“Man charged with hate crime for
anti-Muslim online material” reads the big bold headline of the story published
at page 5 of the July 25 issue of the Globe and Mail. The alleged offence is
said to have occurred in Mississauga, Ontario.
The man in question is
charged under sub-section 319(2) of the Criminal Code of Canada that reads:”Everyone
who, by communicating statements, other than in private conversation, wilfully
promotes hatred against any identifiable group is
guilty of (a) an
indictable offence and is liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding two
years; or (b) an
offence punishable on summary conviction. In this case, the Peel Regional Police Force that laid
the charge has declined to provide the particulars of the specific facts on
which the charge is based, lest their disclosure jeopardise the investigation or
the court proceedings.
Proceedings under
section 319 cannot be initiated without the prior consent of the Attorney-
General of the Province where the offence occurs.
According to Professor
Richard Moon of the Faculty of Law of the University of Windsor cited in the
story, “The threshold for charging someone with hate speech is extremely
high…very few people have been charged and even fewer have been convicted…the
AGs are sometimes reluctant to give their consent in these cases for a number
of reasons, including if it seems like a hard case to prove or if there is
concern that prosecuting someone might give them a platform to further promote
their hate speech. Clearly someone advising the Attorney General in this case has
made a determination that this case has real merit and that there is a high
likelihood of it succeeding. It is important to realize how exceptional these
prosecutions really are.”
(In parenthesis, with
all due respect to the learned professor, the unstated reasons are far more
important than those cited by the learned professor and I wonder whether he did
cite those reasons and they were censured by the newspaper or whether he took
the politically safe road by refraining from identifying them.)
One has to wonder the
reasons for this peculiar state of affairs. Is it because the enforcement of
the law might reveal the true state of multiculturalism and diversity in this
country? Or, is it because of the profound commitment of the Canadian society to
the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms; in this instance, to the freedom
of speech to the extent that Courts tend to resolve almost any doubt as to whether the accused was
exercising his or her freedom of speech or committing a hate crime, in favour
of free speech. And what of a situation where the freedom of speech conflicts
with another Charter freedom such as the freedom of religion?
At all events, the
bottom line seems to be that law enforcement agencies do not bother to
investigate cases of hate crimes either because the AGs are most reluctant to approve their prosecution, or
because they have no interest in the subject matter; lack the proper
qualifications to investigate them, or worse, tend to share the feelings of the
people denounced for inciting hate towards the minority group in question.
The case at hand, is
part and parcel of the continuing saga of the highly controversial, bitter and
emotionally highly charged opposition
both to the decision of a public school board to approve the practice of
Islam in the premises of its schools for
the Friday prayer and sermon; manner in which
it may be practiced, and to the highly questionable way in which the school board went about to reach its final decision, reversing
its earlier sensible position. The fact that at the end of the day
, the board caved in and granted all of the demands, save an inconsequential
one of no import, of the Muslim groups advocating and the practice of Islam in
the public school system, added further fuel to the fire.
The issue that gave rise to this toxic situation was originally raised
by the demands made by and on behalf of the Muslim students in these schools
beginning in early 2016. As the demands began to be contested by some Muslim
groups as well as groups belonging to other religions, the tone and tenor of
the controversy became increasingly bitter and by the end of the 2016 school
year, the school board after one major flip flop, unable to make up its mind
deferred the final decision to January of this year.
In June 2016, the Premier
made the rather unusual decision in the annals of Cabinet-making, by promoting
a junior member of the Cabinet, holding the junior portfolio of Community
Safety and Correctional Service, to the senior and prestigious post of Attorney-General. The Cabinet
member in question turned out to be a Muslim.
Given the rather
opportunistic track record of the Premier in her dealings with the Muslim
community and the important role she played in the introduction of the practice
of religion into public schools- a role of which she said to be very proud, neither
the promotion nor the religious identity of the new Attorney –General was
surprising.
The decision to
approve the charge in this case was a win- win situation. It will win votes of
the Muslim community for the government staring at the fast approaching general
election. As for the Attorney General, the
approval will spare him from the painful consequences of a refusal to do so, at
the hands of a furious Muslim community.
And, if at the end of
the day, the accused is found “not guilty”, so be it.
Lest I be accused of
bad faith towards the Premier and the Attorney-General; regardless of their
motives in the present case and how the
case may play out, the approval of the proceedings confirms my worst suspicions
that the way the Liberal government plays
its hand with respect to hate crime is tainted by bias based on political opportunism.
And I need not go far
and to search high and low to substantiate my argument. During Premier Wynn’s watch there have been a
fair number of documented cases of Muslim clerics promote and incite hatred towards Jews by reciting before their
congregations, prayers that do that
plainly; , not to mention their prayers
for the jihadists to be victorious against the infidels, Jews and Christians,
and to dispossess them of their lands.
Yet, there is no
evidence, as there is in the present case, that
these hate crimes were investigated, charges were drafted and
submitted to the Attorney-General to secure the requisite approval, despite the existence of adequate evidence of the
commission of such crimes including the one case this year where the culprit admitted having preached the hateful words
that at one point or another would have
been in play after the current
the Attorney-General was in office. .
And so long as
Premier Wynn and the current Attorney General remain in their respective offices,
the probability of prosecuting such hate spewing clerics is close to zero, if
not zero.
In Ontario, when it
comes to anti-Semitic hate, whether in Arab publications or in Muslim prayers,
the enforcement of the hate speech laws, become mirages.
Decidedly, when it
comes to hate speech and writings against Jews in Ontario, one feels like travelling
on a very long and lonely highway without garbage cans. So much for
multiculturalism, diversity being our strength and all that jazz.
Let’s face it, the
Federal and the provincial governments and for that matter, school boards,
university administrations and the mass media, save for the Toronto Sun, are
all fearful of the consequences of going after these clerics or publishing
materials critical of those Muslims who espouse religious ideologies hostile to the
Judeo-Christian civilisation and values of Canada and are hateful towards those
who profess it.
Touting
multiculturalism, equity, diversity and inclusion is their fig leaf and the
passage of Islamophobia motions are their trophies.
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