The Trudeau government is using its Online Harms Act. REUTERS
Orwellian Canada wants to put you in prison BEFORE you commit a thoughtcrime
By Post Editorial Board
No, Canada!
The country that brought you debanking protesters and government-assisted suicide for the poor now wants to criminalize speech to lock up people for life and to put wrong thinkers under house arrest if the state sees a chance they will commit a crime.
Doesn’t get more Orwellian than that.
The chillingly titled Online Harms Act was introduced in February by Justice Minister Arif Virani.
Virani (like most of the modern left) couched his effort to strip citizens of their freedom in the language of safety, comparing it to a product regulation for toys.
Utter dishonesty: If passed, the law will endow Ottawa with powers that would make Big Brother jealous.
Pissed at your girlfriend? Tell the government she’s likely to commit a hate crime and have her house-arrested.
Worse, one provision in the bill would “increase the maximum penalty specifically for advocating genocide from 5 years to life imprisonment.”
We’re sure a law that criminalizes “advocating for genocide” could never be twisted to criminalize support for Israel.
The pro-Hamas left will have a field day.
The law would saddle social-media companies that refuse to bend the knee with insane fines reaching up to 6% of global revenue.
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In short, it would be the end of free expression in Canada.
Things have not gotten that bad in America . . . yet.
But as we saw during the pandemic, when the modern left (and sometimes now the right, sadly) holds political power it does everything it can to suppress speech it dislikes.
Though only the left enjoys full cooperation from a lickspittle media while doing so.
And it wasn’t until pro-terror staff and professors at elite US colleges got in hot water for backing Hamas after Oct. 7 that left-dominated colleges suddenly remembered they liked free speech (sometimes).
And this comes from the government of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, whose party secured less than a third the popular vote in the last national election and indeed has been governing as a minority since 2019: maybe not a mandate for thought control?
The Online Harms Act should serve as a reminder that as ugly as the anti-speech movement is in America, it could be vastly worse — and that we all need to fight for our rights without pause.
From the nypost.com