From a recent Christopher Hitchens column on Slate:

"One of the effects of the "war on terror," and of one of its concomitants, namely the attrition between the Muslim world and the West, has been an increasing tendency to make exceptions to First Amendment (free expression) principles, either on the pretext of security or of avoiding the giving of offense. We should have learned by now that, however new the guise, these are the same old stale excuses for censorship. We might also notice that if one excuse is allowed, then all the others are made "legitimate" also. The risk of allowing all opinions by all speakers may seem great, but it is nothing compared with the risk of giving the power of censorship to any official."

I guess its just too difficult for Mr. Hayden to actually come up with a logical reasoned argument against the xenophobic garbage of Mr. Gilchrist. Or perhaps, it is us rubes, the unwashed masses, who are too thick to understand the concept of "judging a man by the content of his character, not the color of his skin". So I can just imagine the social unrest if Mr. Gilchrist was allowed to disseminate his unfiltered views - racism would spread like wildfire across Canada. Thank you oh thank you Mr. Hayden for saving us from ourselves!

Mr Hayden's argument seems to be "Im right, Gilchrist is wrong, so Gilchrist must be censored." What nonsense. Gilchrist IS WRONG. So what? Most of the university profs I had the displeasure of having were socialism-promoting useful idiots - they were wrong on EVERYTHING, they were promoting an ideology that resulted in unspeakable violence and millions of deaths, yet I dont call for them to be censored.

As an interesting tidbit, I'd like to point out that the Weimar Republic (pre-Nazi Germany) had strong anti-hate speech laws, which were in fact used against Hitler. Turns out "being silenced by the state" is great marketing.

Mr. Hayden, I am entirely in favor of thoughtful criticism of the press, having been a journalist (and a critic) for four decades. I'm even in favor of less-than-thoughtful criticism. I'm in favor of any kind of critical thinking, whether I believe it or not. It's called engagement . . .

What worries me is anything that seeks to quell this engagement. What worries me is people like you who seem to be proposing litmus tests for "acceptable" points of view, to be enforced by the OPC or the Ontario legislature or the Kawartha school board.

In Mr. Gilchrist's case, to be censured, and to be removed from committee work, for expressing an opinion that has nothing directly to do with the work, is frankly outrageous and anti-democratic, and I hope, as a historian, that you can appreciate the dangers of this kind of thing. Let's not take it one step forward, and try to prevent people like Gilchrist from accessing the public media.

Finally, how come I'm not hearing from all those people whom you claim have been "unnecessarily" hurt? We're not talking about hate literature here, or the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. We're talking about a Canadian who is expressing his anxiety (and maybe even his paranoia) about "gun-toting" Jamaicans, extremist Sikh nationalists, and violent Tamils. I'm reading his words carefully, and Gilchrist seems to be selectively anxious, rather than broad-brush xenophobic. In fact, I'm wondering if a lot of so-called hyphenated Canadians might not agree with him. However, whether they do or not isn't really the point. The point is, WE live in a country in which (I hope) the right to be rambunctiously controversial is more important than the need to be nice.

We have enough voices calling for censorship. The voice of a reader in a letter is not the same as the voice of the newspaper in an editorial, or in the news columns. People who think like Hayden think that freedom of speech comes in some kind of neat little box, shipped out prepackaged from the universities. It is much more rough and tumble than that. I am always depressed to read of journalists, who should know the history of free speech, advocating more censorship. The Press Council, although slow, was right to dismiss this. "We live in a free country where people have as much right to express outrageous and ridiculous opinions as moderate ones." Mr. Justice Ian Binnie, WIC Radio Ltd. v. Simpson, 2008 SCC 40. That's the law, Mr. Hayden. Luckily the Supreme Court takes a broader view of things.

Mr. Adams, the more comments you post the less convinced I am.

A colleague of mine recently asked: "what exactly does a newspaper commit itself to when it joins the OPC?"

