BC's HRT rules in favor of Mark Steyn and Maclean's Magazine

"For me the problem is not the book, the problem for me is Canada, and I will never think of the deranged dominion quite the same way again. It has made me understand just how easily and incrementally free societies, often for the most fluffy reasons, slip into a kind of soft, beguiling totalitarianism," he [Mark Steyn] said.National Post

The British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal ruled yesterday that a controversial article about Islam in Maclean's magazine did not violate the province's hate speech law, marking the third time this year the Canadian Islamic Congress has failed in its efforts to force the magazine to print a rebuttal.

In dismissing the complaint, the three-member tribunal ruled that the article by Mark Steyn, which was published in 2006 and described the demographic and ideological dangers posed by a growing Muslim population in the West, was not likely to expose Muslims to hatred or contempt.

It ruled that the article, an excerpt from Mr. Steyn's book America Alone, contained historical, religious and factual inaccuracies, relied on common Muslim stereotypes and tried to "rally public opinion by exaggeration and causing the reader to fear Muslims."

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Faisal Joseph, lawyer for the CIC, said he is considering an appeal, and that the decision "sends the wrong message."

"Apparently it is now acceptable for some columnists and media in this country to cloak freedom to hate in the mantle of freedom of speech," he said in a statement.

Mr. Steyn, a conservative columnist who describes his acerbic style as "apocalyptic stand-up," said America Alone was widely excerpted in the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia and elsewhere, and only became the subject of a legal fight in Canada.

"For me the problem is not the book, the problem for me is Canada, and I will never think of the deranged dominion quite the same way again. It has made me understand just how easily and incrementally free societies, often for the most fluffy reasons, slip into a kind of soft, beguiling totalitarianism," he said.