HELP CAFE — SUPPORT FREE SPEECH

                                        HELP CAFE — SUPPORT FREE SPEECH                                                                                                                                                   

                                          Canadian Association for Free Expression

Box 332,

Rexdale, Ontario, M9W 5L3

Ph: 905-566-4455; FAX: 905-566-4820

Website: http://cafe.nfshost.com

Paul Fromm, B.Ed, M.A. Director

 

Times of Triumph and Challenge for Free Speech in Canada

            It’s been six months since I wrote to you. What a wild time it’s been for freedom of speech in Canada!

 

                Canadians are heading in two different directions. On the one hand, more and more people are speaking up for freedom of speech. Almost every weekend, somewhere in Canada there is a protest against immigration or radical Islam and prominent in these protests are concerns about Motion-103, now before the Commons Heritage Committee. M-103 was a condemnation of Islamophobia by Iqra Khalid, a Pakistani who is a Mississauga Liberal MP. People rightly fear that out of this will come even more restrictions on freedom of speech. On the other hand, a panicking cultural Marxist elite is striking out in all directions trying to suppress criticism of special minorities — Moslems, Jews, the sexually unusual — LGBTQ etc.

 

Ottawa Library Folds & Cancels Showing of Movie Critical of Islamic Invasion of Europe

                Almost every day, it seems, there is a new issue requiring a response from CAFE and very often a timely video on You Tube. We are amassing a growing audience. Just as I sat down to write this letter to you, I was made aware that the cowardly Ottawa Public Library had cancelled a meeting of Act! For Canada because they were going to screen the movie Killing Europe. Chronic busybody Richard Warman, who apparently had not seen the movie, declared it was “hate propaganda”. Needless to say, it has never been the subject of a “hate” charge or a conviction. CAFE quickly sent complaints to the Ottawa Library and provided our list with the contact e-mails of the Board.

 

Thought Control Forces Lose One: Professor Tony Hall Returns to U of Lethbridge

                The day before, we got good news. Professor Tony Hall of the University of Lethbridge was back in the classroom. Changes in provincial law — yes, Rachel Notley has managed to do one thing right — forced the university to cancel its suspension and  BANNING from, campus of Professor Hall. He had criticized Zionism and insisted that there should be open debate on the holocaust. B’nai Brith, one of Canada’s most strident anti-free speech group, howled and Tony Hall, a tenured professor, was banned from campus last year and faces charges before the Alberta Human Rights Commission. CAFE wrote a number of letters supporting him and I know many of you did too.

 

Lindsay Shepherd — Free Speech Heroine

                More good news. A creepy story from Wilfrid Laurier University in Ontario. Lindsay Shepherd is a very brave 22 year old woman. She is a graduate student and was teaching a class in communications. She was talking about the issue where some sexual dysfunctionals insist on being called “zir” or “they” instead of he or her. She played part of a TVO debate between University of Toronto psychologist Prof. Jordan Peterson who opposes such nonsense and another professor who supports the use of these made-up terms. All hell broke loose. Some anonymous student complained. She was hauled before her superiors and, in an interview she recorded, she was denounced as a White supremacist and transphobic. She bravely held her ground even when she was advised — incorrectly — that even screening Professor Peterson’s remarks might be illegal. Her future classes would be monitored by her superiors. She held her ground and insisted universities are places for people to explore and debate ideas and that controversy does not create a ‘”toxic” environment. When her recording went viral on the Internet many people rushed to her defence. The thought police at WLU became a laughingstock. Even leftish papers condemned the university’s behaviour.

 

Some Winnipeg Hotels Won’t Let A Controversial Figure Even Rent a Bedroom: Pyongyang on the Prairies

My recent visit to Winnipeg did not end as well. After two well attended and enthusiastic meetings in Victoria and Regina, I arrived in Winnipeg to discover  I had been the subject of a three day smear in the Winnipeg Free Press. I enclose one of these articles. Typical soap opera journalism, the article is full of name calling and denunciation. You’d have no idea what I believe and am presented mostly in the words of anti-free speech activists. I had booked a suite at the Airport Hilton for the meeting, thus, a bedroom. As long as I am sober, orderly and can pay the bill, they cannot deny me lodging. However, I was met by the manager who told me he would not let me enter. He was backed up some  grotesquely fat East Indian who refused to give his name. When asked for reasons, the manager said “circumstances”. I quickly arranged for another location and started contacting my list. About 20 minutes before the meeting, the second hotel manager said he’d spoken to the police and was throwing me out of the hotel. Friends drove me to two more hotels. As soon as I presented my ID, they refused to let me stay. The bald bouncer-like night manager with an ear ring of the Assiniboine  hotel said he “had a bad gut feeling” about me. Clearly, they had been contacted by people high up — we suspect the police — and ordered to violate my civil rights. I am consulting a lawyer and am planning to take action. However, the publicity won us three new supporters who read through the garbage. Because of Donald Trump increasing number of people see the media as liars and purveyors of fake news.

