CARPAY: An election in 2025 will not fix Canada’s cultural decline

John Carpay, B.A., LL.B., is president of the Justice Centre for Constitutional FreedomsLaw follows politics. Politics follows culture. Culture, to a large extent, follows education. The gradual decline in education in recent decades, in particular the failure of schools to teach history properly (or at all), has resulted in a cultural decline that will take years, even decades, to reverse. Such is the state of affairs in Canada, as we reflect on 2024 and look ahead to the new year. As we enter 2025, freedom-loving Canadians should understand that an election won’t fix the cultural rot that has entrenched itself in academia, the media and many of our legal and political institutions.Trudeau’s Online Harms Act, introduced in February, marked a low point in 2024 as the most aggressive assault against free expression in Canadian history. But the Liberals’ Bill C-63 was not the only symptom of a sick culture: too many Canadians want to empower government to decide on behalf of everyone what is true or false. NDP Member of Parliament Leah Gazan introduced Bill C-413 to criminalize “condoning, denying, downplaying or justifying the Indian residential school system in Canada,” and make this new offence punishable by up to two years in prison..Earlier in the year, NDP Member of Parliament Charlie Angus introduced Bill C-372, to make it a crime to state (or even suggest) that fossil fuels “lead to positive outcomes in relation to the environment, the health of Canadians, reconciliation with Indigenous peoples or the Canadian or global economy.”Trudeau, Gazan and Angus are so convinced of the truth of their own beliefs that — if given the chance — they would actually jail their political opponents! Jailing your opponents — as opposed to debating them — is one of the hallmarks of fascism.It would be a huge mistake to view assaults on our Charter rights through a partisan lens and see threats to freedom as a uniquely Liberal-and-NDP phenomenon.Conservative MPs voted unanimously to make it a criminal offence for parents to encourage their sexually confused child or teenager to embrace and accept the sex that she or he was born with. Embracing the highly misleading slogan of prohibiting “conversion therapy,” Conservative MPs joined the Liberals, Greens, NDP, and Bloc to make it illegal for psychologists, counsellors, therapists, doctors and religious leaders to encourage a man who identifies as a woman to embrace his masculinity and his male body.Likewise, it is now a crime to encourage a woman who identifies as a man to embrace her femininity and female body. Under Bill C-4, passed in December 2021, the only legal option for parents — and everyone else — is to put transgender ideology into practice.Even helping an adult to de-transition back to her or his birth gender could lead to a criminal prosecution, thanks to the support of all MPs of all parties.In 1967, Mr. Trudeau (senior) told us that the government has no place in the bedrooms of the nation. But thanks to all-party support for Bill C-4, the government is now present in every counsellor’s office, every synagogue, every mosque, every church and in every kitchen and living room, whenever people might discuss the merit (or lack thereof) of an adult or child embarking on a destructive and ultimately futile quest to become a member of the opposite sex.When MPs of all parties make it a criminal offence to protect children from transgender ideology, and when MPs of all parties remove from adults their right to pursue the psychological counselling of their own voluntary choice, we clearly have a serious cultural problem. A change of government might temporarily make things less bad, but our elected representatives are first and foremost the products of the culture from which they emerge.Our parents and grandparents would not have predicted or even imagined the Online Harms Act, or MPs of all parties imposing transgender ideology on all Canadians through Bill C-4. If we could go back in time 60 years to inform our parents and grandparents about Canada in 2024, they would be astounded to the point of disbelief, feeling horrified by this future dystopia.In the 1940s, Canadians were willing to die — and many did die — to defend our freedoms against Nazi Germany, fascist Italy and imperial Japan. But since that time, governments have gradually taken over hospitals, hospices, adoption agencies, orphanages, homeless shelters, elementary schools, high schools, universities, nursing homes and all manner of assistance to those in need and unable to help themselves. Gradually, schools stopped teaching history and cultivating an appreciation for freedom. Over time, Canadians have come to love the authoritarian state. This was evident during lockdowns, when Canadians gladly gave up their freedoms and human rights in order to support a futile and unsuccessful quest to stop the spread of a virus. Even after the media’s fearmongering narrative had been discredited by facts, many Canadians still asked their politicians to lock them down longer and harder. Those who refused an injection were turned into second-class citizens, even when there was no evidence to show that the injection stopped the spread of the virus.Clearly, Canadian culture has shifted away from our former love for a free country, in which the government was our servant rather than our master.Too many Canadians want to be told what to think, how to think, how to raise their children and how to live. Sheeple seek to be guided, directed, and controlled by the state. Many Canadians want their government to regulate every business, profession, trade, charity, sport and hobby in the name of “safety” or “security” or both.If the government knows best how to manage all these enterprises and activities, why should the government not also lend its benevolence, expertise and wisdom to controlling and regulating our speech, our parenting, and the voluntary choices of adults regarding psychological counselling? The “government knows best” culture paved the way for the Online Harms Act and Bill C-4.The Online Harms Act and Bill C-4 are both steps towards a totalitarian state.An election in 2025 will not fix the cultural problem that led to these totalitarian policies.It is up to us as citizens to change the corrupt, history-dismissing, government-venerating culture from which this kind of legislation emerges. Changing the culture is hard work, a difficult task requiring persistence and concerted effort over years and decades.This means active participation in politics at the federal, provincial, municipal and school board levels. It means accepting responsibility for ensuring that our children receive a solid education and learn to appreciate the free society.But, restoring a culture of freedom to Canada is worth the effort. John Carpay, B.A., LL.B., is president of the Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms (jccf.ca).

CARPAY: An election in 2025 will not fix Canada’s cultural decline

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