Life or culture? Which is the greater civil right?

So which is the more important right for the judiciary to uphold if a choice must be made?

Well, in Canada, it seems a befuddled judge thinks a constitutional right to ‘practice’ one’s culture supersedes the state’s right to protect a citizen’s life from a parent’s belief in the efficacy derived from exercising Oogity Boogity rather than evidence-adduced efficacious medicine.

In a recent court decision: a Ontario judge said,

I cannot find that J.J. is a child in need of protection when her substitute decision-maker has chosen to exercise her constitutionally protected right to pursue their traditional medicine over the Applicant’s stated course of treatment of chemotherapy.

Right, because efficacious medical treatment is apparently and magically a cultural expression all of a sudden… and a substitute medical decision maker can now legitimately pick which one to apply to (what, suddenly cultural?) disease processes and still be consider a responsible adult (and not simply bat-shit crazy with belief in woo) in the eyes of the law.

The local health team who had begun real medical treatment of a treatable disease process had asked the local Children’s Aid Society to take guardianship over the child (a practice often done when the parents of an ill child deny simple blood transfusions on the basis of contrary religious belief) when the mother of the child insisted that her aboriginal rights to do whatever she wanted to do to the child trumped any rights the child had to efficacious medical treatment. The judge agreed, saying these beliefs of the mother’s were “integral” to the family’s way of life, so the ruling was to allow her to choose traditional medicine for her daughter.

In this sense, the right to impose ‘traditional medicine’ on a dependent child over and above real medicine (with an efficacy of over 90%) means death. And this is what the court is trying to tell us is a ‘constitutional’ right.

Bullshit.

Culture does not trump civil rights, and the most fundamental civil right any of us has is the right not to be killed to suit the faith-based ignorant and harmful beliefs of a parent who wishes to impose it on their dependents. This is already well established jurisprudence and this judge missed the point entirely… so busy trying to be ‘tolerant’ and ‘politically correct’ and ‘culturally sensitive’ as to elevate cultural beliefs to be superior to fundamental civil rights.

This is a really bad court decision in general that sets a terrible precedence that will be abused under the guise of ‘cultural expressions’ and particularly for the girl involved. In her case, this decision is a death sentence.

 

What is the lesson from a terrorist attack?

On October 22, 2014, a recent covert to Islam decided to heed the call from ISIS to kill some people who represented the country of Canada in the name of bringing honour to Allah. Here’s the story from Wikipedia:

A series of shootings occurred on October 22, 2014, at Parliament Hill and nearby in Ottawa, Canada. Michael Zehaf-Bibeau fatally shot Corporal Nathan Cirillo, a Canadian soldier on ceremonial guard duty at the Canadian National War Memorial. He then launched an attack in the nearby Centre Block parliament building, where members of the Parliament of Canada were attending caucuses. Zehaf-Bibeau was killed inside the building in a gunfight with parliament security personnel. Following the shootings, the downtown core of Ottawa was placed on lockdown while police searched for any potential additional threats.

The shootings took place two days after an attack on military personnel in Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Quebec, which also killed a Canadian soldier. Prime Minister of Canada Stephen Harper said both of these attacks serve as a “grim reminder that Canada is not immune to the types of terrorist attacks we have seen elsewhere around the world.”

Yes these attacks were a reminder that we are a part of the world. But these attacks allowed Canadians to demonstrate to the rest of the world what secular values of nationhood mean in action:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is a typical overpass of a four lane divided highway running along a populated corridor between Windsor, Ontario and Quebec City in Canada. The Corporal body was driven from where he was killed in Ottawa to his home town of Hamilton. The journey along this section of highway is about 350 Km and has about 50 overpasses. When Corporal Cirillo’s body was repatriated to his home town, this was a typical image that greeted the small convoy.

The point is that our national anthem includes the words “We stand on guard for thee.’ Cirillo was ceremonially doing exactly that at the National War Memorial when he was shot and killed… not for who he was but for what he represented, what he was defending. That cannot be killed. It can, however, be a value reinvigorated in our hearts and minds. And this is exactly what such attacks do. They remind all of us -again – what it is that is worth defending: the rights and freedoms all of us share. What you’re seeing in this picture is the average Canadian and local municipal forces repaying that same debt all of us share and taking our turn… to stand on guard for him.

In case one might be tempted to see this event as some kind of media circus, let me assure you that it happened spontaneously. Across the country the same sentiment was expressed time and again at every local cenotaph. Poppies appeared. Hand written notes were left. Flowers set out by the anonymous. Even 3500 Km away in the recesses of the mountains of British Columbia, we find the same sentiment on display:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is what it means to be Canadian – different in all ways imaginable yet each a part of the whole by what we share: our values of freedom, equality rights, and the dignity of personhood that resides within the living heart of each person who wears a uniform. And even though the military brass was quick to order our men and women out of uniform to avoid being targets, I saw a common and spontaneous response to that: hundreds of local cadets and retired military people don their uniforms in the following days not just to make a statement of support but remind the military itself that we are not separate groups and organizations and institutions … but one people who share in the active defense of our values. This is the lesson from a terrorist attack and one that more terrorists themselves should heed because since our inception, Canada has been and shall remain a warrior nation first and a peacekeeper only second. We really do stand on guard for thee.