Update: Shackling the Press

In my previous post on the Human Rights Commission complaints against Maclean's magazine, I noted that the travesty is not the complaints themselves. Free people should be free to complain. The travesty is that the HRCs have agreed to hear the complaints. Mark Steyn agrees:

What's offensive is not the accusations of Dr Elmasry and his pals, but the willingness of Canada's pseudo-courts to take them seriously. So I couldn't care less about the verdict - except insofar as an acquittal would be more likely to bolster the cause of those who think it's entirely reasonable for the state to serve as editor-in-chief of privately owned magazines. As David Warren put it, the punishment is not the verdict but the process.

Maclean's is now in the unenviable position that anything it does to comply with the HRCs in fact legitimizes them.

Good News from Iraq

Judging by the mainstream media's coverage of the war in Iraq, you would think that the whole struggle there is in a fatal downward spiral. But Michael Yon has posted a comprehensive report by Barry R. McCaffrey, a retired US Army General, whose tone is not one of despair, but of optimism.

The senior leaders of AQI [Al Qaeda in Iraq] have become walking dead men because of the enormous number of civilian intelligence tips coming directly to US Forces. US and Brit Special Operations Forces are deadly against AQI leadership. Essentially AQI has been driven out of Baghdad and is now trying to reconstitute their capabilities.

Read more at michaelyon-online.com. I'm not sure I can agree with this conclusion, though:

Clearly we must continue the current sensible approach by Secretary of State Rice to open dialog with Syria, Turkey, and the Iranians...

The commitment to dialogue on the part of Rice - and President Bush - comes hand in hand with an inexplicable ignorance or denial of the reality of the Islamism that drives Syria and Iran. And these states are only happy to engage in toothless dialogue.

Shackling the Press

No sooner has Mark Steyn revealed the newly-enshrined right not to be offended than the Canadian Islamic Congress has given a case in point: it has filed a complaint against Maclean's Magazine with three Human Rights Commissions regarding an article by Steyn called 'The Future Belongs to Islam'. Read the complaints at Steyn's website. There are just so many things wrong with this. First, regarding Human Rights Commissions:

• HRCs are not bound to rigorous standards of evidence and procedure.
• HRCs are given power to force compliance and levy fines.
• HRC employees need not have legal training, and appointments are often political in nature.
  
• HRCs are balanced heavily in favour of the complainants, who are not responsible for the legal fees and paperwork that can tie up or cripple the party being investigated.
• By contrast, the complainants can avoid legal fees, time in court, and have the benefit of a lower standard of legal procedure - this makes it an easy system to abuse.
  
• HRCs in Canada have done more stripping of human rights (especially those of freedom of speech and freedom of religion) than upholding them - without the checks and balances of standard legal procedure, the HRCs have given favour to certain rights (or even perceived rights) at the expense of other constitutionally enshrined rights.

Regarding this particular case:

• Why three complaints? The main complainant is filing several complaints in the hopes that one will stick. Even if 2 of 3 complaints are unsuccessful, he is victorious.
  
• The main complainant on all three complaints, Mohamed Elmasry, is a professor of computer engineering at the University of Waterloo. That's in Ontario. So I can buy a complaint with the Ontario HRC or the federal HRC. But how can he file a complaint with the HRC in British Columbia? And how can that commission justify hearing the case? What jurisdiction can it possibly have?
  
• The simplest action for the complainants would be to respond in kind: publish a rebuttal in another paper or magazine. Doubtless there is no shortage of media outfits that sympathize with them and would be glad to be the vehicle for such a rebuttal. The fact that the complainants have chosen the HRCs betrays their disinterest in open and frank debate. Instead, they want to silence detractors. If the complainants are so sure of their position, why not silence them with an unrebuttable rebuttal?
• The complainants are using deceptive - no, outright false - claims.
• One of the quotes listed as a grievance is not even Steyn's - it is directly from a Muslim leader!
  
• This is a bold and direct attack on the freedoms of thought, speech and press, and it is obviously so. It is a travesty that HRCs have even considered hearing these complaints.

Any member of the free press that thinks government control (by HRCs or another arm) will not restrict their journalistic freedom is naive. These complaints are very dangerous in that they could very well be a precedent in that direction. This is the very reason for the First Amendment to the US Constitution with regard to the freedom of the press. Yet, aside from some notable exceptions, the mainstream media, whose future is at stake with Maclean's, has been remarkably silent on the issue.

