I don't believe, though that we're willing to abdicate fundamental, absolutely critical freedoms simply because one of our strongest and most eloquent defenders of those freedoms talks to -- gasp -- Americans about it. The issues he discusses are international in scope. Get used to it.
We've been taught the lie -- with the didactic tone itself, remarkably, comprising the actual lesson -- that we're better than the average American. We've got a whooole bunch of good little students, to be sure, but those good little students are molting in an unsightly way.
Things change. Subductedly partisan, politicized state control of our beliefs has been portrayed as "Canadian", and as being enforced on our collective behalf, but our right to free expression of our own conscience is part of an older, more solid heritage that is more fundamental, and stronger, than some hideously time-bound state-sponsored partisan narrative.
If our desire to not have to meet some political test in order to speak out ends up being superceded by our desire to make sure our views on the topic are the opposite those damned Americans, then we're just a nation of twee ponces anyway, our glowing reviews of ourselves notwithstanding.
Well, EBO, I'm still trying to figure out why so many warriors in the very important battle to get rid of S. 13 have concluded the winning argument is to tell Canadians they are the stupid, selfish citizens of a crappy little country.
Posted at 2008-07-15 05:37:25 [PermaLink]Peter, I wrote "I don't believe that (Canadians) are willing to abdicate fundamental, absolutely critical freedoms simply because one of our strongest and most eloquent defenders of those freedoms talks to...Americans about it."
Hardly a put-down of Canadians.
"Our right to free expression of our own conscience is part of an older, more solid heritage that is more fundamental and stronger than some hideously time-bound state-sponsored partisan narrative."
What I'm putting down is the Liberal, "good Canadian" narrative, and those Canadians who swallow it hook, line and sinker.