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Opportunity for Abuse
October 04, 2000
By Denis Solomon
DESPITE their love of abstract terms, such as “freedom” and “democracy”, few people in this country are capable of abstract thought in the real sense of the word: the capacity to draw conclusions of universal application from disparate data, and, conversely, to discern and accept the full, even if unpleasant, consequences of a valid principle.
Here, abstract terms are trotted out only when individual or group interests are at stake, and thrown like bricks at the heads of opponents.
This tendency is most prevalent, and most dangerous, among those in authority. A good example is the claim by the Minister of Information, Wade Mark, that “democracy” means the right of a government to have its bills passed automatically in the Senate.
Another misused term is “rights”. Ramesh Maharaj and many other advocates of capital punishment claim that abolitionists are concerned with the rights of murderers at the expense of the “rights” of the victims. The right not to be put to death in any circumstances is a right recognised by many legal systems. But Ramesh would be hard put to say what “rights” murder victims have, since by definition they are dead; or what “rights” the relatives of murder victims have that are denied by the murderer not being hanged.
Unless he means the “right” to vengeance, which is a “right” universally denied to everyone by the very existence of the criminal law.
Religions are particularly prone to this intellectual and moral short-sightedness. Although none of them would admit to being against freedom of thought, all are ready to condemn freedom of speech where it implies criticism of their own beliefs. This is the irrationality the government is pandering to in its nefarious, and ill-named, Equal Opportunity Act.
As long ago as October 1998 I wrote in my Sunday Express column that Clause 7 of the Act was an attack on the freedom of religion. Freedom of religion must include freedom from religion, which in turn must include the right to make public any views one may have of the pernicious effects of religious thought and practice. I have said, for example, that religious education is child abuse. I firmly believe this, and I claim the right, under the Constitutional guarantee of freedom of expression, to say so. But the Equal Opportunity Act allows any religious group that operates schools to complain that I have called them child abusers. The Equal Opportunity Tribunal can then order me to pay unlimited compensation, with a fine of $25,000 if I refuse.
The purpose of the Equal Opportunity Act is not to ensure equal opportunity for anyone in anything. Its first purpose is to provide the government with yet another weapon against the population. To achieve this the government has cynically confused discrimination with criticism. To limit discrimination is to promote freedom; but to limit criticism (even in the form of the most virulent abuse) is to limit freedom, and therefore has no place in an anti-discrimination law, or in any law at all.
Amendments to this effect proposed by Senator Martin Daly, SC, first that Clause 7 should be deleted, and then that exceptions should be made in cases of artistic merit (e.g. satire in calypso) were rejected out of hand by the government.
The Act's second purpose is to win votes for the UNC by currying favour with religious groups. What must have been the surprise of the Attorney General, therefore, when several of the religious groups objected to Clause 7, as well as to some of the anti-discrimination provisions. But the hard-line Hindus and Muslims maintained their support for the Act in its entirety, even maintaining, falsely, that the Inter-Religious Organisation was united behind them on the issue.
The Prime Minister then held a series of separate meetings with some of the dissenters (even with the disgusting Thusians). From these meetings it transpired that what most of the objectors to the Bill really wanted was exemption for themselves from Clause 7. They wanted freedom to direct their anathemas against conduct and ideas not to their taste, including the beliefs of other religions. This desire the Attorney General satisfied by including a provision to the effect that the law does not apply to statements made in a place of worship (undefined) even if that place of worship is in the open air.
So now, unless I become a priest, I am forbidden to say that the Thusians are child abusers, no matter how many children they beat and torture. But the Thusians can continue to say that Hindus are pagans and idolaters, and that their deities are “immoral and deranged vagrants”.
This hypocrisy even weakens what the real purpose of the Act should be–i.e. to outlaw discrimination. The desire to curry favour with religion has led the Attorney General to exclude from the Act discrimination on grounds of sexual orientation or preference. He also informed the Senate that although the bill forbids discrimination on grounds of disability, HIV positive people can still be discriminated against because “HIV” is not a disability. Presumably a person refused a job for being HIV positive must wait until he gets Aids before he can complain.
The reason given by the Attorney General for excluding sexual orientation or preference is that “homosexuality is a crime”. This is simply not true.
Homosexuality is not a crime, and cannot be. The Offences Against the Person Act criminalises “the abominable crime of buggery”. But the word “homosexuality” refers to a sexual orientation that, if it is not manifested in behaviour, can only be assumed. The churches, and by implication the Offences Against the Person Act, urge homosexuals to refrain from such behaviour. Now the Equal Opportunity Act allows them to be discriminated against whether they refrain or not. Worse, it enables, say, an employer to discriminate against a person for a condition that is not defined or definable, and can therefore exist only in the mind of the discriminator.
Also, the Attorney General does not seem to realise that “sexual orientation or preference” includes heterosexuality. So it is perfectly possible for an employer to discriminate against an employee or potential employee because he like too much woman. In addition to limiting the rights of citizens by its provisions, the Act, in itself is an infringement of rights. Its passage contravenes Section 13 of the Constitution, which says that an Act that limits fundamental freedoms must be passed by a special majority. Even then, such an act is invalid if it is “shown not to be reasonably justifiable in a society that has a proper respect for the rights and freedoms of the individual”.
To limit pitbull ownership, the government decided it needed a special majority. To limit freedom of speech, it considers a simple majority sufficient.
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