Freedom of Speech Undermined

by Marco den Ouden
July 1981

Everyone cheered on June 25 when Attorney-General Allan Williams introduced the Civil Rights Protection Act. Everyone should have shed a tear because that legislation spells the beginning of the end of free speech in British Columbia.

Racism, of course, is a vicious doctrine, the most terrible form of collectivism. It is the ascribing of inferiority or superiority to persons because of their ancestry. It exists in its most virulent form in openly racist groups like the Ku Klux Klan.

But the same kind of thinking occurs in those who oppose the immigration of certain ethnic groups, in union members who think that in any dispute the union side must be right, even in those who boast about the achievements of ancestors or relatives, hoping to bask in reflected glory.

Such thinking, to be sure, is ignorant and wrongheaded. But should it be made illegal?

Will this new legislation mean that Professors William Shockley and Hans Eysenck, who argue that intelligence has hereditary factors, will be forbidden to speak about their studies in B.C.? Will it mean that a recent book featuring a debate between Eysenck and a professor who opposes his views be banned in B.C.?

Some bookstores carry Hitler's Mein Kampf in their history sections. Will they be ordered to remove them? Shall we have a bonfire of forbidden books in Robson Square?

Western democracy is founded upon the ideal of individual liberty. One of the cornerstones of that liberty is freedom of speech.

Freedom of speech means the freedom to express one's ideas freely without restriction. It means the freedom to hold contrary and even wrong views. It means that individuals do not have to wake up each day to the horrors of George Orwell's Thought Police in 1984.

The so-called Civil Rights Protection Act establishes the dangerous precedent that the government can decide which ideas are orthodox and proper to express in society. Today it forbids ideas that most people universally condemn, the horrible doctrine of racism.

Will some zealous moral majority types someday be able to persuade a conservative government to ban the articulation of socialist or communist ideals? Will some radical left wing element someday be able to persuade a socialist government to ban the teaching of free market economics?

The notion that the government is justified in deciding what is and what is not orthodox thought is repugnant to those who value liberty.

The racists of the Ku Klux Klan ought to be brushed aside and ignored. If they engage in acts of violence or trespass, laws already exist to combat that. The introduction of a law that forbids the expression of certain ideas is a cure that is worse than the disease. It threatens the patient as much as it does its target.

Our liberty is too valuable to let ourselves be pushed into restricting freedom of speech by a group of ignorant racists.

Argue with them, censure them, boycott them or ignore them, but do not use a club to kill a fly!