I doubt anyone will want the whole thing. But Quebecor could well have an interest in the Montreal Gazette; Torstar might consider adding the Ottawa Citizen to its Ontario daily stable; and, yes, the reincarnated David Radler, fresh from jail, might relish the chance to reacquire the Vancouver Sun and Province. (The first bidder, in fact, is a group headed by Senator Jerry Grafstein which wants only the Gazette, Citizen and Post).

The CanWest chain is surely worth more sold separately than in one chunk. Why? Because the National Post doesn't have enough circulation in Toronto to carry a national advertising buy anymore. And it's losing a million dollars every two weeks. The rest of the papers are mostly profitable. If you're putting up a billion, you don't want an albatross (the Post) dragging you underwater.

The other reason is that media are increasingly going local. This can be measured in the decline in national advertising at the papers in question, and the growing appetite for local news, which cannot be satisfied by the Internet the way national and international news can.

The return to local owners -- a throwback to the days when Atkinsons and McConnells and Siftons owned their papers instead of debt-burdened public corporations -- is the best idea for rejuvenating the Canadian newspaper industry that I can see on the horizon.

And no, I don't expect an apology from the Canadian newspaper industry. Fourteen years ago, I felt I was just doing my job.

Journalists need to remember it's the public's interest, not their own.

If it has a low point, it was in two columns -- one by George Jonas in the National Post (Sept. 9), the other by Jim Coyle in the Star (Sept. 11). Both implied the bicycle courier was the author of his own death, absolving the man whose car ran him down, former Ontario attorney-general Michael Bryant.

Here's what Jonas wrote in part: "Whatever made the 33-year-old victim, Darcy Allan Sheppard, turn physical, a number of media reports indicate he did -- and as it came to light later, not for the first time that evening. His earlier involvement in a boozy altercation also required police intervention. When Sheppard threw down his bicycle and reached for Bryant who was sitting behind the wheel of his convertible with his wife beside him, the ex-A-G's alternatives were fighting or fleeing."

He cited no sources who saw Sheppard "turn physical," and admits he did no independent reporting himself. Since the facts about what happened that night have not been presented in court, there is absolutely no basis for saying Bryant's only options were fighting or fleeing. And is it "fleeing" when you accelerate your car into the wrong lane of traffic with someone hanging on?

Now here is Coyle, who admits in his column "I know and like Bryant. He's precisely the sort of cocky, mischievous little SOB I loved to have on my team, the kind who wasn't much fun to play against." By contrast, he says of Sheppard: "By no stretch was Darcy Sheppard a member of life's lucky sperm club."

But Coyle goes further, and says the confrontation "had little to do with the hazards of cycling ... What (it) seems more to be about is mental health and the menace of untreated addiction."

Like Jonas, Coyle appears to have done no independent reporting. He does not explain how he knows Sheppard instigated the confrontation, or what form of mental illness he allegedly suffered from. He does not outline what choices either man had in their confrontation, but delivers his verdict out of the blue: "Sheppard's day had been marked by a long string of bad decisions, Bryant's by choices and actions that were responsible, even charming."

Here he is referring to an earlier Star story, leaked by a "source close to the family" (more about this in a sec), that Bryant and his wife had eaten at a modest College Street shawarma joint, then walked on the beach and finally finished up at a Greek pastry shop on the Danforth -- an idyllic and alcohol-free anniversary celebration that Coyle eulogizes as "so romantic and so Toronto."

But, again with no facts to back it up, he speculates that Bryant exercised similar class and good judgment during his altercation with Sheppard. "In the hours leading up to it, Bryant did lots that was good and proper. So, too, in the confrontation. He probably hasn't walked away from many fights. But that night, by all accounts, he tried to disengage. It's worth remembering that Bryant is a boxer. Whatever his impulse and inclination, he opted out of the bout. The other party didn't."

What is troubling is that, two days before Coyle's column was published, NOW magazine put up on its website a surveillance video that, although grainy, appeared to show that Bryant touched off the incident by "bumping" Sheppard and his bike from behind.

I have no idea what prompted Jonas or Coyle to write those columns. I hope it wasn't that ubiquitous "source close to the family," which is almost certainly shorthand for Navagator, the image consultant hired by Bryant shortly after the accident. Planting favourable information about your client in the media is standard operating procedure. So, too, is trying to knock down the image of an adversary, in this case, someone who is not alive to defend himself.

What's clear is that, whatever the motive for writing those columns, neither newspaper should have published them.

That happened to me in the wake of the so-called “Wafergate scandal,” which involved the bogus story about Prime Minister Stephen Harper pocketing a communion wafer at the Roman Catholic funeral of former governor-general Romeo Leblanc.

I ended up not doing the interview, but the facts are these: Originally published on the front page of the Saint John Telegraph-Journal under the headline “It’s a scandal,” the story was picked up by the national media for three weeks until the paper apologized – to the PM and, here’s the rub, the two reporters whose bylines were on the story. Seems they didn’t write it in their story – their editor did.

So editor Shawna Richer and her publisher, Jamie Irving, were fired. Well, Richer was fired. Irving, scion of the powerful clan that owns all the newspapers in New Brunswick, will likely do okay at some other desk in his family’s company.

