CALGARY HERALD: For Maclean's magazine and author Mark Steyn, last week's not-guilty finding by the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal is no doubt a welcome respite from writing cheques to their legal defence team.
However, it is hardly a victory for free speech, or press freedom. All that happened was a government agency, after much deliberation, found their work acceptable.
That is the role of a censor, and Canada has one for each province, territory and Ottawa. All are endowed by their legislatures with the right to examine what appears in print, to see whether it is "likely" to "expose" various people and groups to "hatred or contempt."
Steyn's case arose from complaints by Muslim advocates to commissions in Ontario, B.C. and the Canadian Human Rights Commission itself, about an extract from his book America Alone, reprinted in Maclean's.
In it, Steyn speculated what large-scale Muslim settlement in Europe might mean for law and society there. The Canadian Islamic Congress complained the article was likely to expose Muslims to hatred or contempt.
In the end, the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal disagreed. However, it also pontificated that Steyn's piece contained historical, religious and factual inaccuracies, relied on common Muslim stereotypes and tried to "rally public opinion by exaggeration and causing the reader to fear Muslims."
So there. An arm of government has judged a publisher, slandered its professionalism, questioned its motives, but concluded it was not quite so bad Canadians shouldn't read it.
For the record, it was not Mark Steyn who caused readers to fear Muslims. It was Muslims who tried twice to blow up the World Trade Center, the second time with horrifying success. >>> Calgary Herald | October 20, 2008
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