Toronto Star (August 28, 1996) report. “‘The hate movement has permeated Canadian society. They can be found in all communities, in neighbourhoods and in your own back yard.’ … ‘Hate crime is an insidious cancer that can erode a society,’ Halifax Police Chief Vince MacDonald, who chaired the commitee that wrote the report, told about 175 other officers.” “Periods of economic recession, much like the current situation in Canada, trigger hate group activity, especially white supremacy. Leaders of the racist right heighten levels of xenophobia (the abject fear of strangers and foreigners) because it is their belief that the ‘white race’ is discriminated against the most in Canada. The message is one of economics, i.e. ‘you have no jobs because of those immigrants. We have to protect your right as a white man. … Furthermore, it is the hate groups’ contention that their organizations personify the subconscious beliefs and feelings of the majority of Canadian people.” (p.6) The report is filled with errors.
“Ernst Zundel and James Keegstra (anti-Semites) were charged, the law [Section 318/9] was misunderstood.” (p.17) Ernst Zundel was never charged under Section 319. The charge that dragged him through the courts for nearly a decade was “false news”, since dismissed as unconstitutional by the Supreme Court of Canada. Again,the report libellously dubs Ernst Zundel “the world’s largest distributor of hate literature.” (p.30) It further asserts: “Secret computer hate networks are available to anyone who owns a computer, a modem and a phone line: the electronic hate network is open and uncontrolled.” (p.30) We mustn’t insist on precise meanings for words, but, if these networks are “secret”, how then, can they be “available to anyone”? Further, the report insists: “Canada introduced anti-hate legislation in 1965.” (p.17) The gang that can’t count is only five years off: it was 1970. “Hate groups are presently operating in a public relations mode. They claim they do not hate anyone. The leaders of these groups are educated, articulate and possess excellent public speaking qualities. …
They know how far that can go in relation to the Hate (sic: all spelling and grammar errors are recorded as they appear in this document) propaganda sections of the Canadian Criminal code. The propaganda is very offensive but in a lot of cases it would not contravene the hate propaganda criminal code [sic] section.” (p.7) Well, if that’s true, why does this vile document keep tagging immigration critics with the libel “hate”? These groups haven’t been charged; they haven’t been convicted. Therefore, they are not, under the Criminal Code guilty of promoting “hate”. In a country riddled with Chinese triads and Jamaican posses and inundated with illegals, it seems absurd that the police would be worrying about people who have committed no crime “Organized groups target the recruitment of young people to teach hate. .. Truth mixed with lies are [sic] hammered into the minds of the youth.” (p.8) This wild assertion is backed up with no statistics. If true, why haven’t the perpetrators been charged and convicted? More likely, the truth is that the authors simply don’t like the politics of the groups involved and use the handy label “hate” for what others would simply call political organizing. Knowing that there are really very few “hate crimes”, the police seem desperate to goose up the statistics.
Officers are advised: “It is not always necessary for the responding officer to know if it is a hate crime, suspicion based on one or more of the following considerations is enough to submit a report of a hate crime: … the victim perceived the action of the offender to have been motivated by bias; … there was no appararent provocation or motivation for the incident.” (p.16) That we have a political police in the making, let there be no doubt. Police departments are exhorted to: “Ensure that the appropriate police resources are allocated in order for an efficient police response to hate/bias motivated crimes and hate propaganda charges.” (p.10) The report admits there can be “‘non-criminal’ act(s) of hate/bias, (like) distribution of material deemed offensive by a recipient, yet not within the preview [they probably mean purview ] of Section 319.” (p.27) Well, if it isn’t contrary to the Criminal Code, it isn’t “hate” and the police shouldn’t be wasting valuable resources attacking people’s freedom of speech. Nevertheless, “some successful cases include” a police/comunity/school partnership to deal with “the distribution of hate leaflets,” which the police already admit are not “hate”.