It’s hard to know what the strongest lesson is from this fiasco: Never, if you’re a WASP and a doofus, get into line for the Holy Sacrament? Don’t act on news tips from the publisher? Try not to repeat second-hand stories involving the prime minister without checking?

The unfortunate Richer had to drink Kool-Aid for following orders. So be it, and are other editors across Canada not now maybe feeling extra calcium in their backbones about standing up to the big guy next time? They should. Jamie Irving wasn’t at the funeral and may have been prompted by Liberal friends or relatives to order his editor to write in the allegation that Harper put it in his pocket.

We’ll leave aside the big question for the Prime Minister: Where were your protocol people, since you obviously didn’t know what to do at a Catholic religious service and looked like a dummy?

My concern is broader: Why is there no self-correcting mechanism in the Canadian media? Why did this non-story (yeah, I know, it’s summer but ...) get carried so far on such spindly legs when someone should have simply checked real sources and believed them –  the priest, who said Harper ate it, a Liberal senator, who saw him eat it, or anyone who was in the first five rows at a televised state funeral?

With all the trees that were destroyed to convey wrong facts across the country, one anonymous comment to a Maclean’s magazine blog got it right: “What the apology from the TJ paper in New Brunswick has confirmed in the minds of many Canadians is that the media in this country is corrupt and unscrupulous. They operate in a pack mentality and so if one media outlet reports it then the rest follow suit and take no time to verify that the story is credible and factual.”

The writer added, somewhat hopefully: “The Canadian media should be hanging their heads in shame today.”

But that ain’t happening. The media in Canada are oblivious to shame. It’s not in their vocabulary. They passed beyond shame many years ago. They will simply wait for the next juicy non-story – probably involving shoes or a nanny – pump lots of hot air into it until it floats, then spend weeks nudging it along with reaction.

“Rip and read” used to be a radio sin. In the age of Internet, we need stronger hands at the controls of our major national newspapers and television channels.

Check. It. Out.

Or we may decide we can do without you.

That's how many people in the GTA identify themselves as Italian heritage. The review, by Corey Mintz (Wining and dining like a mayor, Dec. 16), went out of its way to stereotype Basilico Ristorante, an Italian eatery in Vaughan, as a threatening and misogynistic den of crude labourers, fondlers and, perhaps, Mafioso money launderers.

The writer's pretext was to try to recreate the dining experience of troubled Vaughan mayor Linda Jackson, who once billed her municipality $300 for a dinner for three at the restaurant.

After a few catty remarks about the food, Mintz wrote: "The service may be a little patronizing. Our server asks if we know what arugula is and lays paws on the ladies. It's a very male-centric room. Besides our table, there is one woman present, out of 21 guests.

"Guys pop in for minutes at a time, picking up and dropping off envelopes and panettone. One gentleman strides into the restaurant and spends a few minutes working his way around the main table, saying hello, shaking a lot of thick hands.

"I eat in restaurants all the time and rarely do I feel any warmth that extends beyond professional courtesy. But at this Italian restaurant in Woodbridge, in a strip mall housing a Pizza Nova and a 'Canada's Best Karate' I definitely feel that I don't belong."

Well, he got that last part right. He didn't belong there and his review didn't belong in a newspaper that professes to chronicle modern life in the GTA.

The classlessness of the Star's decision to publish it stands in stark contrast to the dignified letter of complaint that Basilico's owner, Sam Primucci, wrote to Mintz and the paper. The Star published it on Dec. 20, but refused to apologize for the review. It still appears on the paper's website.

"As President and owner of Basilico Ristorante in Vaughan I would like to thank you for taking the time to visit my establishment, and as a restaurateur I accept and welcome your feedback and commentary of Basilico Ristorante, its service and most importantly its food.

"As a professional, as an Italian, as a proud Canadian citizen and significant contributor to Canadian society I do, however, not accept the stereotypical allusions that were made in your article that denigrate my patrons, the citizens of Vaughan and the entire Italian community."

Primucci said it is "second nature" to him as a business owner of Italian heritage "that upon arrival to my establishment or any public function, that I greet all with a smile and a handshake and those closest to me with a warm embrace. In the Italian culture, to not do so would be a symbol of disrespect.

"Another facet of the Italian culture that as a food critic you must be aware of is that throughout the Christmas season, Italians pay their respect to family, friends and colleagues in person, bearing Christmas cards, baked goods, bottles of wine, warm embraces and well wishes."

To the writer, Primucci wished him "happy holidays," and suggested he confine his comments to food in the future, because "your lack of integrity, respect, empathy and culture do not deem you fit to share your opinions and voice with the fine citizens of the Greater Toronto area."

Shame on the newspaper for refusing to apologize. Perhaps it needs to hear from a few more of its readers.

Now he has finally done that. What can I say? Congratulations. It’s a start. It’s progress.

At issue was the veracity of the quotation he picked up from Oriana Fallaci and used in a review he wrote in Maclean’s magazine of her book The Rage and the Pride. The quote was allegedly from the Ayatollah Khomeini: "A man who has had sexual relations with an animal, such as a sheep, may not eat its meat. He would commit sin."