 

Democracy in Ontario:  Uninvited to Testify to Legislative Committee

                On October 10, I learned that the Ontario Legislature was expediting passage of Bill 63 — a draconian measure that would create 150-metre bubble zones  around abortion clinics or abortion providers’ residences. Displaying any sign, slogan even a facial gesture critical of abortion within this zone could result in 6 months in prison or a $10,000 fine. This was definitely a free speech issue, I thought. I called the Legislature and registered for a spot at 2:15 on October 12. That was the only day for the hearings. Meanwhile enemies of free speech and open debate like Warren Kinsella sent protests to the Legislature. The morning of the hearing, the clerk advised me that the committee had voted unanimously — and that included the Tories — NOT to hear me. We circulated our brief anyway.

 

Prior Restraint: Toronto Public Library Bans Victor Fletcher Meeting

            Joining the thought control crew is the Toronto Public Library. They refused to let us book their facilities to host Toronto Street News publisher Victor Fletcher in October. Toronto Street News is a publication that looks at conspiracies and has since 1999. Given the history of the individual and group involved in the booking and the publication being discussed, Library staff believe that the booking could lead to a violation of hate speech legislation and a violation of the provisions of the Library‘s Rules of Conduct. The Library cannot allow its facilities to be used to support such activities and we have, therefore, denied the booking on these grounds.” Libraries have often stood bravely for making controversial views available to the public. Not any more. One can only argue from past behaviour. Neither the meeting’s sponsor nor Mr. Fletcher nor his paper has ever been charged, much less convicted, under Sec. 319 — Canada’s ‘hate’ laws. I will be appearing at the December 11 meeting of the Toronto Library Board as a delegation to protest.

 

YOUR WARD NEWS Postal Ban Review Continues

                The review as to whether Judy Foote had reasonable grounds to issue the Interim  Prohibitory Order, banning YOUR WARD NEWS editor Dr. James Sears and publisher Leroy St. Germaine from sending mail — any mail — in Canada resumes today. CAFE is taking an active role and will continue to do so. On November 2, the Committee issued a series of preliminary rulings. First, they decided that the minister had not provided reasons for her decision. They also ruled they could consider the constitutionality of both the minister’s arbitrary actions and of those sections of the Canada Post Corporation Act itself. More hearings will be held.


 

YOUR WARD NEWS Charged With “Hate”

                After several years of fevered agitation, especially by Jewish censorship groups like the League for Human Rights of B’nai Brith and the Friends of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre, with active assistance from anti-free speech meddlers like Warren Kinsella and Richard Warman, the Moslem Attorney General of Ontario Yasir Naqvi — he comes from a country (Pakistan) that doesn’t much value free speech — laid his second “hate law” charge in six months. The victims this time, Dr. James Sears and Leroy St. Germaine, publisher of YOUR WARD NEWS. This is going to be an important battle and CAFE is already on board as an active participant in the defence. Dr. Sears intends to challenge the constitutionality of Sec. 319 as well. Prune face Canada is actually charging a satirical paper for making people laugh. Our grim guts rulers would fit right in with the tyrants in Pyongyang.

 

                The Evangelist versus the Transgendered: Whatcott Human Rights Tribunal — The Opening Shots

                Across the country in Vancouver the hearing of the British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal into a complaint by Ronan Auger who says he is transgendered against evangelist Bill Whatcott for critical leaflets he distributed during last May’s provincial election is still in its preliminary stages. We are supporting Mr. Whatcott’s motion to dismiss this complaint as frivolous and petty. CAFE also  supported the successful application of the Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms to join us as an intervenor supporting Mr. Whatcott’s rights of freedom of speech and freedom of religion.

 

                Indeed, a very busy Fall. All of this takes money and, as always, we must rely on you. Please help Christmas to arrive early for CAFE and send us your most generous support to continue to make all this possible. We are at a dangerous crossroads in Canada with many people speaking out against our suicidal immigration policies and in defence of free speech. But, equally those trying to change our country beyond recognition and impose diversity and special rights for privileged minorities are desperate and dangerous as they try to squelch those who speak up. More than ever, CAFE’s work is vital.

                Merry Christmas! my fellow truth seeker  and friend of free speech,

 

                Paul Fromm, Director

CAFE, Box 332, Rexdale, Ontario, M9W 5L3

___  Here’s my special donation of _____  to help  CAFE fund its interventions in the YOUR WARD NEWS  case (denial of mailing rights and now “hate law” charges).

__   Here’s my donation of ____to help CAFÉ’s support the victims of state censorship, and to produce more timely You Tube videos in this age of Internet alternative media.

