Well, they would be a problem, but they saw the thunder coming for them.
Even in the deepest Sahara, every bandit knows not to mess with Rex the motherfucking Wonder Dog.
17
Jun
Well, they would be a problem, but they saw the thunder coming for them.
Even in the deepest Sahara, every bandit knows not to mess with Rex the motherfucking Wonder Dog.
16
Jun
My weekly TV column is up at Torontoist.
16
Jun
One of the right-wing Canadian blogosphere’s great causes is their opposition to human rights tribunals, mostly because of the hate speech provisions these human rights tribunals sometimes take up. (To hear them complain, you would think human rights tribunals spend the majority of their time censoring people, when in fact most cases heard by these tribunals concern basic workplace equality. Not that they like that either, mind you, but.) Their current hobbyhorses are Mark Steyn (who was found innocent at his Ontario tribunal because hate speech is more than just the simple, dimwitted racism Steyn exudes, but never you mind that apparently in Steyn’s case the system worked – it’s the principle of the thing) and now an Alberta minister named Stephen Boissoin, who wrote a mean letter-to-the-editor about how he hates them fags.
The text of the letter can be found here – I refuse to endorse the schmuck even backhandedly by reproducing it in full, and loath as I am to give Kathy “I Proudly Admit I Am A Bigot” Shaidle traffic, I really couldn’t find anybody less objectionable who was willing to publish it. Which tells you something, really, and the gleeful insouciance with which they republish this dreck tells you something else.
(They’ll claim to be defenders of free speech, but I don’t see ’em republishing, say, excerpts from Catcher In The Rye or Lady Chatterley’s Lover or The Anarchist’s Cookbook or any other famous books frequently banned. Heck, if they want to go at it from a conservative angle, they can always reprint a portion of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, frequently the target of misguided liberal censorship. But no, they’re desperate to republish bigoted crap.)
I’ve given hate speech law a lot of thought, precisely because although I applaud its aims, I do have concerns about its practical application. Those who know me know that I generally favour freedom of expression as a rule. I don’t need to go into the reasons why I favour freedom of expression; these should frankly be self-evident to any reasonable reader and if not, go read some Thomas Paine or something.
But as a society, even before we ever considered tabling hate speech laws, we recognized that freedom of expression could be used to harm, and acted appropriately. We don’t recognize threats as speech (despite what some Metafilterites might think about this). Likewise, consider defamation, and our slander and libel laws. As a society, we understand that malicious and deliberate harm to one’s reputation through falsehood is that which should not and cannot be allowed, lest we inappropriately empower those with access to greater voice in our society. (And yes, I recognize that the Internet has managed to even the playing field somewhat in this regard, but it has not created a situation where libel and slander laws are outdated. Rupert Murdoch still has a bigger megaphone than me and can use it for great harm.)
But slander and libel law can only be applied to the defense of individuals. What happens when language is used to slander or libel groups? And before you say “well, isn’t most racism just opinion and therefore not validly applicable to groups,” let me excerpt a piece from Boissoin’s rant.
From kindergarten class on, our children, your grandchildren are being strategically targeted, psychologically abused and brainwashed by homosexual and pro-homosexual educators. Our children are being victimized by repugnant and premeditated strategies, aimed at desensitizing and eventually recruiting our young into their camps. Think about it, children as young as five and six years of age are being subjected to psychologically and physiologically damaging pro-homosexual literature and guidance in the public school system; all under the fraudulent guise of equal rights.
Is that just opinion? Let me put it another way.
From kindergarten class on, our children, your grandchildren are being strategically targeted, psychologically abused and brainwashed by Chris Sims. Our children are being victimized by Sims’ repugnant and premeditated strategies, aimed at desensitizing and eventually recruiting our young into their camps. Think about it, children as young as five and six years of age are being subjected to psychologically and physiologically damaging pro-homosexual literature and guidance by Chris Sims; all under the fraudulent guise of equal rights.
If I said that in seriousness about Sims, he’d be quite able to bring a defamation tort against me. I could assert a fair comment defense, but to do so I would have to prove that the statement is based on proven fact.
Taking this back to Boissoin, there’s a number of claims in just those few sentences that are highly questionable. “Physiologically damaging” likely qualifies as verifiably false. “Psychologically abused” and “brainwashed” toe the line; Boissoin might argue them to be mere invective, but abuse and brainwashing are extreme language that carry specific connotations along with them.