In his Nov. 30 blog titled The Shagged Sheep, Steyn reveals: "When it comes to the Ayatollah Khomeini’s views on sheep shagging, my guide for many years has been a book called Resaleh Towzih al-Masael…. It was translated into English, unabridged, by J Borujerdi and published in 1984 by Westview in London and Boulder, Colorado under the title A Clarification of Questions."

He quotes from it:

#2631. It is loathsome to eat the meat of horse and mule and donkey and if somebody makes coitus with them, that is an intercourse, they become unlawful and they must be taken out of the city and sold elsewhere.

#2632. If they have intercourse with a cow and sheep and camel their urine and dung becomes unclean and drinking their milk will also be unlawful and they must be killed and burned without delay, and the person who had intercourse with them must pay money to the owner. Further, if he had intercourse with any beast its milk becomes unlawful.

I am willing to accept this as evidence that the late Ayatollah did indeed have something to say about having sex with animals. I am also willing to accept that it was not from the discredited Little Green Book, as I was led to believe by fellow blogger Deborah Gayapong (in the absence of any verification from Mr. Steyn), but from the English translation of a book, Resaleh Towzih al-Masael, which apparently had a blue cover when it was first published.

Journalists and even polemicists should document their sources, and it is every reader’s right to ask them to do so. That was all that I asked Mr. Steyn to do in my Nov. 13 blog (Open letter to Steyn): "I’m just saying that no one has verified that the Ayatollah ever said: "A man who has had sexual relations with an animal, such as a sheep, may not eat its meat. He would commit sin."

Do I owe Mr. Steyn or Ms Fallaci an apology? I do. I was incorrect to say that Mr. Steyn did not cite a source for the quotation in his review. He did (and I corrected that statement on my blog more than two weeks ago). He took it from Ms Fallaci’s book. And I was obviously wrong in saying there is no "Blue Book."

So if Mr. Steyn will be gracious enough to accept my apology for that error, perhaps he will answer three questions about the way he has been using the Ayatollah’s quotation:

1. Do you not see a fundamental difference between the Fallaci version and the version you now cite from A Clarification of Questions? You say in your most recent blog, "Now, it’s true that La Fallaci’s wording differs from Mr. Borujerdi’s. But so what?" I’ll tell you so what: Fallaci, and you, use the quotation to imply that the Ayatollah, and in fact a great many Muslims, condone bestiality. The quotes from A Clarification of Questions, on the other hand, make clear that he considered the practice "unlawful."

2. Are you aware that the translation of the book you cite has been called into question by the Journal of the American Academy of Religion, Vol. 54, No. 2 (Summer, 1986), pp. 370 -371 The reviewer, Prof. Azim Nanji of Oklahoma State University, says A Clarification of Questions: An Unabridged Translation of "Resaleh Towzih al-Masael" is deeply flawed. Borujerdi’s translation, he says, "contains many errors and is very misleading in places." He calls it "a case of lost labour."

3. Now that you’ve found what purports to be the actual quote, why do you persist in using it to gleefully make sport of all Muslims, portraying them as uncivilized, vulgar, menacing people who are prone to do the unthinkable and shag or "roger" sheep? Here’s what you wrote in your Fallaci review: "I enjoy the don't-eat-your-sexual-partner stuff as much as the next infidel, but the challenge presented by Islam is not that the cities of the Western world will be filling up with sheep-shaggers. If I had to choose, I'd rather Mohammed Atta was downriver in Egypt hitting on the livestock than flying through the windows of Manhattan skyscrapers. But he’s not."

It is your use of the alleged quote to promote an inaccurate religious stereotype that I find dishonest. Bestiality is not condoned by Islam. That is a fact. It is prohibited.

You have admirable skills as a writer. You are also entitled to your point of view, and you obviously have a great many loyal followers who hang on your every word. That gives you power, and it should give you responsibility.

What responsibility do you have as a writer to avoid inaccurate stereotypes?

What onus do you feel, as a person who has considerable influence, to promote understanding, not just tear us further apart?

Why do you resort to personal insults when the issues -- most of which I raised and you have not addressed -- are journalistic: Do you select or exaggerate facts to justify your point of view, or is your point of view shaped by the facts?

In the current tumultuous debate about whether Canada ’s human rights commissions trample on free speech, I think it’s worth considering the last part of that preamble statement: “consistent with the duties and obligations of that individual as a member of society.”

You uncritically accepted her reference to the “Blue Book,” and went on to have fun with the notion of Mohammed Atta interfering with the livestock instead of suicide bombing. But there is no Blue Book, it’s The Little Green Book. And it wasn’t written by the Ayatollah at all, as you say, but by a source who was apparently at least three times, and three languages, removed.

“Well, I decided to get on Google myself. And guess what, I found an English translation of the whole bleepin' book. Within five minutes I found this: “The meat of horses, mules, or donkeys is not recommended. It is strictly forbidden if the animal was sodomized while alive by a man. In that case, the animal must be taken outside the city and sold.”

She also quotes: “If one commits an act of sodomy with a cow, a ewe, or a camel, their urine and their excrements become impure, and even their milk may no longer be consumed. The animal must then be killed as quickly as possible and burned, and the price of it paid to its owner by him who sodomized it.”