Let's take one of the OPC's guidelines as an example, keeping in mind Gilchrist's non-specific comment about "gun-toting Jamaicans";

The OPC says, "There is a need for sensitivity in references to race and national origin in stories about criminal charges that might unfairly associate an entire group with anti-social activity."

Now, if I believe that a newspaper which has voluntarily chosen to be a member of the Ontario Press Council has not lived up to what the OPC, through precedent decision, defines as the "highest ethical and professional standards of journalism" ... what do I do? According to you, if I complain about the conduct of a member of the OPC (suggesting that certain given printed material should not have published as such) then I would be promoting censorship.

Actually, this doesn't sound like a matter of freedom of speech at all.

Note that 233 newspapers in Ontario are currently members in good standing of the Ontario Press Council.

From the Preamble to the OPC by-laws:

"a democratic society has a legitimate and fundamental interest in the quality of the information it receives..."

and

"Through [The Ontario Press Council] readers can call Ontario newspapers to account for unfair conduct such as... ignoring commonly-accepted ethical standards..."

One such "ethical standard" in my mind, is a "community responsibility" as defined by the Canadian Daily Newspaper Association:

"the operation of a newspaper is a public trust and its overriding responsibility is to the society it serves.”

From the OPC Policy Statement:

"A rule of thumb is that an identifiable group constitutes people who were born to a group or are part of a group although not necessarily by choice. For example, it would include members of visible minorities, nationalities, ethnic groups, religions and people who are mentally or physically challenged or have a particular sexual orientation."

I argued that the Gilchrist letter was "unnecessarily hurtful” (from the OPC Policy on Opinion) largely because it ascribed negative qualities to "identifiable groups", again, an OPC categorical definition.

So, what does this have to do with some sort of slippery slope to an Orwellian dystopia of groupthink? Mr. Gilchrist could easily have "pinched people's toes" in any number of ways without specifically implicating "identifiable groups" in such a blatantly "hurtful" manner. It was obviously “hurtful” enough by Parliamentary and School Board standards. In Queen's Park, MPPs from ALL parties condemned the letter, and the Kawartha Pine Ridge District School Board voted to censure Mr. Gilchrist and remove him from committee work.

However, my arguments simply weren't strong enough in this case to convince the OPC that the newspaper in question didn't live up to the "highest ethical standards."

That's final.

Now, all of this talk of censorship and Orwellian thought control and so forth seems a bit overblown, at least for journalists who are members of the OPC which, after all, seeks to "encourage thoughtful criticism of the press..." On this note, I wonder if you read yesterday's Toronto Star Editorial on Jeffrey Reitz's study?

Can Mr. Hayden and Ms Gough not accept the possibility that the moment we start "toning down" unpopular and even offensive arguments in the public media, as they suggest, is the moment we start to normalize group-think? Democracy and the freedoms that come with it are by nature messy and occasionally pinch the toes. That's a good thing. The "best interests of the community" are not served by finding a warm and comfortable one-size-fits-all social mindset. As Luther said in another context: "Sin bravely."

Mr. Hayden, you wrote:

"Needless to say, the newspaper "censored" part of the OPC text (the part that was sympathetic to my arguments) when they originally printed the item. If I hadn't complained to the OPC yet again, the actual text of the decision would never have been made public. What then, makes censorship problematic in one case and not the other?"

Im sorry to say that this comment on your part betrays a misunderstanding of what censorship actually is. The newspaper was forced to publish the decision by the OPC - that is itself a violation of free speech, perhaps a justifiable one. However, in some cases, to be forced to speak can be as oppressive as being restrained from speaking.

The confusion here is between freedom of speech, and the right to a forum (a very common confusion in some circles, e.g., the students who tried to force their way into Maclean's pages and David Cronenberg's cries of censorship if his movies didnt get tax credits).

Everybody has freedom of speech as an inalienable right. Nobody has a right to a forum - a forum must be earned.

In this case, the newspaper did not censor the OPC decision - the OPC could and probably did publish their decision independently.