But hate speech law isn’t just about defamatory claims (although they do play a large element). It’s also about eliminationist rhetoric, the attempt to use speech to not only defame a group but also to dehumanize them – which in turn encourages violence against them, because if your opponent is seen as less than human, violent reaction against them becomes easier to justify. Encouragement of violent behaviour is seen – rightly – within our legal systems as invalidly qualifying as “speech” and the protections granted to speech, because despite what Bigot Central might think, hurting people you don’t like has no valid purpose within a just society.
Kathy Shaidle and her ilk have no problem condemning such rhetoric when it’s spouted by fundamentalist Muslim extremists, but apparently Stephen Boissoin is a cause celebre for writing
Come on people, wake up! It’s time to stand together and take whatever steps are necessary to reverse the wickedness that our lethargy has authorized to spawn. Where homosexuality flourishes, all manner of wickedness abounds.
or
It’s time to start taking back what the enemy has taken from you.
Those are direct calls to action, nothing less, and the Shaidle wing will pooh-pooh them by saying that Boissoin hasn’t explicitly said “hey, go kick a fag to death.” This lackspittle defense relies on the belief that all men who would work evil through speech are morons. The implicit call to arms is there, and Boissoin’s choice to not limit action (“whatever steps are necessary”) is quite deliberate.
And that is the crux of hate speech law in Canada – we look to dampen defamatory and inciting rhetoric, recognizing through both history and common sense that some speech is not worth contesting in the court of public opinion, because speech is dangerous – indeed, far more dangerous than any mere weapon. It’s a natural extension of defamation law, a concept which has been with us for centuries. As a society, we choose to recognize that although the freedom of speech is important, and indeed vital to the health of a functional democracy, that absolute freedom of speech by its nature will conflict with other rights, such as liberty or freedom from persecution, which are equally important in Canadian constitutional law.
Now, this doesn’t necessarily mean that human rights tribunals don’t require reform – they do tend to be somewhat patrimonious and they’re built with pre-Internet statute and are frequently outdated in their handling of cases. But that doesn’t mean the job they perform isn’t worth doing; it just means they need to do it better.
EDIT TO ADD: In comments, Joe Helfrich expresses his discomfort with hate crime law, which is a somewhat different kettle of fish than hate speech law. I fully disagree with the concept of hate crime law, which takes ordinary crimes and attempt to divine hateful intent in action to create a more punitive sentence; we have trouble enough in criminal law determining intent (indeed, the search for mens rea is the defining element of most criminal law trials) without going a step further and attempting to prove one’s motive.
That having been said, there’s a longstanding tradition in speech law that end effect is more important than original intent – if I libel you without malicious intent and you get screwed because of it, I’ve still committed libel regardless of me not intending to. Critics of this tradition have suggested it forces people to be more careful about what they say; proponents have suggested it forces people to be more careful about how they say it.
15
Jun
A mock-Tijuana Bible featuring John McCain and George W. Bush.
Explicit, NSFW, and more than a little gross, frankly.
15
Jun
Comic fans who love industry drama should head over to this post about DC’s recent editorial snafus, mostly because the very-recently-fired Chuck Dixon shows up in comments and completely rags on Dan Didio without ever actually saying the name “Dan Didio.”
14
Jun
Via Norman Wilner.
13
Jun
Scott asked me for my take on the new Canadian DMCA (and make no mistake, that’s what it is).
Most people know I tend to be somewhat “copyleft” when it comes to my attitudes on copyright; I favour lower terms of private ownership of copyright for a larger public domain, flexible and relatively wide-ranging fair dealing laws, and legal systems that encourage trial use rather than full immediate purchase of intellectual property. Canadian statutory law contains no protections under fair dealing for parody or transformative use; the protections that exist for me when I use Photoshop to make Iron Man say “fuck” exist solely in jurisprudence, and every serious intellectual property law expert in the country has recommended to a number of governments that, hey, maybe we should enshrine that in statute.
Needless to say, Jim Prentice’s bill does none of these things. Michael Geist has already explained at length how the expansions for fair dealing contained within the bill (and fair dealing in general) are almost wholly nullified by the digital lock provisions. This bill makes most fair dealing illegal simply by having the original producer of content put a basic digital lock or DRM on their material. (Or, more simply, your right to make a copy of a song on a CD that you own ends the moment the CD has a simple DRM on it. The tools to evade that DRM? Illegal as of this bill.)
In short it’s a terrible, terrible bill – a sellout to American lobbyists that completely ignores all the effort Canadian citizens made earlier this year to say “hey, this is a shitty bill and we don’t want it.” With any luck, it will be voted down in Parliament. (Of course, the Harper government may go ahead and make it a confidence vote, in which case Stephane Dion will likely run from his own shadow.
Michael Geist has more, of course.
13
Jun
12
Jun
No doubt some of you wish I would shut up about this show, but tough.
