Today's National Post features an excellent piece entitled "Why human 'rights inflation' could spell 'the beginning of the end of social change'". According to Dominique Clément, a historian at the University of Alberta, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, signed in 1948, included a few dozen rights, all familiar from their notorious violations by repressive states. Today, international law recognizes more than 300.
These less familiar "rights", such as the human right to affordable Internet access or higher education, represent a worrisome trend. "Rights inflation", he argues, erodes the legitimate core of rights that are strictly necessary to life and freedom.
How so? Well, the more "rights" people have, the more likely they are to come into conflict. The "rights" to which I am "entitled" is as long as my arm, but what happens if your arm is longer than mine? Human rights legislation says you may not discriminate against me, or preach hatred against me, for being a white, male, traditional Catholic.
I happen to be a "social conservative" too, but there are no laws to keep the "progressives" from ridiculing my beliefs and demonizing me as antideluvian, homophobic, Islamophobic, racist, etc etc and so forth. And if I, or someone like Mark Steyn (Hi, Mark!) attempts to turn the tables, it's "Helloooo, Human Rights Tribunal!"
Imagine, then, what would happen if one of the "protected groups" -- gays, let's say, or wimmin -- came into conflict with another, like... wait for it... Muslims. Consider the following cases.
Case One: a friendly soccer game in Brampton ON last week. It's established law in Ontario that girls can play sports -- even a real sport like hockey -- on boys' teams if they want to. Last Tuesday a coed team from Robert F. Hall Secondary School (a Catholic school) met on the field with an all-male team from ISNA Private Islamic High School. The teams played the first half without incident, and Hall led ISNA 3-1 at the break.
At that point, the coach of ISNA's team realized that there were girls playing on the other team! (How he figured this out is not reported.) So at halftime, the Muslim coach told the referee that his team "didn't feel that they could continue for religious reasons and for their own personal beliefs."
Obviously his complaint had nothing to do with his team's being on the low end of the score, but, although ISNA would have lost the game by forfeit, Hall needed to win by more than a two-goal differential to advance to the next round of the tournament. So, the girls volunteered to sit out in the second half so play could continue, and Hall went on to win 6-1. Bruce Campbell, speaking for the Catholic school board called the girls' decision to come out of the game "an incredible display of sportsmanship and selflessness and team spirit. But [he added] they shouldn't have been put in that position."
A spokesthingy for the athletic association that organized the tournament explained all teams are expected to abide by league rules and league constitution that includes a gender equity policy, which gives female students the right to play on a boys' team if their school doesn't have a girls' team. "It's our assumption that when schools apply (to be part of the league) they've read the rules and regulations," he said, adding that any team that joins the league is bound to abide by its rules and regulations.
The Brampton Guardian report says that at press time, ISNA Private Islamic High School had not responded to a request for comment. Their end the story by saying that "commenting has been suspended...because some readers have violated our commenting guidelines. Rude remarks and comments that are off topic are unacceptable. Foul language is forbidden."
Case two comes to us from Steven Crowder, an American actor, comedian and former contributor to the Fox News Channel. In October 2013, Big Journalism reported that Fox News had dropped him, shortly after he made negative statements about Fox News host Sean Hannity. Mr. Crowder now hosts a weekly talk show, Louder with Crowder on WAAM in Ann Arbor MI, and posts comedy, commentary and news videos to his YouTube channel, Louder with Crowder -- "the most politically incorrect channel on the Web".
In April, Mr. Crowder posted a hidden camera video which proves that, if you're a Christian who wants to practise religious freedom, you'd better get ready for ridicule, threats and discrimination. But if you're a Muslim who wants to practice religious freedom, of course there's no problem! At least, that's the case in Dearborn MI where he attempted to get Muslim cake shops to bake a cake for a gay wedding, which Islam teaches are wrong. Need we tell you that they refused openly? Watch! And ask yourself if a Christian baker could have got away with this.
No comments:
Post a Comment