As an analogy, Im sure that you would agree that if you were forced by law to swear allegiance to Stephen Harper, you would consider that a major violation of your freedom of speech. If you were to refuse, I dont think you would consider that anybody was censored.

I'd like to acknowledge that many legitimate criticisms have been raised, which I accept as evidence of the importance of this discussion. My intention here was to provide J-Source readers with an inside perspective on the OPC process and my thoughts after a year-long involvement, however fallable I might have been. Of course, I recognize that journalistic freedoms are historic, hard-won rights. That is why the spirit of my submission to the OPC was a request for ethical clarification. As Don Sellar pointed out, this never really happened.

Needless to say, the newspaper "censored" part of the OPC text (the part that was sympathetic to my arguments) when they originally printed the item. If I hadn't complained to the OPC yet again, the actual text of the decision would never have been made public. What then, makes censorship problematic in one case and not the other?

I hope readers will also note that in my submission I proposed the following middle-ground compromise: that the editor might have worked with Mr. Gilchrist to tone down the negative stereotyping in his letter while preserving (and perhaps even strengthening) the legitimate (if offensive or unpopular) aspects of his argument. When, after all, was the last time anyone read a 1000-word letter to the editor? In any case, Mr. Gilchrist said it himself in one of his two printed retractions that he had regretted his choice of words. I believe that a responsible editor would have had the best interests of their community in mind when they considered printing this kind of material. That includes students, staff and teachers in the school board which Mr. Gilchrist represents as a trustee, amongst them a minority of Jamaican, Muslim, Lebanese and other minority Canadians.

I can't help seeing in the pro-censorship opinions an elitist tinge. They are there for the unwashed who might be convinced that because a letter to the editor espouses a view, it is in the mainstream. Thank heavens for "serious" journalists and the HRCs to shield these buffoons from these opinion.

Deal with the letter, write a rebuttal (if you are capable of such an exercise) but a complaint to an HRC is a cowardly and stupud response.

Why is a site devoted to journalism so in favor of censorship? Most people would judge that Gilchrist has shown himself to be a buffoon. Others, though they might disagree with him, might take a closer look at what it is which makes him so angry. Is this anger widespread? If so, why is that?

You see, Mr. Hayden, there's lots to learn if you gear down on the impulse to suppress and censor. Words of wisdom from your elder if not your better.

I am both surprised and disturbed by the fact that something called The Journalism Project is advocating for the suppression of freedom of the Press in this country. If Mr. Hayden did not agree with what Mr. Gilchrist said, he had every right to rebut him in the form of another letter to the editor, or to refute his Mr. Gilchrist's claims in an article. He chose instead to attempt to censor the opinions expressed by Mr. Gilchrist and to go after the newspaper which chose to publish Mr. Gilchist's letter. What worries me is if even journalists won't stand up for freedom of the press,expression and speech how can we possibly hope to retain these freedoms. If you think an opinion is wrong, argue and debate it, don't censor it.

I can understand why someone might not like the tone of Gilchrist's letter, but to think it should be banned is wrong-headed.

Gilchrist wrote: "Left un-reinforced, these new “Canadians” may ultimately learn to love the true meaning of being “Canadian” and we should be accelerating such change in attitude by teaching more Canadian history and civics in our schools.

"But, why do we continue to delude ourselves that we are better off with a virtual “open-door” policy on immigration? Do we not recognize, in addition to creating a “Trojan Horse” situation, these quasi-Canadians cause Canada additional economic and environmental distress?

"Do they not require public support funds? Do they not take Canadian jobs?..."

In response, Hayden writes: "It is now ostensibly permissible for newspapers to print material that ascribes negative intrinsic qualities to identifiable minority groups."

To my mind, arguing that immigrants, while presently culturally different, and thus a risk if in large numbers to certain local cultural norms, might (or might not) nonetheless in time adapt and change so that they come to share local Canadian values, does not add up to "ascribing negative intrinsic qualities". The implied charge of (some kind of biological) racism is bogus.

