Rootin' Tootin' Rick Salutin "Irritated" to Find Two Mouthy Right-Wingers Leading the Fight for Canada's Free Speech

The Toronto Star's Rick Salutin is disturbed and, yes, confused, to find two loud-mouthed conservatives leading the charge for free speech in Canada:

The world is full of mysteries (Why is Castle on the Space channel?) but I find their presence on the free speech podium puzzling. Ezra’s “causes” include Big Oil; Steyn’s include western civilization under threat from Muslim invasion. Those aren’t endangered species in the arena of public discourse. For the record I should say I’m on the Levant/Steyn side in the cases against them; I’m for free speech up to and including outright hate. But the heroization is irritating. 

Funny, I don't find it the least bit irritating. And I doubt that Rick would either, were someone from his end of the political spectrum being lionized as a champion of free speech. But people on the left hew to the doctrine of political correctness, which requires everyone to curb their words lest they "offend," and is thus inimical to free expression. That's why so few of them are willing to stand up for it, why so far no leftist champion has seized the stage to defend it a la Messers Steyn and Levant, and why the two are seen as heroes by those who esteem this most noble and valuable freedom. Of course, Salutin has a different explanation for the "heroization" (is that even a word?), and sides with those who seek to silence them:

I’d say it comes from failing to make a distinction: free speech as getting to say what you think, versus getting to say it loudly enough to have an impact. It’s about access. Anyone can mutter their true thoughts on a street corner or in an obscure blog. Steyn and Levant have always been able to say what they want, from platforms reaching large audiences, and been paid well enough for it to make a decent living. Those enraged by them, who charge and sue, have little opportunity to respond on that level; so they go the depressive, negative route of trying to shut them down legally. Believe me, if they were offered equivalent access as an alternative, they’d grab it.

Absolutely. And it's what we might call the Khurrum Awan Axiom. To wit: if only Maclean's Magazine had opened its pages to Mr. A.'s cadre of the affronted to rebut Steyn's aspersions, they would not have had to take their complaint to three of Canada's "human rights" bodies, and Steyn would have been spared the week-long prosecution by the British Columbia "human rights" court which heard testimony re the "tone" and content of his writing.

Salutin may claim to be love free speech, but, good lefty that he is, he can't help but side with those who drape themselves in the mantle of victimhood in order to curtail "offensive" (i.e. blasphemous) speech:

The most painful case I know is Canadian Muslims, especially Arabs, responding to how they’ve been derisively portrayed for decades in major media, with few chances to respond on their own behalf. I cannot portray their frustration. They accost you socially or at their hangdog conferences and plead less for redress than for a simple acknowledgment of how unfair it is...

Yeah, it's the unfairness of it all that's so irksome. If only they had access to, say, the Toronto Star and/or the Globe and Mail; if only everyone (including Steyn and Levant) would shut the eff up about all that Allahu Akbar stuff; the hard-done-by ones would stop being so "hangdog" and "frustrated."

And if you believe that then you probably believe that Rick Salutin really does love free speech and isn't merely paying lip service to a concept that, in fact and in practice, he disdains.