Trudeau Popularity - or not (various polling, etc.)

[YZT580]

Freedom of speech is a human right. Not something defined by man. As soon as you put parameters on it, it isn't free. When you deny someone their voice, through coercion or extortion, it isn't free.

are we targeting the wrong issue then? I agree that one should be able to express what he believes and in those words be trying to persuade others to think as he does. At least I agree in theory but what happens when those words are aimed at endangering another group i.e. ***** are vermin and you should bury them all six feet under. If you are a persuasive speaker as in Adolf Hitler you might soon have a large following who are indeed marching to put our *****group six feet under. And it was all started by speech. Would it be better to change the offence to aiding or encouraging a criminal act and forget the speech bit entirely?

 

[rmc_wannabe]

Freedom of speech is a human right. Not something defined by man. As soon as you put parameters on it, it isn't free. When you deny someone their voice, through coercion or extortion, it isn't free.

Don't conflate freedom with free will.

Humanity, by existence or providence, has developed cognitive abilities no other species has. This has allowed us to think, communicate, and act outside of biological necessity (often at times to our detriment). I have free will to think, say, and act how I choose. If that happens to be thinking I'm the Angel of Death, coming to rid the world of Gingers, shouting as much on a street corner, wearing a purple G-String... so be it. I am exercising free will.

In the example above, my freedom to do so is severely restricted by the laws we as a society have collectively agreed upon, through democratic exercise. For good reason too, because who wants to live in that kind of anarchy? Even the most libertarian of the bunch would be pressed to want that level of anarchy.

The same applies to freedom of speech or expression. The First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution is extremely vague in how this applies, and wouldnt you know it their judiciary has had to rule on countless cases to clarify the matter. Our Charter, drafted some 200 years later, had the convenience of learning from their mistakes experience.

Section 1 identifies the need for restraint in a civil and just society to limit that "free will" to do anything you want, with the need to simultaneously protect the individual from the collective and vice versa.

 

[Brad Sallows]

Our Charter, drafted some 200 years later, had the convenience of learning from their mistakes experience.

We didn't learn. They were smart enough to put limits on governments that would be (are, to judge from the constant whinging) hard to overcome. We wrote in superhighway loopholes. The main point of a constitution is to put guardrails around government, and we failed. I suppose it's what we deserve for only allowing a short time for deliberation and having entirely too many active politicians in the mix (never long-term thinkers at the best of times).

 

[Jarnhamar]

This is more for cases where it’s believed that someone is going to commit hate-motivated violence, or promote incitement of hatred/genocide. I struggle to imagine this being something that could be used very often.

For comparison, the most restrictive terrorism peace bond I’ve been able to find has been for GPS monitoring. I can’t find any case where the house arrest provisions have ever been used even in terrorism files, and even where there has already been a conviction and a sentence is expiring with the person still believed to be a threat. That gives a sense of what courts and prosecutors actually look at with the peace bond powers.

Thanks for the thorough insights.


Based off the threat of terrorisim having such a high bar, the government must think there's a pretty huge threat out there to need this brought in.

 

[Fishbone Jones]

are we targeting the wrong issue then? I agree that one should be able to express what he believes and in those words be trying to persuade others to think as he does. At least I agree in theory but what happens when those words are aimed at endangering another group i.e. ***** are vermin and you should bury them all six feet under. If you are a persuasive speaker as in Adolf Hitler you might soon have a large following who are indeed marching to put our *****group six feet under. And it was all started by speech. Would it be better to change the offence to aiding or encouraging a criminal act and forget the speech bit entirely?

You mean like the pro Palistine parades that everyone ignores? What is the difference between them and the Third Reich? If you are going to ignore the rules for one group over another, why limit the speech in the first place?

 

[Fishbone Jones]

Don't conflate freedom with free will.

Humanity, by existence or providence, has developed cognitive abilities no other species has. This has allowed us to think, communicate, and act outside of biological necessity (often at times to our detriment). I have free will to think, say, and act how I choose. If that happens to be thinking I'm the Angel of Death, coming to rid the world of Gingers, shouting as much on a street corner, wearing a purple G-String... so be it. I am exercising free will.

In the example above, my freedom to do so is severely restricted by the laws we as a society have collectively agreed upon, through democratic exercise. For good reason too, because who wants to live in that kind of anarchy? Even the most libertarian of the bunch would be pressed to want that level of anarchy.

The same applies to freedom of speech or expression. The First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution is extremely vague in how this applies, and wouldnt you know it their judiciary has had to rule on countless cases to clarify the matter. Our Charter, drafted some 200 years later, had the convenience of learning from their mistakes experience.

Section 1 identifies the need for restraint in a civil and just society to limit that "free will" to do anything you want, with the need to simultaneously protect the individual from the collective and vice versa.

Put out all the qualifiers you wish into your reasoning. I don't agree with your hypothesis, or word splitting.

Plain and simple, Free speech has no limits. Otherwise it isn't free. If you're worried about someone going off the deep end, deal with the crime, not the idea.