My sexual prowess has been questioned, I’ve been accused of being an ageing fossil who doesn’t know how to Google shit, a guilty white man ashamed of my race, an idiot and a pro-censorship traitor to journalism. My qualifications to teach anyone anything anywhere have been mocked in public.

And I realize this stuff will be permanently parked on the Internet to be read, perhaps, by my grandchildren some day.

I blame it all on Ezra Levant.

Canada ’s sawed-off, ultra-right-wing Sultan of Shout likes to wage nuclear war with anyone who dares to hold a reasonable thought in his presence, which means he never has any shortage of material to put up on his half-cocked personal blogging site.

He’s spawned an army of imitators who seem to hang on his every word. He links to scores of “Ezra Lites” like Small Dead Animals, Free Canuckistan, Chucker Canuck, Barrel Strength, Defend Canada , Angry Rough Neck, Just Right, Right as Rain, Right Crazy and Being Right is not Wrong.

Tell me professor: Are they all mean-spirited, reactionary and high-decibel? Why, yes they are! It’s like asking does Mark Steyn seem to enjoy getting under your skin?

Ezra Levant took a disliking to me when we appeared on a panel together on Nov. 1 in Halifax . We were debating “The Media’s Right to Offend: Exploring the Legal and Ethical Limits on Free Speech” and it was a rollicking and lively debate. I enjoyed it and would do it again with him anytime.

I understand Ezra’s ground rules now. He doesn’t fight fair.

My topic was responsible journalism, and how pursuit of the truth and engaging in the discipline of verification were two qualities that give journalism its authority and justify freedom of the press (When I asked Levant if he considers himself to be a journalist, by the way, he wouldn’t answer, but that’s another story).

As an example, I mentioned Maclean’s columnist Mark Steyn’s lack of responsibility in quoting Ayatollah Khomeini, who allegedly said that it’s okay for a man to have sex with animals, as long as he kills them after orgasm and doesn’t feed the meat to his own village. He gave no citation for the quote (CORRECTION: I was wrong. He actually attributed it to Oriana Fallaci) , and I suspect it was made up. The only places I could find it on the Internet were on some right-wing blogsites.

Here’s what Levant wrote on his website about how he decided to strike out at me during the panel discussion:

“I went to Google as Miller was talking and found a ton of references for it … It was pretty sad: an ageing journalism professor, looking down his nose at Steyn and accusing Steyn of sloppiness (and disparaging mere bloggers too), while half the kids in the room could have found what Miller couldn’t in about five minutes on the Net. Some “expert” witness.”

Levant ’s “sock puppets” in the blogosphere took up this refrain, gleefully. Here’s one: “The reality is unfolding even if the establishment are puzzled about why their liberal narrative isn’t universal, and keeps getting sniped by pesky bloggers with other real-world skills and backgrounds. This blogger is a historian, a fact-digger, and a philosophical theologian, used to pondering and listening for the deep issues, and God’s voice and hand. Bloggers are very much part of the future, however old media scrabbles, adapts or reforms. The future is here.”

These people have religion, in other words. Their church is the Internet, and everything on it their gospel, even if it’s only the Gospel According to Wikipedia (to mention one of their more reliable sources).

I checked the references Levant gave me afterwards, and realized it was a staged ambush. None of his 100 links contained the particular quote I was talking about. The link he has on his website to the supposed source, Khomeini’s book Tahrir-ol-vasyleh, contains no mention of that quote. The 1995 collection of Khomeini’s quotes published by Harper’s magazine does not contain it either. When I Googled other paths to finding it, all I came up with was various right-wing blogsites, which are as loose with the facts as their patron saint, Levant .

That sure ain’t journalism. That’s not even the truth. And I can’t see how it’s contributing much good to our society.

The arrogance and hate of the Levantian hordes surprises me. They are shouters, not listeners, and they choose to react by resorting to attack.

I posted on one blog, correcting an inaccuracy about my views, and asked this question: “For my part, it was interesting to look out at the audience and see so many Ezra Levant supporters and know that nothing I said would be even listened to seriously. Judging from the circle that gathered around him afterwards, hanging on every word, you are young, well-educated, articulate, white and very angry about something. I’m curious to know what that something is.”                                     

The blogger answered this way: “I’m angry that Canadians who express their opinions on political and social issues are being punished by being hauled before human rights commissions and, at the very least, forced to pay huge legal fees and, at most, ordered not to express their opinions for the rest of their lives. I’m a Christian and my most deeply held beliefs are ‘pilloried’ all the time, but I live with it. It’s the price of living in a free society.”

That particular blogger was reasonable and polite, but he made me think of the White Power sites on Facebook started two years ago by various “well-meaning” students at Ryerson. Their point was that, in multicultural Toronto , we’re being bombarded by demands from minority groups and it’s time someone stood up for the preservation of white culture. They had no understanding of why that might feel threatening to others, who have stood by while so-called “white culture” had its own way for so long, at their expense.

The new angriness out there, promoted and encouraged by Levant , seems like something we should pay more attention to. It’s more prevalent than we think.

I posted to his blogsite, correcting what he had told the crowd at the Halifax panel as he wielded his laptop at me like a weapon.

