Some Thoughts on Canada's Left & Arthur Topham's Right to Freedom of Speech

Written by Paul Fromm

Wednesday, 24 October 2012 05:04

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- This email newsletter was sent to you in graphical HTML format. If you're seeing this version, your email program prefers plain text emails. You can read the original version online: http://ymlp213.net/zdMsQk -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Some Thoughts on Canada's Left & Arthur Topham's Right to Freedom of Speech Dear Radical Reader, The world is full of irony at so many levels and one of those ironic situations is the relationship that I have had with a conservative right website located in Ontario and going by the name of FreeDominion.ca ( http://freedominion.ca/ ) . Ever since I was first charged by the Canadian Human Rights Commission with a sec. 13(1) "hate crime" back in 2007 I became aware of this site which is basically a forum for discussion of political events (mainly). At that time I joined the forum in hopes of discussing my case with Harry Abrams and the League for Human Rights of B'nai Brith Canada. I didn't last too long before I was banned for espousing ideas that were not acceptable to the majority of the members but although I could no longer post on the site circumstances were such that the issue of freedom of speech became so popular that the case of Abrams and B'nai Brith Canada v Arthur Topham and RadicalPress.com ( http://radicalpress.com/ ) was debated quite extensively and the owner of the site, Connie Fournier, remained receptive to accepting information from me and reposting it on her site for debate and analysis. Eventually even FreeDominion.ca ( http://freedominion.ca/ ) , a staunch enclave of pro-Israel posters, ended up being attacked by the serial complainer Richard Warman (one of the two people who laid the current sec. 319(2) CC complaint against me along with Harry Abrams). That only reinforced our mutual need to conspire together in order to fight this malevolent menace to our constitutional rights. The post below is from the FreeDominion.ca ( http://freedominion.ca/ ) forum which can be found at the following url: http://www.freedominion.ca/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?f=70&t=159217 The poster, Peter O'Donnell, a zealous Lukid lover and likely a Dispensationalist Christian, has given us some interesting commentary related to my case. I hope you can take the time to read it and think about what he's written. Feedback is always welcome and usually beneficial to me. Sincerely, Arthur Topham Pub/Ed RadicalPress.com ( http://radicalpress.com/ ) "Digging to the root of the issues since 1998" RE: UPDATE ON ARTHUR TOPHAM, IN HIS OWN WORDS ( HTTP://WWW.FREEDOMINION.CA/PHPBB2/VIEWTOPIC.PHP?F=70&T=159217&START=45#P1748396 ) ( http://www.freedominion.ca/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=1748396#p1748396 )by Peter O'Donnell ( http://www.freedominion.ca/phpBB2/memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=4885 ) » 10/ 22/ 12 11:36 am This has a keystone cops theme now, given the failure to detect any ironic intention of Arthur Topham in publishing the supposedly offending material. It pays not to be too subtle in Canada, I believe because of our long history of a managed and elitist Torontocentric media, many conflicting points of view are poorly (if at all) understood and people tend to think in very digestible terms, like the poor benighted souls who take those 15-second news digest sheets onto the public transit every day. Now this is not to say that on the whole I agree with Arthur Topham about very much, our views on the holocaust and on Israel's security today are evidently almost polar opposites. What is doubly ironic is that Topham's views on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict are almost word for word the same as most Canadian leftists. Now, had one of them thought of this device of shaming the Jews by finding something they wrote and changing it to the modern context as they saw it, I have to wonder if anyone would have rattled the chains of the censorship police to go out and put an end to their dangerous attack on the state of Israel. Seems unlikely, given that leftists have a free hand to say whatever they want in Canada, even about this hot button topic where any deviation from the Likud party line can lead to charges of anti-Semitism. In my un-Canadian subtlety of thought process, I find that offensive although I am quite happy to reveal my own sympathy for the Likud party line and for the survival of Israel against all the odds. We have wandered into dangerous territory on this issue, where one kind of extremist viewpoint is demonized and another very similar kind is taught in schools. Not only is it dangerous, but it becomes increasingly absurd. When you think about it carefully (and who has, outside of this forum?) there is just about the same justification for raiding the local NDP office as the home of Arthur Topham, if the aim is to stop people from hating Israel. Calling the task by a slightly different name does not really erase this irony. Now I am torn between the prospect of seeing the left in Canada subjected to a purge (their own creation coming home to bite them back) and a commitment to freedom of speech no matter how offensive or unpleasant or uncomfortable we may personally find it. I am also very concerned with the apparent power and ability of private citizens, holding no defined roles in either law enforcement or justice, having any sort of power to quarterback police activities and gain any sort of private advantage or knowledge as a result. This is the classic formula for what most people would call a "banana republic" and no, the ends do not justify the means. My freedom is more threatened by this desire to police what other people think, hear and contemplate, than by any potential organizational opportunities for extremists, which (the latter) is theoretically what these law enforcement moves are meant to control. In other words, I would rather have a few dozen storm troopers marching energetically if impotently around the city streets on odd occasions, than van loads of secret police monitoring all of our communications to see who is thinking correctly, and who needs correction. Because at the end of the day, censors of the land, you are not smart enough to tell us what to think. In some cases, you are not even smart enough to realize that what you sent forth could very easily come back through your own front door one day, animated by a different set of persons seeking that ultimate power, to define the state in their own image. I see there has been an attempt to discuss this, thwarted by the messy realities of the lawfare campaign. In a way, this is a sordid little victory for that campaign, where concerned citizens are not freely able to discuss what other people are saying about matters of importance, due to a "libel chill" set out deliberately to prevent full discussion. That is why we are in this lawfare mess, and it continues to irritate me considerably that Canadians are not getting this story from any of their esteemed media outlets, who have been asleep at the switch, just as they will remain asleep through whatever else unfolds on the distant Barkerville Highway. Sooner or later, some comatose servant of this dead-head censorship regime will stumble into the wrong establishment and take away a lefty's computer, then we'll hear screams of outrage and see the mobilization of opinion against "the regime" but to be fair to all sides, "the regime" is pretty much the whole country minus about five hundred independent-minded persons whose brains are still, against all the odds, working. That movie about the zombie apocalypse? It's just the reality of everyday life in Canada. _____________________________ Unsubscribe / Change Profile: http://ymlp213.net/ugmjhqsqgsgbbqghbegguewwmw Powered by YourMailingListProvider

