4 - Friday, July 24, 1998 — North Shore News

Witness denies trivializing Collins’ argument

From paac 3

Similarly, non-commitred
readers could adopt borderline -
racist views. For their part,
hard-core racists: would be
entertained by what they per-
ceive as an “inside story” pan-
dering to their prejudices, she
said.

During he: News interview,
Henry balked when asked
sie, too, had trivialized a seri-
ous topic by using the tern
“Asians affairs” to describe a key
portion of a Collins column
entitled “Hollywood
Propaganda.”

Published on March 16,
1894, the opinion editorial
gained notoriety for referring
to the Steven Spielberg movie
Schindler's List as “Swindler’s
List.”

Collins complained that the
movie continued a cinematic
tradition of virtually ignoring,
genocides against other races or
groups,

Alter noting the lack of
movies about “the slaughter of
500,000 (breakaway East
Timorese) Tadonesians™ by
their own government, C ‘olins
opined that Japan had likewise
never sufiered from a “constant
propaganda barrage” for atroc-
ities by its soldiers during the
Second World War.

However, rather than detail
Collins’ criticisms of compara-
uvely unpublicized genocides
in Southeast Asia, Henry wrote
that he (Collins) bemoans “the
few (films) that have been donc
on Asian affairs.”

Asked about her choice of
words, Henry said she did not
think the undefined term
“Asian affairs” could oftend
Chinese who survived the
Nanking massacres, Canadian
and American veterans who
faced torture, discase, behead-
ings and forced labor in prison-
er-of-war camps, Korean
women forced to sexually ser-
vice occupying troops, or other
victims of Japanese atrocities.

Henry said she inserted the
phrase during editing in order
to reduce the report to a more
manageable 25 pages.

Recalling i:> circumstances,
Henry said: “I was just sub-
sumed by the task at hand. And

‘News defence

fund continues

On March 26, 1997,
the North Shore News
established the North
Shore News Free Speech
Defence Fund to help
defend the publication’s
rights under freedom of
the press.

The newspaper’s readers
and others interested in
defending their democratic
rights of free expression volun-
tarily contributed — over
$150,000 to the fund, which
has been used to defray the
legal costs faced by the news-
paper in its lengthy battle with
the Human Rights Tribunal
over a complaint laid in 1994
by the Canadian Jewish
Congress.

The battle, which culminat-
ed last year in a five-week hear-
ing, has thus far cost the News
approximately $200,000.

The latest complaint con-
tinues to add to that cost.

The Free Speech Defence
Fund is still active.

Donations to the fund can
be sent to: 1139 Lonsdale
Ave., North Vancouver, V7M
2H4. Cheques should be made
out to the North Shore News
Free Speech Defence Fund.

Pwas under no litte amount of
pressure to cut fedit copy)”
Contacted in’ Vancouver,
journalists. Gerald Porter called
it tronic that, although Henry
intended no slight, she conceiv
ably could be targeted for a
human-rights complaint. trom
the very ageney she champions.
Porter, the former execu-
tive-seeretary of the B.C. Press
Council, said any aggrieved
survivor of Japanese aggression

could fava complaint alleging
her words constituted hare
speech,

Such an irony, he added,
would undercore the perni-
ctous philosophy behind the
provinee’s Human Righty
Code.

The governing NDP passed
legislation in: which “intent
doesn’t count,” said Porter.
“They have stretched the
boundaries of what constitutes

hate literature te cneompass
pretty well anvthing anvone
wants to call haretul.~

Observed Porter: “H some
one took umbrage with what
she (Henrvi had done in trivial
izing something serious, even
though she was condensing
copy or mentioning that term
only in passing ... Asian afhirs’
could run afoul of the code as it
is written.”

The press: council inter-

vened last vear on behalf of the
News at the previeus human
nights hearing to decry the
unconstitudonality of the code.
The council racked up $80,000
in legal fees tor that multi-week
heanng. The News has thus far
spent approximately $200,000
in legal tees detending itself and
Collins against the pwo human
rights complaints.

Approximately $150,000 of

that total was voluntarily con-

tributed to the North Shore
Free Speech Detence Fund by
News readers and other free
speech supporters.

Last year’s hearing way
launched trom) a Canadian
Jewish Congress complaint
about the infamous Hollywood
Propaganda column.

The latest tribunal is consid-
ering the content of that same
column plus three others pub-
lished in 1994.

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