Talk:Status of religious freedom in Canada

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Contents 1 Previous archives 2 Relationship between certain claims and religious freedom 3 Concerns about NPOV 3.1 Defence of Religions Act 4 Religious freedom 5 Reorganization 6 Poll data 7 Preamble section 8 The Bhinder case

[edit] Previous archives

/Archive 1

/Archive 2

[edit] Relationship between certain claims and religious freedom

There are a number of passages in this article which don't seem to have a clear relationship to the question of religious freedom. For instance, "During the 2004 federal election and 2006 federal election campaigns, some sitting Members of Parliament used the term "scary" to describe some Conservative Party candidates or the entire party due to the beliefs of some of its members."

I don't see how rude remarks constitute any sort of attack on religious freedom. I'm perfectly entitled, for instance, to say that I disagree with the position that a given religion takes on a particular matter, or even that I find certain religious positions to be "scary" - obviously that doesn't constitute an assault on religious freedom. So I'm not sure what justifies this particular passage (and there are several others) being in an article on the Status of Religious Freedom. --Ggbroad 12:34, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

To follow up, I don't see how anything in the final section "Comments by Federal Gov't Officials" relates to the question of religious freedom. If I criticize what you say, I'm not necessarily attacking your freedom of speech; if I criticize you for your religion, I'm not necessarily attacking your religious freedom. Most of what is in this section consists of various remarks - some of them admittedly quite rude - but none of them seem directly related to the question of religious freedom, except perhaps the one in which the Minister said that the Catholic church should keep its nose out of Canadian legislation, since the Church (in Canada, at least) obviously has a right to express its views on matters of legislation. But even that one seems marginal. So, before I delete the section, perhaps we could hear some arguments in favor of its retention?--Ggbroad 12:49, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

If Chinese government officials make statements like "The Falun Gong is a troublesome and scary religion", does this relate to the issue of religious freedom in China? Deet 00:19, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

The analogy isn't an appropriate one, since China has no constitutional guarantees on the freedom of religion, no history of defending of freedom of religion and, on the contrary, has an established history of persecuting the religious by the most dreadful means. By contrast, members of the Liberal Party, the NDP, etc., possess no means by which to persecute Christians, etc., and there's no particular evidence that they have any intention to. In any case, the point stands: if I criticize you it does not, as a point of logic, mean that I am denying you your rights. The article lists a few trivial instances of Members of Parliament making rude remarks - this is not functionally related to the issue of religious freedom. Your freedom of religion does not include a freedom from criticism nor a freedom from having rude, mean-spirited, and in most cases even hateful remarks directed at you.--Ggbroad 02:06, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I like your points Ggbroad I have thought for a long time that this article doesn’t represent the state of religious freedoms in Canada after all Canada has one of the best records of in the world.

I have always thought that much of the article is off topic my thinking is that we should only care about the official view of religion’s in Canada not the religious view of individuals if this view is correct then there is no relevance to the homosexual stuff out side of religious education in school I can site references if you like.

I also feel there should be more pro Canada stuff e.g. how Canada is trying to bring religious freedom to the world.Ansolin 04:40, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

• So we want to take out potentially abusive comments by federal government officials relating to religion because that's supposedly off-topic, but then put in comments about Canada's foreign policy approach, because that is supposedly on topic? And the rationale is that we want more "pro Canada stuff"? Why don't we stop trying to put pro or anti-Canada stuff in the article and just put in the NPOV facts without worrying about spin. If a consensus feels the comments by federal government officials are not relevant, then I can get my head around taking it out. The article is finally relatively stable so I'm not in favour of big changes beyond that. Deet 23:15, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I personally see no reason to add foreign policy stuff at this point, but I have yet to see a defense of including a few trivial remarks by gov't officials about religion. By themselves mean nothing - I could find many remarks about the value of religion and the importance of its defense from federal gov't officials, too. But I also suspect that there will no group consensus, since this talk page seems quite inactive. --Ggbroad 23:52, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Concerns about NPOV

