Ezra Levant recently blogged about a CBC Sunday documentary on human rights commissions.
The report focused on three cases -- the Western Standard's publication of the Danish cartoons, the Canadian Islamic Congress's complaint against Maclean's and Mark Steyn, and the conviction of Rev. Stephen Boissoin for rambunctiously professing Christian beliefs about homosexuality. In each case, the CBC interviewed only one side of the story.
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Finally, the CBC interviewed Darren Lund, the complainant in the Boissoin case, without a word from Boissoin himself.
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There was another point that Lund's interview elucidated that I was vaguely aware of, but about which the documentary refreshed my memory. In that offensive decision, the Christian pastor's views on homosexuality were linked circumstantially to an alleged beating of a gay teen a few weeks later. To apportion any blame for an act of physical violence to an unrelated political discussion about homosexuality is an abomination of our legal system. But what I had forgotten -- until Lund's interview -- was that the teen in question has never been identified, and did not even complain to the police. We only have a vague newspaper report and Lund's own say-so -- but nothing more. Who was that youth? Was he really attacked? He was a high school student -- was he one of Lund's own students? Did Lund have anything to do with the complaint? If there was a real, physical crime committed -- an assault and battery -- why was nothing done about it? Why did the police not make inquiries, either to Lund or the reporter in question? Or did they -- and did they dismiss the case as unfounded, or even a hoax?
That such a vague event -- a rumour really -- was used to convict a pastor shows how abominable these human rights commissions are. They didn't "convict" the person who allegedly attacked the teen. So they took out their politically correct venom on some Christian pastor who happened to be talking about homosexuality a few weeks before.
I'm not sure if those subtleties came through to many, especially to people unfamiliar with the case. But it was a reminder to me that HRCs use vague facts -- or, as we saw last Tuesday, even manufacture facts -- as ammunition in their wars against conservatives and Christians. I don't think I would have said so before the Lemire hearing last week, but having learned that human rights "activists" use the tactics of planting fake evidence, and using fake names and fake facts to provoke "hate crimes", I now wonder if the rumoured gay-bashing incident in the Boissoin case was itself manufactured, either by Lund -- the Richard Warman of Alberta -- or someone else looking to drum up business for the commission.
Stephen Boisson reacts to this blogpost in Canadian Viewpoints:
Over the last three months I have been lambasted in my local newspapers more times than I can count. Often, Lund has been asked to comment. My picture was on the front page in December in bold print exclaiming a circumstantial link between my letter and an assault on a gay teenager. My 13 year old son saw my picture on the front page before I even knew about it. The next day I was asked to come into my employers office and explain. In January, I was bashed in an article that talked about how gays are haunted by threats of violence. Last month Lund was on the front page of the Red Deer Advocates local section. He was featured because he was in my city facilitating a "Free Speech Must Have Limits" presentation. In his presentation he reiterated how my comments and position are hateful and how they were linked to an assault on a gay teen. Lund facilitated this presentation in partnership with Bill Baergen, a former educator and school superintendent and a past commissioner with the human rights commission. Baergen wrote The Ku Klux Klan in Central Alberta, a book that exposes the white extremist group’s presence in the region until its dismantling in the early 1990s. In Lund's complaint and publicly he has voiced that in regards to me and my comments "there is a parallel to oother hatemongers such as Terry Long of the Aryan Nation and James Keegstra, Holocaust denier."
I have tried to respond but the Red Deer Advocate will not print anything I submit. I have even contacted the Editor and Publisher humbly voicing the bias and unfairness of not allowing me to reply. I even suggested that they offer me guidance as to how they would limit the content of my response. They just sluff me off and ignore me. This is the same newspaper that gave me an award for my Letters to the Editor years ago. Until recently, I have not submitted one since my 2002 letter.
The Globe was the same. Lund had a guest column with the Globe and I attempted to respond asking for the same opportunity. I was ignored. I even tried to respond in the general comments section. Anything I submitted was ignored.
As much as I admit that it hurts and is frustrating, I still chose to put a smile on my face and with a joyful shout affirm that...Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. "Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you!
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