Weekend Mailbag: Feb. 13, 2021

By Letter to the Editor on February 13, 2021.

Weekend Mailbag is a new online feature at the Medicine Hat News which includes letters to the editor that could not be fit into the paper in a timely fashion. Check out our website on Saturdays for more thoughts from the community, or share yours by submitting a letter to the editor by email at letters@medicinehatnews.com.

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All democracies have limited freedom of speech for a variety of reasons

Dear editor,

Mr. Thacker’s article, Freedom of speech for all, Feb. 2, suggests that my “leftist’s view of the world” is just one scratch away from authoritarianism because I favour civilized public speech. Guilty as charged.

Thacker defends platforms like Parler, which offer “uncensored public discussion and debate.” He believes in unregulated, unlimited freedom of speech. I don’t.

All democracies have limited freedom of speech for a variety of reasons. They all have libel laws, and laws against the incitement of violence. We must not yell “fire” in a crowded theatre. An advertiser’s claims must adhere to some basis in reality. Therefore, it is safe to say that freedom of speech, as an absolute right, has never legally existed.

And yet all of us want as much freedom of speech as possible simply because we value knowledge and truth. The problem is, of course, that we are asked to practise the skill of discerning truth from fiction. Call me silly, but in the field of epidemiology I’d rather trust the truth spoken by Dr. Fauci than the bizarre speculations by D. Trump. Drink disinfectant. Shine a light up your somewhere.

Likewise, on the question of coal exploration and mining in Alberta’s Eastern Slopes, I’d rather accept the troubling research (truth) of field scientists than the carbon-fuelled insanity of Mr. Kenney. Also puzzling is Kenney’s $30 million/year ‘War Room,’ his attempt at ‘stifling’ the voices of those whose values differ from his – a UCP interpretation of freedom of speech?

My suspicion is that Thacker is not speaking for mainstream conservatives. They are, I’m certain, able to discern truth from dross, facts from fiction, miscreants from citizens and rabble-rousing from freedom of speech.

“Uncensored public discussion and debate” is a fine ideal, and we all wish this was achievable. Washington, Jan. 6, suggests this is not yet possible. Thank goodness the big tech firms have accepted their responsibility, if only slightly.

Peter Mueller

Medicine Hat

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We must treat our elders with more respect

Dear editor,

What I admire most about some non-Western cultures is their general belief in and practise of not placing their aged family members in seniors care homes.

As a result, there’s no chance they will be caught in, thus left vulnerable by, cost-cutting measures taken by some care-home business owners to maximize profit.

Care home neglect was present in Canada before COVID-19; however, we didn’t fully comprehend the degree until the pandemic really hit, as we horrifically discovered with the CHSLD Résidence Herron in Dorval, Quebec, about 10 months ago.

Western business culture, and by extension society, allowed the wellbeing of our oldest family members to be decided by corporate profit-margin measures. And our governments mostly dared not intervene, perhaps because they feared being labeled as anti-business in our avidly capitalist culture.

The buck morally and ethically has to stop with the health and lives of human beings, especially those who have little or no voice.

Frank Sterle Jr.

White Rock, B.C.

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Don’t drink the Koolaid

The MLA, a Bow Island farmer and the Premier have been drinking the Koolaid. The MP from Hastings – Lennox drank too much, fell down and can’t get up. We suspect the federal Conservative leader and our MP are closet drinkers.

The two MLAs and the MP meet weekly at the same clubhouse seeking inspiration and enlightenment from their Oracle. The MLA and the Premier don’t seem to get along. Perhaps their Oracles are not congruent. Where the MLAs goeth, goeth the MP also? Intrigue abounds.

A Republican congresswoman from Georgia began drinking around 9/11. She soon fell down. Twenty years later she made a feeble attempt to stand up but immediately and pathetically collapsed.

Canada has designated the Proud Boys a hate group. Hate speech in Canada can get you two years. Holocaust denial in Austria can get you 20.

Parler is hate speech on steroids. Did not the MLA aspire to join it?

Many people in this country drink. They elect people who drink. Herein lies the problem.

“The good thing about science is that it’s true whether or not you believe in it.” ― Neil deGrasse Tyson

Fred Lewis

Medicine Hat

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Sloan, Beyak ousted for expressing right to freedom of speech

Dear editor,

Derek Sloan and Lynn Beyak were unwelcome in the Conservative caucus because they exercised their right to freedom of speech, and dared to tell the whole truth, not just the politically acceptable parts of it. To me, their ousting damages the party’s credibility.

Charmaine Wood

Irvine

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