Here in his classic On
Liberty (1859) John Stuart Mill raises the spectre of not only the “tyranny
of the magistrate” but also the “tyranny of the majority” who today oppose the
wearing of the niqab during citizenship ceremonies. This Niqab Affair remains a glaring example of
where our prime minister is not abiding by his “rule of law” mantra, and it demonstrates
his disregard for the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms when it suits him. Instead Harper is actively drumming up
prejudice against a tiny minority, who, as of now, are being denied basic
citizenship rights.
Protection, therefore,
against the tyranny of the magistrate is not enough; there needs protection
also against the tyranny of the prevailing opinion and feeling, against the tendency
of society to impose, by other means than civil penalties, its own ideas and
practices as rules of conduct on those who dissent from them; to fetter the
development and if possible prevent the formation of any individuality not in
harmony with its ways, and compel all characters to fashion themselves upon the
model of its own. There is a limit to
the legitimate interference of collective opinion with individual independence;
and to find that limit, and maintain against its encroachment, is as indispensable
to a good condition of human affairs as protection against political despotism.[1]
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