Canadian civil rights law and related issues

[finley]

@yyy

Because most people don’t want to go to jail, pay fines, etc. Also, it tends to be good for business if you can say, convincingly, that what you’re selling is legal. Even better if you’re certified by the Better Whatever Bureau.

I think you seriously underestimate the motivations of the people who do this sort of thing. They’re fanatics. They don’t care about going to jail. I know this for sure because, as I said, it’s already illegal.

@yyy

For example, these days in western countries, if you want to have your daughter infibulated (you probably know what that means, but for those who don’t), you may be able to find someone within the country who will do it, but the illegality of it will scare away X% of customers.

Well … this is an interesting one. It’s generally covered by a professional code of conduct (“thou shalt not perform unnecessary and/or disfiguring medical procedures”) but I agree there’s a lot of leeway there. Infant circumcision, for example, is still legal in most of the world despite the fact that many men (10-40%, depending on who you believe) feel that they’ve been violated by having it done, and occasionally it can cause serious medical problems.

In these cases it’s a lot easier to demonstrate actual harm if you wish to outlaw the practice … and yet circumcision hasn’t been outlawed. You’ve so far given me no evidence that psychotherapy aimed at ‘conversion’ (either gender dysphoria or sexual orientation) causes serious and intractable harm comparable to (say) infibulation. Can you produce some research showing a high rate of psychological problems which can be directly traced to therapy (as opposed to the patient’s original problem as he/she perceives it)?

If you show me statistics indicating that infibulation is on the rise worldwide

Correlation is not causation. FGM is declining (although not nearly quickly enough) for all sorts of reasons. Mostly, the women who perform the procedures (yes, it’s usually women) are:

1. Getting old and dying. This is the usual way backward ideas die out.
2. Noticing that the entire planet considers them to be backward and barbaric.
3. Concluding for themselves that it’s not a good idea.

If it were tolerated by the host society, that decline would most likely be slower.

FIFY. The law tracks public opinion. That’s why infibulation etc is legal in backward countries.

@yyy

Then what are we arguing about?

Strictly speaking, the law – the Criminal Code – already exists, and C-8 proposes an amendment to address a shortcoming in this existing law.

I’m arguing that the amendment

a) Addresses a problem that was never there (the law covers it already)
b) It doesn’t even do what you think it does. It outlaws something that is either innocuous or useful, and legitimizes backstreet ‘therapists’.

Maybe you wouldn’t care. I would.

Maybe so, but the Law in most countries considers motivation in only one context: sentencing. It is not used to define the nature of the crime or to establish guilt.

In contrast, there are known to be organized groups that want to assault and/or murder as many X, Y or Z as they possibly can, and once you notice a pattern like that, it may be prudent to try something other than business as usual.

Well yes. But the amendment actually legitimizes those groups, like I said. “Word of mouth” blah blah is the way all shady underground organisations operate. Professionals put out their shingle, because they have nothing to hide. The law will now create a whole new industry - qualified gender therapists - operating in the shadows, like abortion doctors in 1960s England.