Rayven and Jaime: hip-hop. First routine can be tough, but then again Benji and Donyelle got first routine in season 2 and it established their dominance of the show right from the get-go. Rayven and Jaime… do not do that. The judges are being nice tonight, because they always try to be complimentary on the first actual competition episode, but this wasn’t that great; the unison the routine needed just wasn’t there and when they needed to hit a move hard (which wasn’t all of them – Napoleon and Tabitha have a smoother style than, say, the average Shane Sparks number), they didn’t always do it. Still, they both danced with a good deal of enthusiasm. Potential bottom three.
Susie and Marquis: smooth waltz. Smooth waltz needs to be dreamlike; this was practically the opposite of that, with Marquis particularly struggling through even basic footwork. The judges gave it a tonguebath of highly unreasonable proportion, but used the codeword of “so difficult” over and over again to quietly tell the dancers that they were getting first-week props and nothing more. Marquis’s lines were good whenever he extended outward, but when he was, you know, doing steps, this was pretty goddamned clunky.
Kourtni and Matt: jazz. First solidly entertaining routine of the night, cutely done up in black leather ensembles and acting tough. Matt’s probably a bit of a better dancer than Kourtni is; Kourtni is a better performer than Matt is. Good complementary pair; no idea how far they go. I have nothing further to say.
Chelsea and Thayne: cha-cha-cha. The judges gave Thayne all sorts of “you kept up with her” compliments which, to be fair, he only barely managed to do. Chelsea was fantastic in this, oozing personality and flavour. The dance was sold as being extremely difficult, which – look, it wasn’t even the most difficult cha-cha-cha routine ever performed on this show let alone “of all time.” It was a pretty medium-level routine with a few clever tricks. But Chelsea owned it, which is the most important thing.
Chelsie and Mark: contemporary. A Mia Michaels routine on the first show? They liked one of these dancers a whole lot in advance; Mia routines usually almost guarantee an advance to the next round. (Yes, her hippieseque blather and occasional fits of self-righteousness can really make me grind my teeth, but almost all of her routines are spectacular.) Anyway, this was fantastic, as much for the choreography as it was for the dancers’ skill. Mark was better, but he’s a contemporary dancer so that’s to be expected; Chelsie was fine.
Twitch and Kherington: Broadway. “Twitchington?” Oh, Twitch Twitch Twitch, you let your fans come up with the diptych name, you don’t do it for them! But this was thoroughly excellent, and Twitch and Kherington have obvious chemistry as partners (not just “doin’ it” chemistry, but obvious connection to one another as dancers). Kherington impressed me particularly for finally showing off skill and personality I didn’t quite get in the audition episodes. And Twitch is of course Twitch – whatever Nigel Lythgoe might say about there not being front-runners this season, that’s bull, because Twitch is the front-runner and absolutely everybody knows it, and he deserves to be.
Comfort and Chris: jive. Okay, but not A+ fantastic or anything; they didn’t miss any steps or screw anything up, and they partnered well together, but the routine lacked the snap that a good jive routine has; I especially note that on the kicks they weren’t extending their legs nearly as much as you expect when seeing a really top-quality jive. Some of this can probably be attributed to Comfort’s injury and the nature of most choreographers to take it easy on the first week.
Katee and Joshua: hip-hop. It’s always cool when the judges are honestly blown away by a great performance, rather than simply giving obligatory comments, and this was the first time in competition this year that it’s happened, and it was wholly deserved; easily the routine of the night, marrying the energy of a great hip-hop routine with the storytelling you’d expect more from a lyrical piece. And the unison moves were spot-on. And Katee’s solo lived up to Joshua’s (and given that he’s a fantastic hip-hop dancer and she’s not, that’s amazing). And Joshua made it all look easy, which of course it was not. Amazing work.
Jessica and Will: tango. Blaaaaaaaaaand. No fire. Needed a lot more and didn’t have it. Technically, the two of them danced just fine. But the chemistry just wasn’t there for me; good tangoes make the dancers look hungry for one another right there on stage and this, well. This looked like two people thrown together a week ago and given time to practice. Which is what it of course was, but that’s no excuse.
Courtney and Gev: disco. The disco routines on this show are fan favorites, which is weird because there honestly hasn’t been a good disco routine on So You Think You Can Dance since the first season, when there were three and they were all show-stoppers. Ever since then, Doriana Sanchez has come back every season and thrown mediocre disco routine after mediocre disco routine at hapless dancers who would probably like to dance, you know, something good, but no, we get endless Doriana routines with incongruous lifts in place of any musicality or rhythm, because we have to pretend she didn’t peak in the first season or something like that. Nigel Lythgoe savaged these two, which is weird because they did a passable job of turning the boring routine into something watchable.
