Sighting hate
Syed Soharwardy tells us why last year.
Syed B. Soharwardy today filed two formal complaints with the Alberta Human Rights and Citizenship Commission against the publishers of Jewish Free Press and the Western Standards for sighting hate against Muslims. After filing the complaints, he spoke with the media and said that this is a first step towards putting an end towards the hateful and non-Canadian attitude.
Yeah good idea – put an end to the hateful attitude, and do it by force; that’s always a good plan. I don’t like hateful attitudes myself, so I’m glad they’re all going to be put an end to.
Syed Soharwardy thanked the mainstream Canadian Media for protecting the freedom of the press with responsibility and accountability. Syed Soharwardy thanked the various companies for deciding not to sell or purchase the hatemongering issue of the Western Standards.
Yes indeed, self-censorship is so much less trouble than the other kind.
I must say I had some trouble making sense of this press release, and not just because they don’t provide any details of the alleged offending material. No doubt it would be Islamophobic to suggest that an official statement from the Islamic Supreme Council of Canada should be in idiomatic English – not to mention the occasional incoherence, as in
“Syed B. Soharwardy today filed two formal complaints with the Alberta Human Rights and Citizenship Commission against the publishers of Jewish Free Press and the Western Standards for sighting hate against Muslims.”
I think we’re probably all against sighting hate against any ethnic group.
Well, idiomatic English – you see, he was sincere, and that’s what counts.
Sorry, Ophelia, I missed your oblique reference to “sighting hate” in your title to your comment. It was an overcite on my part. I hope this doesn’t insight you into making a cutting remark about my eyecite.
Not at all, Allen, it was a very inciteful comment.
(I hate to tell you this but I have actually heard people use the word in that way – ‘inciteful’ meaning full of potential to incite people. What was that about idiomatic English again?)
I must say I’m slightly confused by this entry. The press release advocates peaceful and lawful redress against what is perceived to be hate speech; I note that the statement specifically condemns violent protest. Your objection seems to be that this action is tantamount to censorship, in which case I’d imagine you would be primarily concerned with the law, rather than people who seek to exercise their rights under it.
Obviously you disagree with what Soharwardy is trying to do, despite the legal and peaceful means employed, and see this as part of a broader phenomenon that you find objectionable. However, highlighting this particular example demonstrates to me that your tolerance for dissent from your position on this issue is rather less than my own. This impression isn’t helped by mocking the english of what may be non-native English speakers, something I had assumed would be beneath B&W.
Funy I see the ever present threat of cities being torched hovering in the background armando.
Ah, but Armando, you rather miss the point. What Syed Soharward is so peacefully and lawfully doing is calling upon the power of state law enforcement to silence those who have the temerity to criticize something he doesn’t want to be criticized. Calling it “hate speech” doesn’t make it so, and calling “censorship” by any other name doesn’t make it any more justifiable.
Remember that the “hate” speech complained of was the magazines reprinting some of Danish cartoons that were the cause of Muslim riots a few years ago and the reprinting was solely to show the public the what the fuss was about.
Armando writes of my comments above:
>This impression isn’t helped by mocking the english of what may be non-native English speakers, something I had assumed would be beneath B&W.< By writing in this way you are misrepresenting the import of what I wrote above. I was not “mocking the English of non-native speakers”. I was pointing out that an official body like the Islamic Supreme Council of Canada should be able to find someone in their organisation who has a good command of English to vet their press releases so that they express what they want to say with clarity. Is that too much to ask for such an important document?
P.S. Okay, in my second posting I *was* implicitly mocking one specific gross error in the English in the Supreme Council of Canada’s press release. But given that this was not my main comment, and that I was embellishing my noting that I had missed Ophelia’s indirect allusion to the gross error that made the sentence in question incoherent, I make no apology for playing around with that error, for the reason I have given above.
While I am no enthusiast of the Western Standard (it’s singular, Mr. Soharwardy, not plural) nevertheless I regard this complaint as even more repugnant to Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms than te republication of the cartoons.
