A few days ago, I have brought you the reports on these hearings from Free Dominion.
Here is Ezra Levant, interviewing Marc Lemire himself about that same hearing:
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Mark Lemire and Section 13: report from Federal Court hearing on 13th of December, 2011
December 14, 2011 — xanthippaFree Dominion has a discussion with several reports about the Tuesday hearing in Federal Court in Richard Warman’s ongoing case against Mark Lemire, which has run into a snag: the question whether Section 13 of the Human Rights Code (the thought-crime section) is Constitutional or not.
Connie Fournier reports that the cast was large: from CCLA and BCLA to Doug Christie on stage, from BigCityLib to free-speech bloggers in the audience. Here is a little quote from her report:
“During this time, the judge listened intently and didn’t interrupt. His face was inscrutable. The funniest moment of the hearing came when the lawyer for B’nai Brith said that Section 13 is “a ringing endorsement of free speech”. Everyone in the audience snorted and snickered uncontrollably. (Probably only one person in the audience was a censor and the rest were free speech supporters or media).”
An excerpt from Narrow Back’s report:
“At 11:00 we returned to hear from the African Legal Clinic. They talked about “irradicating discrimination” for “deeper social concerns” “improvement of the condition of less fortunate people” blah blah, etc. They also talked about S13 as a “conciliatory process”. I just wrote down: “Ha!” “
And here is a part from Mark Fournier’s post:
“A couple of intervenors in favour of state censorship put in their two cents and then Richard Warman got up and complained that just because the CHRC did a terrible job of administering Section 13 his rights shouldn’t be violated. The irony was breathtaking.”
Read the whole reports – along with what people are saying about it – at Free Dominion!
When borders are fluid…
December 12, 2011 — xanthippaI knew a guy who claimed that within his lifetime, held four ditinct citizenships. At different times, he was an Austrian, Czechoslovak, Slovak and Hungerian – he even held Hungarian citizenships at two separate times!
Yet, he never moved!
Simply, his house happened to be on a bit of land that was held by different countries at different times, all while he lived in it…
This is the reality of human existence.
As nations come into and out of existence, as they jostle with each other for territory, this sort of thing is inevitable.
Now, imagine that all these countries which had a prior ownership claim went to, say, the EU and demanded that this land be returned to them, due to the fact they held it in the past and, even if another country usurped it, they had never really given up their claim to it: it would be a mess!
Just like in Europe, the various nations in North America occupied different areas at different times – as their fortunes waxed and vaned, so did their territory. Just like in Europe, at different times, the same land would be claimed by different groups. And, just like in Europe, territorial wars took place…
This just goes to show that this is a function of the human condition!
However, in Canada, the various Native groups can each make a separate claim on the same piece of land – a claim which the courts consider in isolation from competing Native claims over the same land. And, just as they each had a valid claim on the land at different times, each claim can be supported by some evidence.
Yet, since each claim is examined separately, the court cannot take the competing claims into accout. In effect, this causes the Canadian taxpayers to buy the land (settle the claims) over and over and over… No sooner is one claim settled than another one crops up.
To call this a highly flawed system is a serious understatement.
How to solve this in a way that is fair and equitable to the Native groups with land claims as well as to the Canadaians who hold legal title to the land and have invested their life savings into a home on this land?
How to solve this in a way that is fair to different Native groups making conflicting claims, when their claims would be considered at different times and under differing political conditions?
We do have the Assembly of First Nations – resolving land claims is one of their major ‘raison d’etres’:
The Assembly of First Nations (AFN) is the national representative organization of the First Nations in Canada. There are over 630 First Nation’s communities in Canada. The AFN Secretariat, is designed to present the views of the various First Nations through their leaders in areas such as: Aboriginal and Treaty Rights, Economic Development, Education, Languages and Literacy, Health, Housing, Social Development, Justice, Taxation, Land Claims, Environment, and a whole array of issues that are of common concern which arise from time to time.
The solution I propose would not be easy, but it would be simple and fair:
- All First Nations land claims – currently pending, whether under negotiation or court action, or ones as yet undeclared – would be registered with the AFN. (The AFN would need to make a call for land claim registration, with a firm ‘register-by-date’.)
