In Saskatchewan, a human rights law, so called, makes it an offence for anyone to say, sing, dance, mime, write or draw anything that exposes, or tends to expose, other people to hatred or ridicule, or belittles or otherwise affronts their dignity, on the basis of certain prohibited grounds, including sexual orientation.

All right — I mean, it’s not all right, it’s anything but all right, but it’s the law.

If that’s the law, you’d think that likening Canada’s gay parades to Sodom and Gomorrah might breach it. You’d think stuffing flyers into people’s mailboxes that say: “If Saskatchewan’s sodomites have their way, your school board will be celebrating buggery, too!” might affront the dignity of gays and lesbians.

You might think that, but you’d be wrong.

About nine years ago, a man named William Whatcott, who described himself as a Christian Truth Activist, appeared to run afoul of the province’s Human Rights Code, which prohibits exposing homosexuals to hatred and ridicule, by distributing a series of flyers in Regina and Saskatoon that stated, among other things, that “now the homosexuals want to share their filth and propaganda with Saskatchewan’s children.”

Given that the provincial Human Rights Code prohibits belittling and ridiculing gays, Whatcott impressed four homosexual and lesbian complainants as being in breach of the Code. He created a similar impression in the provincial Human Right Commission, which appointed a tribunal to hear the complaints; in the Human Rights Tribunal that made a finding of such a breach; and finally in the Court of the Queen’s Bench, which dismissed Whatcott’s appeal.

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