Yes, that is what we need…expanded powers for the HRCs
April 21, 2008
Just insane. Recommendations for how the can be improved include the following:
- ‘hate incident’ means any act or omission, whether criminal or not, that expresses bias, prejudice, bigotry or contempt toward a vulnerable or disadvantaged community or its members. A ‘vulnerable or disadvantaged community’ is any group or community identified as such on the basis of characteristics protected by the Criminal Code of Canada, the Canadian Human Rights Act, the Ontario Human Rights Code, or Section 15(1) of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms [Charter]
When I read this, I can’t help but think that it means that one could potentially be hauled before a human rights commission not for the crime of articulating a racist sentiment, but for not speaking out against racist speech that one happens to overhear…even though deciding to let the bigot waste his breath, and to not dignify his words with a response, is not a crime.
Perhaps I am being paranoid. Then, again, I re-read the above statement and wonder how exactly “any act or omission, whether criminal or not” is a criteria set to which there is any notable exception.
We come, yet again, several steps closer to the day when we may all yet be under the gun of the HRCs. Except they won’t literally have guns, because progressives hate those.
Update: Welcome, Steynians!
