However will Canada's pro-CHRC crowd carve this Turkey?
In what must certainly be regarded as a rather bizarre twist for many supporters of the Canadian Human Rights Commission, global atheist heavyweight Richard Dawkins' website has been banned in Turkey.
In what appears to the rational mind to be a rather befuddling and childish complaint, well-established Turkish creationist Adnan Oktar -- also known by his pen name, Harun Yahya -- complained that Dawkins insulted him on numerous online forums and blogs.
"We are not against freedom of speech or expression but you cannot insult people," said Seda Aral, Oktar's press assistant. "We found the comments hurtful. It was not a scientific discussion. There was a line and the limit has been passed. We have used all the legal means to stop this site. We asked them to remove the comments but they did not."
Oktar has described Dawkins' criticisms of Oktar's the Atlas of Creation as "defamatory" and "blasphemous".
Interestingly, many of Richard Dawkins' most fervent supporters in Canada were also wildly supportive of the complaints filed against Western Standard publisher Ezra Levant when he published the infamous "Prophet Mohammad cartoons" that had incited riots in Denmark.
Levant more recently faces complains regarding his re-publishing of the letter written by Reverend Stephen Boissoin to the Red Deer Advocate.
For the record, LGBT website Xtra.ca has also re-printed the letter. Whether or not they'll be subject of a CHRC complaint has yet to be seen, but should be considered fairly predictable.
The nature of the complaint was that the cartoons in question were "defamatory", and "encouraged hatred".
Meanwhile, Oktar also attempted to have Dawkins' book, The God Delusion, claiming that it encourages hatred of religion. Fortunately, Oktar was unsuccessful to that end.
It should be interesting to see how the pro-Dawkins, pro-CHRC crowd will react to this little nugget.
But if they have any sense in their heads whatsoever -- and in some cases, that has yet to be seen -- they may be persuaded to take a new stance toward the runaway CHRC.
"In the words of the late great Colonel Sanders: I'm too drunk to taste this chicken."
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