 

Stunning Vindication of Pastor Stephen Boissoin After 10 Year Ordeal at Hands of Albe

Written by Paul Fromm

Wednesday, 24 October 2012 04:55

Stunning Vindication of Pastor Stephen Boissoin After 10 Year Ordeal at Hands of Alberta Human Rights Commission The 10-year ordeal of Alberta Pastor Stephen Boissoin and and his persecution by a homosexual activist professor at the University of Calgary and his brutalization by the Alberta Human Rights Commission have come to an end. Last Friday, the Alberta Court of Appeals upheld a Court of Queen's Bench ruling tossing out an Alberta Human Rights Commission finding of discrimination against the pastor and a degrading order that he apologize to his homosexual tormentor and pay the tormentor, one Professor Lund, $5,000 for having taken the trouble to complain against him. Shades of Red China, where during the Cultural Revolution "counter-revolutionaries" and dissidents would be shot and their families billed for the price of the bullet to dispatch them.. the National Post explained: The commission argued that "Mr. Boissoin and his group, the Concerned Christian Coalition, were in violation of the province's Human Rights, Multiculturalism and Citizenship Act, which prohibits published material that 'is likely to expose a person or a class of persons to hatred or contempt.'" (*National Post*, October 20, 2012) This is the same vague wording as the now repealed Sec. 13 (Internet censorship) of the Canadian Human Rights Act. To benefit, you must be a member of a privileged group: to wit, " race, religious beliefs, colour, gender, physical disability, mental disability, age, ancestry, place of origin, marital status, source of income, family status or sexual orientation;." And don't think that protects Europeans or Christians. And, even more appalling, the ruling gagged the pastor in terms of expressing his religious beliefs on homosexuality. the *National Post*explains: The Commission "ordered the man to cease all commentary on issues relating to gays. the fact that Alberta's human rights law also contains a clause declaring that 'nothing in this section shall be deemed to interfere with free expression of opinion on any subject' was brushed aside." A considerable portion of Canada's political/legal establishment hates Christians, particularly traditional Christians. Taken as a whole, the Act, as it affects free speech, is utterly contradictory. On June 17,2002, he wrote a letter to the *Red Deer Advocate*. He blasted "the homosexual machine" and the "militant homosexual agenda" that was spreading "all manner of wickedness." He urged "Mr. and Mrs. Heterosexual to start taking back what the enemy has taken from you." Within a few weeks, his persecution began. "A gay activist named Darren Lund blamed Mr. Boissoin's letter for providing local homophobes 'with encouragement' including those who allegedly had beaten a gay teenager in Red Deer In July, 2002, Mr. Lund drafted a complaint to the Alberta Human Rights and Citizenship Commission." (*National Post*, ibid.) In 2008, the complaint went to a Tribunal and rev. Boissoin was fined and effectively gagged in terms of discussion homosexuality in any medium. thus, his religious rights and his function as a pastor, teacher and leader were egregiously trampled of for three years. he sought judicial review (appealed) the police state ruling to the Alberta Court of Queen's Bench last year.Pastor Boissoin won. Mr. Justice Earl Wilson "tore apart the human rights verdict against Mr. Boissoin. He concluded there was no evidence to support Mr. Lund's claim that an attack had [even] taken place - nor the claim that any alleged attackers had read Mr. Boissoin's article. He also overturned the panel;s conclusion that Mr. Boissoin's letter constituted hate speech, and, perhaps most importantly, declared that the panel had no authority to order the wide range of punishments it had imposed." (*National Post*) Professor Lund appealed to the Alberta Court of Appeals. Last