As Matthew Parris remarked in February 2006, “We must never surrender, nor lightly value our right, not to argue in the face of other people’s gods, but to fart.
My confusion comes from the fact that I had assumed the opposition to “Islamofascism” was rooted in a committment to liberal values. Now, in such a liberal society, the fact that there are disagreements over what constitutes hate speech or censorship, and what the proper limits of government intervention should be and are totally commonplace. For instance, a libertarian will see you “calling upon the power of state law enforcement” if you propose free education paid for by taxation. This is unremarkable, and dissenting voices are normal business in a liberal democracy as long as those voices are non-violent and lawful. The fact that this particular non-violent and lawful petition seems to evoke existential fears in some, almost suggests to me that the committment to liberal values is rather weaker than I had assumed. The real outrage, if outrage it is, should surely be directed toward the Canadian laws that allow someone to make such a formal complaint, since only supporting a complaints process when we agree with the complaint is a pretty vacuous position.
Allen: Yes, it is a gross error almost certainly made by a non-native english speaker who wasn’t sufficiently rigorous. The meaning, however, is not particularly opaque to my mind and so mockery comes across as a bit…*graceless* to me.
Armando,
“highlighting this particular example demonstrates to me that your tolerance for dissent from your position on this issue is rather less than my own.”
Well that may well be the case, but then my tolerance for a lot of things is less than that of some other people; this is inevitable; apart from anything else tolerance of X often entails intolerance of Y: one can’t always be tolerant of absolutely everything; and I don’t want to anyway.
Putting the matter as one of tolerance of dissent is of course rather tendentious. What I’m ‘less tolerant’ of is not Soharwardy’s dissent from my position on this issue but his attempt to have his dissent made a matter of law and punishment and prevention. Tolerance, dissent, position, issue are all comfortably abstract and ideal and non-physical, but Soharwardy is quite literal about the matter. He’s not content merely to disagree with Levant, he wants to punish him and prevent others. I don’t really see why I’m even expected to ‘tolerate’ that. I don’t want people like Soharwardy punishing and preventing me, for one thing, and actions like this make it all too plain that they would if they could.
You’re right, I don’t usually mock the English of non-native speakers (and nor does Allen), but I think it’s a fair point about the Islamic Supreme Council of Canada. If it’s that supreme, surely it can rise to an in-house editor?
Cross-post there.
“dissenting voices are normal business in a liberal democracy as long as those voices are non-violent and lawful.”
Yes but again dissent is one thing and hauling people before a tribunal is quite another. I consider the laws an outrage if they allow Soharwardy to attempt to censor the Motoons, but I also consider Soharwardy and Islamists in general outrageous for attempting to censor criticism and mockery of Islam.
“My confusion comes from the fact that I had assumed the opposition to “Islamofascism” was rooted in a committment to liberal values. Now, in such a liberal society, the fact that there are disagreements over what constitutes hate speech or censorship, and what the proper limits of government intervention should be are totally commonplace…This is unremarkable, and dissenting voices are normal business in a liberal democracy as long as those voices are non-violent and lawful. The fact that this particular non-violent and lawful petition seems to evoke existential fears in some, almost suggests to me that the committment to liberal values is rather weaker than I had assumed.”
Besides, you’re contradicting yourself here. Dissenting voices are normal business in a liberal democracy as long as those voices are non-violent and lawful – and I’m a dissenting voice; I’m dissenting from what Soharwardy said and did. I’m doing it non-violently and lawfully – and even non-coercively, which is a lot more than you can say for Soharwardy. I’m not hauling Soharwardy before a tribunal, I’m just writing something on a (somewhat influential) website. So what’s the problem? Why do you see a weakness in the commitment to liberal values here? Because Soharwardy’s non-violent and lawful but coercive petition ‘evoke[s] existential fears’? That’s an odd reason – a very odd reason. It yanks the ground right out from under your own position. And I would say existential fears are perfectly reasonable and even sensible – I don’t for a moment think that Soharwardy would limit himself to mere dissent or even a mere tribunal if he had more power than he does have.