So far he’s refused to put it up.

So much for this so-called champion of the unfettered right to freedom of speech.

Journalistic opinion is hailing Mark Steyn, of all people, as the new poster child for freedom of expression in Canada .

I beg to differ.

His xenophobic and Islamophobic writings in Maclean’s magazine have prompted a complaint by Muslims to the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal. Hearings are being held in Vancouver this week.

Section 7(1) of the B.C. Human Rights Code prohibits anyone from publishing any statement that “is likely to expose a person or a group or class of persons to hatred or contempt” because of their religion.

That is the law as it stands, and everyone must obey the law.

The problem with the Code is that it seems to treat all types of publication alike. Section 7(1) provides no basis for distinguishing between legitimate examples of free expression, such as a carefully researched piece of journalism, and speech which should be proscribed, such as a racist polemic.

Without some objective test or measure for what constitutes hateful publication, the principles of free expression and freedom of the press could conceivably be jeopardized by this legislation.

The Canadian Association of Journalists has intervened in the case to argue for a narrow interpretation of Section 7(1). It is proposing that the following factors be considered in determining whether a published statement is hateful or contemptuous:

(a)    What the intention of the author was (why it is said);

(b)   Whether the statement was expressed in “good faith;”

(c)    Whether the statement was relevant to a subject of public interest;

(d)   Whether it “was believed to be true;”

(e)    Whether or not it has been shown on the evidence to have silenced the target group or hindered the free exchange of ideas.

While I applaud the CAJ for trying to guide the tribunal in its interpretation of Section 7(1), I wish to argue that its proposed criteria are unsatisfactory and troublesome for several reasons: First, they are not objective or measurable. How can the tribunal know what the intention of an author was, or whether a statement was expressed in good faith? Secondly, they are unreasonable. Why should the tribunal force a group maligned by hateful speech to prove that it has been silenced as well? Thirdly, they are inadequate to distinguish hateful speech from legitimate speech. Even racists can argue that they believed a hateful statement to be true and that it was in the public interest to publish it.

Balancing the rights of free expression and equality in the application of Section 7(1) is a worthwhile and necessary goal of the B.C. hearings. (Ethical disclosure: The tribunal turned down my application to intervene after the lawyer for Maclean’s objected. What follows is the gist of what I wanted to say.)

A good test for how to determine the balance between these two important rights is suggested in the recent statement of the Ontario Human Rights Commission, which found it did not have jurisdiction under its legislation to consider this same complaint. But it did say the following:

 “It is often said that with rights come responsibilities. It is the Commission’s view that the media has (sic) a responsibility to engage in fair and unbiased journalism. Bias includes both an unfair and one-sided portrayal of an issue as well as prejudicial attitudes towards individuals and groups based on creed, race, place or origin, ethnic origin and other Code grounds. Freedom of expression should be exercised through responsible reporting and not be used as a guise to target vulnerable groups and to further increase their marginalization or stigmatization in society. “

www.ohrc.on.ca/en/resources/news/en/resources/news/statement

The Ontario Commission said the media have a significant role to play in either combating societal racism or refraining from communicating and reproducing it. It defined Islamophobia as “a form of racism that includes stereotypes, bias or acts of hostility towards Muslims and the viewing of Muslims as a greater security threat on an institutional, systemic and societal level.” The Maclean’s article, it said, was an example of Islamophobia.

In its defence, the editors of Maclean’s claimed “the article in question was a legitimate piece of journalism written and published in good faith.”

So was it? Does Steyn’s article, “Why the future belongs to Islam,” published in Maclean’s on Oct. 23, 2006, measure up to the standards of responsible journalism?

Not by a long shot.

His argument rests on four questionable premises, none of which is attributed to sources or accompanied by reliable evidence.

Premise #1: “Demography is the most basic root of all. A people that won’t multiply can’t go forth or go anywhere. Those who do will shape the age we live in. Demographic decline and the unsustainability of the social democratic state are closely related.”

Premise #2: Islam has serious global ambitions, and it forms the primal, core identity of most of its adherents.”

Premise #3: “The modern multicultural state is too watery a concept to bind huge numbers of immigrants to the land of their nominal citizenship. So they look elsewhere and find the jihad.” (He also says that while not all Muslims are terrorists or support terrorists, “enough of them share their basic objectives.”)

Premise #4: “On the continent the successor population is already in place and the only question is how bloody the transfer of real estate will be…Native populations are aging and fading and being supplanted remorselessly by a young Muslim demographic.”

Mr. Steyn’s lack of attribution or evidence violates journalism’s discipline of verification, namely (as defined by Kovach and Rosenstiel’s The Elements of Journalism): “Seeking out multiple witnesses, disclosing as much as possible about sources, or asking various sides for comment, all signal such standards.”

Two of his premises – #1 and #4 – oversimplify the complex field of demography and misstate the facts. A well-documented article in The Economist in June 2007 debunks such assertions and, interestingly, refers specifically to Mr. Steyn as a “conservative polemicist:”

Many of these, of course, are social democratic countries with child-care supports (France, the Netherlands and Scandinavia, contrary to Steyn’s assertion that such states discourage “the survival instinct”).