Friday, Mr. Justice Clinton O'Brien upheld the decision of the Court of Queen's Benchin overturning the ruling against Pastor Boissoin and, in addition awarded him the costs of the appeal. "Matters of morality, including the perceived morality of certain types of sexual behaviour, are topics for discussion in the public forum. ... Freedom of speech does not just protect polite speech." So, after a decade of legal harassment, a solid victory for free speech and Pastor Boissoin. But, only one and a half cheers. A victory, yes, but how will Pastor Boissoin retrieve the three years when he was gagged by the tyrannical order of a tribunal? He can't. Human rights commissions and their irresponsible powers should be abolished or, at the very least, all powers of regulating free speech should be taken from them. *Paul Fromm* *Director* *CANADIAN ASSOCIATION FOR FREE EXPRESSION* Appeal court upholds ruling in favour of 2002 anti-homosexual letter By Daryl Slade, Calgary Herald October 17, 2012 Comment 2 - Story - Photos ( 1 ) [image: Appeal court upholds ruling in favour of 2002 anti-homosexual letter] Darren Lund launched the original complaint to the Alberta Human Rights Commission over a letter to the editor that appeared in the Red Deer Advocate titled Homosexual Agenda Wicked. *Photograph by: *Calgary Herald Archive , Calgary Herald The Alberta Court of Appeal has upheld a Queen’s Bench decision that concluded a 2002 letter to the editor that ran in the Red Deer Advocate, entitled Homosexual Agenda Wicked, is protected by the fundamental freedom of expression. A human-rights tribunal originally sided with the applicant, Darren Lund, that the letter by Stephen Boissoin exposed homosexuals to hatred or contempt, and directed the author to cease and desist, and awarded damages. That decision was overturned last year by Queen’s Bench Justice Earl Wilson, prompting Lund, who describes himself as a human-rights educator and activist, and member of the faculty of the University of Calgary, to take it to the province’s high court. In the ruling released Wednesday by appellate Justice Clifton O’Brien, Wilson’s ruling was upheld. “The judge (Wilson) held that while the language of the letter ‘may be jarring, offensive, bewildering, puerile, nonsensical and insulting,’ it was not likely to expose homosexuals to hatred or contempt within the meaning of the Alberta statute. “I agree that the letter is offensive; it is coarse. crude and insensitive. However, in my view, the letter constituted an expression of opinion that did not infringe the statute.” At the time Boissoin wrote the letter, he was executive director of the Concerned Christian Coalition Inc., and the target audience of the letter was people whom Boissoin believed were apathetic to the inroads made by what he called the “homosexual machine,” primarily in respect to educating children that homosexuality is a morally acceptable choice and lifestyle, O’Brien wrote. Boissoin said in his letter that his banner “has been raised and war has been declared” on the homosexual agenda. “Don’t allow yourself to be deceived any longer,” Boissoin wrote. “These activists are not morally upright citizens, concerned about the best interest of our society. They are perverse, self-centred and morally deprived individuals who are spreading their psychological disease into every area of our lives. “Homosexual rights activists and those who defend them are just as immoral as the pedophiles, drug dealers and pimps that plague our communities.” Two weeks later, the same newspaper reported that a gay teenager had been assaulted in downtown Red Deer — solely because he was gay — prompting Lund, who once taught high school in Red Deer and was involved with the Gay/Straight Alliance, to launch his appeal to the Alberta Human Rights Commission. O’Brien also awarded costs of the appeal to Boissoin. Read more: http://www.calgaryherald .com/life/Appeal+court+upholds+ruling+favour+2002+anti+homosexual+letter/7406365/story.html# ixzz29yfEsYY5

