CUPE Local 391 was not consulted in the booking of Greg Felton, author of the The Host and the Parasite: How Israel’s Fifth Column consumed America, for the Freedom to Read week at Vancouver Public Library. The Union does not endorse the event and would strongly condemn any anti-Semitic writings which constitute hate literature.
This author’s reading has sparked controversy among the reading community of Vancouver. The following links address some of the stakeholders concerns around the significance and/or dangers inherent in legitimizing this event as a “freedom of speech” issue.
http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/news/editorial/story.html?id=
8f4a3c29-1ad4-43fc-bb49-b627feac1810&p=1
http://www.libraryjournal.com/article/CA6532761.html
http://transmontanus.blogspot.com/2008/02/freedom-to-be-antisemitic-week-in.html
CUPE Local 391 confirms the union’s support of intellectual freedom. The union invites members of the public to consider information available
about Felton’s writings and to think critically whether or not Felton’s views actually support freedom of speech or have hateful content. If the public considers the material hateful (after having read it), they should consider not attending the event.
Quotes re: Free Speech, Conscience, Ignorance, Literature, Books, Political Correctness
“Any hack can safely rail away at foreign powers beyond the sea; but a good writer is a critic of the society he lives in.”
Edward ABBEY
American writer (1927-1989)
“To limit the press is to insult a nation; to prohibit reading of certain books is to declare the inhabitants to be either fools or slaves.”
Claude Adrien HELV