Anningson: What If…?

[Times and Transcript] So what if none of us ever got to say what we thought was important?

What if when I tried to write about vegetarianism the meat lobby had me shut down. What if the coffee federation silenced me when I said we should pay more for a cup of coffee because the labourers don’t make enough? What if the government brought me up on charges when I suggest that detainees are being treated unfairly in military prisons?

If you have been reading Maclean’s magazine this year you will realize that Canada has such a thing as a Human Rights Court, which is not really a court in a standard legal system, but a court where any individual whatsoever can bring charges that you have somehow written or published hate literature against some group.