 

Some Thoughts on Canada's Left & Arthur Topham's Right to Freedom of Speech

Written by Paul Fromm

Tuesday, 23 October 2012 09:57

*Some Thoughts on Canada's Left & Arthur Topham's Right to Freedom of Speech * ** [image: Photo: Some Thoughts on Canada's Left & Arthur Topham's Right to Freedom of Speech Dear Radical Reader, The world is full of irony at so many levels and one of those ironic situations is the relationship that I have had with a conservative right website located in Ontario and going by the name of FreeDominion.ca . Ever since I was first charged by the Canadian Human Rights Commission with a sec. 13(1) "hate crime" back in 2007 I became aware of this site which is basically a forum for discussion of political events (mainly). At that time I joined the forum in hopes of discussing my case with Harry Abrams and the League for Human Rights of B'nai Brith Canada. I didn't last too long before I was banned for espousing ideas that were not acceptable to the majority of the members but although I could no longer post on the site circumstances were such that the issue of freedom of speech became so popular that the case of Abrams and B'nai Brith Canada v Arthur Topham and RadicalPress.com was debated quite extensively and the owner of the site, Connie Fournier, remained receptive to accepting information from me and reposting it on her site for debate and analysis. Eventually even FreeDominion.ca , a staunch enclave of pro-Israel posters, ended up being attacked by the serial complainer Richard Warman (one of the two people who laid the current sec. 319(2) CC complaint against me along with Harry Abrams). That only reinforced our mutual need to conspire together in order to fight this malevolent menace to our constitutional rights. The post below is from the FreeDominion.ca forum which can be found at the following url: http://www.freedominion.ca/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?f=70&t=159217 The poster, Peter O'Donnell, a zealous Lukid lover and likely a Dispensationalist Christian, has given us some interesting commentary related to my case. I hope you can take the time to read it and think about what he's written. Feedback is always welcome and usually beneficial to me. Sincerely, Arthur Topham Pub/Ed RadicalPress.com "Digging to the root of the issues since 1998" Re: Update on Arthur Topham, in his own words by Peter O'Donnell » 10/ 22/ 12 11:36 am This has a keystone cops theme now, given the failure to detect any ironic intention of Arthur Topham in publishing the supposedly offending material. It pays not to be too subtle in Canada, I believe because of our long history of a managed and elitist Torontocentric media, many conflicting points of view are poorly (if at all) understood and people tend to think in very digestible terms, like the poor benighted souls who take those 15-second news digest sheets onto the public transit every day. Now this is not to say that on the whole I agree with Arthur Topham about very much, our views on the holocaust and on Israel's security today are evidently almost polar opposites. What is doubly ironic is that Topham's views on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict are almost word for word the same as most Canadian leftists. Now, had one of them thought of this device of shaming the Jews by finding something they wrote and changing it to the modern context as they saw it, I have to wonder if anyone would have rattled the chains of the censorship police to go out and put an end to their dangerous attack on the state of Israel. Seems unlikely, given that leftists have a free hand to say whatever they want in Canada, even about this hot button topic where any deviation from the Likud party line can lead to charges of anti-Semitism. In my un-Canadian subtlety of thought process, I find that offensive although I am quite happy to reveal my own sympathy for the Likud party line and for the survival of Israel against all the odds. We have wandered into dangerous territory on this issue, where one kind of extremist viewpoint is demonized and another very similar kind is taught in schools. Not only is it dangerous, but it becomes increasingly absurd. When you think about it carefully (and who has, outside of this forum?) there is just about the same justification for raiding the local NDP office as the home of Arthur Topham, if the aim is to stop people from hating Israel. Calling the task by a slightly different name does not really erase this irony. Now I am torn between the prospect of seeing the left in Canada subjected to a purge (their own creation coming home to bite them back) and a commitment to freedom of speech no matter how offensive or unpleasant or uncomfortable we may personally find it. I am also very concerned with the apparent power and ability of private citizens, holding no defined roles in either law enforcement or justice, having any sort of power to quarterback police activities