Just before Christmas, Ashu Solo, a Saskatoon engineer and mathematician, filed a complaint with the City of Saskatoon over "Merry Christmas" messages displayed on city buses.
When a person such as Solo exercises his constitutionally-guaranteed right to make a complaint of this nature, he expects to receive well-reasoned opposition.
It is also not overly surprising, unfortunately, that he would receive hateful, racist and ignorant backlash.
What appalls me is I have seen almost none of the former and way too much of the latter. Solo even received death threats.
I'm going to set aside how disgracefully un-Christ-like that kind of behaviour is and deal strictly with the woefully uninformed "opinions" that characterized the "arguments" against Solo.
In the first place, an overwhelming number of people seemed to somehow get the idea that he is an immigrant.
"I am quickly losing tolerance for those that come here for freedom and then want to stomp on our freedoms," wrote Nathan Friesen on Saskatoon city councillor Darren Hill's Facebook page in a typical example. "So, Ashu Solo, I would love to put you on the next boat back to whatever country you came from so you can enjoy the freedoms there!"
Solo is Canadian, born and raised. He even served in the army reserve. And even if he was an immigrant, as a resident of this supposedly free and civil society, he has every right to raise an objection to anything he believes is unconstitutional or discriminatory.
When I raised this point on another Facebook thread, I was told I should leave too. Not only is that kind of "reasoning" personally offensive, it is absurd.
I would be willing to bet almost every person who expressed this sentiment-and there were hundreds if not thousands-has something they don't like about Canada. In fact, most of them made it pretty clear what they don't like about Canada is that people who don't agree with them are allowed to exercise their constitutionally-guaranteed rights and express their opinions.
Another very popular assumption was that Solo is Muslim. Brown face, funny name, must be, right? He is an atheist.
Atheists, in fact, are generally some of the greatest defenders of freedom of religion because it is a one of the fundamental tenets of a free and secular society.
Another favourite sentiment was that Canada is a democracy and, therefore, majority rules. This "argument" demonstrates a lack of understanding of basic civics. Canada is a constitutional democracy. That means the political structures, powers and limits of the government are set forth in a constitution.
Our constitution guarantees freedom of religion, which includes freedom from religion. The government must not favour one religion to the exclusion of others or favour religion over non-religion.
The very principle of separation of church and state is critical to freedom of religion because the Government of Canada and the constitution exist to protect the rights of all Canadians, not just the Christian majority.
Many people also made statements to the effect that non-Christians who object to government-sponsored religion should not be entitled to the statutory holiday.
That is simply ridiculous. By the time the Canadian mission in Afghanistan wrapped up, at least half of Canadians were opposed to the war. Does that mean they don't qualify for the Remembrance Day holiday? What about Victoria Day? Should members of the anti-monarchist group Citizens for a Canadian Republic be forced to work?
Should Ukrainian Catholics also be exempt from the Christmas holiday because they celebrate Christ's birth on January 7?
Christmas is a statutory holiday. Statutory means prescribed or authorized by law, not that the majority of Canadians believe it is their saviour's birthday, like the Queen or support the military.
Perhaps the most common and most ludicrous feedback of all, though, was the idea that Solo was attempting to stop people from celebrating Christmas.
Nobody wants to infringe on anybody's right to practice their religion or run around wishing everybody they see "Merry Christmas" or decorating their private front lawn with a life-sized nativity scene or call the thing in their living room a Christmas tree.
Solo's complaint is about one thing and one thing only, whether it is appropriate for governments to display religious messages on government property.
It is absolutely appropriate for Ashu Solo, or anybody else, to express the opinion that it is not appropriate, without fear of retribution.
Without fear does not mean without debate, but only when you strip away the assumptions, ignorance and bigotry can you start to form a reasoned opinion that attacks the person's arguments rather than the person himself.
You can bet your life if this case makes it to a courtroom, you will not hear the City of Saskatoon's lawyers saying, "Your honour, Mr. Solo is wrong because he is a Christian-hating, immigrant who should be deported."