- In cases of multiple claims over the same land by various Aboriginal groups, the AFN would engage all claimants in constructive negotiations, with full adherence to Native traditions and methods of dispute resolution.
- Once the AFN had resolved conflicting land claims with respect to each other, they would then present all the claims together (though only one claim per one tract of land – or with all the various claims to one tract of land by various parties grouped together for, perhaps, a ‘weighted’ ruling), with all the supporting documentation, to either the Supreme Court of Canada or some special land-claim-resolution judicial court that the AFN, Federal and Provincial/Territorial governments would agree on specifically for this purpose. This Court can then rule on each land claim following a thorough an complete review all of the harmonized land claims and apply uniform criteria when it considers them, ensuring that equal standards are applied in all the cases.
I suspect that this is the only way we could even come close to resolving this issue fairly.
Short of this type of action, I do not see any way to avoid protracted legal quagmire – in perpetuity!
H/T: BCF
Video of the December 3rd 2011 Caledonia arrests
December 7, 2011 — xanthippa
Read the comentary at Voice Of Canada.
This video raises a number of things that I have been wondering about.
For example, the uniformed police officers do not display their badge numbers, making it impossible to identify them. Is this legal? If so, should it remain so?
Another question: what recourse does a population have if a police force either refuses to enforce the laws of the land or enforces illegal orders?
In my never-humble-opinion, the only way an organizational corruption of this scale can be tackled is by holding the individuals within the organization personally responsible for their actions, including holding them personally responsible for following illegal orders to the maximum level the law permits. Yes, this would mean legal action against individual police officers – if not criminal, then civil – even if these police officers are nice individuals. Still, if they follow an illegal order, they must be accountable for this breech of law.
Of course, these are easy words to type and there is a world of difference between writing this and actually doing something about it. Still, one ought to gather as much information first…
So, if you are knowledgable on this topic, please, comment and educate me on the laws, rules and procedures – and any other options legally available. It would be much appreciated.
Because to my way of thinking, this is not a ‘native/non-native’ issue: this is a policing issue and equality before the law issue!
UPDATE: Here is a comment posted by Mark Vandermaas, which, in my neve-humble-opinion, is important enough to bump it into the ‘body’ of the post:
The scary part of Caledonia is that all the organizations, gov’t and NGO, that should have been pro-active in protecting the rights of the innocent were unwilling or unable to help: Human Rights Commission; Ombudsman (wanted to help, but not allowed to get involved in police issues); the Opposition (oh, how we tried); the Federal govt (not only wouldn’t they help Harper annointed Fantino as PC candidate!); the OCCPS (old agency for Police Services Act complaints); Haldimand’s Police Services Board; Haldimand Council (other than former Mayor Trainer); Cdn Civil Liberties Association (repeatedly begged them for help to no avail).
It would be hard to list here everything we tried, but some of the key things that worked well were:
1. Dr. King’s methods of peacefully confronting injustice and forcing them to violate your rights (techniques that he learned from Gandhi to influence the media and the conscience of the nation. When one protests with dignity and is willing to be verbally abused and assaulted without retaliating there is very little defence to this approach. Using it we actually caused the union radicals, anarchists, anti-Israel groups and native militants to curb their violence and aggression because – as one of them said at an anarchist’s conference, we were making THEM look like the racists by applying Dr. King’s methods. Just as King did not demonize whites, we did not demonize native people as a group (the thugs would disagree, of course). We tried our best to ensure people knew that the thugs didn’t speak for the good people of 6N.
2. Civil Lawsuits to a degree. I say that because while there were some important court victories such as the $20M Caledonia Class Action, the Brown-Chatwell settlements and some victories achieved by us via the small claim and superior courts, the fact is that racial policing is still practiced and the gov’t, 6N and the OPP have never apologized or ammended their policies.
3. Private Prosecutions under the CCofC. You know, of course, that Gary M, despite not being a lawyer, convinced the courts to charge 5 individual police officers for offences such as Mischief, Influencing Municipal Official and Obstructing Justice, and even won a case at the Court of Appeal. This has reigned in their abuses quite effectively, but apparently, they still have more to learn.
