TorSun founder Peter Worthington connects dots between Caledonia victims, Dr. King, and European persecution of Islam critics

Posted on February 13, 2011 | 2 Comments

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REMINDER: ’Truth & Reconciliation’ Rally in Caledonia on Feb 27, 1pm.

Peter Worthington, Toronto SunToronto Sun founder Peter Worthington has become the first Canadian journalist to connect the dots between 1. the targeting of non-Native victims in Caledonia; 2. our application of Dr. King’s teachings in confronting appeasement of extremism; and 3. the persecution of European critics of Islamic extremism such as Lars Hedegaard, Jesper Langballe and Elisabeth Sabaditsche Wolff under draconian ‘hate speech’ thought-crime laws:

Truth and its Consequences

by Peter Worthington, Toronto Sun/SunMedia, Feb 13/11

When Ontario’s McGuinty government and the leadership of the OPP sided with First Nations protesters against local residents in Caledonia in 2006, it outraged many people. In her seminal book about the issue, Helpless, Christie Blatchford avoided the native rights issue and concentrated on the abandonment of rule of law which, curiously (or maybe not so curiously), offended many rank and file OPP officers who were ordered not to provoke Indians, but to hammer down locals who protested against the protesters.

Two of the victims of the temporary policy — Gary McHale and Mark Vandermaas, once arrested for raising the Canadian flag! — cite Martin Luther King’s famous letter from Birmingham jail in 1963, where he was under arrest for parading without a permit. In his landmark letter, Dr. King recalled that it was not an issue between legality and illegality, but right and wrong. He noted that everything Hitler did in Nazi Germany was “legal”, and everything Hungarian freedom fighters did in 1956 was “illegal”. “One who breaks an unjust law must do so openly, lovingly, and with a willingness to accept the penalty,” Dr. King wrote. One who does this “is in reality expressing the highest respect for the law.”

King’s words reverberate with McHale and Vandermaas: “Condemning peaceful action because it might precipitate violence is like condemning a robbed person because his possession of money precipitated the evil act of robbery.”

Skip forward to Denmark today. When historian Lars Hedegaard was charged with making disparaging remarks about Muslims and Sharia law, Jesper Langballe, a Danish MP was similarly charged for supporting Hedegaard’s right to free speech. Both were charged under Article 266b of a Danish law which, extraordinarily for a democratic country, does not allow “truth” as a defence.

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Anyway, the political correctness sweeping Europe, and the fearfulness of offending that contravenes free speech, has echoes in North America — witness Caledonia, where local residents were the enemy for wanting the law upheld against protesters.

VoC Comment

Peter Worthington was the first Ontario journalist outside Caledonia to write about our Ipperwash Papers project after commenting on Christie Blatchford’s book Helpless:

This latest article by the legendary Worthington should, hopefully, help those concerned about the appeasement of Islamic extremism understand why it is worth investing the time to learn about Caledonia, and encourage them to understand our message regarding the power of applying Dr. King’s lessons to confront it. I have provided some helpful links in that regard below within my thank you note to Worthington (some links have been added):

My thank you note to Peter Worthington (in part)

Dear Mr. Worthington,
 
1. Despite having done our best to follow Dr. King’s teachings and help others understand the lessons they offer in peacefully confronting injustice in Caledonia (and in Denmark) we have been repeatedly ridiculed for doing so by supporters of the occupation who scoff at the idea of ‘white privileged’ people like us quoting a black civil rights leader – as if people with white skin are incapable and/or too racist to be permitted to do so, especially when the victims of oppression have white skin and their oppressors do not. I don’t know, therefore, how to begin to thank you for ‘Truth and its consequences,‘ but I’ll try.
 
While Christie did quote Gary’s views on our application of Dr. King’s teachings in Helpless, you are the first journalist to editorialize on the subject, and the first to compare Caledonia’s injustices to the assault on civil liberties in Europe. 
 
I’ve lost track of the number of reporters who have asked questions along the line of, “Aren’t you provoking violence by marching in Caledonia?” They never seemed to be very interested in asking the natives why they were threatening violence against peaceful protesters. So, thanks for reporting what we have told them time after time – that the question of ‘provoking violence’ during the exercise of one’s rights has already been answered by one of the greatest civil rights leaders in history.
 
I recall receiving a comment from a well-meaning VoiceofCanada reader one day asking why we were planning our Oct 08/07 pre-election ‘Remember Us’ March given that things were so quiet and that we might stir things up. I referred her to Dr. King’s letter along with some editorial comment of my own. The next day Sam Gualtieri was nearly beaten to death in the home he was building for his daughter, an attack that left him unable to work due to permanent brain damage. As King observed, the absence of conflict is not the same as the presence of justice. Until the OPP, the Ontario government and Six Nations apologize for what they did we will never know if we are experiencing a temporary lull in the attack on innocents or if we are truly living in the presence of justice. 
 
As you know, as with the Danish Free Press Society, the International Free Press Society is headed by Lars Hedegaard, and he has featured Sabaditsche-Wolff as a speaker in Copenhagen. I am very grateful that Mary Lou Ambrogio of the Cdn chapter of IFPS has invested much time to learn about Caledonia and understand why it should matter to those concerned about Islamic extremism. She has helped share our message with Hedegaard and others that a civil rights struggle employing Dr. King’s ‘non-violent direct action’ approach could help Europe confront governmental appeasement of Islamic radicals.
 
 As you can imagine, therefore, I am thrilled that you have helped ‘connect the dots’ – as Mary Lou likes to describe the nexus between Caledonia & the appeasement of Islamic extremism here and in Europe.
 
2. I’m not sure if I sent you this before, but it outlines why those concerned about Islamic extremists should care about Caledonia: http://voiceofcanada.wordpress.com/2010/05/31/cupe-extremists-supporting-muslim-extremists-supporting-native-extremists/ 
 
I’ve also attached a copy of a mini-report/brochure entitled ‘Caledonia’s Fifth Column‘ that speaks to the involvement of radical unionists, anarchists, anti-Israel groups and terror group supporters in the Caledonia crisis. Unfortunately, the OPP didn’t once criticize these crazies or target them for arrest, but chose instead to try to smear us and violate our rights in order to appease their native proxies.
 
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It matters not whether the appeasement is of native militants in Caledonia or of Muslim militants in Europe; good things can happen when the nexus between the two is understood and activists unite in defence of civil liberties.

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References

Mark Vandermaas, Editor
VoiceofCanada
info@voiceofcanada.ca  

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