 

[Kirkhill]

The Grand Mufti of Jerusalem and Hitler.

What Hitler and the Grand Mufti Really Said

The conversation didn't happen the way Benjamin Netanyahu said, but it still sheds light on a historical moment

time.com

The timing of the meeting is critical to understanding it and placing it in context. In late November 1941, as World War II continued, German troops had besieged Leningrad and had reached the outskirts of Moscow. A great many observers all over the world had expected the USSR to have collapsed under the weight of the attack Hitler had unleashed that June, and it was not yet clear that Germany was not about to defeat the Soviet Union. Equally importantly, although the negotiations between the United States and Japan that were designed to preserve peace in the Pacific seemed about to fail, the United States was not yet in the war. When Hitler and al-Husseini met, both leaders clearly believed that Germany was going to win, and the bulk of their conversation dealt with what the Arabs should or should not do help bring that outcome about.

Al-Husseini began the conversation by declaring that the Germans and the Arabs had the same enemies: “the English, the Jews, and the Communists.” He proposed an Arab revolt all across the Middle East to fight the Jews; the English, who still ruled Palestine and controlled Iraq and Egypt; and even the French, who controlled Syria and Lebanon. (The British had secured a mandate for Palestine at the Paris peace conference in 1919, and made halting attempts to create a “Jewish national home” there without prejudicing the rights of the Arab population.) He also wanted to form an Arab legion, using Arab prisoners from the French Empire who were then POWs inside Germany. He also asked Hitler to declare publicly, as the German government had privately, that it favored “the elimination of the Jewish national home” in Palestine.

Netanyahu uttered a half-truth when he referred to Hitler’s supposed desire to expel, rather than murder, the Jews. That had indeed been the policy of the German government at least until 1938. Hitler’s reply to Al-Husseini on November 28, however, confirmed that this policy was already a thing of the past before that meeting.

A great deal of evidence indicates that the decision to murder all the Jews of Europe had been taken sometime during the prior six months. The implementation of the policy, indeed, had begun immediately after the invasion of the USSR on June 22, when Einsatzgruppen squads began rounding up and shooting Jews by the thousands as troops advanced into the USSR. On July 31, Reinhard Heydrich of the SS had received a directive to prepare “the total solution of the Jewish question,” The construction of death camps in Poland had already begun, and Heydrich had already sent out invitations for the Wansee Conference, the meeting of high German officials from all involved ministries, that discussed the implementation of the “Final Solution” when it convened in January. Hitler’s reply to Husseini reflects all these decisions and measures.

Though al-Husseini asked for it, Hitler did not want an Arab revolt, at least not yet, as he did not expect one to succeed. He promised that it could be undertaken after further advances into the USSR, and through the Caucasus. But Germany’s “fundamental attitude,” he said, “was clear: Germany stood for uncompromising war against the Jews,” including, obviously, the “national home” in Palestine. “Germany,” he continued, “was at the present time engaged in a life and death struggle with two citadels of Jewish power: Great Britain and Soviet Russia.” Ideologically the war was “a battle between National Socialism and the Jews,” and Germany would of course help others involved in this “war of survival or destruction.” And Germany, Hitler said—in an unusually frank statement of what was about to happen—“was resolved, step by step, to ask one European nation after the other to solve its Jewish problem, and at the proper time to direct a similar appeal to non-European nations as well.”

Hitler and the Mufti vs Churchill, Stalin and the Rothschilds, or as it was often framed, the Masons, the Communists and the Jews - and London was the epicentre. It still is. Along with the Anglosphere.

Amin al-Husseini - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Arab Ba'ath Movement - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Muslim Brotherhood - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

The corporatists lost. The liberal democracies and the communists won. The liberal democracies established the UN. The UN established Israel. Islam has not forgotten that. Nor has it forgotten the betrayal of Islam by Kemal Ataturk.

 

[brihard]

Put out all the qualifiers you wish into your reasoning. I don't agree with your hypothesis, or word splitting.

Plain and simple, Free speech has no limits. Otherwise it isn't free. If you're worried about someone going off the deep end, deal with the crime, not the idea.

Slander? Libel? Threats? Perjury? Counseling someone else to commit a crime? Surely you’re not actually taking a 100% absolutist stance that there ought be no legal constraints on expression whatsoever?

 

[YZT580]

We didn't learn. They were smart enough to put limits on governments that would be (are, to judge from the constant whinging) hard to overcome. We wrote in superhighway loopholes. The main point of a constitution is to put guardrails around government, and we failed. I suppose it's what we deserve for only allowing a short time for deliberation and having entirely too many active politicians in the mix (never long-term thinkers at the best of times).

ours was written by a group enamored with french law and headed by Pierre, a man with no respect for English common law.

 

[Fishbone Jones]

Slander? Libel? Threats? Perjury? Counseling someone else to commit a crime? Surely you’re not actually taking a 100% absolutist stance that there ought be no legal constraints on expression whatsoever?

