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Letters: Two dead. And we're discussing language?

Readers comment on the tragic Air Canada crash and related language furor, race-based sentencing, the Iran war, a Supreme Court showdown, plus more

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‘The priority is to recognize loss, support those affected’

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Re: It’s insane to focus on the French of Air Canada’s CEO — Chris Selley, March 25

Letters: Two dead. And we're discussing language? Back to video

When tragedy strikes, judgment must come before procedure.

Canada is proudly bilingual, and that matters. But in the first hours after a fatal event, leadership is not measured by procedural completeness. It is measured by humanity, speed, and the ability to acknowledge loss in real time. A response delivered in the rawness of those moments should be understood in that context.

In the immediate aftermath of a fatal aviation accident, a public message of condolence was delivered quickly. It was not a scripted campaign or a polished communication exercise. It was an attempt, however imperfect, to acknowledge loss and speak to a shaken community. That context should matter.

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In moments like these, leadership is measured first by humanity, speed, and sincerity. The priority is to recognize loss, support those affected, and begin holding together people and institutions under stress.

There will always be time to assess whether processes were followed perfectly. But not everything that is technically incomplete is substantively wrong.

When a response in the first hours of tragedy is scrutinized primarily through a procedural lens, something important is lost. It risks elevating form over substance, and symbolism over compassion. A more proportionate approach would recognize both truths at once: that official languages are fundamental to Canada, and that crisis moments require judgment, context, and a measure of grace.

Correct where needed. Improve going forward. But do so in a way that reflects the reality of the moment in which the communication was made. Because the standard we set here matters.

If leaders come to believe that even their first expressions of empathy will be immediately judged against procedural perfection, hesitation becomes the safer instinct. And in a crisis, hesitation carries its own cost.

Letters: Cheers for the first Blue Jays — and Allen Abel

Letters: Shut down the hate before it's too late

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If our first instinct in the face of tragedy is to audit language before we honour loss, we should pause and ask what we are really protecting, and what we are quietly eroding. Judgment is not the abandonment of principle. It is the proof that we understand it.

Samuel Elfassy, Toronto (retired Air Canada executive)

Thanks to Chris Selley for telling it like it is. The outrage over the inability of Air Canada CEO Michael Rousseau to speak French while acknowledging the deaths of the two Air Canada pilots killed in the LaGuardia crash would be laughable if it were not so typical of our political leaders.

Despite what federal legislation may say, Canada, as Selley points out, is for all practical purposes not bilingual. New Brunswick and the federal government may be officially bilingual, but no other jurisdiction in Canada can make such a claim.

Prime Minister Mark Carney’s fake outrage to score political points and to protect Liberal votes in Quebec is typical of his lacklustre leadership and the hyper partisanship of the Liberal Party of Canada. Two people are dead and many others injured and traumatized by an accident that should not have happened.

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Sympathy for all of those people, not the language used to offer that sympathy, is what matters.

Paul Clarry, Aurora, Ont.

Why has Don Cherry been excluded from the Order of Canada?

Re: Don Cherry snub exposes Order of Canada’s partisan, elitist bias — Christopher Dummitt, March 23

The Order of Canada definitely has a “who-you-know” kind of clubby atmosphere. There have been Quebec separatists who have accepted the award, even though they don’t believe in Canada, and Indigenous people who have gladly seized it yet believe their land was stolen from them.

In the United States, the Presidential Medal of Freedom is given to those who contribute greatly to the fabric of the U.S.; it’s an honour and an appreciation, not a closed club. The U.S. doesn’t discriminate. The medal has even been awarded to Canadians — Michael J. Fox is one example.

In a country like Canada, which prides itself on being a hockey nation, it does seem odd that Don Cherry, who has contributed so much to “the game,” would be denied entry into the Order of Canada. Like many awards, there’s politics, elitism and discrimination involved. It’s given to some who don’t deserve it, and not given to those who do.

Don Cherry shouldn’t worry about it. Everyone knows his contribution, even if he hasn’t been “pinned” to prove it.

Douglas Cornish, Ottawa

A ‘points’ system for sentencing discounts?

Re: The crusading judge who helped Liberals build a race-based sentencing regime — Jamie Sarkonak, March 21

Jamie Sarkonak’s recent column on Judge Faisal Mirza and the growing use of race- and background-based sentencing discounts should concern anyone who still believes in equality before the law.

We appear to be drifting toward a system in which punishment is no longer tied primarily to the crime, but to a checklist of personal characteristics and grievances. If this logic is to be taken seriously, we might as well formalize it.

Why not introduce a “loyalty points”-type system for sentencing? Points for hardship, points for identity, bonus multipliers for overlapping categories of disadvantage — redeemable, presumably, at the courthouse.

The satire writes itself because the underlying principle is already absurd. Justice cannot function as a sliding scale of identity. The moment we abandon equal treatment, we cease to have a legal system and instead adopt a form of bureaucratic moral accounting.

A court should weigh evidence, intent, and harm — not ancestry, fashionably interpreted disadvantage, or ideological trends of the moment.

If the law is to command respect, it must be blind — not selectively so.

Paul Finlayson, Vaughan, Ont.

‘A whole new case for defunding the police’?

Re: Victoria police to halt attendance at Gaza protests — March 26 (print); and Canadian police politely ask antizionists to stop blocking roads all the time — Tristin Hopper, March 27

Let me please get this straight: the “long-term health of police officers” is threatened by the very act of policing? And this excuse is being used by the very organization tasked with doing the actual policing job? These questions raise others.