I am concerned about the last section of this page that contains quotes that show apparent attacks on freedom of religion, as it contains almost entirly liberal quotes of inappropriate comments that often have been withdrawn and applogised for. If this section is to remain I think it needs to be re-balanced with NDP and Conservitive comments. Thanks. 206.208.37.2 20:05, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

I agree, as I've stated above. As a point of logic, a handful of scattered comments of this kind prove nothing. One could easily find similar comments about the value and importance of religion and religious freedom to counterbalance them. Moreover, the comments are not related to the question of religious freedom in Canada. It should should be removed. --Ggbroad 20:15, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

Concern addressed. Section removed. Deet 01:46, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Defence of Religions Act

Could we get a source for this? I saw something about it on CBC tonight, but a Google search brought up precisely zero under "Defense of Religions Act". If the Conservative government is considering it, than surely there is something substantial to consider? Where can details be found?Ggbroad 00:11, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure what the confusion is. There is a reference. There are other stories on the Globe and Mail in addition to the one referenced. Deet 02:06, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

My mistake entirely. Sorry. I missed the reference somehow. --Ggbroad 11:58, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Religious freedom

(copied from my talk page)

Trystan,

I can't agree with the changes you've made here: the article is currently skewed towards discussions of homosexuality (due to the contributions of a single author), but this isn't fundamentally what the article is about. CJCurrie 03:31, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

Moving a blurb about homosexuality to the intro was only a small portion of the edits you have reverted. Is that the only one you have a problem with? In any event, if the article is skewed, I don't think it hurts to have the into reflect the current content until it is corrected.--Trystan 03:54, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

I thought there was only one other significant change (ie. shifting the "preamble" section). CJCurrie 05:46, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

Would you be in favour of reorganizing the intro to some degree? I find the first sentence, about the preamble to the constitution, to be a bit of a non sequiter.--Trystan 05:59, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

As do I, quite frankly. I wouldn't object to some rewording; I just didn't think that referencing gay rights in the intro was the best course of action. CJCurrie 06:16, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Reorganization

I've reorganized the article to try and include a clearer taxonomy. The legal framework section now includes the case law section, though much of what was under case law has been moved to specific topics under the Specific freedoms section. The majority of the rest of the article has been organized into the Specific freedoms section, which is divided into various areas. Some still need work, such as Refusal of treatment, which leaps into an example where the right is curtailed without first establishing that it is generally a right. This is a flaw which affects several sections of the article, which jump into a high-profile case dealing with the subject without first establishing any context.

I'm not quite happy with what's left in Case law; the first paragraph seems fitting, if too brief, in outlining general principles of religious freedom, but then we there are two disjointed, random particulars of case law. The rest of the sections have been placed under appropriate subheadings of Specific freedoms, but these two don't seem substantial enough to make their own.--Trystan 19:32, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Poll data

I think that Monday's poll, the COMPAS one comissioned by the Institute for Canadian Values, is getting a little too much play in the article, being mentioned in four separate places. There have been many polls on issues such as the reopening same-sex marriage debate in Parliament, with many conflicting results, yet only this one is mentioned. I would lean towards excluding this one rather than including others to make it comprehensive; I don't really see the relevance of a public opinion in the article. It's about the status of religious rights in Canada, not poorly measured public reaction to high-profile cases. In the paragraphs about Brockie and Kempling, the poll data seems at best out of place and at worst misleading, since it the questions listed differ significantly from the facts of those cases.--Trystan 22:12, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

It was credible enough for the front page of one of our two national newspapers. Let's make sure we aren't playing favourites. There has always been a plethora of polls in "Good Articles" like Same-sex marriage in Canada, so it would seem unfair to exclude polls supporting religious believers in this article. I'm still working through all the changes you've made, but one thing I think is needed is to put back in some sort of background to explain the dynamics between religion and homosexuality, as many younger Canadians truly have no frame of reference for the issue. The link to Christianity and homosexuality was a neutral manner of trying to accomplish this in former versions (i.e., by outsourcing the discussion). Deet 22:45, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

