Thursday, May 19, 2016

The Thought Police in Canada

Are you feeling so depressed about the current political climate that you were getting ready to move to Canada? If so, think again.

The radical leftist government of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is now proposing to ban what it calls anti-trans hate propaganda. You know what that means. If you should happen to utter a discouraging word about transgendered people, a word that violates the current leftist orthodoxy,  if you believe that they should not be allowed to shower with members of the opposite and state as much in a public forum, the government of liberal Canada will toss you in jail.

Citing the need to make transgender people “feel safe and secure in who they are,” Canada’s Minister of Justice Jody Wilson-Raybould introduced legislation Tuesday that would prohibit discrimination on the basis of “gender identity” or “gender expression” and make anti-transgender “hate propaganda” punishable by up to two years in prison.

The proposed legislation — which was unveiled on the International Day Against Homophobia, Transphobia, and Biphobia — would amend the Canadian Criminal Code to expand existing “hate speech” prohibitions to include any public speech or communication that “promotes hatred” on the basis of “gender identity” or “gender expression.”

Glad to see that the Minister of Justice knows who these transgendered people really are. Because the psychiatric profession begs to differ.

Does anyone seriously believe that the only problem that the transgendered face is that other people are unwilling to treat them as they wish to be treated. Only the most rabid political extremist would imagine that the only obstacle to the happiness of the transgendered is the fact that other people, when looking at them, can see, almost immediately, that they are not what they say they are.

One hastens to jot down these thoughts, because if one were living in Canada under the proposed law one would probably be doing time for having them.


Ignatius Acton Chesterton OCD said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Ares Olympus said...

Let's see:
Wilful promotion of hatred
(b) an offence punishable on summary conviction.

This is confusing what the words reallt means. So for example, if the New York Yankees come into town, if I express hatred for the Yankees who always beat the Minnesota Twins in postseason, I shouted "Down with the Yankees" from the stands during the game, would this quality as serious hatred? Or maybe if the Yankee players all wore pink skirts, then I'd be in legal trouble?

So whatever this means, hopefully they'll clarify. But I'll agree this appeal to the law is a troublesome thing, as Jonathan Haidt summarized from Bradley Campbell and Jason Manning's work.
We argue that the social conditions that promote complaints of oppression and victimization overlap with those that promote case-building attempts to attract third parties. When such social conditions are all present in high degrees, the result is a culture of victimhood in which individuals and groups display high sensitivity to slight, have a tendency to handle conflicts through complaints to third parties, and seek to cultivate an image of being victims who deserve assistance.
C) A Culture of Victimhood
Microaggression complaints have characteristics that put them at odds with both honor and dignity cultures. Honorable people are sensitive to insult, and so they would understand that microaggressions, even if unintentional, are severe offenses that demand a serious response. But honor cultures value unilateral aggression and disparage appeals for help. Public complaints that advertise or even exaggerate one’s own victimization and need for sympathy would be anathema to a person of honor – tantamount to showing that one had no honor at all. Members of a dignity culture, on the other hand, would see no shame in appealing to third parties, but they would not approve of such appeals for minor and merely verbal offenses. Instead they would likely counsel either confronting the offender directly to discuss the issue, or better yet, ignoring the remarks altogether.[p.714-715]


Somehow lines have to be drawn that distinguish between honest and harmless hatred and real threats of violence. The weaker the "crime", the more injustice is likely to come from lawful authority to mediate conflict.

Ignatius Acton Chesterton OCD said...

Happy belated International Day Against Homophobia, Transphobia, and Biphobia!

Did you miss it? Hmmmm... You'd better celebrate... or else.

What shape and color were the piñatas?

Can't wait to read the details and specifics contained in that Canadian legislation. I suspect the scribe will be putting his/her (or either/both) master's degree in creative writing to the ultimate test. Can't wait to see how the nameless, faceless government authorities can MAKE another human being "safe and secure in who they are." Isn't that one of the great challenges of the human condition?

And I am still flummoxed as to how a human being can MAKE another have an emotion. Someone get back to me on that, please. Ares... can you solve this vexing riddle for me?

I just signed up for a June professional conference on Tuesday. The gender choices were male, female or "it's complicated." Needless to say it was not for my application to attend the International Asphalt Pavers Conference.

No, it's not complicated. Your mind makes it complicated. Should I be made subject to the intricate variability of the gyrations of someone else's hopelessly confused mind? Discrimination legislation used to be about immutable characteristics. The genital characteristic central to the transgender movement's concern seem to me to be immutable, despite the transgendered oerson's greatest hopes wants and desires (brutal surgical interventions notwithstanding, followed by a many-fold increase in suicide probability).

Should we be subject to fulfilling the delusions and hallucinations of those in the nearest psychiatric ward, too?

This is all getting crazy. What marginalized group is next in line?

Leo G said...

And this falls right in line with our biggest province, Ontario, about to bring legislation forward, that will force everyone in the province to heat with some form of electricity only. No gas, oil, coal, etc.

