censorship
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The Woke Dissent
The thinking animating the dissenting opinion in Ward’s case would destroy freedom of expression in the name of equality and safety Continue reading
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Telling People Whom to Vote for
An illiberal community seeks to dictate its members’ votes. How can, and should, the law respond ― and quite how different are liberal democracies anyway? Continue reading
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Platonic Guardians 2.0?
The New York Times has published an essay by Eric Schmidt, the Chairman of Google, about the role of the Internet, and especially, of the exchange of ideas and information that the Internet enables, in both contributing to and addressing the challenges the world faces. The essay is thoroughly upbeat, concluding that it is “within Continue reading
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Twelve Banned Books Weeks
Once upon a time, I mused about whether Parliament could ban books as part of its regulation of election campaign spending. The specific question that interested me then was whether the exemption of “the distribution of a book, or the promotion of the sale of a book, for no less than its commercial value, if Continue reading
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Pity the Censor
I have started reading the WWI memoir of a British journalist, Philip Gibbs, called Now It Can Be Told. At least part of the reason for the title is that during the war, what he saw could not be told because of military censorship. Gibbs’ description of the censors’ modus operandi is worth quoting at Continue reading
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More about Election Law
There are two things to mention today, both related to election law, and more specifically to restrictions on “third-party” speech in the pre-electoral context. First, Radio-Canada reports that Québec’s Chief Electoral Officer has been in touch with the leaders of the student organizations who are protesting the tuition fee hikes announced by the provincial government. The Continue reading
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Can Canada Ban Books?
The New Yorker has published an interesting, albeit tendentious, as The Volokh Conspiracy’s Jonathan Adler explains, account by Jeffrey Toobin of the notorious Citizens United decision of the U.S. Supreme Court, which struck down limits on corporations’ spending on pre-electoral advertising. According to Mr. Toobin, the key to Supreme Court’s engagement with the case was a question asked by Continue reading
Double Aspect 