Category Archives: Law

Osgoode Hall v Mark Steyn

June 10, 2008 – 8:35 am

This whole Mark Steyn fooferaw just gets slimier and slimier.
It appears that Canada’s leading law school is busily turning out the Human Rights equivalent of ambulance chasers. The main man on Steyn’s case (referred to as ‘Head Sock’ all over steynonline) is one Kharrum Awan, a recent graduate of Osgoode Hall School of Law (a [...]

By skepticlawyer | Also posted in Free Speech | Comments (37)

Cyber-court

June 8, 2008 – 11:00 am

A former US Supreme Court Judge has launched a computer game called “Our Courts“, intended to teach children about the way in which the American court system works. It will have an interactive forum to show how the courts work, with some examples of real legal issues.
Well, if something like “Second Life” can be successful, [...]

By Legal Eagle | Also posted in Technology | Comments (1)

Human rights and criticising Islam

June 7, 2008 – 12:20 am

I’ve been following the case brought by the Ontario-based Canadian Islamic Congress (CIC) against Mark Steyn in the British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal. And as per Pete M’s request, I’m writing a post on it (in the middle of the night because I’m an insomniac). Perhaps, as per John Hasenkam’s comment in response to Pete, [...]

By Legal Eagle | Also posted in Free Speech, Human/Civil rights, Media, Personal liberty, Politics, Racism, Religion, Society | Comments (31)

Two cheers for Westminster (or why President Obama won’t be able to change much at all)

June 5, 2008 – 11:51 pm

Barack Obama has campaigned thus far on a strong platform of ‘change’. On one level, he’s been very unspecific; on another he has deliberately sought to be less partisan in his message, trying to include more people in his vision. His most pointed and intelligent criticisms of current political practice focus on the partisan divide [...]

By skepticlawyer | Also posted in Politics, Public Policy | Comments (5)

Intellectualism and the Emperor’s New Clothes

June 5, 2008 – 8:51 pm

I’ve been reading the interesting string of posts on the question of intellectualism and anti-intellectualism. It all started off at PrawfsBlog, where Rick Hills explained why he was an anti-intellectual. At Slate, Eric Posner and Richard Ford mounted a defence of intellectualism, while still maintaining a dislike of deliberate obscurantism.
Hills’ example of intellectual obscurantism was Judith Butler’s [...]

By Legal Eagle | Also posted in Academia, Education, Philosophy, Society | Comments (31)

Of good character

June 3, 2008 – 10:19 pm

The requirement of being “of good character” is one with which lawyers are familiar. After all, we have to show that we are fit and proper persons before we can be admitted to practice (as outlined in this post about plagiarist law students). Generally, when I think about someone being “of good character”, I think [...]

By Legal Eagle | Also posted in Free Speech, Human/Civil rights, Immigration, Personal liberty, Politics, Terrorism | Comments (8)

Lulz and legals bleg

June 3, 2008 – 7:56 am

I’m going to reveal my technical idiocy here, but I can’t think of any other way around it.
Legal Eagle and I have had a few requests, both online and offline, for a post on the legal issues arising out of the ongoing Spin Starts Here/Lulz Starts Here imbroglio. Yesterday, we thought we pretty much had [...]

By skepticlawyer | Also posted in Blogging, Internet | Comments (10)

Can religious discrimination be justified?

May 29, 2008 – 8:20 am

James Farrell’s thought-provoking post at Club Troppo got me chewing over this question, and to that end I thought I’d share one of the papers I wrote last term for Oxford Jurisprudence. In brief, it’s a serious engagement with the ideas of John Finnis, who argues (among many other things) that discrimination on the basis [...]

By skepticlawyer | Also posted in Immigration, Philosophy, Politics, Religion | Comments (20)

Blogging judges

May 28, 2008 – 5:41 pm

You don’t get many blogging judges. In fact, I can’t really imagine any of the judges of my acquaintance writing a blog, although I can imagine them reading legal blogs avidly.
However, I read this story of a US Federal Court judge in Massachusetts, Nancy Gertner, who has commenced blogging for Slate magazine. I would think it [...]

By Legal Eagle | Also posted in Blogging, Technology | Comments (14)

Being Behinderhund or, blogging while disabled - guest post by DeusExMacintosh

May 27, 2008 – 6:17 am

DeusExMacintosh is one of our regular commenters, and earlier this year she had a slightly unusual run-in with facebook, which seems to be an organisation somewhat given to perverse control-freakery. While not on a par with the casual denigration on display here, it’s still pretty ordinary. I asked her if she’d be interested in telling [...]

By skepticlawyer | Also posted in Animals, Blogging | Comments (18)