So why does Hayden make this rather contrived charge? Might I speculate it is because his education has encouraged it, an education indulging in the arts of deconstruction where one is taught that any and all discourse about the Other is inherently, shall we say intrinsically, violent, in that the very act of making a distinction between us and them is the root of all victimizing evil. (I refer all too briefly to a postmodern world view that has emerged in response to the Holocaust and Hiroshima.)

However, what to do with the reality that any use/sharing of language creates a centre of attention and a periphery more or less alienated from a centre that someone has succeeded in calling our attention to, a centre/periphery created by the very act of commanding our attention? And thus, by extension, what are we to do with the reality that any use of language creates an internal (domestic) us and them, while also creating a shared domestic centre/periphery to oppose to one or another external (foreign) centre/periphery?

In other words, the postmodern student is set up to police something - othering - that is intrinsically human (rooted in the nature of language) and to put under permanent suspicion this messy, imperfect aspect of our fallen humanity. More or less implicitly in the postmodern academy, deconstruction is done in favor of some loosely-imagined Utopia of non-violence. Though it is never admitted, this "utopia" would have to be one of non-speech, i.e. it would be non-human, since all speech others someone; and even if you are othering on behalf of the supposedly downtrodden, and thus consider yourself morally "safe", you can't do this for long without putting into question just who rules and who is really downtrodden (did Hayden doubt, at the outset, that the power of the state and professional bodies would be on his side in this little dispute, and not with the alleged angry old white guy?)

Ultimately, the postmodern student in the cult of deconstruction is taught, like the "human rights" bureaucrat, an intolerance for all speech that does not conform to some impossible "principle" of non-discrimination. I put that in scare quotes because it is not in fact possible to articulate this "principle" in any rational way, only to imply it as if faith in some Utopia is still necessary, a required mark of identity on the left even after/despite the historical failure of communism.

In the real world, people have to use language to negotiate their differences. All the "stereotypes" Gilchrist uses are, to some degree, founded in actual events that news-informed Canadians will recognize. Now we may also recognize many other more hopeful signs of successful integration of immigrants. But to say Gilchrist is "stereotyping" immigrants, as individuals, is less true than that he is dwelling on some violent events in a way actually not that dissimilar from Hayden's excited interest in a deconstruction of Gilchrist's "violent" speech event. Gilchrist is simply not interested, in this letter, in the nature of all immigrants as individuals: like Hayden, he implicitly thinks we should be interested in violent events, whatever their frequency as compared to our many uneventful days.

In other words, both assume correctly, but without examining the reasons why, that human self-knowledge stems primarily in response to our intra-specific violence, as realized in particular events, rather than from our mundane experience of less-violently mediated differences, i.e. from our mundane experience of accepted social rituals or norms.

But the two writers are not quite the same since while Gilchrist in allegedly "stereotyping" is actually pointing to events of violence that those of us familiar with Canadian news stories recognize, Hayden, in indulging the black arts of deconstruction (black art because indebted to a magical idea that if we police language we, the right thinking, can control human resentment and rivalry; but this is a dangerous delusion) and "human rights" policing, is actually undermining some (maybe, if taken to a logical extreme, all) of our mundane and not particularly glamorous ways of mediating differences through one or another form of steam-blowing language or norm assertion. One might note that Gilchrist's steam blowing is also engaged in an attempt, however (un)successful, to put forward Canadian norms in which we can all trade.

Hayden has made Gilchrist into an event, but he could have ignored him. But Hayden felt he had to take the bait, or that a dangerous cat was already out of the bag, thus proving that it is particular, rather atypical, events (misconceived as "stereotyping") that win our attention and create the basis for civic debate. It is true that shared norms may in time flow from our mediation of unique events but we barely begin to understand (and I fear we undermine) this historical or anthropological process, this exchange, by talking vaguely of "stereotypes".

I conclude that Hayden and commenters like Christina Hough are more dangerous than Gilchrist to the ability of Canadians to mediate their differences in future. The holy postmodern live with the Utopian delusion of overcoming an inevitable human resentment and rivalry by forever policing speech. Gilchrist, whatever his limits, at least recognizes that we cannot but conceive of a free public discourse as anything other than a process that entails othering and the identification of norms that one hopes others will come to negotiate and share by way of making an always-temporary peace.