If the poll is going to be included the poll itself should be linked to (it's available as a PDF from the Compas website.) I found the wording in the National Post to be a bit ambiguous, as it led me to believe that 64% of Canadians favored reopening the discussion about gay marriage in order to ensure religious and free speech, but in fact the Compas poll itself is explicit that the question was not about whether or not the core issue of same-sex marriage should be revisited, it was whether or not the legislation should be reviewed on the question of whether or not religious freedoms and free speech are protected. It may seem self-evident to you, but it certainly wasn't to me, and obviously the pollsters themselves were concerned enough to explicitly clarify that point. Moreover, I feel compelled to point out that front-page on the National Post - a paper whose ideological slant is not crystal clear but gleefully admitted to by its editors, columnists, stakeholders (and indeed readership) - does not by itself make it credible. --Ggbroad 23:33, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

I'm not saying it's more or less credible than any other poll, just that including only poll in the article presents a very narrow view, and doesn't balance out potential bias in other articles. I don't think we can say that this poll "supports religious believers" any more or less than any other poll. My initial edit was to move the paragraph on Christianity and homosexuality to the intro, as it seems to be a summary of some more detailed sections of the article. That wasn't agreed to, and it didn't make any sense in the middle of "legal framework", so I removed it. With the exception of the first sentence's "seen by some", I have no problem with it's inclusion.--Trystan 23:44, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

I think the polls are important at some level because it supports it somewhat in that it gives legitimacy to the article's existence. The poll responses seem to indicate that Canadians agree that freedom of religion is important and that there may be unresolved freedom of religion issues. Don't forget that someone tried to delete it (and you can read there that another user was so upset with the article's existence he even wanted to have a book burning party and delete all the history). I agree with linking directly to the COMPASS polls (it doesn't matter because we didn't include any National Post specific comments or ideas). So that solves any National Post issue (although I personally disagree with the assertion that it is not a reliable source). I think the printer poll question was actually almost the exact same fact pattern as the Scott Brockie situation (he was refusing to print gay advocacy material). The Kempling facts are more elaborate than the poll question, but has the letter to the editor issue at its centre. Clearly the questions were based on those two individuals. Deet 01:10, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

The Brockie question is the one most markedly distinguished from the actual facts, as it asks about a brochure, which implies the sort of content which the Divisional Court said would be protected by a printer's freedom of religion. I think that's clear in the article now. I've updated the poll citations to use the PDF on COMPAS' site directly, and changed their wording to better reflect the precise wording, which in some cases left out significant qualifiers and, in the case of the first question, echoed an outright misstatement in the National Post coverage.--Trystan 19:38, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Preamble section

Regarding the recent edit summary (trying to better align the words with the facts the preamble article and the references. I'm not sure the last sentence needs to be in this article vs. the preamble article), I'm not quite sure what the recent edits to the preamble paragraph, or the paragraph itself, are trying to achieve.

My specific concerns with the paragraph as it stands is that it rather gives the wrong impression to describe the "supremacy of God" portion and then say that Supreme Court gave some consideration to the preamble, as the SCC's consideration dealt entirely with the "rule of law" portion. The "supremacy of God" portion has never been given legal effect by the courts or used to interpret other provisions of the Charter, as was stated in the cited leading case on the matter (which is by an appellate court, not a provincial court).

Why would the last sentence not belong? It is directly connected to religious freedom, the only part of the paragraph that is. Previously, this was just a statement regarding the content of the preamble, the relevance of which to the article wasn't clear, despite the fact that it was the first sentence in the article.--Trystan 01:01, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] The Bhinder case

This has gone back and forth several times on this page between one version which said that Bhinder ended up being dismissed because of his refusal to comply with work rules that he wear a hard hat and another version which said that after appeals Bhinder got his job back with compensation for lost pay and implied without saying so that Bhinder was allowed to omit the hard hat and wear a turban. I committed the latest of these back & forth changes. However, after reading the legalese from the Supreme Court of Canada I am not sure that I got it right.

