Fake Sun lawsuit

These articles are posted here to support my friend Thekla Lit and her friends. :)

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Jewish Independent - An organization called the Seriously Free Speech Committee hosted an event last week offering support and solidarity to local political activist Mordecai Briemberg. Briemberg is facing a lawsuit by media conglomerate CanWest, for his alleged involvement in the production and distribution of a fake copy of the Vancouver Sun.

Roughly 200 people came to the event called CanWest: Media Bully, which took place at Simon Fraser University, Harbor Centre, in downtown Vancouver. A panel discussion focused on media concentration, political satire, censorship and SLAPP, or strategic lawsuit against public participation, which is how the event organizers characterized CanWest's legal action.

The suit was filed in December 2007, six months after 12,000 copies of the fake Vancouver Sun four-page broadsheet were printed and distributed to several locations around Vancouver and in Victoria. The satire was a carefully made replicate of the daily, virtually indistinguishable from the real paper graphically: it had the same fonts and scales, its layout was similar, its coloring the same. Content-wise, it was clearly a fake.

The mock paper contained material that was sharply critical of things like Israel's presence in the Palestinian territories, Canada's Middle East policy, Chapters/Indigo CEO Heather Reisman, companies that do business in Israel and, especially, CanWest's coverage of the Israel-Palestinian conflict and the company's major shareholders, the Asper family. The parody's creators identified themselves only as the Palestine Media Collective and claimed to have created the paper "to point out the extreme anti-Palestinian bias of CanWest publications, particularly the Vancouver Sun."

CanWest's lawyers submitted a writ of summons to the Supreme Court of British Columbia identifying Briemberg, Horizon Publications Ltd. (the printer) and six John and Jane Does, as the people responsible for producing and distributing the fake paper. CanWest is seeking damages and cost for the defendant's alleged transgression of Section 7 of the Canadian Trade Marks Act. The writ also pointed to Briemberg's involvement in anti-Israeli and pro-Palestinian media activities and of harboring antagonistic views towards CanWest and conspiring to injure its reputation.

Briemberg is a longtime advocate of Palestinian rights and is a founding member of the Canada Palestine Support Network (CanPalNet). He recently won the Power of Peace Award from the YMCA of Greater Vancouver for his international peace work.

Briemberg was the first to speak at last week's event. He acknowledged that he distributed copies of the fake paper after finding them at the Vancouver Public Library while attending an event commemorating 40 years of Israeli "occupation" of the West Bank and Gaza, but denied having anything to do with its production. "This was the first time I saw the parody and, after briefly scanning it, I picked up a small handful of copies and delivered them to commuters in Burnaby – where I live – the next morning. I did so because it would stimulate them to think anew about the reliability of the information and commentary regularly published in the authentic Vancouver Sun," he said.

Briemberg described CanWest's lawsuit as an act taken out of fear. According to him, they fear that their control over the public debate is waning and, instead of engaging in open discussion, they are resorting to lawsuits.

The second member of the panel to speak was Leo McGrady, Briemberg's lawyer. According to McGrady, the civil wrongs filed against Briemberg are rarely used outside of commercial law. "I am not aware of any case where these torts have been used in a pure free speech/parody context," he said.

The charges sought to be brought against Briemberg include conspiracy, injurious falsehood, passing off and violation of trademark law. "All seem wildly inappropriate," said McGrady.

McGrady also read out examples of the type of information that Briemberg was required to submit, including information about the June commemoration event and the names and contact details of all the people involved with the Seriously Free Speech Committee. "There is no question that this is a SLAPP suit," said McGrady. "A SLAPP suit seeks to chill or punish a party's exercise of constitutional rights to free speech and to use the court for redress of this apparent grievance."

The two other speakers were Murray Dobbin, a veteran journalist and commentator, and Martha Roth a feminist activist. Both discussed what they considered to be CanWest's wrongdoings in terms of broad social changes.

Dobbin spoke about the dangers of media conglomeration: "The ultimate goal of our quibbling elite is to have us integrate into the United States." He later added, "When we let things like this go by without a fight, it is for them a signal to unleash similar assaults on other freedoms and other people."

Roth said, "The Vancouver Sun invites ridicule when it takes extreme, pro-Zionist, anti-Palestinian positions under the guise of reporting news.... The publication that Mordecai [Briemberg] and others distributed ... unmasked the hypocritical political bias of the Sun by ridiculing it, exaggerating it and punning on it." She concluded by calling for support of Briemberg: "CanWest has money, but they don't have something that we do have – and that's solidarity."

Following the speakers was a question period. Most of the comments were about how better to attack CanWest, including counter lawsuits, independent complaints, consumer boycotts and letters to the editor. Donations raised to help finance Briemberg's legal defence totalled slightly more than $2,500.