And it’s not because of immigration in general, or Muslim immigration in particular. The Economist cites a study by Laurent Toulemon of the Institut national d'études démographiques (INED) which found that immigrant women in France do have high fertility (2.5 compared with 1.65 for French-born women). But because immigrants make up only one-twelfth of women of childbearing age, this raises the national fertility rate only slightly.

Mr. Steyn’s premise #4 – that “the successor population is already in place” – is also contrary to the facts. Aside from France (10%) and the Netherlands (5.4%), the Muslim populations of the rest of the countries of Europe are all under 4 percent, and countries like Italy and Britain have Muslim populations roughly equal to Canada’s 2.5 percent. The idea that Muslims in Europe will be in a position to demand special concessions like Sharia law in the near future is unlikely.

He is content to quote people without checking out their facts. He quotes a Norwegian imam, who says “every Western woman in the EU is producing an average of 1.4 children. Every Muslim woman in the same countries is producing 3.5 children.”

This is a statement of fact, and is easily checked out, but neither Mr. Steyn nor the magazine bothered to do so. The facts, as established by France’s INED, are that in France, like everywhere else in Europe, the birthrate among immigrant mothers drops quickly toward the local norm in less than two generations. This reflects factors such as universal female education, rising living standards, the effect of local cultural norms and availability of contraception. The science of demography is not as simplistic as Mr. Steyn portrays it.

His menacing reference to Islamic “will,” and particularly the will of young Muslims, as a threat to the West also appears to be questionable. As a 10-country Zogby International opinion poll in 2002 showed, young Muslims do not hate the West. They actually admire Western technology and lifestyles, although they disapprove of U.S. policy in the Middle East.

Mr. Steyn’s attempt to use anecdotal evidence to back up this claim also fails the test of accuracy. For example, he cites a 2006 incident in which Moroccan “youths” beat to death a 54-year-old Antwerp train conductor. He says three youths were arrested but the ringleader escaped because most of the 40 bystanders were too intimidated  to come forward to help police. He uses it as an example of weak-willed Europe letting wanton and unprovoked violence by young Muslim immigrants go unchecked.

In actual fact, the conductor, Guido Demoor, was not “beaten to death;” he died of a subarachnoid hemorrhage caused by a pre-existing condition, according to newspaper accounts of the trial. Nor was he murdered. The charge against his one attacker, an adult, was assault and battery, and he received a conditional sentence. Charges were dismissed for lack of evidence against the other five suspects, some of them youths, who were all arrested within two days from descriptions provided by bystanders.

Other specific claims in the article are questionable. For example, Mr. Steyn states that high birthrates in Muslim countries “will give tiny Yemen a higher population than vast empty Russia” by mid-century. Yemen’s population in 2007 was 22 million, and Russia’s was 141 million. Barring some historic collapse of the Russian population, Yemen is not going to overtake it by 2050. A projection by the U.S. Census Bureau says Russia’s population will decline marginally before reversing itself and registering a low rate of growth in the early part of this century.

Another example: He cites the example of a London judge who agreed “to the removal of Jews and Hindus from a trial jury because the Muslim defendant’s counsel argued he couldn’t get a fair verdict from them.” Not true. Although the judge did make such a ruling, no Jews or Hindus presented themselves for jury duty for the 2003 trial of the Muslim cleric, Sheikh Abdullah el-Faisal. The cleric was convicted of counselling murder on the evidence, mainly tapes he made calling for the death of non-believers.

A simple Google search (as I have done here) shows the selectivity and carelessness Mr. Steyn used in his research, almost as if he set out to tailor the evidence to his thesis that Islam constitutes a threat to the West. This violates several of the standards for responsible journalism cited in Kovach and Rosenstiel.

It is contrary to the value of keeping the news comprehensive and proportional – specifically by “inflating events for sensation, neglecting others, stereotyping or being disproportionately negative.”

It violates the discipline of verification – specifically by not “seeking out multiple witnesses, disclosing as much as possible about sources, or asking various sides for comment.”

And it runs contrary to a journalist’s first obligation to the truth – specifically by neglecting “the professional discipline of assembling and verifying facts.”

His article in Maclean’s seems to fit the Ontario Human Rights Commission’s definition of bias in that it constitutes “an unfair and one-sided portrayal of an issue.” I agree with the Commission’s opinion that this article is Islamophobic because it “includes stereotypes, bias or acts of hostility towards Muslims and the viewing of Muslims as a greater security threat on an institutional, systemic and societal level.”
Mr. Steyn and Maclean’s also appear to violate a great many of the principles and guidelines for reporting that the Canadian Association of Journalists adopted in 2002. They include (to name only the most obvious ones):

I agree with that statement with one exception: Maclean’s chose to give Steyn’s views maximum exposure, filling the cover and several pages of a magazine that claims a readership of 3.1 million across Canada. Even if it wanted to (and it plainly doesn’t), the publication would not be able to give counter arguments or factual corrections the same exposure.

Nor would any other publication in the country.

So-called “free speech” advocates, who share a contempt for the kind of wisdom that can be meted out by human rights commissions, had a field day this week after the Ontario commission decided it didn’t have the mandate to consider a complaint against Maclean’s magazine – but criticized the article in question for promoting intolerance and Islamophobia.

