BBC TV news producer Kate Peyton was shot in the back by an Islamist gunman mere hours after arriving in Mogadishu, Somalia in February 2005.

Her family believes the Beeb pressured her into accepting a very dangerous assignment.

From The Globe and Mail's editorial about the report to the CHRC recommending that the criminal law be used to prosecute online hate crimes:

The hate-speech provision of the rights act is much broader than the hate law in the Criminal Code. It requires only a likelihood that the speech will cause hatred or contempt, rather than an intent to promote hatred. The wording is broad enough to encompass written material that uses satire to achieve its aims, or that reflects stereotypes, or merely seems to. There is no defence of fair comment. It allows the commission (or people who complain to it) to take aim at those who give offence. Yet open debate in a democracy is grounded in the right to offend. “Any attempt to exclude from public discourse speech that stereotypes or defames the members of an identifiable group would require extraordinary intervention by the state and would dramatically compromise the public commitment to freedom of expression,” says Richard Moon, a law professor at the University of Windsor, in his report. “Because these less extreme forms of discriminatory expression are so commonplace, it is impossible to establish clear and effective rules for their identification and exclusion.” Stick to banning expression that incites violence, he says, wisely, and leave it to the Criminal Code, rather than the rights act. (His recommendation that we need a mandatory national press council, if the voluntary provincial ones don't become more vigorous, would be a ridiculous way of enshrining what he objects to in the human rights act.)

The silliness of having human-rights bodies supervise the news media was on view in human-rights complaints against an article by Mark Steyn in Maclean's. The article, “The Future Belongs to Islam,” fell well within the bounds of reasonable debate. Putting Mr. Steyn and Maclean's in front of a rights tribunal is the real offence in a democratic society.

I would idly note that the B.C. human rights tribunal did not find against Maclean's.

But I would ask what accountability mechanisms for the media the Globe would suggest in the event that some publication does carry on a vendetta against an identifiable group.

Personally, I think it would be nice to see some clear-eyed, methodologically rigorous, reasonably objective analysis of how the MSM covers minority communities and see whether we really do have a problem of (insert aggrieved group here)ophobia.

If you use Twitter (you might not if you aren't a big-city-livin', charcuterie-eatin', iPhone-usin' social media evangelist), then check out Mr. Tweet.

It's a twitter network-mapping tool.

The most useful part of it is helping you find people you might wish to follow.

The least useful part is identifying people who follow you (and who you don't follow for a reason).