Diary Sept. 16 At Saint Mary's University

Sept. 16

Last night, Sept. 15, the first lecture.

Marc Mercer (Philosophy Prof at SMU) was Moderator with 49 people in attendance.

Next lecture is on Friday Sept. 22 in the McInnis Room of the Dalhousie Student's Union Building.

Last night's presentation was without incident. Well, the university computer was down to no Power Point, not even computing on screen. And one of the participants complained that he was profiled since the police frisked him upon entry.

The computer failure made a close discussion of Canadian Hate Propaganda Law (Criminal Code 319 Sec. 1 and 2) impossible and this made the conversation less rigorous afterwards. I was arguing that Section 1 of this law is closely related to the older Riot Act , that it escapes the critique of other parts of the law and that it represents a legitimate constraint upon free speech. I would argue that the law ought to be applied to anyone who preaches the Koran in such a way as to incite hatred and likely to lead to violence.

I might have added that it should not be left to citizens to bring action under this section. For example, if an Imam teaches children the Koran in a way which endorses passages which both incite hatred and are likely to lead to violence, then he should be prosecuted. Obviously the same should apply to any other religion. I single out the Koran since it is a particularly and very obviously a generally troubling example given recent news.

During the discussion: (Replies at the end)

Note: The preceedings were not be recorded so these reports are only from memory.

1) Zia demanded that I produce passages from the Koran which justify these kinds of statements.

2) Spencer Bevan-John pointed out that the kinds of measure I propose have been taken in the Netherlands but that their strategies are hampered by a collective bad conscience resulting from the persecution of the Jews during WW II. I took him to be arguing that, quite naturally, they feel that suppressing Islam would now be too much like the violent suppression of the Jews and are therefore unwilling to take the necessary strong action.

3) Zia returned to argue that the origins of the word 'domocracy' make it clear that democracy is the rule of the mob and that therefore it was not a desirable way of doing politics..

4) David Chaisson asked why I was targeting Islam and not also Christianity.

5) Tom Vinci argued that religious speech needs to be banned from any discussion in the public sphere else the discussion is not appropriate to a democracy. Echoing Marc Mercer's objections he also argued that the Hate Propaganda provisions of the Criminal Code are an unacceptable restriction on free-speech.

6) Rob Swetnan argued that we should not be held responsible for the actions of the Christians during, say, the Crusades or during the Spanish Inquisition. I had argued that Xians had done much worse than anything which Moslems could be suspected of having done in this or the last century. I argued that, relatively speaking, 9/11 was relatively 'small potatoes' by comparison to what the Xians had done in the past.

7) Spencer also argued that we don't know what it is which makes a terrorist and that I seemed to be suggesting that I knew.

8) Muhammad argued that March was talking as if Canada were a finished product and that those who were now coming here must just accept it the way it is.


My replies, in order:

1)I replied trying to make the case that I did not find the quote/counter quote game productive or sensible. Two reasons: the Koran often contradicts itself on the crucial issues and if the Koran is the product of a number of all too human scribes, then there is no reason to believe that there is a single 'Truth' that one can extract from the confused writings. Of course, one who believes that the Angel Gabriel spoke to both Allah and the Mohammed is also likely to believe that everything in the Koran is God's truth and might feel comfortable claiming that somehow all the contradictions can be resolved. That argument however, whatever else it is, is an argument from superstition and is not an acceptable part of rational discussion.

My policy will be to say what I find in the Koran and, in the spirit of good science, let others repeat the experiment for themselves by reading the Koran. They will find, I claim, that it often contradicts itself, that it often preaches violent solutions, the hatred of specifically named groups and the killing of people - along with the subjugation of women.



2) I replied in general agreement with this line of argument but pointing out that Canada does not share this difficulty: we are not collectively guilt-ridden with respect to our treatmwnt of Jews. Spencer mentioned the fact that perhaps we feel guilty since we failed to rescue European Jews even when they were in our waters and begging for help. I would agree that we are culpable to that extent but that we did not exterminate Jews and they have thrived in Canada. In any case we don't seem to feel guilty about our treatment of Jews.

3) I argued that mentioning the origins of a word is not a sound and therefore not a reliable means for determining its meaning

4) I replied that, at the moment, Islam is what we are collectively concerned about and that it made sense to deal with what concerns us. I assured him that if it seemed that Christians were preaching hatred then I would certainly take up that issue as well.

5) I argued in response that while I was entirely sympathetic nevertheless there seemed no other practical means of preventing the incitment and the ensuing violence.

6) Private communication from Rob Swetnan, so the group did not hear my reply but I want to record the point.


7) I admitted that I didn't know and that it should not have sounded like I did.
8) I tried to admit that if I had spoken so it was an error. I said that I could see how Canada might become an Islamic state. Reflecting on it today (Sept.17) I'd want to add that I would hate for that to happen - in the sense in which I think of an "Islamic state".