We are now approaching the apex of the bell curve in my opinion, and the left cannot/will not look at what awaits them on the other side of that cliff.

Ignatius Acton Chesterton OCD said...

Leo G @May 19, 2016 at 7:19 AM:

What generates the electricity in Ontario? There's no way renewables can make up that kind of demand. I look across Lake St. Clair into Canada (north of Windsor) and there are tons of windmills churning. Are y'all using a lot of nuclear power? Or is it coal?

Ares Olympus said...

IAC, there's a lot of hydroelectric in Ontario. Minnesota even buys some of our hydroelectric from the province for our renewable mandates.

Wow, bored or motivated people on wikipedia seem to have an article on everything! NO coal, but natural gas wins, but for how long?
Natural gas 13,933.3MW
Nuclear 12,900MW
Hydroelectric 8,129.51MW
Wind 1,246.55MW
Biomass 360.5MW

Ares Olympus said...

p.s. Here's something more on target, but oops, ACP just a protest organization against the real AAP, scientifically promoting opinions as facts, to oppose gays rights people defending opinions as facts. Fair's fair.
The American College of Pediatricians (ACPeds) is a small, socially conservative association of pediatricians and other healthcare professionals in the United States. The group was founded in 2002 by a group of pediatricians, including Joseph Zanga, a past president of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), as a protest against the AAP's support for adoption by gay couples.

Sam L. said...

Remember, boys, and girls, and whatever you think you are or may be someday, that mere disagreement, let alone "a discouraging word" is HATE SPEECH FOR WHICH YOU MUST BE PUNISHED. Severely, continuously, and for the rest of your life. DIE, you H8r.

Ignatius Acton Chesterton OCD said...

Ares Olympus @May 19, 2016 at 11:28 AM:

Ares, I've always been fascinated by your concept of fairness. Please, enlighten us all...

priss rules said...

If a man can be a woman, maybe hate can be love.


AesopFan said...

A couple of articles relevant to the subject.

Plus an Article 2 winner from an unexpected source, just to cheer you up --

-- unless they use the guns to protect themselves from us homophobic bigots, of course.

Ares Olympus said...

IAC: Ares, I've always been fascinated by your concept of fairness. Please, enlighten us all...

I think my own serious version of "fair" would fit within the idea of a "Minority report" like the Supreme court. It is troublesome that large professional organization can take controversial stands on issues that don't have 100.0000% unity of opinion.

So rather than creating an internet webpage "college" to express minority opinions with a false authority, it's better to demand minority positions within the larger professional collective organization have a platform and voice to offer their objections or concerns about the majority position.

Scientific truth may not be democratic, but if we're going to "appeal to authority" to confirm what we want to believe, we should at least do it eyes wide open.

Ignatius Acton Chesterton OCD said...

Ares, since you're so concerned about fairness, I'm sure you'll agree that the LGBTQ activist groups will face nowhere near the IRS scrutiny the conservative groups do. And the IRS scandal continues unabated to this day. Maybe you should take a look at that with your eyes wide open, and recognize the horrible precedent it sets for the IRS going forward, since you're so singly concerned about Republican demagoguery.

Ignatius Acton Chesterton OCD said...

Ares, furthermore...

The American Medical Association took a stand in favor of ObamaCare that the majority of its membership was opposed to, and I heard nary a peep about it.

Homosexual "marriage" and transgender accommodations are preposterously silly. They seek not to participate in institutions, but seek to have those institutions conform to their individual needs and desires. Homosexuals are 3.2% of the population, the transgendered figure is 0.34%. 36% of people believe extraterrestrial aliens have visited Earth, and are likely to come back. Should we build affordable housing to house little green men?

When are you and people of your ilk ever going to wake up to the fact that most of your motivation is promotion of anything that is against what the majority of traditional "conservative" America holds dear? When are you going to realize that you can upset other people only so much, until it loses its allure and efficacy? Most conservative Americans I know were not opposed to civil unions, but homosexual activists said that was not enough. Most people don't want to share bathrooms with people who have fluid, fringe proclivities about what gender they are. That's not intolerance, it's standing for a safety risk. Again, if I "identify" as a British person today, should I be allowed to drive my car on the on the "other" side of the road and endanger everyone else's life? Really, what's next? I thought all the Left wanted was freedom to engage in private activity among consenting adults. What if the general public of non-consenting adults refuses to consent to sharing bathrooms with people who are so psychologically dysfunctional that they can't even go to the bathroom assigned to their genitalia?

The Culture War is over, yet the Left is now piling on. At this point, it's bunch of bullies, and their clever smugness is loathsome. I grew up watching movies that featured mean people who would beat up people for no other reason than they were different. Now we have a smarty-pants element of our society that destroys institutions they have no intention, nor interest, in fully participating in. Why? Because they can.

The Left is purely a destructive force, angry and as self-righteous as those they propose to fight.

Shaun F said...

I wasn't aware of this, but it is keeping in line with Trudeau's fascism disguised as liberalism. Glad to see this caveat "other than in private conversation" in the document.