A better response to his letter might have been to contest his understanding of Canadian values, to search out or put forward other models of norms, negotiating and rediscovering our capacity for shared transcendence, creating models of what is more likely to engender shared understandings of what is sacred to Canadians. This would be the work of contributing to a relatively non-violent mediation of our differences. But the black arts of deconstruction and PC policing do not really give us norms; they only undermine them except for leaving us with the sanctimonious figure of a false saint whose "progressivism" is really a form of nihilism.

The norms that will hold Canadians together in future will have to emerge from something approaching a free debate. There are indeed an awful lot of errors in our self-understandings, as we search out and try to emulate models of Canadianness (one cannot model anything without making errors that distinguish you, imperfect one, from your model). But it is only through free exchange in these errors that we can intuit who and what we are today, and open ourselves to believing that there really is something transcendent, in which we really can share/trade/negotiate our imperfections (while also better recognizing what we really must oppose - if not unrealistically "ban" - as incompatible with a free society/exchange).

What we can share, for a while, as transcendent and unifying, will in time erode under the force of our inevitable rivalry and resentment and we will be called on again to rediscover, in the event, what holds us together. This is inevitable because however "good" our values, there will always be a difference between those who get more space in the newspaper to promote them and those who feel pragmatically disadvantaged in comparison. (My excuse for going on so today!)

Those who think they are protecting immigrants by trying to close down this rivalry and free exchange of resentments don't really understand what it is the immigrants must join if they want to share in Canadian freedom. Democracy is not about sharing love and kisses - that's the work of more spiritual arts - it's about trading freely in our resentments as an alternative to having some big man or big state telling us what we can, cannot, or must, resent (or, alternatively, some violent street gang or blackmailing terrorist force pressuring us to accept their reality). As Churchill said, democracy is the worst system except for all the rest. You're not supposed to feel comfortable when you read the editorial page or realize that our choices in a democracy are among policies or models that are all capable of evil: we should pick the lesser evil, the least violent form of shared norms, not dream of overcoming the human evil which makes our imperfect grasp of the good possible.

Free speech is our guarantee, not that our speech will never be implicated in violence, but that we will minimize our violence by trading freely in our resentments. In a truly competitive marketplace of ideas, where the state guarantees individual freedom and does not take sides for or against some alleged victim group, or some deconstructing religion, the more deeply resentful fail: their norms just do not attract enough attention because the resentment is a measure of alienation, and would-be winners aspire to overcome their own alienation and sign off on a successfully shared centre of attention. We can only model that centre by trying, and failing, and trying again. All we need is the freedom to speak out against the mindless scapegoating of one side or another, which is to say the freedom to frankly identify and measure our shared social realities/dangers against charges freely made. But if we think we are righteous in silencing an alleged scapegoater, while denying any interest in his take on reality, then we are losing the freedom and discipline to really understand scapegoating, or reality.

We declare an endless war, in the name of peace. We do this because we can't accept that "peace", in this world, is never all that peaceful, never perfect, never permanent. If we are not endlessly patient with our imperfections, we cannot be free; instead, we must believe in some Utopia, i.e. in state-sponsored dictates interested in upholding "good ideas" rather than in using ideas only to help us see our actual, conflict-ridden, human reality. WE are all resentful and hence dangerous to each other, and that includes the immigrants; our shared humanity is not safely denied.

I'd like to clarify my earlier point: my intention was to challenge the assumption that the merest whiff of censorship is the result of the devil's work, while all who defend the unrestricted and inalienable freedom to publicize anything are necessarily on the side of the angels.

And it is not because I don't sympathize with the concerns of R.B. Glennie and others, who may fear excessive political correctness may curtail fair discussion. In fact, if I thought that Mr. Hayden was suggesting that all debate about the pros and cons of immigration was automatically racist, I wouldn't be as inclined to defend him (incidentally, I'm not so sure there had been no public debate on immigration prior to Jason Kenney's comments on the subject - I easily found an article from 2006 in the Economist entitled "Canada's immigration debate").

