Bill C-30 and vikileaks

I have been reading with interest the opinion pieces in major Canadian newspapers regarding Bill C-30 and the vikileaks protest. Most commentators have been moderate, saying that MP Vic Toews should be censured for his behaviour but also saying they do not support the anonymous vikileaks source which distributed personal information related to Mr. Toews’ divorce. This is not the way we comport ourselves in Canada; we are civil, and we do not stoop to such base behaviour.

True. Not ordinarily. But all the protests, science and rational discourse in the world have not been able to sway the ideologues of the federal Conservatives from any of their bizarre schemes. Their legitimacy as a democratically elected government is based on a flawed system whereby a party with a substantial minority of votes can get a majority of seats. 

And on Thursday February 23, 2012, it was revealed that election day fraud was perpetrated last spring, and even if it was not the Conservatives (the news reports keep saying the company that perpetrated the fraud has ties to the Conservatives), the election results in the affected ridings are now in question.

If a party takes advantage of a flawed system and fraud to claim a majority and enact legislation that is contrary to the interests and wishes of the people it serves, then that government's "legitimacy" is questionable. Governments need to serve their constituents, not follow blindly their destructive ideologies and pretend they were elected to do so. By members of Parliament breaking the law or their own rules when it serves their own purposes, the Conservatives have modeled the behaviour deemed acceptable. 

On the topic of internet child pornography: recently there were arrests of 60 people in Ontario related to this. The police seemed to be able to conduct their investigation quite satisfactorily by the processes currently permitted by law. If the Conservatives believe child pornography is so rampant that it merits widespread surveillance and unlimited police powers, then maybe they should be spending more on prevention measures like increasing funding to mental health research and treatment programs. 

My concern over C-30 is complicated. I am one of the people leaning toward "If you have nothing to hide, what's the problem?" But what we have seen over the past few years, with the G20 Summit and the Cadmin affair, now the possibility of large scale election fraud, and the behaviour of local Conservatives Jaffer and Goldring (see previous posts), is a disdain for the law. What I foresee is unwarranted search and seizure to justify passing C-30 - and in cases where the searches don't turn up anything, evidence will be planted. At least having to put your evidence or reasonable suspicions before a judge means there has to be SOMETHING already pointing to a breaking of the law BEFORE the police sieze the property, before it can be tampered with. As it stands, the bill provides this government with a great way to harass or frame anyone they want. I'm a law-and-order/social responsibility kind of person; sometimes that means I speak out against the things members of the government do. That makes me a target. So what would stop a politician from directing the police (and the G20 summit showed how closely they work together) to get my IP address and information, come to my house and take away my computer (which has confidential files related to my work duties) and plant false evidence? Nothing. As the bill is currently presented, it is my understanding they don’t even have to tell you why.

Fifteen years ago I had the experience of being inappropriately targeted by politicians who then didn't even have the decency to acknowledge my civil - even gentle - letters correcting the factual errors they made to the public about me and my work. Those politicians were Reform/Alliance and Conservative. They were completely willing to be judge and jury without any sort of fair hearing. No, I do not trust these people. They have proven that they are not trustworthy. To give these people more power is ill-advised.

How, then, do you stop a majority government that will not accept fact, reason, or logic and that labels anyone who stands up for principles of democracy and justice as enemies of the state or friends of pedophiles?

Vikileaks humiliated Toews, and it was wrong. But Toews needs to understand that an unwarranted search and seizure, without explanation or justification to the person whose property is confiscated, is also wrong. The consequences in terms of lost work, lingering damage to reputation, and the expenses of spurious court cases and investigations – these are far greater than Toews’ having his divorce documents made public. Toews was willing to put lots of Canadians through that process for no discernible reason, other than to populate the prisons the Conservatives want to build, promoting a culture of fear and violence. Since when have those been Canadian values? If what it took for Toews to wake up was a dose of his own medicine, and it worked...

Stephen Harper wants to change Canada (despite Canada working better than almost every other country in the world). He needs to be prepared for the result: Canadians might stop behaving with the civility that used to be our trademark, and the poetic justice is that the monster the Conservatives create will turn its sights on them.