‘Freethinkers’ hot to Trot
Re: Trottier makes a poor martyr, April 2
I must register my absolute horror at the editorial regarding the attack on Justin Trottier. Since when does the victim become the bad guy? If a woman is dressed provocatively and is raped, is she “asking for it?” Working for the paper I would assume you enjoy freedom of speech. You may not like what Mr. Trottier has to say, but isn’t he entitled to say it without worrying for his safety? I doubt very much that Mr. Trottier wants to be a martyr for his cause. And what is a “plain old assault?” Have we become so desensitized to the violence around us? If someone hit you because of your ridiculous editorial, would it still seem like a trivial matter? Come out from behind the safety of your newspaper and see what it feels like to be re-victimized in the press.
Annalee Trottier
• I was astounded to read your editorial trivializing the assault against Justin Trottier. You argue that it ought not to be classified as a hate crime, for no other reason that that the beliefs to which Mr. Trottier’s assailants took offence were irreligious. Let me get this straight. If members of Campus Crusade for Christ or the Muslim Student Association are putting up posters extolling their god, and a too-easily-offended freethinker takes a swipe at them, then you recognize a hate crime. But reverse the roles, and you will only call it a common assault. Why, I wonder, do you not believe freethinkers deserve equal protection under the law? There is one statement in your editorial I do agree with. You do not consider the assault on Mr. Trottier to be on a par with the desecration of cemeteries. Nor do I-I consider it worse. Whatever the motivation, violence is always a worse crime in my book than vandalism.
Moses Klein
• One of the claims of Dawkins’ latest crusade against religious groups, “The God Who Wasn’t There,” is that religious animosity has been one of the foremost instigators of infighting within the human species, so to speak. It certainly is startling to notice how people will often fly into a rage or become personally insulted if you bluntly disagree with their religious views, their hypotheses about the afterlife, and so on. This never happens if you claim at the dinner table that you believe string theorists will find a Grand Unified Theory, or that you don’t.
But perhaps the difference is not so much the subject matter, but the manner in which opinions are voiced. For example, if a small group set up stands and began postering the campus with claims that string theory was nonsense, it wouldn’t be very surprising if a few physicists became quite angry at the apparent campaign against their research project, and altercations ensued. The difference, again, seems to be between presenting an informed opinion in an appropriate context (like a class on the philosophy of religion, or on advanced physics) and launching a political campaign against a particular point of view. The New Atheists (by which I mean to refer to the people who poster campuses, or announce their claims passionately on YouTube, as opposed to the old generation who wrote thoughtful books or simply stopped going to religious services) seem to be going about things in exactly the provocative manner which led to the infighting in the first place. And it would indeed be quite fitting if they were treated legally as a religious group, although this would demonstrate that they have completely failed to solve the problem they set out to address.
Cathal O Madagain
• Are representatives of SAC and The Varsity really resting on the flimsy “letter of the law” argument to claim that the assault on atheist activist Justin Trottier was not a hate crime? True, the Criminal Code mentions religion-but not “absence of religion”-in its list of hate-crime prejudices. But comments by SAC Chairperson Jen Hassum and in the Varsity editorial suggest that this precludes calling the assault a hate crime. The legal argument could be made that some “other similar factor” (words which are indeed in the law) precipitated the assault, and I certainly cannot imagine a good moral argument that hating atheists for their beliefs is a “lesser hate” than hating the religious. That Trottier was a provocateur is surely relevant somehow-perhaps it makes him less of a victim. But to the extent that he is a victim, he is a victim of hate.
Ewan Dunbar
• Being physically attacked makes one a victim. Reporting the crime and calling attention to it is not an attempt to make oneself a martyr-it’s called standing up for oneself. So the guy is “media savvy” enough to know how to get his story out-does that negate the validity of his complaint? Hardly. It sounds quite plausible that Trottier was attacked because of his perceived beliefs, which suggests that the attack was a “hate crime,” whatever legal minutiae qualify the term. The Varsity’s editorial on this story was despicable and irresponsible. It insinuates that Trottier somehow deserved what he got. No one, no matter what wisecracks he makes, no matter what posters he puts up, no matter if it is day or night, no matter his beliefs (or lack of belief), deserves to be physically attacked. I don’t know Trottier or the editorial staff, but reading between the lines here, it looks like the writers got a bit too excited by gossip about a former colleague and seized the opportunity to bring someone they don’t like down a peg or two.
Madeleine Beaupré
Taskforce hits the wallet
Re: A ‘failure to accommodate,’
March 22
The report of the CFS taskforce on the “needs” of Muslim students bathes itself in uncanny levels of hypocrisy. The report aims to tailor every aspect of university life, from curriculum to gym usage, to the constraints of Islam, disregarding any infringement on the freedoms of others. If students at Western are successful in changing the visual art curriculum to their wishes, what’s to stop an evangelical Christian from demanding to be excluded from learning evolution in BIO150 (which is mandatory for U of T’s life science students) without academic penalty? It is seen as a travesty that Muslim women who choose not to use a co-ed gym facility should still pay their athletic fees. Yet CFS leaders should be reminded that a large section of the student population (which it forgets it represents) is not religious and had little need for a Multi-Faith Centre that their tuition was used to build.
Schreiber Pereira