We’ve tried just about everything during the last 5 years. in the end, it’s not one magic bullet. It’s ordinary people taking advantage of every opportunity when presented and, as Gary says, ‘withstanding the test of time’ (while you’re being vilified, assaulted, and arrested). And…don’t wait for anyone to come to help. But, that’s the wonderful thing! A small group of committed people with no money, no power and no connections really can make a huge difference.
Having said all this, there were some good people who did help and paid a price for doing so. At risk of leaving someone out and inadvertently insulting them, I won’t try to list them. But one guy who doesn’t get enough credit is lawyer John Findlay of the Class Action, a lawyer who represents us in several cases including one where he helped mediate a solution whereby the OPP union finally admitted in writing they had no evidence we were inciting hate and violence. Couldn’t have done it without him.
Sorry to go on so long. Thks for listening.
Readers who want to know more should visit the Caledonia: No More Nightmares page at http://www.HelplessByBlatchford.ca which has videos and notes from our 2011 presentation of the same name in Ottawa – where you and I met. Thanks for being there, and thks for the coverage.
Mark Vandermaas
Editor, VoiceofCanada
Founder, Caledonia Victimis Project
City of Toronto ‘multifaith’ prayer room
November 21, 2011 — xanthippa‘The cab driver was mortified to see that prayer room, it is in no way shape or form inclusive or respectful of others, in fact it’s downright threatening to those who suffered at the hands of Muslims in their countries of origin.’
Living up to the challenge and went to investigate:
Head over to his site and check it out.
Of course, I maintain that prayer – under all circumstances – is demonstrably immoral and offensive and that not a penny of any taxpayer money must be permitted to go to anything even remotely related to religion(s). No publicly funded prayer rooms, no publicly funded preachers and no praying in public. That would avoid this all mess!
In somewhat related news, here is some advice from Mark Vandermaas over at VoiceOfCanada:
‘Our Western countries have become divided states, one part for the radicals and one for the majority of citizenry — and, by virtue of our free and fair society, they are both afforded the same rights.’
And, I know this is a few days old, but: check out women’s rights under Sharia! (And, yes, this is precisely why we must not have a law banning the burka: the moment the state is given the right to legislate how we dress, we are giving up our right and ability to protest against this.)
Feeling Dehydrated? Don’t say that drinking water may be beneficial – in the EU, you could go to jail for that…
November 20, 2011 — xanthippaOK – the idiotcracy that is the EU has been my pet peeve for a long time now.
Having been born in what is now the EU, I ‘get an earful’ about how things went from ‘optimistically enthusiastic’ to ‘pre-WWI-Austrian-bureaucracy-induced-paralysis’ (my great-grand-father lived to almost 100 years of age and he used to tell us, kids, the stories – plus I read ‘The Castle’).
This, however, takes the cake!
According to the EU, after a ‘multi-year-study’ by 21 ‘scientists’, ‘there is no evidence that drinking water may prevent dehydration‘!?!?!
Whom the {insert expletive of choice} are they using as ‘scientists’? The IPCC quacks?
Oh, and if you make a claim to the contrary, you just might face a 2-year jail term…
The EU has systematically stripped away the ability of citizens within the EU zone to affect the laws. The EU bureaucrats have methodically and systematically replaced democratic processes and constitutional civil rights guarantees with bureaucrat-designed-and-implemented rules which, once drafted by the bureaucrats, even the elected members of the EU Parliament are unable to prevent from being enacted: the best they can hope for is to delay the implementation for a few months!
This is yet another glimpse of the disconnect with reality among the ruling bureaucrats and the actual physical world.
Abolish the EU now, IF you still can!!!
And all of us living in North America: we need to increase our vigilance against the NA zone (which would mirror the EU zone), which can be glimpsed in acts such as SOPA….
When reason and the scientific method are thrown out the window are thrown out the window in favour of some ideological ideals (be they religious or secular – it does not matter at this level), it signal the type of corruption which sounds the death-knoll for society and ushers in an era of oppression of individuals in the name of these ideological ideals.
It’s happened before.
It has started again.
Let’s not let it come to fruition!
Xanthippa's Chamberpot 