Dear Sir:
I thought it necessary to provide an update on the House of Commons Motion 103.
It was passed in March and commissioned the House of Commons’ Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage to inquire into the climate of “hate and fear” pertaining to “discrimination and religious intolerance” in Canada, particularly in regard to “Islamophobia”.
Predictably, the federal Liberal government justified its promotion of this motion by pointing to the controversy which ensued its ratification.
Also predictably, the Liberal spin is misleading. The French have a word for people like Prime Minister Justin Trudeau who perform this maneuver: “provocateur”.
The motion itself is creating, ironically, the “climate of hate and fear” the committee is decreed to assess.
Concerned people can see it has the potential to bestow upon an ideology (Islam) special privileges that no other ideology has (or should have) and could make its criticism a criminal offence (read: a blasphemy law tailored for Canada).
Draw a cartoon of Mohammed and someone assaults you because you have offended their sensibilities, you could be the one who gets charged.
Correlatively, the Liberals are trying to “modernize” and “make government more efficient”, but what they are really doing is minimizing their accountability to the House of Commons and the Canadian people.
Make no mistake, they have an agenda.
We all need to take an interest in these developments or we may be saying two and half years from now: “how in the hell did we end up here?”
Worrisome in this issue are the members who comprise the committee commissioned to conduct the study.
There are six Liberals, three Conservatives and one NDP member with Liberal Hedy Fry as the chair.
Yes, that’s correct, the same Hedy Fry who declared in the House of Commons in 2001 “there are crosses burning on lawns in Prince George as we speak”.
Now, it’s one thing to have a delirious opinion with no causal connection to real events, but she was Secretary of State for Multiculturalism. And the venue wasn’t somebody’s living room and a bottle of wine.
A penchant for exaggeration or even fabrication to prove she is the right person for the job and a champion of social justice issues doesn’t engender trust.
Will Ms. Fry and her colleagues find “facts of mass discriminations” and “fearful hysteria” or will they submit a report consisting of little evidence (apart from opposition to the motion itself) to show for all the controversy and money spent?
Based on previous evidence, it doesn’t bode well the report will reflect what is really the case.
Irwin Jeffrey,
Terrace, B.C.