and gain any sort of private advantage or knowledge as a result. This is the classic formula for what most people would call a "banana republic" and no, the ends do not justify the means. My freedom is more threatened by this desire to police what other people think, hear and contemplate, than by any potential organizational opportunities for extremists, which (the latter) is theoretically what these law enforcement moves are meant to control. In other words, I would rather have a few dozen storm troopers marching energetically if impotently around the city streets on odd occasions, than van loads of secret police monitoring all of our communications to see who is thinking correctly, and who needs correction. Because at the end of the day, censors of the land, you are not smart enough to tell us what to think. In some cases, you are not even smart enough to realize that what you sent forth could very easily come back through your own front door one day, animated by a different set of persons seeking that ultimate power, to define the state in their own image. I see there has been an attempt to discuss this, thwarted by the messy realities of the lawfare campaign. In a way, this is a sordid little victory for that campaign, where concerned citizens are not freely able to discuss what other people are saying about matters of importance, due to a "libel chill" set out deliberately to prevent full discussion. That is why we are in this lawfare mess, and it continues to irritate me considerably that Canadians are not getting this story from any of their esteemed media outlets, who have been asleep at the switch, just as they will remain asleep through whatever else unfolds on the distant Barkerville Highway. Sooner or later, some comatose servant of this dead-head censorship regime will stumble into the wrong establishment and take away a lefty's computer, then we'll hear screams of outrage and see the mobilization of opinion against "the regime" but to be fair to all sides, "the regime" is pretty much the whole country minus about five hundred independent-minded persons whose brains are still, against all the odds, working. That movie about the zombie apocalypse? It's just the reality of everyday life in Canada.] <http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=199057990229108&set=a.116376408497267.18699.100003747267905&type=1&relevant_count=1> Dear Radical Reader, The world is full of irony at so many levels and one of those ironic situations is the relationship that I have had with a conservative right website located in Ontario and going by the name of FreeDominion.ca<http://freedominion.ca/>. Ever since I was first charged by the Canadian Human Rights Commission with a sec. 13(1) "hate crime" back in 2007 I became aware of this site which is basically a forum for discussion of political events (mainly). At that time I joined the forum in hopes of discussing my case with Harry Abrams and the League for Human Rights of B'nai Brith Canada. I didn't last too long before I was banned for espousing ideas that were not acceptable to the majority of the members but although I could no longer post on the site circumstances were such that the issue of freedom of speech became so popular that the case of Abrams and *B'nai Brith Canada v Arthur Topham and **RadicalPress.com* <http://radicalpress.com/> was debated quite extensively and the owner of the site, Connie Fournier, remained receptive to accepting information from me and reposting it on her site for debate and analysis. Eventually even FreeDominion.ca <http://freedominion.ca/> , a staunch enclave of pro-Israel posters, ended up being attacked by the serial complainer Richard Warman (one of the two people who laid the current sec. 319(2) CC complaint against me along with Harry Abrams). That only reinforced our mutual need to conspire together in order to fight this malevolent menace to our constitutional rights. The post below is from the FreeDominion.ca <http://freedominion.ca/> forum which can be found at the following url: http://www.freedominion.ca/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?f=70&t=159217 The poster, Peter O'Donnell, a zealous Lukid lover and likely a Dispensationalist Christian, has given us some interesting commentary related to my case. I hope you can take the time to read it and think about what he's written. Feedback is always welcome and usually beneficial to me. Sincerely, Arthur Topham Pub/Ed RadicalPress.com <http://radicalpress.com/> *"Digging to the root of the issues since 1998" * Re: Update on Arthur Topham, in his own words<http://www.freedominion.ca/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?f=70&t=159217&start=45#p1748396> <http://www.freedominion.ca/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=1748396#p1748396> <http://www.freedominion.ca/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=1748396#p1748396>by *Peter