The problem is not that Mr. Gilchrist was critical of immigration, it was that he used inflammatory and racist arguments to criticize it. If he had discussed economic pitfalls or bureaucratic flaws in Canada's immigration policy, it would have been one thing. What he did, in fact, was call immigrants enemy spies and "aberrations." Only a couple comments besides mine addressed the harmfulness of such racist public declarations, and the extent to which they contribute negatively to the lives of others. While it may be possible to argue which harm is greater, I do not think it fair to dismiss the problems associated with disseminating racism, just because they may call into question the unconditional sanctity of free speech. This issue is worth discussing.

It is clear from the article and some of the comments that the desire to control everybody in order for them to hold the "correct" opinions is alive and well.

You people are so afraid of the effect of a racist letter on the unwashed masses, you would nominate yourselves to review everything that is published or broadcast to make sure only "approved" stuff makes it through your filter.

There are a couple of words to describe this attitude. Here's a short list: totalitarian, fascist, orwellian, and tyrannical. Equally applicable however, are idiotic, pointless, moronic, and self-defeating.

You can shut up every dissenting scientist on AGW, and jail every last racist you want. People will still make up their own minds no matter what. People will still get upset at ethnic groups blocking the Gardiner, or at Al Gore flying a private jet. You have no power over this, give it up. Your best shot at influencing others is to provide a reasoned argument - that's it.

More to the point, censorship or attempts at censorship are always self-defeating, and make the object of censorship more interesting. Just like Perez Hilton made sure Carrie Prejean had more name-recognition she would ever have had if she had quietly won Miss USA, censoring opinions always has the opposite effect of what is intended.

So freedom of the press is now a "knee-jerk" defence? Who, I ask, should dictate what letters to the editor, or which portions of reports, should be published? Is this editorial discretion to be removed from the hands of newspapers owners or editors? I welcome Mr. Sellar's suggestions about how these decisions should be made. I have the feeling that any of his corrective solutions--which would likely override the normal pressures of the marketplace-- might be worse than the "problem."

Although the tone of this piece is one of lament, on the part of the author, that his efforts at censorship were not successful, I am quite heartened by all the trouble Mr. Hayden encountered in trying to regulate thoughts and ideas.

What is disappointing, however, was to read on a web site called `the Journalism Project', the support given to Mr. Hayden's censorship crusade.

In particular, I refer to the remarks of commenter `Christina Hough', who writes

[quote: Do ideas not become more plausible the more we hear them discussed in public? I would like to believe it's because we think carefully and critically about the merits of each case, but gloomily suspect that it's simply because the more people who seem to believe a thing, the less crazy it begins to sound.]

Ms Hough later writes:

[quote: if the media emphasizes one point of view over all others, it may indeed become a common assumption. At the same time, emphasizing the validity of two or more viewpoints instills the idea that the situation is complicated, perhaps too complicated to hold a decided opinion about at all. I'd argue that complicating an issue in this way can in many cases be just as calculated and manipulative as excluding inconvenient opinions.]

If I'm to understand the above ideas, it is the `responsibility' of the news media to actively eliminate viewpoints considered - in Ms Hough's opinion at least - as wrong, for for of `excessively complicating' matters.

I don't think our news media can be accused of excessive complication, today or in any era. And I think we long ago reached the point where our news media have worried too much about ensuring each point of view gets a reasonable hearing.

As for the letter to the editor that sparked Mr. Hayden censorious instincts, it's `acceptability' depends, again on your point of view. Although I don't share the sentiment that immigration is bad, or that immigrants are largely harmful to society (if that is, indeed, what Mr. Gilchrist was saying), Canadians have scarcely had a debate about the wisdom of immigration, multiculturalism or even the refguee system, which the federal Minister responsible has called `broken.'