The author of the article, Mark Steyn, accused the commission of a “drive-thru conviction” and wrote on his website: “Even though they don’t have the guts to hear the case, they might as well find us guilty. Ingenious!”

“The Future Belongs to Islam,” an excerpt from Steyn’s latest book, portrayed Muslims as sharing the same negative characteristics, including being a threat to the West. “The only question,” Steyn wrote, “is how bloody the transfer of real estate will be.” The Canadian Islamic Congress and four law students at Osgoode Hall complained that Maclean’s, by repeatedly printing such articles and refusing to provide space for rebuttal, violated their human rights (see my earlier blog).

While the Ontario commission said it didn’t have the mandate to investigate a complaint against a magazine, it said: “The Commission recognizes and understands the serious harm that such writings cause, both to the targeted communities and society as a whole. And, while we all recognize and promote the inherent value of freedom of expression, it should also be possible to challenge any institution that contributes to the dissemination of destructive, xenophobic opinions.”

That statement won Steyn some allies, including the Toronto Star. “Human rights commissions, federal and provincial, should stick to policing hateful acts, not words,” it said in an editorial on April 11. It also said any complaints about publications should be directed to press councils, forgetting that Maclean's does not belong to one.

Related complaints against Maclean’s have been filed with the British Columbia and federal human rights commissions. A hearing as been scheduled for June 2-6 under section 7(1) of the B.C. Human Rights Code, which unlike the Ontario legislation prohibits publications that subject identifiable communities to hate.

Clearly, the tide of human rights legislation in Canada is recognizing the hurtful effects of targeting religious and ethnic groups through the media. As the Ontario Commission wisely said in its ruling: “Freedom of expression should be exercised through responsible reporting and not be used as a guise to target vulnerable groups and to further increase their marginalization or stigmatization in society.”

A new mandate for the Ontario Commission, which takes effect in July, will expand its role to public education. This includes “taking a leadership role in fostering constructive debate and dialogue among concerned individuals and organizations regarding the issues raised by Islamophobia in the media.”

Instead of the backlash against such action, we should heed the advice of Faisal Joseph, lawyer for the four Osgoode Hall students. “The fact that the Commission recognized in strong and clear language that Maclean’s is part of the racism and Islamophobia that exists in the media against Canadian Muslims, should be cause for shame and embarrassment,” he said. “Maclean’s should now try to solve the problem, not escalate it.”

Submitted to court on March 3 by Richard G. Dearden, the five-page Notice of Libel represents the first time in Canadian history that a sitting prime minister has sued the Official Opposition.

That alone should put it high on the agenda of every political columnist who covers the House of Commons. Yet, strangely, not one of them has so far chosen to write about it. I find that chilling, and very worrisome for our democracy.

Dearden, of course, is the lawyer representing Stephen Harper, who has chosen to sue the Liberal Party of Canada for statements appearing on the party’s website alleging that the Prime Minister knew of a financial offer to secure the vote of the late Independent MP Chuck Cadman.

According to the Notice of Libel, the statements are “false and devastatingly defamatory” and might cause people to think Harper “was involved in illegal activities, knowingly breached the Criminal Code of Canada, knowingly violated a Standing Order of the House of Commons, committed a high crime, subverted Canada’s constitution, was guilty or wrongdoing and is a criminal.” Click here to read the Notice of Libel.

Harper asked that the offending articles be removed from the website, and that Liberal Leader Stephane Dion read a seven-line apology in the House of Commons. Dion has refused to do that, although the Liberal party appears to have called in its own lawyers and toned down some of the language on its website. For example, a headline saying “Harper Knew of Conservative Bribery” was changed to “Harper Needs to Answer Canadians’ Questions.”

This strange case has prompted so many unanswered questions that it’s difficult to know where to start. What does Harper hope to accomplish by resorting to the courts? His explanations of what he knew and when he knew it, quite frankly, have been weak so far. He has faced numerous questions in the House of Commons and will undoubtedly face more. There have been calls for a public inquiry. Will the lawsuit provide the Prime Minister with an excuse to avoid answering his critics in public?

There are other questions that seem to be in the public interest to know – and know now. How long will we have to wait to find out what Harper was talking about when he seemed to admit on tape that he knew about a Conservative financial offer to Cadman to secure his vote on the eve of a historic 2005 parliamentary showdown?

Libel negotiations can be lengthy. There is the likelihood that MPs will invoke parliamentary privilege to avoid being questioned in examination for discovery. Harper did just that last year after longtime Tory Alan Riddell sued him and the Conservative Party for allegedly libeling him during the last federal election. Courts have ruled that MPs aren’t compelled to appear at legal proceedings while the House of Commons is in session. Nor do they have to appear within 40 days of the end of a session.

Lots of things for a parliamentary columnist to write about, huh?

But a scan of the most recent Ottawa columns written by journalists at The Globe and Mail, National Post, SunMedia and the Toronto Star shows that not one of them has addressed Harper’s lawsuit. Not one.

