AGAR: Canadian freedoms at stake if Liberals’ online harms bill passes

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Do we want a Department of Pre Crime; a government that could convict people of possibly, maybe, according to the government, committing a crime in the future?

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I am not making this up.

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The Globe and Mail reported, “Justice Minister Arif Virani has defended a new power in the online harms bill to impose house arrest on someone who is feared to commit a hate crime in the future – even if they have not yet done so already.”

Seriously?

Whose opinion do we value enough to let them decide what the future holds, such that a citizen’s freedom could be taken away?

“The bill would allow people to file complaints to the Canadian Human Rights Commission over what they perceive as hate speech online – including, for example, off-colour jokes by comedians. People found guilty of posting hate speech could have to pay victims up to $20,000 in compensation,” the G&M reports.

What comedian is safe?

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What newspaper editorial, questioning the government, is safe?

How safe are you unless, like the citizens of repressive regimes, you praise the current government and toe the current political line?

I can tell you from personal experience that when I defend female athletes from trans female athletes, some people see that as hate speech on my part.

It is none of my business what adults do with their lives, unless they are harming others. Trans woman athletes are harming biologically female athletes, both physically and in opportunities lost.

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If Bill C63 passes, I am sure the complaints I receive now will ramp up to a complaint that could see me in legal jeopardy. Who comes to the defense of women then, if the government of the day prefers one side of a debatable issue?

The government pushes the bill as one to protect children from harm due to online sexual exploitation. We already have laws against that.

But what Trudeau and company are pushing is a crime omnibus bill, purporting to be about children and protecting people from things like revenge porn.

Buried within are the parts we need to be worried about.

An age old political trick is to hide such government power overreach behind those reasonable child protections, such that if the opposition parties vote against it the government can come out and say, “Our opposition refuses to protect children.”

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It is political gotcha, with our freedoms at stake.

Consider that the government looking for this power over opinion and thought is the same one that unconstitutionally invoked the Emergencies Act, taking away your protected rights, freezing bank accounts and charging people they didn’t like, all over what amounted to noise and parking infringements by a group of truckers with a bouncy castle and a hot tub.

That the whole protest was a local police issue the Ottawa police failed to manage was no reason to trample on the freedom of an entire nation.

If passed, Trudeau will leave that power to whichever government comes next, and we should not think that some government, of any political party, would not use that power to their advantage.

Power corrupts.

Aggressive political argument is far preferable to fear of the government.

Sexual exploitation and advocating violence are already illegal.

Allowing the government to lock up an off-colour comedian or a political opponent is what repressive governments do.

It is not Canadian.

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