O'Donnell<http://www.freedominion.ca/phpBB2/memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=4885> * » 10/ 22/ 12 11:36 am This has a keystone cops theme now, given the failure to detect any ironic intention of Arthur Topham in publishing the supposedly offending material. It pays not to be too subtle in Canada, I believe because of our long history of a managed and elitist Torontocentric media, many conflicting points of view are poorly (if at all) understood and people tend to think in very digestible terms, like the poor benighted souls who take those 15-second news digest sheets onto the public transit every day. Now this is not to say that on the whole I agree with Arthur Topham about very much, our views on the holocaust and on Israel's security today are evidently almost polar opposites. What is doubly ironic is that Topham's views on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict are almost word for word the same as most Canadian leftists. Now, had one of them thought of this device of shaming the Jews by finding something they wrote and changing it to the modern context as they saw it, I have to wonder if anyone would have rattled the chains of the censorship police to go out and put an end to their dangerous attack on the state of Israel. Seems unlikely, given that leftists have a free hand to say whatever they want in Canada, even about this hot button topic where any deviation from the Likud party line can lead to charges of anti-Semitism. In my un-Canadian subtlety of thought process, I find that offensive although I am quite happy to reveal my own sympathy for the Likud party line and for the survival of Israel against all the odds. We have wandered into dangerous territory on this issue, where one kind of extremist viewpoint is demonized and another very similar kind is taught in schools. Not only is it dangerous, but it becomes increasingly absurd. When you think about it carefully (and who has, outside of this forum?) there is just about the same justification for raiding the local NDP office as the home of Arthur Topham, if the aim is to stop people from hating Israel. Calling the task by a slightly different name does not really erase this irony. Now I am torn between the prospect of seeing the left in Canada subjected to a purge (their own creation coming home to bite them back) and a commitment to freedom of speech no matter how offensive or unpleasant or uncomfortable we may personally find it. I am also very concerned with the apparent power and ability of private citizens, holding no defined roles in either law enforcement or justice, having any sort of power to quarterback police activities and gain any sort of private advantage or knowledge as a result. This is the classic formula for what most people would call a "banana republic" and no, the ends do not justify the means. My freedom is more threatened by this desire to police what other people think, hear and contemplate, than by any potential organizational opportunities for extremists, which (the latter) is theoretically what these law enforcement moves are meant to control. In other words, I would rather have a few dozen storm troopers marching energetically if impotently around the city streets on odd occasions, than van loads of secret police monitoring all of our communications to see who is thinking correctly, and who needs correction. Because at the end of the day, censors of the land, you are not smart enough to tell us what to think. In some cases, you are not even smart enough to realize that what you sent forth could very easily come back through your own front door one day, animated by a different set of persons seeking that ultimate power, to define the state in their own image. I see there has been an attempt to discuss this, thwarted by the messy realities of the lawfare campaign. In a way, this is a sordid little victory for that campaign, where concerned citizens are not freely able to discuss what other people are saying about matters of importance, due to a "libel chill" set out deliberately to prevent full discussion. That is why we are in this lawfare mess, and it continues to irritate me considerably that Canadians are not getting this story from any of their esteemed media outlets, who have been asleep at the switch, just as they will remain asleep through whatever else unfolds on the distant Barkerville Highway. Sooner or later, some comatose servant of this dead-head censorship regime will stumble into the wrong establishment and take away a lefty's computer, then we'll hear screams of outrage and see the mobilization of opinion against "the regime" but to be fair to all sides, "the regime" is pretty much the whole country minus about five hundred independent-minded persons whose brains are still, against all the odds, working. That movie about the zombie apocalypse? It's just the reality of everyday life in Canada. <http://www.freedominion.ca/phpBB2/memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=4885>