These complaints have heightened the debate about HRCs, but not enough that Canadians will demand that they be shut down. If the HRCs realize the danger of ruling in favour of the complainants and fail to do so, Maclean's will be off the hook, but so will the HRCs. The best possible outcome may just be that Maclean's loses its fight initially, but is supported by the anger of the free press and freedom-loving Canadians and fights the HRCs off for good.

Culture of Victimhood

Western culture has become a culture of victimhood. Many people see themselves as victims of injustice and insensitivity - they've been wronged or offended by someone. Many even claim to find the remnants of Christian culture oppressive. But it is all a strategy for selfish gain or to shut down debate. Is it any wonder that our enemies are using the same tactics against us? Mark Steyn hits the nail on the head again:

But the point is that the right not to be offended is now the most sacred right in the world. The right to freedom of speech, freedom of association, freedom of movement, all are as nothing compared with the universal right to freedom from offense.

Infidel: Conclusion II

To conclude the review of Ayaan Hirsi Ali's book Infidel, we've answered some of Hirsi Ali's objections to Islam. (See our initial conclusion here.) For her, some of these objections also apply to the Christian faith. This has led her to secular humanism, a religion in its own right. But it is also a dead-end street that threatens the Western world just like Islamism.

Our last thought on this comes courtesy of Mark Steyn, from his great book America Alone (see the link "On the Bookshelf" to the right):

In 2006, a dozen intellectuals published a manifesto against Islamism and in the defense of "secular values for all." The signatories included Ayaan Hirsi Ali, the Dutch parliamentarian; Irshad Manji, the Canadian writer; and Salman Rushdie, the British novelist. All three are brave figures and important allies in the campaign against the Islamist tide. But they're making a mistake: secular humanism is an insufficient rallying cry. As another Canadian, Kathy Shaidle, wrote in response: It is secularism itself which is part of the problem, not the solution, since secularism is precisely what created the Euro spiritual/moral vacuum into which Islamism has rushed headlong."

None of the Above

Keeping tabs on the upcoming US elections, which will affect Canada and the rest of the world, it's hard to know who to root for. But I'm not alone - Mark Steyn also laments the lack of a conservative candidate.

As it is, the present field poses difficulties for almost every faction of the GOP base. Rudy Giuliani was a brilliant can-do executive who transformed the fortunes of what was supposedly one of the most ungovernable cities in the nation but on guns, abortion and almost every other social issue he's anathema to much of the party. Ron Huckabee is an impeccable social conservative but fiscally speaking favors big-government solutions with big-government price tags. Ron Paul has a long track record of sustained philosophically coherent support for small government but he's running as a neo-isolationist on war and foreign policy. John McCain believes in assertive American global leadership but he believes just as strongly in constitutional abominations like McCain-Feingold.

More at the New York Sun.

Departments of Uneducation

From Michelle Malkin, an investigation into Everyday Mathematics. This is a method of teaching math that deliberately avoids rote and repetition in teaching the basic skills of arithmetic. The knock on the traditional methods of education is that students learn methods but fail to understand the mathematical concepts behind them. For proponents, the means apparently justify the end; that end is the realization by many parents that their children are not grasping simple mathematical concepts and operations.

I have firsthand experience of this educational philosophy. During my studies for my B.Ed., I came across it time and time again. After our first class, one of my Teaching Math profs had the majority of prospective math teachers in the room in disbelief. It was not much better at the end of the course. What this educational theory is getting at is that direct instruction and repetition is bad. You have to create learning opportunities for students to discover learning. So, repeated testing of multiplication tables, for instance, has died out.

Guess what? Students are missing it. They can't tell in a split second what 7 x 9 is. The premise of the theory is that rote and repetition does not foster understanding. But are you better off knowing that 9 packs of gum at $7 apiece will cost you $63, or why the math works out that way? In the end, the goal is that the student knows both, but the point is we don't want students - or anyone - to have to think about the mathematical realities behind the gum purchase in order to make that calculation.

It is in subjects like math and (some) sciences that we notice the disconnect between the reality of simple, hard facts and this need to find a convoluted way to learn (or teach) them. But it's not just about math. This educational theory has invaded most subjects. For instance, the reluctance to promote memorization of reading, spelling and grammar skills has contributed to a generation of students who are barely literate.

At its basic, it is a war between practical reality and theoretical fantasy. I have been a student under the educational theory of constructivism, and it is no fun. Instead of the practical skills for mastery and proficiency in teaching, I received a large dose of theoretical ideas that helped me little in the classroom setting. And that is the problem - students are losing out. Instead of a proven method with the goal of excellency, Departments of Education have embraced a soft, fuzzy method. It is a vote for mediocrity.