There’s no doubt the authors of the report are slavering for the sort of jail-the-opposition powers that exist in more advanced totalitarian states. “Police officers have often been limited in prosecuting certain offenders due to ineffective legal diction,” the report gripes. (p.17) “It is important that anti-hate legislation satisfy both hate/bias crime victims and law enforcers.” (p.17) Interestingly, there isn’t the slightest recognition that the rights of people to dissent and criticize should also be protected. What do Canada’s KGB-wannabes really want? We reproduce the following. Ungrammatical and confused as it is, it appears to hunger for the power to arrest and charge any member of a group if even one member of the group practises any “racist activity” , which, incidentally, is undefined and not necessarily against the law. The Orwellian document states: “An arresting officer is supported more by legislation that strikes out against racist activity rather than a specifically named ‘hate group’ (in lieu of ‘moral panics’ generated by the rise of the B’nai Brith Canada, have provided a ‘perceived window of opportunity for racist groups to recruit and indoctrinate youth openly,” the report faithfully parrots.
Order this report for $5.00 from CAFE. North Shore News (October 27, 1996) columnist Doug Collins notes: “If this document is anything to go by, ‘hate’ practitioners are always from the right . I saw no mention of violence-prone leftist lunatics like the Anti-Racist Action in Toronto. Nor is there word about the ‘Anti-Fascist League’ that was sending bombs to people [on the right] last year. … To ensure that hate watchers are steered in the right direction, the brief includes a long list of organizations to which people can turn for ‘help’. Unbelievably, Alan Dutton’s leftist lot in B.C. is included.” That’s B.C.’s $723,000-man. Dutton and his now legally de-registered Canadian Anti-Racism Education and Research Society, have pocketed nearly three quarters of a million dollars from several levels of government over the past five years. Oh, yes, and you paid for this blueprint for a police state too. “The resource guide was produced and published with financial assistance by the Multiculturalism Programmes of the Dept. of Canadian Heritage.” That heritage doesn’t include free speech.
Alberta Human Rights Head Pats Self on Back for Shutting Down 3rd Option Meeting
The forces of tyranny are becoming bolder. In a guest column in the Calgary Herald (October 29, 1996), Charlach Mackintosh, chief commissioner of the Alberta Human Rights and Citizenship Commission, boasted of his thought police organization’s “proactive stance” in helping cancel the announced venue for the Third Option Committee’s meeting on constitutional reform in Edmonton, October 19-20. “The commission was able to confirm for the hotel that the organizer and main speaker for this conference were well-known promoters of racism and anti-Semitism. We also informed the hotel that demonstrations, possibly violent ones, could erupt. … The Coast Terrace Inn, then decided to cancel the booking — a decision for which it should be commended.” The Alberta Human Rights Commission held no hearing. The Third Option Committee was allowed no defence or explanation./ They were simply declared guilty and smeared by the taxpayer-funded censors. Ezra Levant, a Jewish law student and outrspoken civil libertarian, hammered the commission, saying they “have violated every precept of civil liberties they were sworn to uphold. Let’s start at the beginning. In the year 1215 there was a little scrap of paper called the Magna Carta. I know that’s all boring ‘dead-white-male’ stuff to the folks over at the commission. So, they probably don’t think it applies to them. But the Magna Carta stood for a basic principle: Rule of law, not rule of man. … Let’s be clear here.
The organizer has never been charged with any crime. He has never been convicted of anything. He’s a free citizen, like you or me, and he signed a contract with the hotel. But the commission had heard of him before. Again, no charges, no convictions, nothing. But they had heard some gossip. … Hang on a second. Spreading hatred against an identifiable group is a crime in Canada. And the organizer has never been charged with this. So, how could the commission get away with defaming him in this way? … Let’s get this straight: There was no investigation. There was no hearing. The organizers of the conference were never allowed to defend themselves against any charge. But the commissioner felt free to smear them, and induce the hotel to break their contract with them, based on unproven whispers.” (Calgary Sun, November 1, 1996)
Dutton Calls on Victoria to Ban Free Speech Group from City Facilities
Doug Christie’s Canadian Free Speech League booked the Broughton Street branch of the Victoria library for a seminar on free speech, October 26. Alan “$725,00” Dutton came with the local press in tow to complain. The consummate hypocrite groused: “‘It really concerns me that taxpayers are subsiziding meetings of this nature in public facilities.
I think the City of Victoria has to understand the importance of not providing access to groups that contribute to the disunity of this country by promoting views that are racist, that oppose immigration and multiculturalism.” (Victoria Times Colonist, October 27, 1996) Michael Peter, former chairman of the Capital Region Race Relations Council, was quoted as slandering the meeting: The league “‘professes to believe in freedom of speech and then uses that as a front to disseminate hate literature.'” Fact: The CFSL has never been charged or convicted of such behaviour.