In the past, when anyone tried to discuss these issues, they were immediately and falsely branded as `racist' or `intolerant'.

The efforts at censorship launched by Mr. Hayden about Mr. Gilchrist's piece, ironically prove this point.

thank you

Since the Elmo case against the star was dismissed, how does your case overturn any precedent set by it?

How predictable, how sad. It took 13 months for a reader's complaint against a newspaper to be considered by the Ontario Press Council.

Yet it raised significant ethical concerns about the newspaper's woeful lack of judgment in publishing a letter-writer's ignorant, nasty rant against immigration.

When the complaint is ultimately dismissed, the newspaper in question then initially publishes only part of the adjudication, leaving out a mild press council criticism of its conduct.

Once again, the knee-jerk journalistic defences - freedom of the press, publish and be damned, etc. -- trump a serious discussion of newspaper ethics.

For shame.

While I myself have been back and forth on the issue, I think Mr. Hayden is quite right to call into question the assumption (or "liberal piety"?) that the public dissemination of any and every opinion is by definition a healthy and laudable practice.

Sure, it may be useful to know, in case we're tempted to assume that racism is finally dead, that xenophobic attitudes still exist. However, I think publishing them in the paper does more than provoke debate among those willing and eager to consider all sides of any given issue. It also gives people who might incline towards similarly racist opinions the comfort of knowing they're not alone. Do ideas not become more plausible the more we hear them discussed in public? I would like to believe it's because we think carefully and critically about the merits of each case, but gloomily suspect that it's simply because the more people who seem to believe a thing, the less crazy it begins to sound.

And while we are right, I'm sure, to worry about bias in the media, does giving equal weight to all points of view solve the problem of bias? Does it lessen the power of the media to shape the way we think? I would argue that it does not. If the media emphasizes one point of view over all others, it may indeed become a common assumption. At the same time, emphasizing the validity of two or more viewpoints instills the idea that the situation is complicated, perhaps too complicated to hold a decided opinion about at all. I'd argue that complicating an issue in this way can in many cases be just as calculated and manipulative as excluding inconvenient opinions.

For example, I've heard of this kind of thing being used as a tactic by those who have a stake in arguing that greenhouse gases do not pose a substantial risk. However many scientists come out and say that certain emissions have a clear and substantially harmful effect on the Earth's atmosphere, all you really need is a few emphatic voices saying that there is no evidence, and you've achieved your aim: to sow just enough doubt to greatly reduce the degree of action that's likely to be taken.

So to return to the question of harm, I think Mr. Hayden can very reasonably ask the question: is it less harmful to enforce the view that to refer to Jamaicans, Muslims and Indians as "aberrations" is unconditionally unacceptable, and thus limit free speech, or is it less harmful to publish this opinion as equally valid as any other (even if only in principal) and risk casting doubt on the issue, potentially emboldening others of the same opinion...which may in turn have a direct and unpleasant effect on an increased number of Jamaicans, Muslims and Indians?

Where is the "harmful content" in the Gilchrist letter that offends Mr. Hayden so deeply? As a student of history and political science, Mr. Hayden should know that it is more socially harmful to censor or silence unpleasant opinions, than to allow them to ventilate in the open air where we can all judge their merits (or demerits, as in the Gilchrist argument.) I WANT my newspapers, especially the letters and opinion pages, to publish points of view that challenge liberal pieties, cant, given wisdom and assumptions. I can handle negative stereotypes; I can even deal with exclusionist thinking and xenophobia (and so, I suspect, can Mr. Hayden.) I find it useful to know that there are Canadians (many, I suspect) who feel this way. I disagree strongly, but those views only intensify if we push them underground and label them "unacceptable."

The complaint was properly tossed out. Hayden's remedy was to send a letter of his own to the newspaper. I'd really like to think he is right about the Ontario HRC being timid to act on free speech after the McLeans/Steyn case, but I'm not holding my breath. They are too well-funded not to continue their usual line, although they may very well direct their actions against individuals who lack the resources of media organizations to respond.