__  Please renew my subscription for 2018 to the Free Speech Monitor ($15).

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Free speech supporters kicked out of a Toronto library

Free speech supporters kicked out of a Toronto library

Retreat from free speech and presentation of many ideas
 
Toronto Public Library won’t allow a meeting featuring conspiracy authority and publisher Victor Fletcher (TORONTO STREET NEWS)
 
Image may contain: 2 people
 
 
Paul Fromm is the Director, Canadian Association for Free…
YOUTUBE.COM

YOU OWE US AN APOLOGY

YOU OWE US AN APOLOGY

Canadian Association for Free Expression

Box 332,

Rexdale, Ontario, M9W 5L3

Ph: 905-566-4455; FAX: 905-566-4820

Website: http://cafe.nfshost.com

Paul Fromm, B.Ed, M.A. Director

Liz Braun, Columnist,  lbraun@postmedia.com

TORONTO SUN

Dear Ms, Braun:

Your article “Don’t Blame Library for Hate Gathering” (Toronto Sun, July 13, 2017) is a disgrace. Of course, I agree with your conclusion that the library should not discriminate among various political or historical views.

However, you heap defamation and smears on the attendees at the Memorial for lawyer Barbara Kuazska. First, you were not there. You are relying on conjecture or, worse, the lies of mortal enemies of freedom of speech.

Your headline is a lie. The memorial was NOT a “hate” gathering. Hate, sadly is a criminal offence in this country. No one at that meeting was charged let alone convicted for anything said that night. The meeting was to celebrate the life of a brave diligent woman. It wasn’t about hating anybody.

You describe the attendees as ” pathetic anti-Semitic/anti-black/anti-female/homophobic/Islamophobic/etc. garden variety bigots” Nothing at the meeting was said criticizing  Blacks, women,  homosexuals or Moslems. Indeed we were honouring a woman!

As for Jews, the truth is that major Jewish lobby groups (Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs, Friends of the Simon Weisenthal Centre, and former Canadian Jewish Congress spokesman Bernie Farber) were in the forefront of those trying to arm-twist politicians and the library into cancelling the memorial.  We know many Jews support free speech but these official free speech haters give the Jewish community a bad name.

Too bad you were not there, Liz. You might have seen several coloured folks in our ranks honouring Barbara Kulazska. I suppose they were White supremacists too!

The Sun owes us an apology and its readers the truth.

Paul Fromm

Director

CANADIAN ASSOCIATION FOR FREE EXPRESSION

Don’t Blame Library For Hate Gathering

by Liz Braun, The Toronto Sun

July 13, 2017

http://www.torontosun.com/2017/07/13/toronto-public-library-reviewing-policy-after-event-with-ties-to-racist-groups

Don’t blame library for hate gathering

www.torontosun.com

The city is up in arms over a memorial held Wednesday for a lawyer whose name was synonymous with hate groups.

TORONTO – The city is up in arms over a memorial held Wednesday for a lawyer whose name was synonymous with hate groups.

The usual suspects — white supremacist types Paul Fromm and Marc Lemire — gathered at Richview Library in Etobicoke to honour Barbara Kulaszka, who provided counsel over the years to Holocaust denier Ernst Zundel, Nazi rocket scientist Arthur Rudolph, accused war criminal Imre Finta and others of that ilk.

Kulaszka’s thing was freedom of speech cases; it is a widely held view that she was philosophically on-side with many of her clients.

At any rate, people were aghast, and rightly so, that any such meeting of hate-mongers was permitted at a branch of the library. Advocacy groups (such as the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs) were outraged that persons with known neo-Nazi ties were allowed to book space at the library, and even the mayor waded into the controversy saying he was “deeply concerned” by the gathering.

As a result, the Toronto Public Library says they will be reviewing their policy. They did not endorse the event, a library spokesman said, but they were legally unable to get out of it.

Let’s be honest here. The person who rented this space for Kulaszka’s memorial probably had no idea who and what was involved. A group of old white people? That could be anybody in that part of Etobicoke. These pathetic anti-Semitic/anti-black/anti-female/homophobic/Islamophobic/etc. garden variety bigots could only raise 25 people to gather on behalf of Kulaszka, and far more of them codgers than boogie men.

Could we please not blame the library? The libraries in our fair city are increasingly the drop-in-centres-of-last-resort, trying to keep the world literate even as they deteriorate into ad hoc old folks’ homes, psychiatric waystations, homeless shelters and day-care alternatives. Libraries are among the few places left where those on the fringes of society may freely enter, and that’s what happened Wednesday night when a group of old nutcase hate advocates gathered to swap yarns of fear and ignorance.

As we enter a new dark ages, racism and hatred are on the rise globally, fuelled by stupidity and liberated by the anonymity of social media. And those who gathered on behalf of Kulaszka are representative of all that, but the library is not responsible.

