American Exceptionalism

Came across this article in the NY Times today, only to discover it's part of a series the NY Times is running on American exceptionalism in the law, that is to say aspects of our legal system that are unique in the world. Haven't read the rest of the articles but plan to.

At any rate. Today's is on Freedom of Speech which, as we all know, is relatively absolute in the US and guaranteed explicitly to remain so as laid out in the 1st amendment. This is not at all the case in the rest of the world, even in those countries who trace their legal systems to English common law, as we do.

The article takes as a hook a rather controversial human rights case going on in Canada wherein one of their major publications has been hauled before a tribunal for an unflattering article on Muslims, something that would be impossible to imagine in the U.S.

The case is pretty much endlessly fascinating. I recommend Ezra Levant's blog as a resource. He writes well not only about the McCleans/Steyn case mentioned by the Times but also his own pending tribunal. If you have the time his YouTube videos of his own interrogation by a bureaucratic censor are hysterical.

The Times article's headline (at least in the online version) is the disapproving-sounding "Out of Step with Allies, U.S. Defends Right to Offend". Given that a publication like the Times rarely finds reason to come down on the American side of any difference with Europe, I figured this would be an upsettingly anti-free-speech take. Overall, the article was fair. It presented the rational for the anti-hate-speech laws prevalent in other lands but also included a reasonable description and assortment of defenders of our own first amendment absolutism on speech. The support for the censorial was mostly front-loaded but I suppose that's just nit-picking, ultimately.

At any rate. I have loads to say about the Canadian cases and what they signify for the broader decline of Western Civilization but it's late and I want to go home.