Canadian Conservatives Shrill For Neo-Nazis
As Farley Mowat once said, never let the truth get in the way of telling a good story -The Canadian Sentinel and Small Dead Animals are believers, and, apparently, sympathetic to neo-Nazis.
Oddly enough neither Kate nor Scenty bother making any reference to stormfront.org where this good Christian woman posted her comments…. and where others talk about their “Swastika and SS lightening bolt tattoos“, “Understanding Just HOW MUCH Whites are BRAINWASHED” and the “Jewish controlled media“.
Nor, equally oddly, do they contain a link to the HRC judgment and the 29 other hate messages.
These reputable Conservative bloggers are, of course, free to support any person, movement, cause, or ideology they please – Canada is, after all, a (semi) free country and not 1940’s Nazi Germany, or, as Scenty points out, Red Communist China, The Islamic Republic of Iran, Saudi Arabia, or Zimbabwe.
– the bunker just finds it odd that their ideology, and the ideology of people who post comments at places like stormfront.org, are as close as they appear to be.
[h/t Dawg's Blog]
Whooee! I reckon maybe SDA an CS are shrill in their shilling but I think maybe you meant “shill” an’ not “shrill.” Maybe not.
It’s a dang sad thing when avowed Tories stand up a fer self-described “full-time Nazi.”
JB
[...] post by unknown This was written by . Posted on Saturday, November 24, 2007, at 9:07 am. Filed under [...]
No dude, they, and their assorted supporters, are screeching quite blindly – I thought shrill was the appropriate word
Sorry, SL. Swastika-saluting shrill shills they are.
I think that stormfront site is disgusting (I just looked, very quickly, at the front page – the “white pride” thing did me in, I didn’t look much further).
That being said, freedom of speech is supposed to mean freedom of speech, not freedom-of-speech-as-long-as-you-don’t-offend-anyone, no? So I would agree with the sentiments on the two posts (SDA & CS) in general, i.e. this IS an attack on freedom of speech, particularly of Bible-thumpers. I’m also troubled by the fact that the site in question is US-based, and where-the-heck does the HRC get off in telling you or me or a psychotic wingnut living in Canada what they can post on a US site?
I agree with you, though, in wondering why the specifics of the site and leanings of the person in question aren’t mentioned in either of the posts. It’s much more difficult to defend the right of someone with a truly ugly agenda to broadcast same.
If you’ll excuse me, I need to go shower now.
The sad thing about all this is that the Abrahamic religions of Islam and Christianity and Judaism are all deviated from the same path. So when the Christians attack the Koran and vice versa, it’s really like listening to Penguins arguing over who is more black and white.
Because the mythological war on Christianity by the equally mythological left needs causalities if it is to be sustained…. and if it means backing a neo-Nazi type, well, they can always hope that other folks just accept that there is a war on Christianity and this is another causality because they said it was.
If the comments on either of the reputable sites linked are any indicator it seems to be enough for the
echo chambermajority.I saw Scenty’s post a few days ago. It links back to a free speech advocate who argues that the HRC Ruling was a form of religious persecution. From there I read the judgment from top to bottom and could not find any direct reference in the ruling limiting her to posting bible passages on the Internet. It did fine her and prohibit her from posting hate material, of which there was no shortage in her comments on the site.
The defendant in the HRC complaint is guilty of vile behaviour. Since very little of the “speech” at issue quoted scripture, it is unfair to characterize the judgement as one against posting scripture.
Rights of free speech exist to protect speech with which people take issue or find to be deplorable, not to protect the opinions that most people hold to be peachy keen. The whole point of defending free speech is being prepared to defend the right of self-described full-time Nazis to make assholes of themselves in public.
The government should not be in the business of regulating expression of hatred, and the HRC should not even exist. To the extent that anyone prosecutes anything it must be done through the criminal or civil court system if we are to retain the “democratic values” so many hold dear. We have courts and judges; use them.
I don’t disagree with anything you posted lrC. It took me awhile to get there but, free speech should be a right. It isn’t now and the HRC’s out there are an impediment to it.
