It is enormously frustrating to fans of unadulterated parliamentary democracy, and to progressive politicians wishing to masquerade as same, that a great swath of the Canadian population seems unconcerned, disinterested or simply baffled by their complaints of Conservative misbehaviour: Never mind prorogations. The 2011 federal election began with the Conservatives found in contempt of Parliament, and Canadians went and handed them a majority!
Especially in a country that is broadly speaking muddling along pretty well, sometimes it really is difficult to present parliamentary malfeasance in a way that seems viscerally offensive to people who just want the least daft people in charge. Sometimes, though, thankfully, it is not difficult at all. Every now and again the Conservative logo shows up on a giant novelty cheque written by the Canadian taxpayer, for example. That’s easy to understand: It’s just regifting on a grand scale.
This week, someone discovered a couple of partisan screeds from Julian Fantino, Canada’s utterly improbable Minister for International Cooperation, on the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) website. “Dear NDP: CIDA does not need your economic advice,” one was headlined.
CBC.ca referred readers to Treasury Board rules to explain why partisan spew on a government department’s website is problematic. But this, too, is dead-easy to understand. It’s like going to get your diver’s licence renewed in Calgary and finding the place festooned with anti-Wildrose agitprop. Politics and government services blend into one hot mess on television, but in real life people know, and perceive, the difference — better, perhaps, than Mr. Fantino does.
On the other side of the Atlantic this week, we saw another kind of political overreach from Lynne Featherstone, the Liberal-Democrat Junior Minister for International Development. (What is it with that portfolio?) On Sunday, The Observer ran a typically splenetic column from Julie Burchill, who accused transgendered activists of bullying a fellow writer — who had described the media-propagated ideal female figure as that of a “Brazilian transsexual” — and fired back with some provocative verbiage of her own. (Suffice to say the terms “bed-wetters in bad wigs” and “dicks in chicks’ clothing” appeared.)
Twitter exploded in indignation, and the arch-liberal Observer eventually disappeared the column. But this was not good enough for Ms. Featherstone. She demanded Ms. Burchill be “sacked.” When someone on Twitter suggested Observer editor John Mulholland also be sacked, she enthusiastically agreed. Yes, yes, him too!
In the wake of the British phone-hacking scandal, the most vigorous pushback against the idea of some kind of statutory press-oversight body came from the conservative press. “If such a group is constituted we will not attend its meetings, pay its fines nor heed its menaces,” The Spectator declared. Hopefully Ms. Featherstone’s comments demonstrate to all what a terrible idea it is in principle. These people can’t help themselves.
Canadian media are hardly immune to this. Recall the House of Commons’ absurd unanimous declaration of sadness when Maclean’s called Quebec “corrupt.” In November there were allegations a Manitoba MP applied pressure to have a critical reporter at a small-town paper fired. It was all too plausible: Where politicians can apply leverage, one should trust that they will. And it is absurd to assume (though one might hope) they will do so with any degree of consistency.
The same goes for ideological partisans: Those who run weeping to the press council or human rights commission, or allege criminal hate speech, when they’re offended by an opinion column or a television broadcast are always quick to explain why similar attacks against their fellow travellers are very obviously “not the same thing.” And if the body in question rules against someone they like, they will accuse it of having been corrupted by the people they don’t like.
The answer is not to cede the power to punish speech to anyone, because it will always come back to bite people you like. The answer is to hold politicians’ feet to the fire on democratic abuses as much if you happen to like them or their party as if you don’t — if you have their vote, they have your ear — because those abuses, too, will come back to bite you some day. Thankfully, in Canada, the erosion of democracy and free speech hasn’t yet seriously impacted our quality of life. But history shows us nothing good down the path we’re on.