Canadian Heritage Minister smears DMCA opponents as "radical extremists"

Michael Geist sez,

Canadian Heritage Minister James Moore today warned against those opposed to his Canadian DMCA, calling them "radical extremists." When Moore claims that critics of his bill are radical extremists, who is he speaking of? Who has criticized parts of the bill or called for reforms? A short list of those critical of the digital lock provisions in C-32 would include:

* Liberal MPs
* NDP MPs
* Bloc MPs
* Green Party
* Canadian Consumer Initiative
* Association of Universities and Colleges of Canada
* Canadian Association of University Teachers
* Canadian Federation of Students
* Canadian Library Association
* Business Coalition for Balanced Copyright
* Retail Council of Canada
* Canadian Bookseller Association
* Documentary Organization of Canada

Who are James Moore's "Radical Extremists"?

• [Boba Fett Diop]

  Hey, back in the ’80s I was totally radical!

  *flashes “hang loose” gesture*

• [Anonymous]

  Moore is a fascist pawn pushing the fascist agenda of his corporate masters. He wants to hand our rights and freedoms over to big business. Too bad he wouldn’t share (with me) some of the corporate bonus’ he must have gotten for this…I suspect I could be out of debt.

  Wikipedia definition of fascism:
  “Fascists seek to organize a nation on corporatist perspectives, values, and systems such as the political system and the economy.”

• [Wallflower]

  The only extremist is the person who’s mouth originated this utter blither. I mean really? A Drama Queen to be sure. War on this and that.. It’s laughable, and unfortunately these “conservatives are sounding more like the Bush and Cheney administration every day.

  The only transparency from the Mr. Harper’s caucus that I see is how they are trying to marginalize and gag everyone, from artists to intellectuals to journalists, or indeed anyone who may have a difference of opinion from them.

  Here’s hoping fellow Canadian “extremists” will wake up to this fact very soon.

• [David Carroll]

  To answer Mr Geist: All of them are “radical extremists” and I would add Commie Pinko Pirate Shit-Disturbers too. ;) No I am not a Harper Sock-puppet.

  But seriously: I listened to Jesse Brown’s Jim Prentice interview on Search Engine ( http://podcasts.tvo.org/searchengine/audio/800838_48k.mp3 ) and felt Minister Prentice was at least impersonating a reasonable, open minded, informed person. He defended locks too but was not a jerk about it like Moore.

  Perhaps they are playing a game of Moderate Minister / Wing-nut Minister on us.

• [dfornika]

  Tony Clement, not Jim Prentice.

  • [David Carroll]

    D’oh! Thanks for clearing that up.

• [the_headless_rabbit]

  Radical extremists: a well-informed, concerned citizen with a passion for democracy, transparency, and free speech who refuses to swallow the trite handed to him by a dishonest politician.

• [Akiracee]

  Ummm. The Canadian Federation of Students are radical extremists.

  I think it’s their motto.

• [Antinous / Moderator]

  But piracy is theft. Clean and simple. It’s smash and grab. It ain’t no different than smashing a window at Tiffany’s and grabbing. — Joe Biden

  Apparently the US and Canada are engaged in a coordinated semantic assault.

• [Trotsky]

  Radical is such a tremendously versatile and time honored slur-dongle. You can attach it to anything and it seems to trigger a peristaltic response in any human who hears it.

  Radical atheists. Radical Muslims. Radical lesbians. Just typing those out made me a-scared!

  Radical podiatrists!

  But then adding extremist is really crossing a line. Like saying “evil villain” or “thieving scoundrel.” Overkill.

  So what IS a radical extremist? Well, it’s either someone who is EXTREME in their radicalism or RADICAL in their extremism.

  Humans are silly.

• [Trotsky]

  BTW, fuck the Canadian Heritage Minister sideways.

  Turning an entire ocean into a toilet as BP has done qualifies as both radical and extreme (if indeed either of those words begins to describe the full extent of that atrocity), but I’m willing to bet that if BP was willing to toss cash at Moore, he’d have no trouble generating sufficient obsequiousness to participate in a genteel sit-down over finger foods and cocktails to discuss logistics with a well-manicured rep from the company.

  Usually for people like Moore “radical extremism” is mostly a matter of personal hygiene and cold, hard cash. They dial it up or down in their head in direct proportion.

• [teapot]

  I always knew there was something sinister afoot at the Documentary Organization of Canada!

• [Anonymous]

  Re James Moore: the “radical extremists” are neither radical nor extreme.

  Re Antinous / Moderator • #5: Biden’s “piracy” is not piracy, and his “theft” is not theft. Btw, “intellectual property” is not property. And an “Internet driver’s license” is not a driver’s license.
  *************
  Although in principle intellectual property can be a legitimate constructive social contract, in practice a corrupt political class is seizing more and more of the public domain on behalf of rent-seeking cartels.

  Roll back copyright periods to five–ten at the outside–years. Then and only then talk to me about enforcement. And structure policy so that smaller entrepreneurial content creators, who presently are caught in the middle, can get more than crumbs.

• [Anonymous]

  declaring cba radical extremists reminds me of fahrenheit 451.

  .~.

• [millrick]

  crap.
  woke up up this morning only to discover that, as a student and a documentary filmmaker, I am a “radical extremist” on two counts.

  worse; i’ve voted for “radical extremists”, attended “radical extremist” institutions, shopped at “radically extreme” booksellers, patronized “radical extremist” shops, researched at “radical extremist” libraries, and befriended “radically extreme” professors.

  i think i’ll go back to bed. i must be dreaming.

• [2hirondelles]

  Radical extremist? Gee, thanks, that’s the nicest thing anyone’s ever said about me.

• [ausPPC]

  Those radical extremists sound a lot like proud Canadians to me…

  So, if having certain views on copyright makes one a radical extremist, what does that make the anti-war and anti-oil crowd? Enemies of the State?

  Who’s State is it anyway?

• [Anonymous]

  Ah yes, radical extremists, the SAME PEOPLE that created the content.

• [IronEdithKidd]

  Will Canadians fall for this inflammatory hyperbolic rhetoric as easily as Americans have?

  • [Jerril]

    It’s difficult to say. On the one hand, as a Canadian, I find describing random Canadians as “radical” something or “extremist” anything kind of surreal.

    On the other hand, we’ve historically had organized terrorists operating inside the company trying to promote the independence of our favorite rebellious province which led to a nationwide state of emergency and martial law (see also wikipedia.org/wiki/FLQ_Crisis ), we have a couple of very determined bombers working on exploding the oil and gas lines in the northwest, and never mind the wikipedia.org/wiki/Oka_Crisis …

    So apparently we’re sort of low key in our extremism.

    • [Jerril]

      Sorry to reply to myself, but I hit send before explicitly communicating my point.

      Unlike Americans, we actually sort of have historical reasons why we might find claims of “radical extremism” plausible. We’ve had actual “radicals” or “extremists”, Canadians all, in our country, Doing Stuff, within living memory.

      On the gripping hand, we have examples of REAL ACTUAL “extremism” and “radicals” in action in living memory, and they don’t look much like people writing angry letters to their parliamentary representatives.

      So I dunno.

• [mdh]

  Think about it – Having your own opinions truly does make you a radical. Standing by them truly does make you an extremist.

  And refusing to take a good long look at yourself and your own actions before you sling such mud makes you an idiot.