The SC decision in the Bhinder case says:

CN introduced a work rule that all employees wear a hard hat at a particular work site. Bhinder, a Sikh employee, refused to comply because his religion did not allow the wearing of headgear other than the turban. Bhinder's employment ceased since the company refused to make exceptions to the rule and Bhinder refused to accept other work not requiring a hard hat. The Canadian Human Rights Tribunal found CN had engaged in a discriminatory practice and ordered reinstatement and compensation for loss of salary. The Federal Court of Appeal, on a s. 28 application, set aside that decision and referred the matter back for disposition on the basis that the work rule was not a discriminatory practice. At issue here was whether or not the hard hat rule was a bona fide occupational requirement, and if so, the effect to be given s. 14(a) of the Canadian Human Rights Act.

Held (Dickson C.J. and Lamer J. dissenting): The appeal should be dismissed

I cannot follow the convolutions in that. I read it (now, and contrary to my recent edit on this page) as saying that the Court of Appeals decision should be dismissed, therefore the CHRT ruling should stand, therefore Bhinder should be reinstated, compensated, and allowed to wear a turban. I am not really sure that I read it correctly, though.

I also note a later decision bearing on this which is not (yet) mentioned on this page - Central Alberta Dairy Pool v. Alberta. That case says, in part:

Bhinder v. Canadian National Railway Co. is correct in so far as it states that accommodation is not a component of the BFOQ test and that once a BFOQ is proven the employer has no duty to accommodate. It is incorrect, however, in so far as it applied that principle to a case of adverse effect discrimination. The end result is that where a rule discriminates directly it can only be justified by a statutory equivalent of a BFOQ, i.e., a defence that considers the rule in its totality. (All human rights codes in Canada contain some form of BFOQ provision.) However, where a rule has an adverse discriminatory effect, the appropriate response is to uphold the rule in its general application and consider whether the employer could have accommodated the employee adversely affected without undue hardship.

and

Overturned: Bhinder v. Canadian National Railway Co., [1985] 2 S.C.R. 561; ...

So, this case reversed the Bhinder decision. As I read it, though, this seems to be saying that the Bhinder decision being reversed had left Bhinder prohibited from wearing a turban (not what I understood the Bhinder decision to say) and that this was incorrect because CNR should have considered whether they could have accommodated Bhinder without undue hardship and did not do so.

I'm still not sure whether Bhinder ended up without a job or was reinstated, compensated, and allowed to wear his turban. As best as I can figure out, I think Bhinder ended up with his job back and his turban intact, but I'm not sure of that.

Perhaps someone better able to follow these convolutions than I can figure this out, explain it here, and fix the Bhinder portion of the page. The fix probably ought to include the addition of a cite for the Alberta Dairy Pool decision. -- Boracay Bill 02:19, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

According to the summary of the Bhinder case you posted, the Human Rights Tribunal found CN's actions to be discriminatory. CN appealed this to the Court of Appeal, which agreed with them and overturned the Tribunal's decision, saying there was no discrimination. The SCC dismissed Bhinder's appeal of the CA decision, meaning they agreed with the CA, and that Bhinder ultimately lost.

I haven't read the Bhinder case or the Dairy Pool case, so I'm not sure exactly what part of Bhinder was overturned. It's quite possible that part of the Bhinder reasoning was overturned, but not in such a way that would have altered the outcome; it sounds like it is merely have put forward a different legal test or method of approach to the problem.

It would be helpful to expand the Religious dress section to include a general description of the legal principles invoked (BFOQs, etc.), but until that is done I don't know that the detail in Dairy Pool is necessary.--Trystan 21:05, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. Since Dairy Pool overturned Bhinder, I think it needs a mention. I've rewritten the Bhinder portion of the article and supplied cites. -- Boracay Bill 00:55, 15 November 2006 (UTC)