The Growing Rise of Censorship in Canada

[Webster]

American Family News: Censorship is ever expanding

A pro-lifer says a recent incident in Canada demonstrates how far away her country is from protecting free speech rights.

Campaign Life Coalition members were recently on hand for a National March for Life press conference at Ottawa's Parliament with pictures of aborted babies – an effort to display the humanity of the preborn child and the reality of what abortion does.

Spokeswoman Josie Luetke tells AFN they were approached by police and ordered to take down the pictures. "It's definitely very worrisome, given that Parliament Hill is right in front of Parliament; that's where you're supposed to be able to do your advocacy and have freedom of expression," Luetke notes. "We already do have bubble zones in Ontario, which prohibit any pro-life expression around the vicinity of abortion facilities, but it seems like this precedent of censorship is just ever expanding."

Police say graphic imagery is banned, but Luetke thinks that only seems to apply when such imagery is attached to a pro-life message. She suggests that if it were applied across the board, then pictures of deceased Jews from World War II would be forbidden on Holocaust Memorial Day. "Canada seems to be moving in the direction of censorship, of trying to shelter people from the reality of human rights injustices," the pro-lifer laments.

She adds that the government is "very much controlling" the dynamic in public places that should be a forum for public discourse and expression.