You should object, of course, if you want to. And I could then object to your dissent etc etc ad nauseam. I just don’t understand your outrage, and yeah, I don’t really get the existential fears. Partly because those kinds of fears can be used to justify all sorts of actions in response which are rather far from the liberal democractic values we agree on. And this is reasonable, in a sense. If your actions really cause me existential fear, then I’m probably not going to be too tolerant of them. If those actions are lawful in a liberal democratic society, then I might well decide to compromise on ideals…and as we know, this is far from a purely academic point.
In short, I’m saying that it is quite hard to maintain a commitment to tolerance if one is threatened by the exercise of common rights, and sees their employment as somehow illegitimately “coercive”. By contrast, I’m neither outraged nor threatened by your dissent, which is why I’m not actually contradicting myself.
As to Soharwardy, I think I’d need some evidence of his ultimate desires before I could really comment on them.
What common rights? There is no ‘common right’ to try to censor newspapers or cartoons or speech. Such a right would nullify the genuine common rights of free speech and opinion (which are enunciated in the Universal Declaration for instance). We don’t have a general ‘common right’ to try to shut people up – we just don’t.
The outrage (such as it is) is part of the overall context of the reaction to the Motoons. I was indeed outraged by that – precisely because it did indeed threaten the right to free speech and publication.
However, I don’t have a commitment to tolerance. Tolerance with stipulations, yes, but just plain tolerance, no. As with so many things, it depends on what we’re talking about. Soharwardy is resorting to attempted coercion to censor cartoons he dislikes; I have no commitment to be tolerant of that.
Armando writes
>Allen: Yes, it is a gross error almost certainly made by a non-native english speaker who wasn’t sufficiently rigorous. The meaning, however, is not particularly opaque to my mind and so mockery comes across as a bit… *graceless* to me.< Now that I have read the press release a third time, I admit that, as Armando writes, it is not particularly opaque. (I think my initial reaction was at least partly because I had zero knowledge of the issues in question.) However, the specific error I picked up on was pretty gross and it was a crucial word in the initial statement of the complaint. The Islamic Supreme Council of Canada is a Canadian organisation representing Canadians. I would have thought it rather important that they get their statement of complaint right, surely not a difficult thing to do in an English-speaking part of Canada. On the point about “mockery”, as Ophelia writes above I wouldn’t dream of drawing attention to, let alone mocking, such a statement if it had straightforwardly been produced by an individual whose knowledge of English was unidiomatic. But this was produced by an *organisation*, not an individual. Let me give you a somewhat analogous situation to make my point. I have a vinyl record sleeve for Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time, produced by an established French record company. The blurb in French is accompanied by a parallel version in English. Here is a typical passage from the English version of the biographical sketch of the composer: “His reputation is rapidly growing, people throng in Trinity church to hear his inventive and out of custom improvisations… He finds his best models in Nature of which he has full knowledge and his inspiration takes its rise in a strong catholic faith.” And so on. Now I wouldn’t dream of drawing attention, let alone mocking, such a passage if it had been made by an individual Frenchman in normal circumstances. But this was produced by an established French record company, which leaves one asking: Why on earth didn’t they either get someone fluent in English to translate the blurb, or at least get the translation vetted by such a person? In this situation I regard the fractured English (especially the rather hilarious “takes its rise”) as fair game for playful comment. It was in this spirit that, in the case of the ISCC press release, I played around with “cite” and “sight” in mockery of the rather important error of using the word “sighting” instead of “inciting”.
