Canadians 'just don't get it'

Ezra Levant received a report from a reader about comedian Guy Earle's Sunday benefit:

"I had a nice chat with Guy and one other comic: I mentioned both you and Mark Steyn and they both seemed to have very little idea of your importance in all of this. E.g., I said to Guy what an honour it is to be linked to your and Steyn’s blogs where thousands of people have been made aware of his plight. He was polite but not at all excited: I honestly felt, including my discussion with him, that he doesn’t really get it. I explained that, as an observant Christian, I’d been unhappily aware of the HRCs for a couple of decades. I noted that we’re unlikely allies but that it was good that we’re fighting the illegitimate power of the state together. He was very grateful for the support, but I feel, in talking to him, another comic, at length, and watching the show, that these people don’t understand who the enemy is or how deadly serious this issue is.

"The show, itself? Unimpressive, I’m afraid. Almost no dealing with the topic of the gulag. There was loads of smut and very unsavoury references to various bodily parts, orifices, and fluids, in the bluntest language. I found it juvenile and unfunny. I wasn’t offended, per se. It’s just that a golden opportunity to educate people—but one has to know what the ISSUE is—and to ridicule our political masters was almost entirely squandered."

And then there's this report, via Blazing Cat Fur, that doesn't mention the human rights issue at all.

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Ezra notes: My correspondent made some good points about the apathy of the crowd. But as I mentioned in reply, most Canadians are closer to those fellow comedians than to the revved up blogosphere. My estimate is that, seven months ago, 99% of Canadians hadn't even heard of human rights commissions, and that now the figure was down to 90%. That's a spectacular success, by the way, since most people don't care about politics of any sort, even during an election campaign. The key is getting normal people to care, not just the political die-hards."

Good point. We who are passionate about this issue think everyone should be (and they should), but awareness takes time. As Ezra noted, it's actually a good thing, in a way, when high-profile people are persecuted by "human rights" tribunals, as it helps raise the issue in the public consciousness faster.

I confess I AM disappointed in the Guy Earle thing, though.