Right to a belief doesn’t make it right
Re: This Isn’t Religion, It’s Madness, Conrad Black, May 28.
Though Parliament is a forum for public opinion and belief, we do not usually claim that our public opinions and beliefs are infallible, even though such opinions and beliefs do become the basis for law. Moreover in Canada, laws that are declared deficient or unconstitutional by the Supreme Court, are struck down. This fact presumes the fallibility of public beliefs.
In Canada, people have a right to their beliefs, and religious beliefs are specifically identified as a right. While this may give comfort to believers, having a right should not be confused with the verification of the belief, a bestowal of certainty, or the affirmation of absolutism and infallibility.
Though there is a close association between t he words, “infallible” and “absolutism,” absolutism in the Hegelian sense is a dangerous word in history and politics. While the Supreme Court does defend religious rights in Canada, it does not have the mandate to make them absolute. If it did so, we should be worried, for as absolutism advances, sanity retreats. Gordon Watson, Rocky Mountain House, Alta. Conrad Black presents a situation that is becoming all too common in Canada — a legal system that has become insane. Why don’t we have a Theodore Olsen, or Ruth Bader Ginsburg on our Supreme Court? It makes me think of Norman Mailer’s 2002 letter to the editor after reading George F. Will’s generous praise of George W. Bush following 9/11. Mailer didn’t agree and framed his response with a passage from A Farewell to Arms when he wrote: “It is worth reminding ourselves that the life of a democracy may also depend on the good and honourable use of language and not on the scurvy of manipulation of such words as evil and love by intellectual striplings of the calibre of our president.”
The manipulation of language appears to be acceptable in Canada’s courts. We have too many intellectual striplings in the legal system who are unable to apply at least a modicum of analysis to their decision making and spew opinions. Canada’s reputation, economy and growth are being crippled by such people in Parliament, academic institutions and government offices. The question is why — could it be indifference, ignorance, political correctness, frustration, or is it acceptance of the futility of trying to effect change with people entrenched and happy with the status quo? Canadians are not stupid — indeed many of us are asking the same question, “Where did this madness come from?” Rosemarie B. Barker, Calgary.