If a province mandates the wearing of face masks in public during the pandemic need the public comply? Do those who reject masks have a right to refuse? Is it an absolute right or is it limited to particular circumstances? What about social distancing? Do they have a right to refuse to keep their distance from others? What about the community's rights to expect that those sharing that community not expose them to unnecessary risks to their health, their wellbeing, even their lives?
We have a Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The SCC is well accustomed to interpreting the Charter.
This is not a trivial matter. It's a matter of life or death.
In Canada's bad boy of Covid-19, Quebec, thousands rallied yesterday to protest the government's mask mandate. They trotted out the predictable claims about rights and freedoms with heavy anti-vaxxer undertones.
"We want our liberty. We want the right to say yes to a vaccine. We want the right to decide. It's our life, it's our bodies, it's up to us," said [Nathalie] Warren.There it is in a nutshell. Masks and social distancing mandates are abuse. When it comes to children returning to school, it's punishment.
"I'm not OK with children going to school wearing masks, and physical distancing," said Irène Sarmiento. "It makes no sense. The children aren't to blame. The population is being abused."
There must be a way to put an end to this business, one in which both sides have an opportunity to state their case and be heard fairly. A place to put these issues to rest.
I say this bearing in mind that the coronavirus, Covid-19, won't be the last pandemic. We've been warned there are more already in the barrel, locked and loaded. There will also be other challenges to our social order from climate change that Canada is doing virtually nothing to avert. We can expect food security issues, the disruption of supply chains, heatwaves and droughts, severe storm events of increasing frequency, intensity and duration - the very same challenges that every region will experience in some form or another.
We will probably need the Charter more than ever in the decades ahead to balance rights with responsibilities as governments resort to emergency powers that must be carefully controlled. Covid-19 seems to be a perfect place to hone a new system of checks and balances for the 21st century.
10 comments:
At the grocery store last week, a guy of about 35 years told me ( unbidden ) that he had seen a mask saying " this doesn't look like freedom ".He then said we need to get rid of the commies just before he said he was going to get his mother to order one for him.
Just another 35 year old reformatory who lives with his mother.
The easiest way to undermine the fight to contain the virus is for it to become part of the great North American madness, the culture war. The Right has learned that soft issues such as inequality, racism, women's rights almost fall naturally into the culture war abyss. But it's also a great place to bog down issues ranging from climate change to pandemics. If you can reduce the grave perils of the day to an "us versus them" narrative you can even get your flock to vote against their own interests time after time.
".He then said we need to get rid of the commies..
North Americans would not know a 'Commie' or a Socialist if they spoke to one.
They have lived in a world that worships private enterprise( for what it is) that has been wonderful for some and not for others.
Problem is that private enterprise fails miserably when we have a medical emergency such as we have!
Suddenly we have socialism for everyone and without question.
The meeting of our free for all society with massive amounts of socialism is turning the world upside down.
Face mask or no face mask should be a matter of personal responsibility not rights and freedoms.
No one is free so lets put that one to rest.
TB
"No one is free so lets put that one to rest."
To live in society, to participate in the benefits of community, entails a measure of compliance with the requirements of the population over the individual. That is not supposed to be unreasonably imposed or capriciously unwarranted. Yet excesses happen. Rights are unreasonably abridged, sometimes ignore outright. We are lucky to have laws that permit the aggrieved to judicial redress if warranted.
If we choose not to accept the reasonable restraints of community, do what Thoreau did. Move to Walden pond. Build a shack and live free of the offending obligations.
I just saw an interesting article by CNN which reported on a Duke University study on differing types of masks. Not surprisingly the N95 was deemed the most effective, but of course the public is being advised to wear cloth masks. The research found 3 layers of material to be best, but of course they have to be worn properly, fitted tightly around the mouse and nose.....and based on my observations hardly anyone wears them properly, even when it's a medical mask...so often they're fitted very loose with the nose exposed. Turns out the neck gaiter I and others are wearing in order to comply with the laws...they actually increase the number of droplets by breaking the larger ones into smaller more numerous and more easily inhaled droplets.....ugh, but I have to wear something or else I'm a monster or something.....
Here's the article if you want to read it...
https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/08/us/duke-university-face-mask-test-trnd/index.html?fbclid=IwAR23yDD4pmKTWArLZ0zF_KZETJQS2ohfAcu9T0Z10CqG2F_Dad1MKIVRc4g
When a Provincial Court Judge can say, “I just sentenced someone to jail for screaming” , one has to wonder how this judge would handle anything to do with Climate Change....but then this judge is Provincial and not close to Supreme Court. Anyong
Gordie, I'm one of those 'compromised' people. I've got a basketful of heart and blood ailments and such. Aside from those glitches I seem to be as healthy as an 18-year old. That said I was told in the bluntest terms by my GP, my cardiologist and my hematologist that, should I contract this virus I'm almost certainly a goner.
When the time for 'sheltering in place' arrived I did a deep dive into masks and their respective advantages and drawbacks. I bought a few that turned out to be duds. Every outfit seemed to flood the web with offerings that turned out to be garbage or worse.
I finally found an American company that had been in the business for years, a respirator mask, that they had supplied to industry and fire departments. It was light, immensely breathable and effectively filtered out the respiratory contaminants that shorten the lives of so many fire crews. It looks like so many others - a tightly fitting cover with two one-way exhaust valves. They had their own N99 replaceable filter. The masks are washable. Not cheap but, considering the realities, worth every dime.
I still do the self-isolation. Yet I hit the grocery store about once a week. I wear one of those masks. I get home and wash thoroughly. Do I miss contact with family and friends? Immensely. I just want to see them next year more than this year.
Yes, cloth masks and surgical masks are not the best but that's not the point. Are they better than nothing at protecting others? Absolutely. They may not be as efficient as the sort I use but that's not the point. They're inexpensive, readily available and, as we've seen in Asia, wearing them is instrumental in curbing the spread of viral infection.
Wearing them also conveys to the user a realization of what we're confronting and that shapes behaviours in so many ways including social distancing, hand washing hygiene and such. It reminds us that the threat is real. Covid-19 is on a path to become the third greatest cause of death in the U.S. behind heart disease and cancer (CDC).
As for your neck gaiter, if it doesn't work, throw it in the pile with all the other bad bets and get something better, something that does work. That's not an intolerable burden, is it?
Anyong I haven't a clue what you're referring to? What judge? What were the circumstances?
Didn't little Jason Kenny live in his mother's basement up to a few months ago ?
I’m sorry I don.’t have a clue either since the subject was “ family defamation.” Who this person is doesn’t matter. Anyong
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