When asked whether he had called out to the producers of the fake paper to take responsibility for their actions, Briemberg said, "I'm neither a priest, nor a rabbi nor a policeman. You ask me what I would do in the circumstance – if I did something and you were nailed for it? – I would come forward and say: 'I did it and I think I am right to have done it,' but that's only my personal opinion."

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A reaction from Mordecai Briemberg

The Canwest media monopoly wants to silence my right to speak freely about Israel and Palestine. Yet in April this year the YMCA honoured me with their International Peacemaker award for my efforts to contribute to the peaceful resolution of that and other wars. Go figure!

Canwest is the largest media conglomerate in Canada. They own the National Post, ten major-market dailies and several community newspapers. They estimate the daily readership of their English-language newspapers at 4.8 million Canadians. As for TV, they own the Global television network, the History, Food and Showcase channels. In Vancouver they own about seventy percent of news outlets -- from dailies to weeklies to television.

Why would such a massive corporate enterprise become enraged when persons unknown to me published a slim four-page funny spoof of Canwest’s Vancouver Sun? Comedians regularly make fun of politicians – it’s part of Canadian culture. Think Rick Mercer. Should powerful corporations have immunity from jokes? Apparently so according to Canwest.

For all its wealth, it seems this giant has lost its sense of humour. Instead of laughing, they have acted like a thin-skinned elephant, running amok trying to crush a mosquito. And I am the mosquito!

Canwest has launched an expensive legal suit accusing six unnamed people and me of ‘conspiring’ to create, produce, and publish this four-page spoof. Canwest admits it has no documents to show I did this. I’m not surprised they have no documents, because it just isn’t true. I did not help in any way to create, produce or publish the satire. My only connection, which I have said without hesitation, is this. I saw a pile on a table after an open meeting at the Vancouver Public Library, took a small handful, and the next morning distributed them to public transit commuters in my Burnaby neighbourhood.

Given I had nothing whatsoever to do with the creation and publishing of this satire, why did Canwest pick my name from a hat, to bully and harrass?

I have been a prominent critic of Israeli policies that violate international law, human rights, and major United Nations resolutions concerning mistreatment of the Palestinian people. I have written for magazines and papers, including Ming Pao, published research, spoken at churches, peace forums, universities and colleges, been interviewed on television and radio, interviewed others on radio, organized demonstrations, organized public meetings in Vancouver for many internationally renowned Palestinians and Jewish-Israelis. In short, I have been a public voice in the intense debate about how to achieve peace and justice for Palestinians and Jews in historic Palestine.

This is why Canwest targeted me. Strange as it may seem, this Goliath of a corporation has weak self-confidence and fears even small voices like mine. What is it they fear?

Canwest is committed to defending Israel, right or wrong. But popular opinion about Israel is shifting away from this attitude. Despite all the pro-Israeli news reports, editorials, and commentaries, and despite praises from our Prime Minister, more and more Canadians are uncomfortable with the policies and practices of the government of Israel. The mood among many Jewish-Canadians also is shifting from celebrating Israel to disenchantment and embarassment.

Hurling slanders at former President Jimmy Carter and Archbishop Desmond Tutu, calling them “anti-semites” -- as Israeli supporters have done -- just seems ridiculous to more and more people.

What to do? When your own arguments can’t convince people, try and silence those whose only strength is information and arguments, information and arguments you are afraid to publish and discuss openly. Attack with all your massive power the small voices who have miniscule financial resources. Hope that with legal suits and bullying you can scare away Canadians from thinking for themselves and publicly sharing their diverse thoughts on this contentious issue.

Canwest’s newspaper the Montreal Gazette just refused even to publish a paid ad with the title “60 Years of Israel = 60 Years of Palestinian Suffering & Homelessness”. Apparently they don’t want anything to detract from the “celebration of Israel” spirit that Canwest is promoting.

A democratic culture is what Canadians need to promote. We need all-sided information and diverse opinons so we can make up our own minds without harrasment, intimidation and censorship.

The Vancouver Sun says it is “Seriously West Coast”. How about “Seriously Free Speech”? That’s the name of a committee -- www.seriouslyfreespeech.ca -- calling on Canwest to drop their legal suit and to promote the expression of diverse opinions on Israel and Palestine.

The BC Civil Liberties Association, the BC Librarians Association, the union that represents the journalists who work for Canwest, prominent intellectuals, human rights educators, authors, musicians – among them Noam Chomsky, Naomi Klein, Thekla Lit, Joy Kogawa – have joined the committee as “honourary members” to stand in defence of a democratic culture. You’re invited to stand with them.