Neutering the charge of “anti-Semite!”

December 9, 2007 

Lacerte, with 40 neighbors, presented to the mayor a stack of evidence — for example, photographs taken through his front window that faces MR’s synagogue. MR then sicked his lawyer (one Julius Grey — well known Montreal Jew and frequent advocate for religious groups claiming special privileges) on him, asking for $100,000 and an apology for “racist and anti-Semitic” statements that had gone “way beyond the reasonable limits of freedom of expression” [my translation].

Suddenly the media took seriously the complaints against the Hassids that had gone on for years. On December 3, LaPresse (Quebec’s main newspaper) ran major articles describing the petty irritations endured by those living next door to Hassids. For example, a lady, long frazzled by raccoons drawn to her area by the rubbish which Hassids notoriously leave strewn around, installed a motion detector so as not to be surprised by the animals (i.e., raccoons). Her Hassidic neighbor claimed the detector affected her ability to fulfill her religious obligations and asked her to remove it. She did so after convincing the Hassids to buy a garbage can for their rubbish.  

Lesson learned: strange cultures are not always easy to live next door to. No wonder Montreal now is covered with “ethno-burbs” as people desperately try to salvage freedom of association.

Some Jews may already have realized that taking on Lacerte was a mistake. Their lawyer, Julius Grey, expressed surprise, according to LaPresse, that Lacerte had gone public over the legal attack Grey had initiated.

Even the Canadian Jewish Congress seems to be dissociating itself from the Hassids by recommending to the Bouchard-Taylor Commission that the public sphere be left free of religious paraphernalia other that a few left over from Quebec’s grand Catholic heritage — for example, the massive illuminated cross on Mt. Royal or crucifixes in the National Assembly.

 If the matter does reach the courts, the effort to prove that Lacerte was “racist” or “anti-Semitic” could be very interesting. Lacerte has not implicated Jews generally (never mind all “Semites”), either to local officials or to the Bouchard-Taylor Commission. And his complaints have not really been so much against the Hassids, themselves, as against the elected officials and the police who refrain from applying the law to the Hassids. It’s analogous to Americans being labeled anti-Semitic for criticizing US complicity in allowing Israeli mistreatment of Palestinians. At least in the US, the first Amendment protects one’s freedom of speech, leaving punishment to be achieved via loss of job and reputation. However, in Canada, “hate laws” have massively limited freedom of speech and the degree to which one can criticize Jews or other minorities. So this could well be a test case. Stay tuned