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By James Black

A few weeks ago, a mob amassed at Queen’s University to shut down Dr. Jordan Peterson’s guest lecture on the rise of compelled speech in Canada. It brought to mind another similar event in a less absurd time.

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In 2006, the late contrarian Christopher Hitchens gave a similar — more controversial — talk at the University of Toronto. The event proceeded without incident. Then, student activists sought to give voice to the silenced. Now they do the silencing.

During the event, Hitchens offered a defence of free speech centred on the tenet that “it’s not just the right of the person who speaks to be heard, it is the right of everyone in the audience to listen.” This concept is lost on would-be vigilante censors and self-ordained arbiters of what should be permitted to be listened to.

Photo by Stuart Nimmo for National Post

Today, the fight for free speech is now almost entirely a rearguard action. Peterson expressing concern about being compelled by the state to say things with which he may not agree — over the menacing of the campus squadristi — is the current theatre of war.