At the Globe, Jeffrey Simpson is on holiday, but his fill-in Lawrence Martin has written about Afghanistan . Rex Murphy, who often tackles political issues, wrote instead about Elliot Spitzer’s indiscretions.

At the Toronto Star, Chantal Hebert and James Travers have devoted their most recent Ottawa columns to Judge Gomery’s reforms, the federal byelections, a doomed private member’s bill on RESPs, and the finance minister’s snub to Ontario .

In the National Post, John Ivison focused on the imprisonment of a Canadian woman in Mexico .

Even the SunMedia’s legal columnist Alan Shanoff, an experienced libel lawyer, wrote his weekend column on compensation for victims of crime (NOTE: Shanoff has subsequently written two fine columns on the PM's libel action, but questions still abound long after the matter was settled out of court).

Asleep at the switch? Your guess is as good as mine.

(In Charter cases like this, the courts must always carefully balance journalistic rights with other rights, and two weeks later the Court of Appeal decided the other way and dismissed a contempt conviction against Hamilton Spectator reporter Kenneth Peters, who refused to reveal his source in a lawsuit filed by a nursing home against the City of Hamilton. The CAJ hailed that decision as a significant victory for protection of sources, although in fact it, too, was decided on more technical grounds unique to that case. Mr. Justice Robert Sharpe found it "inappropriate" for the trial judge to initiate contempt proceedings against Peters on his own, especially since the court already had the information it sought from him.  "This was not a situation of open defiance of a court order requiring an immediate sanction to uphold the court’s integrity," he wrote on March 14.)

What the CAJ and some other critics of the appeals court ruling fail to acknowledge is that Laskin wrote a strong statement acknowledging the importance of reporters being able to protect their sources, even though there is currently no right in law for them to do so in all cases.

"If the journalist-informant relationship is undermined," Laskin said, "society as a whole is affected. It is through confidential sources that matters of great public importance are made known. As corporate and public power increase, the ability of the average citizen to affect his or her world depends upon the information disseminated by the press. To deprive the media of an important tool in the gathering of news would affect society as a whole.  The relationship is one that should be fostered."

"However," he continued, "this does not mean that press organizations or journalists are immune from valid searches under s. 8 of the Charter. And s. 2(b) does not guarantee that journalists have an automatic right to protect the confidentiality of their sources. The court must ensure that the privacy interests of the press are limited as little as possible. But the court must also balance against the privacy interest of the press the state or other societal interests in getting at the truth."

In other words, in this case, an RCMP forgery investigation was more important than McIntosh and the Post protecting the identity of their anonymous source. It's hard to imagine many Canadians arguing strongly against that concept.

The Post, which has had the document since 2001, never was able to verify if it was genuine or forged and in fact did not publish the damaging allegation against Chretien. It was published first by other media in the context of Chretien's denial. So you'd think the newspaper would welcome the chance for the police to do a thorough investigation to find out if the newspaper was duped.

This case should also cause journalists to be wary about giving sources blanket, unconditional promises to protect their identities, which McIntosh, an award-winning investigative journalist now working in the United States, did in this case.


Read the full text of the Ontario Court of Appeals ruling here 

At issue is an October 2006 article “The Future Belongs to Islam,” written by Mark Steyn. In it, he claims that Muslims in the West are poised to take over entire societies and “the only question is how bloody the transfer of real estate will be.” Without documenting his claims, Steyn says enough Muslims are terrorists to make the religion a global threat, and they will subject us all to rigid Muslim laws when the takeover is achieved.

Four Osgoode Hall law students are taking the magazine to the Ontario, B.C. and federal Human Rights Commissions after the magazine refused their request for a more balanced article about Islam.

The reaction to that challenge to press freedom by some Canadian journalists has been apoplectic. Click here for the journalistic reaction

Before we grace Steyn's inflammatory and inaccurate comments about Muslims with heavy-duty rhetoric defending him as an exemplar of freedom of expression, let's examine what we are talking about.
It's not freedom of expression.

Steyn is entitled to his opinions about Muslims or anyone else. No one is disputing that, including the four law students who are challenging Maclean's. What they are objecting to is that he has gone too far, and is trying to rally public opinion against a Muslim threat that he has failed to document factually. This "moral panic" approach has been widely identified as one of the racist discourses in academic literature (Henry and Tator, Discources of Domination, 2000).

The issue is racial stereotyping, not the freedom to say what you think.

Suppose we treat this as a case of libel against Muslims. If such a case ever got to court, the onus would be on Maclean's to demonstrate that what Steyn said was well grounded in fact, or was fair comment (in which case it would have to show the facts upon which he based his opinion were true). In some courts, it could rely on the "responsible journalism" defence, which requires it to document how Steyn was diligent about checking out all sides of the situation before reaching his opinion.

Could Maclean's do that? Has it so far even bothered to try? Its response -- "we'd rather go bankrupt," said editor-in-chief Ken Whyte -- is the sort of thing that would do in any editor facing a libel suit. It would be cited as evidence of malice.

The issue here is whether what Maclean's printed was responsible journalism. Let's deal with that, and not retreat to defend the highest hill, imagining that freedom of expression itself is under fierce attack.

That would only be creating our own journalistic "moral panic." It would not help us sort out the far more important issues at stake here.