Abortion, Hate Crimes and THE END OF THE WORLD.
Okay, so maybe it’s not the end of the world.
You’d think so, though, based on the Twittosphere.
Two Tory backbenchers are vowing two acts of right-wing idiocy - hacking off the provision of federal hate crime legislation that protects folks from hate speech sent online, and de-funding Planned Parenthood’s international work.
Brian Storseth is the champion of repealing section 13 of the Canadian Human Rights Act. What horrors is he looking to abolish from our totalitarian dystopia?
The section of the act reads -
It is a discriminatory practice for a person … communicate telephonically … any matter that is likely to expose a person or persons to hatred or contempt by reason of the fact that person or those persons are identifiable on the basis of a prohibited ground of discrimination.
Egads. I may not slur someone based on gender, race or sexual orientation (side note: if it’s someone’s gender identity - slur away, because parliament won’t identify them as a group!)
On the other side, Tory back-bencher Brod Trost is upset over the government’s decision to continue funding Planned Parenthood. In an interview on CBC, Trost tells us why family planning is the devil’s work.
Ultimately, I have the backing of my constituency association and the Conservatives there. That’s who I represent. Because I’ve been vocal on this issue before, I owe them my democratic voice. I also owe my democratic voice to people who disagree with me so they know honestly whether or not to vote for or against me in the next election. It’s the proper thing to do.
Right.
Aaron Wherry takes maybe a pro-democracy approach to that position on his Macleans blog,
Setting aside, for the moment, whatever your feelings about Mr. Trost’s position on this particular issue, setting aside the politics of Mr. Trost’s situation, his “democratic voice” is probably to be applauded and encouraged.
Uhuh.
Wherry, to be fair, is deferring to parliamentary significance of Trost’s breaking with his caucus - insofar as it’s good for democracy to have internal debates within the parties.
I’ll buy that for most things. I think disagreeing with your party is a good thing, as it keeps politics interesting, fluid and responsive to a variety of different ideologies and opinions.
However - can we stop pretending like abortion is still something that needs to be discussed? Planned Parenthood is a group that advocates family planning (abortion services are only a small part of their programs) and the government funding that Trost is objecting to is for humanitarian help in countries where abortion is legal. We’re not sending emissaries of death abroad - we’re making sure families without education in safe sex practices are capable of keeping the size of their family manageable so they don’t starve to death.
I give serious credit to Harper on this one - because while Wherry seems to believe that an internal debate on abortion is warranted and fruitful, Harper seems to have already realized that the moralistic and practical debates on the issue are more appropriate for the pews in a church - not the House of Commons.
The same goes for the hate crimes legislation. It’s pretty commonly accepted that these things do very little harm (aside from Mark Steyn getting dragged in front of a tribunal one time) and they do quite a bit of unspoken good - but ideology is blind to practical results.
If I were to write Harper’s legacy in a positive light, I would do so readily. It could be summed up rather succinctly in saying - he fought sharp derision in his caucus and usually chose the option most in line with mainstream Canadian opinion.
Folks will scream dictatorship and totalitarianism at some of his decisions, but at the end of the day - this isn’t a Reform government. Harper’s brand in this majority government so far has been a dash of Mulroney-style free market economics and Chretien-esque cost-cutting. Maybe a peppering of Reform ideology.
Harper has luckily kept us safe - thus far - from the Brad Trosts and Brian Storseths in his own caucus.
But can it last forever?