Prosecute the crime. Slander, libel, threats, perjury are crimes. Until they cross that line it's only words.

Freedom of speech is not a licence to lie or to commit crimes against another. The same as any other true right, you don't abuse it.

 

[Lumber]

Plain and simple, Free speech has no limits. Otherwise it isn't free. If you're worried about someone going off the deep end, deal with the crime, not the idea.

Do you have any idea just how many limits there already are on "speech" and "expression" in Canada? Free speech absolutely has HUGE limits on it within even the most liberal western nations.

 

[Fishbone Jones]

ours was written by a group enamored with french law and headed by Pierre, a man with no respect for English common law.

Or democracy.

 

[Lumber]

Prosecute the crime. Slander, libel, threats, perjury are crimes. Until they cross that line it's only words.

Ok, so speech has no limits unless we define a particular speech as a crime... how's that not a "limit"? Crime are nothing more than "limits" on peoples actions that are decided and agreed upon by people.

 

[brihard]

Prosecute the crime. Slander, libel, threats, perjury are crimes. Until they cross that line it's only words.

Ok, so through the legislative process, some expressions can be deemed criminal then.

What’s your stance on the existing Criminal Code Ss. 318 and 319, advocating genocide, and willful promotion or incitement of hatred?

 

[YZT580]

You mean like the pro Palistine parades that everyone ignores? What is the difference between them and the Third Reich? If you are going to ignore the rules for one group over another, why limit the speech in the first place?

that is sort of the way my mind was wandering but standing up and yelling nasty things is not the same as taking a Molotov cocktail to a synagogue. If my words inspire you to burn down a church then I should be charged with assisting or instigating arson: not with a hate speech crime. My speech would then become evidence against me but not because of the act of speaking itself but because those words implied intent.

 

[Fishbone Jones]

Ok, so through the legislative process, some expressions can be deemed criminal then.

What’s your stance on the existing Criminal Code Ss. 318 and 319, advocating genocide, and willful promotion or incitement of hatred?

I don't know. You could always ask the pro Palestine bunch, or the Crown, why they aren't being prosecuted for those exact crimes. Are laws that are not prosecuted really laws? Why are they free to advocate genocide but nobody else is?

 

[brihard]

I don't know. You could always ask the pro Palestine bunch, or the Crown, why they aren't being prosecuted for those exact crimes. Are laws that are not prosecuted really laws? Why are they free to advocate genocide but nobody else is?

They’re not here; I’m trying to flesh out your view, because for a few minutes it seemed like free speech absolutism but you seem to have stepped back a bit from that and conceded there’s some middle ground.

Our promotion of hatred laws have been tested the most by antisemitism; Keegstra was an antisemite whose case went to the SCC and saw the promotion of hatred charge upheld. There’s been at least one promotion of hatred charge out of Montreal after October 7th, for someone accused of promoting hate against Jews.

These laws have never been used frequently, but they are used, including in at least that one case since the Hamas attack on Israel.

 

[Fishbone Jones]

that is sort of the way my mind was wandering but standing up and yelling nasty things is not the same as taking a Molotov cocktail to a synagogue. If my words inspire you to burn down a church then I should be charged with assisting or instigating arson: not with a hate speech crime. My speech would then become evidence against me but not because of the act of speaking itself but because those words implied intent.

If the godfather says 'Send Sammy to sleep with the fishes' is it a crime? Or does it become a crime when the barrel goes overboard?

 

[Lumber]

I don't know. You could always ask the pro Palestine bunch, or the Crown, why they aren't being prosecuted for those exact crimes. Are laws that are not prosecuted really laws? Why are they free to advocate genocide but nobody else is?

They’re not here; I’m trying to flesh out your view, because for a few minutes it seemed like free speech absolutism but you seem to have stepped back a bit from that and conceded there’s some middle ground.

Our promotion of hatred laws have been tested the most by antisemitism; Keegstra was an antisemite whose case went to the SCC and saw the promotion of hatred charge upheld. There’s been at least one promotion of hatred charge out of Montreal after October 7th, for someone accused of promoting hate against Jews.

These laws have never been used frequently, but they are used, including in at least that one case since the Hamas attack on Israel.

What's good for the goose is good for the gander, @Fishbone, and I suggest you let that one marinate!

 

[Fishbone Jones]

They’re not here; I’m trying to flesh out your view, because for a few minutes it seemed like free speech absolutism but you seem to have stepped back a bit from that and conceded there’s some middle ground.

Our promotion of hatred laws have been tested the most by antisemitism; Keegstra was an antisemite whose case went to the SCC and saw the promotion of hatred charge upheld. There’s been at least one promotion of hatred charge out of Montreal after October 7th, for someone accused of promoting hate against Jews.

These laws have never been used frequently, but they are used, including in at least that one case since the Hamas attack on Israel.

They are here. Who is organizing all the protests? Supplying the flags and banners? Creating the slogans? Why are these anti Semitic parades still allowed?