Armando writes:
> In short, I’m saying that it is quite hard to maintain a commitment to tolerance if one is threatened by the exercise of common rights, and sees their employment as somehow illegitimately “coercive”.< These comments sound reasonable if one takes them out of the context we are discussing, but not otherwise. Here is a quote from a recent issue of the Economist: “Last month the students and the Canadian Islamic Congress (CIC), a lobby group, filed complaints against Maclean’s at the Canadian Human Rights Commission, as well as those of Ontario and British Columbia. The article, the CIC claimed, harmed Muslims’ ‘sense of dignity and self-worth’.”
http://www.economist.com/world/la/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10499144
What we are seeing in Canada is a society that has been bending over backwards to accommodate the viewpoints of groups whose position on some issues is out of kilter with specific free speech traditions developed over a long period of time. Some organisations claiming to represent Muslims are attempting to push it even more in that backward direction by crying foul at anything *they* regard as offensive, even though most claims of alleged offensiveness are not so regarded (wheresoever they are directed) by most of the citizens of the country. (Most of such claims are, dare I say, alien to the traditions of the society, though they are commonplace in areas of the world under Muslim influence). Now one of these Muslim pressure groups is complaining that material in a book, reprinted in a magazine, harms Muslims’ sense of dignity and self-worth. Armando may feel no alarm at this, believing it to be nothing more than an expression of common rights, but most of us see it as an attempt by alleged representatives of a minority group to impose their viewpoint on a society that has in recent times taken tolerance to mean allowing illiberal attitudes to free speech gain a foothold that previously would not have been countenanced.
>I just don’t understand your outrage, and yeah, I don’t really get the existential fears. Partly because those kinds of fears can be used to justify all sorts of actions in response which are rather far from the liberal democractic values we agree on…< Coming in a context which tends to be one of Muslims (albeit a small minority of them) engaging in “all sorts of actions” in response to non-violent events which they interpret as insulting to their religion, I find this comment somewhat out of place. In any case, if Muslim organisations actually *succeed* in their aim of an increasing restriction on what most of the rest of society regards as free speech, it is rather more likely that there would be regrettable “actions in response” which liberal-minded people would strongly deprecate.
What they said. Please, do follow the links, they explain what is actually happening to Ezra Levant and why he’s enjoying it. You can also go to his blog.
I have to get back to polishing my liberal fascist jackboots (Canadian version, now with snow tires!)
Peace, order, and good government to all.
“What common rights? There is no ‘common right’ to try to censor newspapers or cartoons or speech.”
Sorry, this wasn’t meant to be a capitalised “right”. But surely making an official complaint to a human rights commission and seeking legal means to combat hate speech is a path available to anyone. You can call it “coercive”, in much the same way that libertarians call taxation coercive (that is, any manifestation of state or legal power is “coercive”, if you like to frame things that way), but your argument is surely then that the Alberta Human Rights and Citizenship Commission is an illegitimate body, and no one should be making formal complaints to them, isn’t it?
Because at the moment it seems that you guys agree that this coercive, censorius letter of formal complaint shouldn’t be allowed, and hence that there should be no body restricting the publication of (what it sees as) hate speech. Is that right? Otherwise I can’t see how you can have such a body, and then object to someone using it, even incorrectly.
From chris link….
“Yes, the HRCs are imperfect in both theory and practice. No, they’re not tyranny. No, Levant is in no actual danger of losing.”
…which sounds about right to me. Like the man says, if “coercive” is really such a big deal to you, you’d probably want to get rid of the whole legal system…which some do, of course, but not many.
Armando writes:
>Because at the moment it seems that you guys agree that this coercive, censorius letter of formal complaint shouldn’t be allowed…< I’ve checked through the contributions on this thread and can find no one saying the letter in question “shouldn’t be allowed”, only that they strongly oppose what the letter is aiming to achieve. >…and hence that there should be no body restricting the publication of (what it sees as) hate speech. Is that right? Otherwise I can’t see how you can have such a body, and then object to someone using it, even incorrectly.< This argument has already been rebutted above, in some detail, by Ophelia. Quoting Chris first, Armando writes:
> “Yes, the HRCs are imperfect in both theory and practice. No, they’re not tyranny. No, Levant is in no actual danger of losing.”
