CLC Blog

February 8, 2022 (Campaign Life Coalition) – In March of 2020, in response to a 40 Days for Life campaign I led, the province of Nova Scotia legislated “safe access zones” that banned pro-life protests in those zones. It seemed obvious to me that this was merely discrimination against an unpopular opinion. If only one side of a polarising issue is not allowed to protest in a public area, can it be anything less than government-sanctioned discrimination? However, I saw a great danger in how this discrimination was being obscured. I knew it could potentially lead to freedom of expression being denied anywhere for anyone on any divisive issue.

The reality is that those who banned pro-life free speech in “safe access zones” had no solid grounds for doing so. They tried to hide the obvious discrimination behind this law by claiming it was for the safety of patients and healthcare workers. But, how does a peaceful protest have any effect on patient and staff safety? Harassment, assault, abuse, and other such unsavoury behaviours are already illegal under the Criminal Code of Canada. If pro-lifers actually engaged in such unsavoury behaviours, we would be in jail! Because pro-lifers are, as a general rule, the most peaceful and loving activists you will ever meet, those wanting to ban them from certain areas realized that they needed an additional argument beyond “safety”. They resorted to the dangerous argument of emotional damage or “emotional violence” and other variations of such concepts.

I addressed this issue directly when I spoke in front of the Committee on Law Amendments in 2020. I pointed out that strong emotions may arise anywhere a protest is held, not just outside hospitals and clinics. If dealing with disagreement on divisive issues is the problem, what happens if people feel emotionally hurt in front of a bus stop, or a store, or a parking lot, or anywhere else protests might be moved to? Will protests that evoke strong emotion be banned from those areas too?

Strong emotions are not only aroused by abortion either. For instance, they are also aroused by immigration, LGBTQ advocacy, and Covid-19 vaccine mandates, just to name a few. What this means is that, as I pointed out to the Committee, if these thoughts are followed to their natural conclusions, a precedent is being set that could bar free speech on any divisive issue, anywhere in the province.

I hate to say my words in early 2020 were prophetic, but it seems they were. They also came true more quickly than I anticipated. The very next year, the Nova Scotia legislature brought in Bill 11. This would expand “safe access zones” to prevent protests outside hospitals. It was done because people were protesting vaccine passports.

In a submission to the committee, I pointed out that I saw this coming: “I warned you last year. I have warned you again today. I fear if this trend continues, someday it may be you who is muzzled.”

The truth is that if the government can muzzle one identifiable group, then no one’s freedom to speak is secure.

World War II German pastor Martin Niemöller poignantly made this point in his poem titled “First They Came.”

First they came for the Communists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Communist
Then they came for the Socialists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Socialist
Then they came for the trade unionists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a trade unionist
Then they came for the Jews
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Jew
Then they came for me
And there was no one left
To speak out for me

I repeat this warning to all of you: Speak up for the right to speak while you still can, even if you don’t agree on the issue at hand. The government of Newfoundland is now proposing to expand “safe access zones” too. This happened in response to those who were protesting being forced to take the vaccine.

What issue will people be forbidden to speak about in public next? Whose speech will be banned next? How long before all public property is monitored for government compliant speech?

Speak up now, before your voice is taken from you entirely.