First, why employ these officers if they cannot do what they’ve been hired to do? And, second, why have the police organization at all if they won’t perform the duties of policing?

I must be missing something, but the City of Victoria and its police department seem to be making a whole new case for defunding the police.

Don’t squander this opportunity for regime change in Iran

Re: Trump seeks an off-ramp in the war with Iran — Kelly McParland, March 26

If there is no clear, decisive regime change in Donald Trump’s war with Iran, then the entire moment risks going down as a squandered historic opportunity. The Middle East rarely presents clean breaks where a single shift can reset the balance of power, but this is one of them. Half-measures, temporary deals or symbolic shows of force won’t remake the region, they’ll just prolong the same cycle of instability. Without a definitive outcome, Trump won’t have reshaped the Middle East, he’ll have merely stirred it.

What makes that failure more striking is the growing perception that Trump is less focused on finishing the job than he is on his popularity at home. Rather than completing the difficult push required to fundamentally change Iran’s trajectory, he appears more concerned with how each move plays politically. The result is a strategy that starts big but risks ending small, leaving behind not a transformed region, but a louder, angrier status quo.

Despite what he tweets or says at that point, if the current regime in Iran survives it will claim that it has beaten the great Satan.

The Iranian people, the Israelis and the Saudis who all wanted Trump to finish the job, won’t be saying, thanks Donald.

CUPE needs input on AI to protect members

Re: AI use at universities not something to be negotiated with unions — Peter MacKinnon, March 24

Artificial intelligence is in a regulatory vacuum in Canada, so it’s crucial for unions to bargain guardrails that govern this powerful new technology.

Without strong protections, workers could face job losses, be hired, fired and monitored by an unaccountable algorithm, and see their personal data mined and misused.

As a union, we aren’t holding our breath for AI Minister Evan Solomon and the Liberals to step up. Instead, they let themselves get swept up in the hype, as shown by their recent AI “sprint” consultations that had plenty of space at the table for Big Tech, and almost none for workers and the people who will be affected by these decisions.

CUPE members are filling the void of government inaction by negotiating contract language so we can share in any benefits of this new technology, and avoid getting hurt by it.

It’s our job as a union to defend our members’ rights and jobs through major technological changes — AI is no different.

Mark Hancock, CUPE National President, Ottawa

Notwithstanding clause is crucial to Quebec

Re: ‘Extreme’ hypothetical scenarios won’t decide notwithstanding clause appeal, chief justice says — Christopher Nardi, March 26

If the Parti Québécois takes power in Quebec this October and the Supreme Court of Canada (SCC) has not yet rendered its decision in the case initiated by opponents of the Act respecting the laicity of the State (Bill 21), which is currently being heard, Quebec should warn Ottawa that if the notwithstanding clause is overturned by the SCC, a referendum on independence will be launched immediately.

It is worth recalling that the notwithstanding clause protects a law from potential legal challenges when so-called fundamental rights are threatened.

As long as Quebec is not independent, this notwithstanding clause in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms constitutes a safeguard against the excesses of Canadian multiculturalism. If the Supreme Court of Canada finds a way to weaken or invalidate it — even if it is constitutional — Quebec will gradually lose its distinct character.

Sylvio Le Blanc, Montreal

‘Our education system long ago lost its way’

Re: Caving to anti-Zionists, Vanier College abruptly cancels Holocaust ceremony — Terry Newman, March 26; and McGill adviser quits over ‘escalating pattern of hostility’ toward Jews — Ari David Blaff, March 25

It was disheartening — but not surprising — to read on the front page of the Post about both the resignation of Jonathan Amiel from his position as chair of McGill Law School’s Faculty Advisory Board, and Vanier College’s 11th-hour decision to cancel its Holocaust commemoration program.

Our education system, from the primary grades through to university faculties, including law, medicine and others, long ago lost its way. A major study undertaken by the Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism and Policy (ISGAP), of which I am a research fellow, found that billions of dollars had been pumped into American universities from such benefactors as Iran and Qatar, and it would be naive in the extreme to think that the same has not happened in Canada. There is no such thing as a free lunch and in return for this largesse, our institutions of higher learning now include Middle Eastern Studies among their other so-called “grievance courses” and a professoriate whose role is to use its position as a platform from which to trash Israel and “Zionists” and to stifle any dissenting voices, all in the name of academic freedom, of course.

In both higher education and the elementary/secondary school systems, merit has been replaced by identity, teaching has given way to propagandizing and indoctrinating. Political correctness now determines curriculum decisions, and the purveyors of “anti-racism” are enriching themselves on the public purse, sometimes with tragic results, as in the case of former Toronto District School Board principal Richard Bilkszto, who committed suicide after one of these mandatory “anti-racism” sessions.

Popular narratives have replaced historical facts. Moral clarity has been upended by moral relativism. Administrators fear repercussions for taking correct but unpopular stands and so find ways to take no action.

Jewish students and children are harassed and assaulted on their way to classes and even in their classes, while in Toronto and British Columbia, teachers are expected to push the Palestinian narrative through “anti-Palestinian racism” courses and more sinister yet, to silence Jewish voices.

Esteemed historian Niall Ferguson recently pointed out that during the Nazi era in Germany, the universities expelled all their Jewish professors and students. German universities, which had been among the most prestigious in the world, quickly declined and now after 80 years, have still not regained their former stature. It is a cautionary tale for all university administrators.

E. Joan O’Callaghan, Toronto

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