>…which sounds about right to me. Like the man says, if “coercive” is really such a big deal to you, you’d probably want to get rid of the whole legal system…which some do, of course, but not many.< It seems to me that both Chris and Armando are here missing the central point. It is not about the nature of the Canadian Human Rights Commission, or its powers, but about the fact that Muslim organisations in Canada are engaging in a campaign to extend the restriction of free speech well beyond the generally accepted sanctions against “hate speech” (e.g., to include what one such organisation calls harming Muslims’ “sense of dignity and self-worth”), in other words to effectively restrict robust criticism of Islam.
Oh ok. So “shouldn’t be allowed” was a misstep. In summary, there should be no restriction on Soharwardy to carry out his coercive, censorius action, which evokes existential fear. Moreover, there is no problem with the body which allows people to submit formal letters of complaint, in the pursuance of the same coercive actions. Is that right?
The issue is really a lack of faith in legal institutions in general in safeguarding our rights in the face of certain Muslim organisations who seek to curb free speech. Right?
I sort of understand. Certainly, I see the attempt to censor the motoons as wrongheaded. But, on the other hand, one feature of liberal democracy is that incompatible claims get resolved by lawful means. Thats why I’m less convinced by all the “coercive” rhetoric. If one has a principled objection to curbs on speech – for reasons of hate speech, say – I can understand, but as I keep saying, this seems like a general objection to a body like the Alberta Human Rights Commission which apparently isn’t an issue.
Otherwise, one can object to the letter of complaint being frivolous….but then this misses the point, it seems to me. Evaluating claims which some will see as without merit via legal means is a feature of liberal democracy, not a bug.
I guess the real difference is that I don’t feel the same existential threat that you do, or at least I don’t feel it in the same way. My muslim friends are peaceful and lawful and yet feel increasingly the subject of unfair criticism, which subsumes their individuality under a broad label of “Muslim”. I have more sympathy, perhaps, for case that some Muslims genuinely believe they are the victims of hate speech, and so acting on that doesn’t seem particularly sinister to me. So I am hesitant in being overly critical of someone who condemns violence and does nothing more than write an official letter of complaint. Imagine if all protest to the motoons had been like that!
Armando writes:
>I have more sympathy, perhaps, for case that some Muslims genuinely believe they are the victims of hate speech, and so acting on that doesn’t seem particularly sinister to me.< The central point, as I tried to indicate above, is that the “acting on that” in question (i.e., the subject of this thread) is being undertaken by organisations with the aim of stretching the meaning of “hate speech” to include robust criticism of Islam, or other items that are regarded as unacceptable in the Muslim world (but not, for the great majority of people, in Western societies). Incidentally, on a more general point not restricted to Muslims, I think that the fact that some people “genuinely believe” a certain thing doesn’t necessarily mean we should take that thing as a given.
“I think that the fact that some people “genuinely believe” a certain thing doesn’t necessarily mean we should take that thing as a given.”
Yes, indeed. But who do you think should decide whether something constitutes hate speech or not?
And you mention this because you think that the Alberta Human Rights Commission is run by Muslims? Or you think that, by making a complaint, a muslim is exerting undue influence on the process?
>And you mention this because you think that the Alberta Human Rights Commission is run by Muslims? Or you think that, by making a complaint, a muslim is exerting undue influence on the process?< I mention this specifically in relation to *your* question asking who I thought should decide what constitutes hate speech, in the context of a discussion of Canadian Muslim organisations attempting to stifle the publication of material they deem to be offensive to Muslims. For this reason both your questions above are non sequiturs.
