Without heroes, without victims, the speechy movement amounts to very little beyond a few syllogisms cobbled together from Mill's On Liberty. No, to make it real, to put flesh on the abstractions, its been necessary for Ezra and Steyn and the gang to find examples of good men and women beat down by an out-of-control bureaucracy, to find proud citizens who've fought back against the language police.Thus far, the best they've managed to come up with is Marc Lemire.
However, Lemire is a problematic figure, and maybe not good hero material. For example, the standard histories (ie wiki) tag him as "President of the often violent Heritage Front organization from January 1, 2001 until the organization folded around 2005." HF was a white supremacist gang, and that's their logo top-left.
But is this claim re the Heritage Front True? Lemire himself has apparently denied it, and just last month FreeD's Mark Fournier (posting as Entropy Squared) challenged his readers to "do what nobody else has been able to do. Source that ridiculous claim."
Well, they've been too busy paying off legal bills at FreeD to take up that challenge, but the folks at Anti-Racist Canada have done so and, not to spoil and wonderfully thorough post, but yeah, Lemire was leader of the Heritage Front. The money quote, from Heritage Front co-founder Gerry Lincoln:
This is more or less an open letter to the new leadership, specifically Marc Lemire, who seems to have assumed the role of head honcho and put his good name on the line.
It's a thankless job, but I guess somebody has to do it.
Back in the mid 1990s I was involved with a diversity group through Toronto metro council. One project undertaken by Bernie farber of the Canadian Jewish Congress was the tracking of neo-Nazi leaderts in Toronto. That led to a reprot that after much goog;ling I was finally able to find.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.cjc.ca/docs/RD/98_Marches%20to%20Modems.doc
It is a quintissential piece on the white supremacist leaders of the day and all were instrumental in the success of the Heritage Front.
Marc Fournier:
ReplyDelete"Every person I've talked to or interviewed about those days says it never happened. Not one single person who was around at that time says Marc Lemire had anything to do with running the Heritage Front."
How does he know all these people?
It's fascinating, all in all, to watch the devolution of the Fourniers from mere "social conservative" verbal gay-bashing fetus fetishists into out-and-out Nazi apologists.
ReplyDeleteSocial conservatives are very stupid, and can't tell when their fellow travellers move from cultural conservationists to cultural chauvinists to xenophobes to racists.
ReplyDeleteI think Connie Fournier still believes she's a cultural conservationist, although the complete absence of any celebration of whatever culture (white, Anglo-Saxon, protestant, I presume) they're intent on conserving has always been suspicious. You don't go to FreeDominion to celebrate and be educated about English history, or art or food or music, or the Anglican religion, or the English language or the noble contribution of England to liberalism or democracy, for example. In fact, the common ground they seem to have is this attachment to a mythic "European culture" (which is so diverse as to be meaningless). When all that nonsense is cleared away, all they've got left is...white skin.
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ReplyDeleteOoohh. It's those scary white supremacists again. Be afraid; be very, very afraid. Thankfully, we have HRC's in Canada protecting us from this (non-existent) threat.
ReplyDeleteThe behaviour and legitimacy, or lack thereof, of HRC's in Canada is the real issue. Recently these HRC's have been coming up short in that regard.
Ooohh. It's those scary white supremacists again. Be afraid; be very, very afraid. Thankfully, we have HRC's in Canada protecting us from this (non-existent) threat.
ReplyDeleteThe behaviour and legitimacy, or lack thereof, of HRC's in Canada is the real issue. Recently these HRC's have been coming up short in that regard.
Stay on-topic, knob.
"Stay on-topic, knob." - Mini Me
ReplyDeleteAu contraire. Since this speechy thing has been going on, BCL has been ofuscating the issue.
Fact is, various HRC's have been recently sighted waddling off with their tails between their legs. It's degenerated into farce with postal subsidies now the big issue of the day on this site.
Steyn and Levant are innocent. Fact.
And the white supremacist threat in Canada? You're playing this for laughs, right?
It's about assertions grounded in evidence, Paul...not something you seem all that interested in.
ReplyDeleteI know *you* think this is all about your freedom (from growing or from lifelong education, I believe), the fascism of HRC's and the fate of persecuted liars like Steyn and Levant, but there is in fact a more substantive, nobler motivation at work here...a commitment to truth, as best can be determined.
Now, go read a book (any book, even America Alone or Mein Kampf). You're astonishingly jejune and that's not good.
" . . . there is in fact a more substantive, nobler motivation at work here...a commitment to truth, as best can be determined."
ReplyDeleteIs that what you call the HRC's folding up their tents and slithering home? LMSO! Victory in defeat indeed.
Actually you should be disappointed that Steyn and Levant were let off the hook. The mantra of the racists is that there's no chance that they could win a human rights complaint ("the truth is no defense" and crap like that). Well, the fact that the CHRT and provincial counterparts decided there wasn't enough evidence to convict actually proves that the system is working. If a bigot like Bahr or Fromm or Tremaine or Winnicki or others are found to have violated the human rights code, then it must be because the evidence was overwhelming. The Steyn and Levant decision hurts the bigots more than it helps.
ReplyDeleteIn saying that, Steyn and Levant are both still douches.
Disappointed? Not really. The HRC's lost the Steyn and Levant cases long ago. They never had any evidence, and now, without public support, their "cases" were finished. They knew it and withdrew.
ReplyDeleteNow the HRC's can spend more time protecting all decent Canadians from that great menace that imperils and threatens us all . . . yes, (gasp!), "white supremacists".
I'd really like to know what the point of your dull blather is, Paul S.
ReplyDelete"On August 10, 2008, the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada ruled in Marc Lemire’s favour over a Privacy Act complaint and chastised the Canadian Human Rights Commission for improperly withholding information."
ReplyDeleteWhat - BCL nothing to say on that?
Robertnichols,
ReplyDeleteI hope Marc enjoys his copy of the transcript they send him.