...born with the gift of laughter and a sense that the world was mad

Reader rebuts CJC big wigs: Last week in the Halifax Chronicle-Herald, the two guys who head up the Canadian Jewish Congress tried to make a case for preserving the HRCs, but limiting who had access to them—as if that’s in any way feasible. (Oddly enough, the article has yet to show up on the CJC site.) Today, the paper published  this trenchant response from Brian Sanderson of Wolfville, N.S.:

Shaky foundation

Rabbi Reuven Bulka and Sylvain Abitbol ("Some human rights complaints are frivolous," June 7 opinion piece) defend the continued existence of Human Rights Commissions, while at the same time accepting that those same commissions have entertained frivolous complaints that abuse defendants and diminish freedom of speech.

Their argument seems to hinge upon "balancing a diminution of individual rights against the greater collective good of social harmony and cohesion."

The proposition that individual rights must be diminished for the collective good has a shaky foundation – the 20th-century experiment with communism is a clear counter-example. Three hundred years of science clearly shows that resplendent order arises from "simple" atoms. If the dogma promoted by Sylvain Abitbol and Reuven Bulka serves any purpose, it is to illustrate the intellectual bankruptcy that has shaped the political, legal and religious disciplines.

Any Human Rights Commission that violates freedom of speech also violates our human rights. Preservation of human rights is more important than the interests of flawed Human Rights Commissions and their lackies.

The Human Rights Commissions have made fatal errors – like Maxime Bernier, they must go.

I don’t know that I’d equate metrosexual Maxime’s girl troubles with the HRCs. Other than that, Mr. Sanderson is on the money.

Posted by: scaramouche at 12:04 | link | comments

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