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| Hermit Spirit's final tweet |
This absurd story could not have been invented, even as parody.
In the wake of the attack on the Quebec City mosque, Canadian authorities are going into high gear to monitor and in some cases arrest those who engage in anti-Muslim "hate speech" online. Canada is already problematic when it comes to free speech, but it looks like things are going to get worse.
Apparently, the Montreal police force is hiring 55 more staff members, in part to police online activity.
On Wednesday, Antonio Padula, 45, got into a twitter fight on the subject of the Quebec City attack, refugees and Islam in general. Later that night, police arrived at his home to arrest him.
Padula was charged with "uttering threats to an individual" and "public incitement of hatred against an identifiable group."
A number of his tweets included references to killing Muslims.
The Crown actually opposed his release on bail but the judge released him anyway, on the condition, among other things, that he wouldn't use the internet. Theoretically, he could receive up to seven years in prison.
Most accounts claim that Padula had an incredulous and shocked attitude throughout the proceedings.
I don't blame him and here's one reason why: If you look at the content of the offending tweets and the context of the full fight, it's very clear that Padula was taking a "pro-refugee" position and arguing against one or more "Islamophobes."
When Padula referred to "killing all refugees at the airport, " "killing innocent Muslims while praying" and so on, he was sarcastically characterizing the alleged views of his opponents!
This would be utterly obvious to anyone even a tad on the brighter side of your average Canadian secret policeman.
Here are some of the tweets:
Padula is a liberal, who from the look of his tweet stream (which is still up), gets into the usual arguments all the time about fake news, Donald Trump, refugees and so on. And he makes the usual liberal accusations against his opponents - they're racists, homophobes, warmongers, etc., This time, when he got into the Twitter argument with the "Islamophobe" person (that guy could have been me!), he was quick to characterize the person's views (it's not clear how seriously) as potentially murderous.
Too quick.
Now he himself is charged with being a murderous Islamophobe.
As a Catholic, I don't believe in Karma, so I'm going to resist the temptation to mention Karma here. I have seen no evidence that Mr. Padula has ever defended criminalizing "hate speech." Rather, he seems to be in favor of free speech. Or as he put it on twitter a few days ago:
Everyone has the right to be a racist pr*ck.
Mahound's Paradise wishes him well.
What on earth has happened to Canada. They have become a paranoid totalitarian regime. Is this really what Canadians want?? If not, they had better start resisting now.
ReplyDeleteCanada is a hot mess.
Mr. Padula should have been kicked off Twitter, but hate speech laws are an assault on freedom, and once the State has those, your ability to defend your people and nation from annihilation by immigration is limited. But they better get going anyway.
The irony is that Twitter - which often has a trigger finger against people espousing "hate speech" - was perfectly fine with it. The guy is an obnoxious lefty troll. But the charge that he was inciting violence against Muslims is obviously false. If anything, he was inciting hatred against conservatives.
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