That is, I believe in free speech.
Even icky speech.
If there is any single thing I'm genuinely, passionately patriotic about, it's our constitutionally enshrined freedom of speech. What a freaking great idea. I'm glad I happen to live in the only country which apparently realizes its importance. Now if the rest of the world would only get on board.
Do I like nasty mean hateful speech? No. Am I pleased as punch that it isn't illegal to produce it? Absolutely. Does this make me more liberal than many Western democracies? Apparently so.
If you haven't been following the story of the Canadian Human Rights Commission Tribunal — the trial of Mark Steyn and Maclean's Magazine is only the most well-known (so far this "tribunal" has a 100 percent conviction rate in so-called hate speech cases) — you should.
This blog post by Ezra Levant is a good place to start. Believe in the separation of church and state? Then the government shouldn't be telling religious leaders what to preach, eh?
(louder) EH?
Canada needs a First Amendment.
Isn't it pretty damn obvious that when Icky Speech is illegal, then the people in power get to decide what is and what isn't icky? Isn't it pretty damn obvious that the same powers that can be used against the people you don't like (say, racists) can, in a different political environment, be used against the people you do like (say, people who like to criticize the government)?
Or do the Canadians who support the hate-speech tribunal have such a blind trust in the innate goodness government that they believe it will never be taken over by nefarious people who might use it to attack the speech that they themselves hold dear?
Knee-jerk patriotism is a bad idea. "My country, right or wrong" — the only good way to look at that is if it remains your country, right or wrong, one hopes you are motivated to right the wrong. I respect people who are able to see in the symbol of a mere flag a representation of everything they love about America; I still don't like to "pledge allegiance to the flag," since it symbolizes different things to different people and some of the things that some people see in it, I don't ally myself with. But oh, I'll pledge allegiance to the Constitution any day.
Remember all those people who said they would flee to Canada if George W. Bush were elected (and later, if he were re-elected)? Because the fascists were taking over the country and they wanted to move somewhere safe? I actually know someone who did emigrate to Canada after the 2000 elections (granted, a job change was involved, but the way she talked it sounded like the incoming presidential administration was the last straw). Look, I'm not exactly a fan of the current administration, but have you noticed something? Eight years later, it's almost over. (Hurray for the two-term limit — that's another freaking good idea, don't you think?) Eight years is not exactly insignificant in the life of a human being, but it's hardly something to renounce your citizenship over. It's the way it works: if I belong to a people that chooses its own leaders, sometimes (lots of times!) that people chooses one I don't happen to like. So my turn is another time. I can deal.
And in the Canadian refuge, they may be free from George W. Bush, and perhaps that is enviable; but it is there that the government tells you what you may and may not say out loud, or in print, or in a blog post.
I'll take here, thank you very much. I'll go to the polls in November, and I'll say what I want about it.
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