“in the context of a discussion of Canadian Muslim organisations attempting to stifle the publication of material they deem to be offensive to Muslims.”
which in this particular instance, is being done by submitting a letter of formal complaint to the Albert Human Rights Commission. I don’t think that mentioning them can really count as a non sequitur, since they are specifically being asked to assess whether something is hate speech and are (part of) the subject in the opening post.
chris,
So…you want us to read sage comments on “the pathetic wailing of wealthy white conservatives who occasionally learn that they can’t, in fact, shit all over Muslims and their faith ad infinitum without consequence.” And you want us to derive what from that? That we should approve the idea of “consequences” for people “shit[ting] all over Muslims and their faith” with “shit[ting] all over Muslims and their faith” understood as publishing the Motoons? In other words that we should think that people ought not to publish the Motoons because to do so is to “shit all over Muslims and their faith”? But I don’t think publishing the Motoons fits that description; I don’t think newspaper editors should be threatened with “consequences” for publishing the Motoons; I don’t think any religion should have special protection of that kind. So following your link didn’t persuade me that publishing the Motoons is a violation of anyone’s human rights.
“Thats why I’m less convinced by all the “coercive” rhetoric.”
But Levant (as I understand it: correct me if I’m wrong) has to answer the charge (or the complaint) – he has to appear, he has to defend himself. There is no cost to making a complaint, apparently not even much cost in effort, but there is considerable cost to defending against a complaint. If the complaints are frivolous or without merit or a form of illegitimate censorship, then they are coercive – they coerce people into at the very least wasting their time and energy defending themselves. Do you really think that kind of coercion has no influence at all on what kind of thing people will be willing to write or publish? Do you really think people won’t self-censor just to avoid the hassle?
“My muslim friends are peaceful and lawful and yet feel increasingly the subject of unfair criticism”
Ah well we have different friends then. My Muslim friends intensely dislike the spectacle of fellow Muslims trying to silence critics.
If this link is to be believed, the case can be dismissed by the tribunal, and no actual defence is required if the complaint is judged to be frivolous. If that is indeed the case, then that makes the claims of coercion a bit harder to support.
But that doesn’t make any sense, Armando. It’s already been coercive.
Oh wait, I see – you don’t have to talk to the investigator, and the investigator comes to you. Okay – that is less coercive then. Soharwardy’s intention is still coercive, of course, but the tribunal’s may not be if that letter is accurate. Okay! I’ll dial down the rhetoric about coercion.
I wish the first amendment to the U.S costitution applied throughout the whole western world, I detest these ridiculous speech laws and the stupid outcomes they produce!
http://www.mediamonitors.net/soharwardy5.html here is this worthy chaps thoughts on 9/11.
G. Tingey: I’m not clear in what sense the item you have linked to provides “counter-examples” to Richard’s link to a statement by the complainant to the Canadian Human Rights Commission. That there are Holocaust deniers in the West – and your link was specifically about German neo-Nazi activity – is irrelevant to the point Richard was making. His link told us something that *is* of some relevance to this thread, the kind of views held by the complainant to the Canadian Human Rights Commission, a man who wants to stifle public expression of robust criticism of Islam.
To save people checking back to see the URL in question: though commendably speaking out vigorously against terrorism, Syed B. Soharwardy unmistakenly insinuates that sinister Western forces were behind 9/11:
>The terrorists have committed a great evil against Non-Muslims and Muslims alike. They have not only spilled the blood of innocent people, but in doing so they have also splashed that blood on all Muslims. Majority of the Muslims believes that Muslims could not commit these heinous crimes because of the sophistication and precision in the planning and execution of these terrorist attacks. In the midst of the attacks on WTC and Pentagon, people are being led to believe that this kind of operation has been launched by someone from the dark corners of the world putting the whole American intelligence apparatus at bay. Don’t the world understand as to who exactly are the real beneficiaries of this episode…< And so on. http://www.mediamonitors.net/soharwardy5.html
Soharwardy also asserts that “99.99% of Muslims around the world are shouting and telling the western world that they are too Against Terrorism.”. I think he may have got a few digits wrong in that figure.
Allen I think Mr Tingey was replying to my comment on the first amendment not my later post about the veiws of the complainent to the commision, to answer G.T.s point about holocaust deniers let them speak I say they condem themselves by their own words!
Thanks for pointing that out, Richard! And G.T. would therefore be right about a crossed wire or two.