Rindall admitted to writing the posts in a Feb. 13 statement to police. He told police he was entitled to “free speech” and should be allowed to post whatever he wants, adding he didn’t think laws against this type of hate speech should exist, the statement of facts said.
This is what a steady diet of Fox News and the like will bring. Hatred, plus not knowing the difference between American laws and Canadian laws. I really appreciate that hate speech is a criminal offence in Canada.
Another Canadian laid low by american culture.
He told police he was entitled to “free speech” and should be allowed to post whatever he wants
People don’t know what free speech is and how much it varies from country to country.
Generally it is to ensure people can express opinion freely. Obvious threats or inciting unlawful actions are not opinions.
Lots of people are swimming in a sea of American media. American personalities, American stories, American cultural touchstones. This effect is taken to extremes in the extremely online right, as there is a sort of transnational fascism emanating from there. This is why you get people who think Miranda rights are a thing in Canada, or the various amendments to the US Constitution apply. It’s also why we need to defend Canadian media. For better or worse, many people’s knowledge of the world around them comes from the media they consume. And an unfortunate number of Canadians are spiritually American as a result. For example, the premier of my province who thought premiers had the same power of pardon that US governors have, despite being an MLA for years and really having no excuse to not know this.
Understanding how it could apply in different situations is definitely a thing.
Had to explain in final exam in EU country, how/if the constitutional right to free speech would apply, when a man starts shouting ‘fire’ in a theater full of people.
Wasn’t the only part of oral exam, but one of 2-3 main questions, somehow managed to still get equivalent of ‘B’, though I don’t recall what I said exactly.
It probably also helped that this particular subject, rather than focused on law, was a mix of behavioural studies, law and philosophy.
Freedom of speech ≠ freedom of consequences
Sure but Canada is not America and we have laws against hate speech.
Correct. That’s the consequences part.
I think the reason they corrected you is that usually when that phrase is used, it is referring to US “freedom of speech” where although the law protects you from being arrested or charged for your speech, you can still be ousted from a community or fired (consequences)
However, in Canada, the Charter of Rights and Freedoms permits the government to enforce “reasonable” limited censoring of speech. So, in Canada, we do not have free speech in the same way because we can get arrested for hate speech.
So there is a distinction here. I’m happy to clarify if any of my language was confusing, let me know if this explanation makes sense.
Edit: also in Canada it is not called “freedom of speech”, it is called “freedom of expression”