I agree with SL and you, apparently, that framing this as an affront to Christianity is silly. I am not surprised that Scenty jumped on this bandwagon, but I am that SDA did.
The whole point of supporting free speech is to point out when it is being violated in a credible fashion – not as part of some interest group campaign. Support the free speech and expose the lunatic fringe for what they are, I say.
Just as you have the right to do as you please as long as it doesn’t bring harm to anyone, so you have the right to say as you please as long as it doesn’t bring harm to anyone.
Define harm.
Harm according to dictionary.com
1. physical injury or mental damage; hurt: to do him bodily harm.
2. moral injury; evil; wrong.
–verb (used with object) 3. to do or cause harm to; injure; damage; hurt: to harm one’s reputation
I think you misunderstood me SL. What I was trying to say was that Freedom of Speech is fine, until it harms someone. And I think the hate spewed by neo-nazis is harmful, and should therefore be prevented and punished.
I think the point SL is making is that “harm” from speech is impossible to quantify. Instead, it becomes a discussion about speech that “offends”. We then move into a discussion about how we need laws to protect people from being offended which is very dangerous in the sense of individual liberty.
My theory is that hateful and extreme ideas only marginalize those who espouse them. The lady in this case is a good example. She is a blatant hate monger and racist. She’s a moron but I support her right to express herself even though I think what she says is offensive and stupid. We don’t need HRC’s to solve these issues. There are laws in place for criminal hate speech (that I question) and the civil courts as well.
With all due respect TH – I don’t know how to say this without sounding like an ass, so I’ll just say it.
I think the way some see and interpret the debate around hate speech vs. freedom of speech might differ from the way you do. This is not meant to demean your character in any way, it’s just that IMHO for some of us of a different shade the protection from hate speech outweighs the sanctity of freedom of speech.
I respect your opinion very much Throbbin and as I note in a comment above it took me a long time to accept freedom of speech in my own political beliefs.
One of the reasons that changed my mind was due to a friend who was greatly inconvenienced by a bogus claim made against him at the Ontario Human Rights Commission. It was so ridiculous that it was unbelievable that it would even be heard. It didn’t even pass the sniff test. He almost ignored it but at the last minute talked to a lawyer who advised him that if you do not defend they will render a judgment against you in absentia.
He didn’t like those odds. I can’t blame him. How about having the government label you a racist for the rest of your life whether or not you deserve it? These kinds of commissions are thought police, Throbbin, IMHO and completely anti-democratic. It starts with (here comes the slippery slope argument) departments like Homeland Security in the US where the government monitors your every travel move. Then they need to tap into cell phones or put up “security” cameras on every second block. Next they want to shut down dissenting opinion.
There are plenty of examples of this slippery slope in action. It moves slowly in some states more than others but it is happening nonetheless. Today’s excuse for many countries is Terrorism.
Nope, I don’t want the government deciding for me what I can or cannot read or say. While I abhor the likes of Neo-Nazis, it is better for them to be able to spew their bile in a free society so that we can all see what hate mongers they are. I don’t want the government to tell me what I can/cannot read or say.
“That guy said I should hate and despise and kill ” isn’t a defence except perhaps for the genuinely criminally insane (in which case “that guy” is often inside their own heads); and I don’t care to start it down the path to being one – not one little bit, not even a shred of sentencing mitigation. Criminalizing expression is just a way of shifting blame. A person is responsible for his judgement and actions. Let’s keep it that way. When someone tells you to jump off the bridge, don’t do it.
Do you think people go to neo-Nazi web sites to weigh the arguments and learn new points of view? Those trash are preaching to the converted and serving as a strong reminder to the rest of us what is at the bottom of some slippery slopes. Let them rant.
Another good conservative has jumped on the bandwagon with a post titled CANADA: PRISON FOR POSTING BIBLE VERSES ONLINE?
As I said before, people are free to support any person, movement, cause, or ideology they please, but I gotta wonder what Conservatives are thinking when they support that sort of tripe.