Predicted bottom three couples: Rayven and Jaime, Susie and Marquis, Courtney and Gev.
Going home: Rayven and Marquis.
12
Jun
A) Racist people making “fun” of Barack Obama
B) The most incredibly stupid boosterism ever
12
Jun
My second post at thecourt.ca this week is about the sentencing of a fairly notorious asshole.
It’s worth noting that sometimes, in criminal justice, you have situations where judges are looking for a legal excuse to really nail someone to the wall. This is, I think, one such.
12
Jun
Any discussion of Dr. Spectro…
…no, sorry, I’ll start again. When considering Dr. Spec…
sorry… uh… Dr. Spectro is worth talking about because…
…OH GOD HE LOOKS LIKE A FUCKING DISCO BALL.
That is his superpower. He is a walking disco ball. He uses bright lights to confound and hypnotize his enemies. And that’s all he can do. The entry takes pains to point out that he is completely useless in a fight beyond being a walking disco ball of evil.
You know what this means? Daredevil doesn’t even have to try hard to beat him. Lucky thing Daredevil’s a universe or three to the left, but even so.
There are a lot of DC supervillains like this, who are technical geniuses but can’t throw a punch to save their asses. You’d think at some point some of them might figure, “hey, maybe one day I’ll have to fight Batman. Maybe it would be good to last more than three seconds against him.”
I want to make more fun of Dr. Spectro, but I’m pretty sure he died in an issue of some comic John Ostrander wrote. He sort of has that feeling about him. “Yep, this guy’s gonna die in an issue of Suicide Squad.” It just seems cruel to pick on him, even if he does have the fucking ugliest costume of all time.
11
Jun
11
Jun
Go to Google reader.
Hit the following keys: up arrow, up arrow, down arrow, down arrow, left arrow, right arrow, left arrow, right arrow, B and A.
(Heh.)
10
Jun
So, the Tories managed to pass Bill C-50, the new immigration law bill, yesterday. Nobody outside of the Tories thinks this is a good bill; it doesn’t really do what it aims to do (increase skilled worker immigration to Canada), and it directly impedes reunion of immigrant families, which nobody thinks is a good idea outside of diehard nativists.
Canada’s immigration laws have problems, of course – the most notorious being the fact that wait times for immigration review are horrendous. Of course, the Immigration and Refugee Board is 35 percent unstaffed, and they directly attribute the largest part of wait times to that fact in their report on the matter, and you’d think that if the Tories were serious about improving immigration they’d appoint new people to the Board.
But this isn’t about improving immigration; it’s the same as everything the Tories do, which is to rubberstamp their vision of what Canada should be through legislation, be it “family-friendly” filmmaking backdoored into Bill C-10 or reopening the legal status of the fetus with Bill C-484. Now, if Canadians had actually voted the Tories into a majority government, I would be angry, but I’d have less cause to gripe; if Canadians desperately wanted the Tory way, that’s how democracies work.
But these bills aren’t passing because the Tories have a majority government. Because the Tories have a minority government. These bills are passing because the Liberal Party is abstaining on every single goddamned vote that has the potential to be even slightly contentious. This is because Stephane Dion is in charge of the party, and Stephane Dion is playing chickenshit politics. Every contentious vote becomes the same question: “can Stephane Dion win an election?”
And the answer given is always “no,” even though Dion – probably the least liked Liberal party leader of the last, oh, fifty years or so – at the helm of the Liberal party puts the Grits only three points behind the Tories in countrywide polling right now. It’s a death spiral, because every time Stephane Dion refuses to fight the Tories on a contentious vote, the public becomes increasingly more convinced that he can’t lead the country. Which is fair, because if you don’t think you can take on a dink like Stephen Harper, what the hell business do you have trying to run a nation?
At this point I think the Liberals have to pull the emergency play: boot Dion, put in an interim party leader that would scare the shit out of Tories trying to call an election while the Liberals are getting organized (Gerard Kennedy or Ken Dryden are good candidates in this regard), and then have their convention and immediately challenge the Tories, who honestly aren’t that popular at all any more in Quebec and whose support elsewhere in Canada outside of Alberta is mostly soft and due to Dion’s immense wimpiness as a party leader. (I’m already hearing from friends within the low levels of the Liberal party infrastructure that this plan is gaining popularity rapidly in the ranks; the MPs want to fight the Tories on these stupid bills and Dion won’t let them.)
Because right now it’s just Dion getting the bad press; soon, though, it’ll be the Liberals’ fault for letting Dion walk them down the path to electoral suicide, and then it’s real trouble.
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