{"id":289,"date":"2013-05-10T20:26:13","date_gmt":"2013-05-11T00:26:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cafe.nfshost.com\/?p=289"},"modified":"2013-05-10T20:26:13","modified_gmt":"2013-05-11T00:26:13","slug":"my-memories-of-douglas-hewson-christie","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cafe.nfshost.com\/?p=289","title":{"rendered":"My Memories of Douglas Hewson Christie"},"content":{"rendered":"

My Memories of Douglas Hewson Christie<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

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I remember when I first\u00a0 met Doug Christie.\u00a0 In was in late January or February, 1986 at\u00a0 a meeting in Toronto.\u00a0 At the time the Zundel and Keegstra cases\u00a0 were still in the news.\u00a0 I had read about Doug in both the mainstream\u00a0 press and in the \u201cunderground right-wing\u201d newsletters.\u00a0 What\u00a0 immediately struck me about him as he spoke was his air of authority.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 By \u201cair of authority\u201d I do not mean that Doug was arrogant, in fact\u00a0 far from that.\u00a0 When he spoke, either to a formal audience or when\u00a0 he spoke informally to you one could tell that he was someone who knew\u00a0 what he was talking about.\u00a0 His warnings about the threats to free\u00a0 speech were very convincing and prophetic.\u00a0 His answers to people\u2019s\u00a0 questions were always precise and to the point.\u00a0 Friends and relatives\u00a0 who I later brought to these meetings, some of whom had little knowledge\u00a0 about Doug, also made this same observation.\u00a0 I can only regret\u00a0 that I never got to witness him at first hand in the courtrooms.\u00a0\u00a0 I can only guess that the opposition were shaking in their boots each\u00a0 time he would get up to speak.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

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When I moved out to\u00a0 Victoria, BC, in the early 1990s I would see more of Doug Christie.\u00a0\u00a0 I joined the work party group who often gathered at his house on Townsend\u00a0 Road in Saanich.\u00a0 After we stuffed the envelopes with The Friends of Freedom and The Western\u00a0 Separatist Papers newsletters we would sit down for drinks and\u00a0 snacks and to listen to Doug\u2019s latest situation reports.\u00a0 As\u00a0 with my first impressions, Doug continued to display his grasp of the\u00a0 situations whether concerning his court cases, or about provincial,\u00a0 national and international politics and even local Victoria politics.\u00a0\u00a0 The group that gathered monthly at the Christie homestead were varied\u00a0 in their ethnic and religious backgrounds.\u00a0 There were Germans\u00a0 and eastern and central Europeans as well as those of English and Scots\u00a0 and Irish background like myself.\u00a0 There were Roman Catholics like\u00a0 Doug and Protestants like myself.\u00a0 Some were members of the Western\u00a0 Canada Concept and others might have been called \u201csoft separatists.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0 Whatever our differences we were united in our convictions for free\u00a0 speech and for integrity in government.\"\"<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

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There were occasions\u00a0 when taking our stands meant violent opposition and adverse press coverage.\u00a0\u00a0 I well remember the night at the 1992 Orwell Dinner when the Victoria\u00a0 Police raided the downtown Chinese restaurant and arrested English historian\u00a0 David Irving.\u00a0 We all followed Doug to the police station and held\u00a0 an impromptu protest which made the front page of The [Victoria] Times-Colonist the next morning.\u00a0 When driving along Blanchard\u00a0 Street I would look at Doug\u2019s vandalized downtown office with the\u00a0 graffiti: KILL CAUSE!\u00a0 In the late 1990s I remember those meetings\u00a0 where gangs of leftists harassed people and tried to obstruct them from\u00a0 entering public libraries to hear Paul Fromm, Doug Christie and\/or that\u00a0 other Doug, Doug Collins.\u00a0 Our little group persevered.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

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Doug\u2019s activism involved\u00a0 more than just the courtroom and the political soapbox.\u00a0 During\u00a0 the Christmas season of 1996 an unexpected blanket of snow covered Victoria,\u00a0 which put the city (not used to such weather), in a standstill.\u00a0\u00a0 One day I was making my way through the slush around the James Bay area\u00a0 and I saw a van with Western Canada Concept posted on the side.\u00a0\u00a0 I knew that it was Doug Christie.\u00a0 I waved and Doug took me along\u00a0 with him to help others whose vehicles were stuck or whose walk-ways\u00a0 needed to be shovelled. <\/span><\/p>\n

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I\u2019ve read that at\u00a0 Doug\u2019s funeral Fr. Lucian Larre asked the valid question (based on\u00a0 a country music song) about as to \u201cwho is going to fill his boots.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0 There is another valid question.\u00a0 Are we all going to continue\u00a0 to uphold the legacy Doug fought for?\u00a0 Not all of us can be lawyers\u00a0 to fight the battles in the courtroom, but we all had some talent to\u00a0 contribute to the fight.\u00a0 Doug was aided by many of us in giving\u00a0 him moral and financial support over the years.\u00a0 Many of us wrote\u00a0 letters in support of him and of the freedom for his clients to state\u00a0 their views.\u00a0 Will we keep up our end of the fight against the\u00a0 tyranny of political correctness in whatever way we can?\u00a0 Will\u00a0 the Doug Christie we knew be remembered for posterity, or will the libellous\u00a0 view from the opposition be trumped? <\/span><\/p>\n

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May God give us strength?<\/span><\/p>\n

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Yours,<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\"\"<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

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Alexander David (\u201cAlex\u201d)\u00a0 Greer<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My Memories of Douglas Hewson Christie     I remember when I first\u00a0 met Doug Christie.\u00a0 In was in late January or February, 1986 at\u00a0 a meeting in Toronto.\u00a0 At the time the Zundel and Keegstra cases\u00a0 were still in … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[89,51],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cafe.nfshost.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/289"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cafe.nfshost.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cafe.nfshost.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cafe.nfshost.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cafe.nfshost.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=289"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/cafe.nfshost.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/289\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":291,"href":"https:\/\/cafe.nfshost.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/289\/revisions\/291"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cafe.nfshost.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=289"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cafe.nfshost.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=289"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cafe.nfshost.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=289"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}