Your bloody free speech zone

Bill Dembski asked me to post something on this at Uncommon Descent a while back, but hassles prevented me from getting to it until now, and I am posting it here too:

From Canadian civil rights lawyer Ezra Levant, author of Shakedown:

"That's your bloody free speech zone"

By Ezra Levant on April 8, 2009 9:40 PM

A reader sent me this letter to the editor that appeared in the Southern Utah University newspaper. Here's the link; allow me to reprint it in its entirety:

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In light of SUU officials plan to designate "Free Speech Zones" on campus, I thought I'd offer my assistance. Grab a map. OK, ready?

All right, you see that big area between Canada and Mexico, surrounded by lots of blue ink on the East and West? You see it?

There's your bloody Free Speech Zone.

Jeffrey Wilbur
Senior communication major from Bountiful

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Something tells me that Young Jeffrey is the type of guy who, if he were a Canadian, would attract human rights commission busybodies like flies. And he wouldn't bow down to them for a minute, either.

I look forward to the day -- not long from now, I hope -- when such a clarion call would resonate in Canada in the same way. It ought to -- free speech is as much our legacy as it is America's. We just need to remind ourselves that, despite thirty years of being told we're actually a censored people, we remain a free people.

Yes, we do.

From Denyse: Lo, I tell you a great mystery! There is a giant hockey heaven - far bigger than anything you could ever imagine or believe - north of the United States. In Hockey Heaven, many of us have recently started shoving "human rights" nannies hard into the boards. You've no idea how quickly that reduces their numbers.

As we say here: Fine, whatever. See you on the ice tomorrow.

Or, if you need me to put it in a more elegant way: Here we discuss ideas, and maybe reject them as out of bounds, but we don't declare them illegal, unless they involve seriously advocating a crime.

Or at least, we didn't used to. And we are in the process of ridding public life of the people who have started social engineering our society so that all sorts of ideas that do not involve advocating a crime are forbidden ... .

Or, even more elegant still (you people really must have the most elite tray of tea sandwiches, must you? Very well, ... Waiter!, the top tier tray, please. No canned tunafish. All fresh salmon!!):

"I am a Canadian,
free to speak without fear,
free to worship in my own way,
free to stand for what I think right,
free to oppose what I believe wrong,
or free to choose those
who shall govern my country.
This heritage of freedom
I pledge to uphold
for myself and all mankind."

From the Canadian Bill of Rights,
July 1, 1960.

By the way, I remember when this statement was routinely posted in church halls and union halls across my country. Then it started to mysteriously disappear. And it sure won't be my fault if it doesn't start appearing again!