Dear Editor:
I read with interest Filce’s (‘A viable safeguard,’ Feb. 4) and Goudie’s (‘Gatekepers of real truth,’ Feb. 4) responses to my assertion that censoring free speech will undoubtedly lead to a Canada that will be a much worse place to live in than it is with free speech.
I love how we as smug Canadians are much better than our American neighbours: “We only need to look to the south in order to see what freedom of speech and expression led to in weeks past. Death and destruction.” (Filce) My question to Filce is what makes you think Canada is so much better than the United States?
Goudie asserts that “Lies are a form of censorship because they bury or distort actual truth.” To Mr Goudie: Who are you saying is actually lying?
For the last number of years, I have been listening for actual balanced journalism, primarily from our national broadcaster, the CBC, and also from other mainstream media. I am honestly not seeing the balance. As long as I am willing to buy into a socialist narrative, and go along with a socialist agenda, all is fine, but as soon as I dare to present a challenging viewpoint, it is denigrated into “hate speech, obscenity, and defamation.” (Filce) or “Conspiracy misinformation presented as fact, and other forms of untruth pushed as real and true.” (Goudie).
I would also like to ask Goudie and Filce, how do they expect to police and safeguard us from such intolerable things as conspiracy theories?
Call me paranoid, but I see some very evil happenings in this world: a push to annihilate small independent businesses, a push for compliance to socialist dictates, that exorbitant debts being racked up by all levels of government is acceptable, a push to discredit Christian believers and standard of conduct, and a whole slurry of other horrible things that we should not tolerate. These things cannot be instituted by one deviant actor, but on a massive scale of conspirators wanting to affect the same end.
I would like to end this with a quote, I am not sure who penned it, but I feel it very appropriate under the circumstances: “Liberty is meaningless where the right to utter one’s thoughts has ceased to exist, that of all rights is the dread of tyrants.”
Wayne Baker,
Wellington North