Wayne Sumner, a University of Toronto professor emeritus specializing in ethics and freedom of expression, has already said that the library did well to err on the side of free speech. He told CP that barring such events as the memorial, “raises disturbing possibilities of picking and choosing among points of view and what sort of speech is allowed and what sort of speech is not.”

If things deteriorate into hate speech? That’s a police matter, said Sumner, not a library issue.

The library did its best by having a staff member monitor the meeting.

This led one memorial attendant — who wished to remain anonymous, as these sad-sacks always do — to complain that there was a spy in their midst.

“What kind of country are we living in?” she asked, to which a librarian might have answered, “The kind in which people know their history, particularly if it involves book burning.”

 

Liz Braun, Toronto Sun

 

lbraun@postmedia.com

 

Outrage over group’s use of Toronto library threatens freedom of speech

Outrage over group’s use of Toronto library threatens freedom of speech

The Globe and Mail

Free speech is the cardinal right – the right that underpins all others. Yet how casually we brush it aside.

This week in Toronto, a small group held a memorial service at a public library branch for a lawyer who had defended Holocaust deniers and other figures on Canada’s far-right fringe. Spokesmen for Jewish groups said they were outraged that the Toronto Public Library would provide a platform for such a gathering. Mayor John Tory was “deeply concerned.” Members of city council said they were shocked. “Those tied to hate and bigotry have no place in our libraries,” Councillor James Pasternak said.

They seemed entirely oblivious to the threat to freedom of expression. If the library takes it upon itself to decide who has the right to speak, where does it end? If it denies space to a far-right group, what happens when a far-left group comes along? What would it say to the many Canadians who suffered under communism if someone who denies the crimes of Stalin or Mao wanted to hold an event and was denied? What would it say to Toronto’s large Tamil community if extreme Sinhalese nationalists were not permitted to hold a study meeting at the library about the crushing of the Tamil separatist movement in Sri Lanka?

Opinion: We need to protect free speech on campus

It is precisely to avoid making these judgments that the library takes a neutral approach to those who book its spaces. It doesn’t demand to vet their opinions in advance. As long as they follow basic rules of conduct, they get the space. So it is absurd to suggest that the library is somehow endorsing or countenancing the views of those who held this week’s memorial.

Critics of the event seem especially upset that it took place in a “public space,” under the roof of a publicly funded institution. It is not hard to see where that dangerous argument could lead. If people whose opinions are deemed beyond the pale are to be kept out of the public libraries, why not the public parks, the public squares, the public streets? Who gives them the right, some might say, to wave their nasty placards where all can see, or publish their rank opinions where all can read? Surely public spaces are where free speech, however outrageous or obnoxious, should be allowed to flourish. That is the principle behind the famous Speakers’ Corner in London’s Hyde Park, where people of every opinion and background get the chance to sound off in public. No one says that because the authorities allow it they are giving their stamp of approval to what is said.

Libraries, in particular, should be havens for free expression. They are the places citizens go to learn about the world in all its complexity. Librarians are always facing pressure from one group or another to ban books that they say might corrupt morals or spread hate. They are right to fend off such attempts. Librarians are guides to the world of knowledge, not arbiters of it. They should be equally impartial about who meets in library spaces.

Banning objectionable speech short of direct incitement to violence is always a mistake. Those who object to this week’s event and gatherings like it have other ways to respond. One is to protest. If a hate group holds a rally, hold a rally condemning hate and praising tolerance. Another is to correct. When deniers spout nonsense about how many died or didn’t die in the Holocaust, fight back with the undeniable facts.

The last option – perhaps the best when it comes to the tiny, miserable group of cranks who are Canada’s white nationalists and Holocaust deniers – is simply to turn away. They feed on publicity like this week’s fuss. Instead of fulminating against them or attacking the library for giving them space, ignore them. They don’t deserve even a minute of our time, much less all the air time and headline space they got this week.

No matter how we choose to respond to offensive opinions, it is important to remember the danger of suppressing them. Even in a blessed place such as Canada – a strong, stable democracy with a respected Charter of Rights and Freedoms – freedom of speech can be a fragile thing. We saw that just recently, when three editors left their jobs after an angry pile-on over the complicated issue of cultural appropriation.

In a 1945 essay on free speech and the profusion of it in Hyde Park, George Orwell wrote: “The relative freedom which we enjoy depends on public opinion. The law is no protection. Governments make laws, but whether they are carried out, and how the police behave, depends on the general temper of the country. If large numbers of people are interested in freedom of speech, there will be freedom of speech, even if the law forbids it; if public opinion is sluggish, inconvenient minorities will be persecuted, even if laws exist to protect them.”

On the evidence of the library affair and other events lately, public opinion in the Canada of 2017 is sluggish indeed.