Wednesday, January 30, 2008
Our friend Robert Ferrigno emails to let us know that his new book, Sins of the Assassin
Ferrigno also alerts us to the fact that he figures in to the Mark Steyn "Human Rights" farce going on up in Canada. He writes at his blog: Proud to Be a Footnote at Mark Steyn's Trial (permalinks not working)
...I first became aware of the situation when a Canadian reader emailed me with the news that not only was Steyn being charged by the Human Rights Commission, but in the documentation against him was his very positive review of my previous novel, Prayers for the Assassin
When I heard about the complaint, I confess I dismissed it as something akin to getting a warning from a pimply hall monitor telling me that my shoes squeaked. I was wrong.
In fact the complaint seems to be part of a campaign to use the Canadian Human Rights Commission, not for redress of racial or sexual discrimination in jobs and housing as originally intended, but as a method of harassment against free speech and intellectual inquiry, particularly where it pertains to Muslims. While the Human Rights Commission's punishment is limited to fines and orders to desist, the procedures of the commission involve steep costs for the defendants, and no cost whatsoever for the one filing the complaint. Steyn will be forced to travel to British Columbia and appear before the commission on June 3 to defend himself and his writing. He will probably chose to bear the cost of an attorney, but he will not be allowed to have the attorney present when he testifies before the commission...
Our congratulations to Robert Ferrigno for being in such august company in such a worthy cause. The rest of Robert's spot-on comments on the issue are worth reading as well. I'd say that the people who called him an Islamophobe are unlikely to have read the first novel in the series. It's hardly anti-Muslim, instead displaying a range of interesting Muslim characters. From the email he sent:
...Seems [Steyn's] very positive review of Prayers for the Assassin in Maclean's is cited in the addendum to the lawsuit against him, since I am "a recognized Islamophobe." Odd, since it was my long time publishers in France, Germany and Italy who turned down Prayers citing fears of being sued under their own "giving offence to religion" laws, while Turkey was the first foreign sale, printing as many copies as they did the latest Stephen King novel. There's even an Arabic edition...
Not surprising, in spite of the dearth of work being translated into Arabic, the Muslim World would love the premise. Hey, never let the facts get in the way of a good lawsuit.
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