"Liberty for wolves is death to the lambs," he wrote in The Crooked Timber of Humanity (The crooked timber of humanity), the British political scientist Isaiah Berlin (1909-1997) in an attempt to explain the importance of balance between concepts of "freedom" and "equality" within the liberal thought of the twentieth century and, by extension, in any democracy.
I was quite impressed by the debate that has originated in the comments of my previous post on Ilfattoquotidiano. com, entitled I hate them, the Nazis Alberta. Hit it, perhaps by coincidence, some commentators have defended the idea that a very lively even the neo-Nazis have a right to march and demonstrate in public their ideas in a democracy if you want to say that.
Now the concept is actually one of the first that are addressed in any good during the first year of Political Science. I remember distinctly that the question came up during both the wisdom of contemporary history with my professor, the Christian Social Scoppola Peter, who in the course of the History of Political Thought, with Professor Gaetano Calabro, liberal.
Well, not two dangerous Bolsheviks, and no two Hegelians, if we are honest. However, many of my fellow students, before listening to the teachers and make their own readings, as the commentators believed in my previous post that "democracy" meant a place where everyone can express their political opinions whatever, even and especially when it is explicitly opposed to democracy itself.
It 's a naive belief, because in reality the history of liberal democracies is full of examples of constitutions that have prevented the expression, participation, even the expression of certain political ideas, from Communism, Nazism, fascism just to mention the most famous. In West Germany, to say, there was the express prohibition in the Constitution of the reconstitution of the Communist Party and the Nazis.
In the U.S., the home of liberalism, all the long decades of the Cold War did not even enter as tourists, foreigners who were members of a communist party. In Canada, another country considered by all international statistics as a cradle of democracy, an example to the West, it existed even a state of emergency from 1914 to 1988, the War Measures Act, which allowed the government in charge of assume special powers in the case of "war, invasion or insurrection, real or believed that" even able to suspend habeas corpus, the right not to be detained without trial, freedom of speech and expression, even the private property.
Interestingly, this state of emergency has been used by Ottawa not only during the First and Second World War, but also in 1970, during the famous October Crisis, by one who has remained in the hearts of Canadians as Prime Minister's most popular History: Liberal Pierre Trudeau. The War Measures Act, which among other things allowed the dissolution of the Canadian Nazi Party, called the National Social Party Chrétien, was replaced in 1988 dall'Emergencies Act, which is a much more reasonable text and submit it to the suspension of civil rights voted by Parliament to the dictates of the Constitution of Canada.
And yet, a form of emergency legislation exists in almost every liberal democracy in the twenty-first century. This does not mean that Western democracies will conform to the fascist or communist regimes prohibit free speech or political, as some commentators seem to believe the fact. It does not mean that, because the measures are exceptional, in fact, exceptional, must be approved by a majority of Parliament usually qualified and often are subject to the Constitution, as is the case today in Canada.
It just means that a democracy, as a body, has white blood cells, able to come to the defense when a threat affect the internal life of the organism. I want to push to make another observation, less peaceful, and perhaps less universally shared, some commentators on my post stigmatized by the fact that in Calgary the 12 neo-Nazis risked being lynched by 200 anti-Nazis, to the point that Police in Alberta has had to run to their rescue to prevent the two groups facing each other.
Now, I think that if you have the courage to tell the Nazi preaching violence and hatred, to argue that gays, Jews and blacks are inferior animals, it is possible that sooner or later when trying to express these ideas in public, you come across a group of gays, Jews, blacks or non-white supremacists who want to accept the level of discussion you propose - violence - and they play you for the good.
'S life, rather than democracy. And if I find sacrosanct that the police, paid by all taxpayers including the Nazis, it takes action to defend the neo-Nazis, I do not condemn the violent reaction of those Canadians, maybe gays, Jews, blacks and whites do not supremacists. So, to paraphrase John Belushi still: "I hate them, the Nazis of Alberta." 
I was quite impressed by the debate that has originated in the comments of my previous post on Ilfattoquotidiano. com, entitled I hate them, the Nazis Alberta. Hit it, perhaps by coincidence, some commentators have defended the idea that a very lively even the neo-Nazis have a right to march and demonstrate in public their ideas in a democracy if you want to say that.
Now the concept is actually one of the first that are addressed in any good during the first year of Political Science. I remember distinctly that the question came up during both the wisdom of contemporary history with my professor, the Christian Social Scoppola Peter, who in the course of the History of Political Thought, with Professor Gaetano Calabro, liberal.
Well, not two dangerous Bolsheviks, and no two Hegelians, if we are honest. However, many of my fellow students, before listening to the teachers and make their own readings, as the commentators believed in my previous post that "democracy" meant a place where everyone can express their political opinions whatever, even and especially when it is explicitly opposed to democracy itself.
It 's a naive belief, because in reality the history of liberal democracies is full of examples of constitutions that have prevented the expression, participation, even the expression of certain political ideas, from Communism, Nazism, fascism just to mention the most famous. In West Germany, to say, there was the express prohibition in the Constitution of the reconstitution of the Communist Party and the Nazis.
In the U.S., the home of liberalism, all the long decades of the Cold War did not even enter as tourists, foreigners who were members of a communist party. In Canada, another country considered by all international statistics as a cradle of democracy, an example to the West, it existed even a state of emergency from 1914 to 1988, the War Measures Act, which allowed the government in charge of assume special powers in the case of "war, invasion or insurrection, real or believed that" even able to suspend habeas corpus, the right not to be detained without trial, freedom of speech and expression, even the private property.
Interestingly, this state of emergency has been used by Ottawa not only during the First and Second World War, but also in 1970, during the famous October Crisis, by one who has remained in the hearts of Canadians as Prime Minister's most popular History: Liberal Pierre Trudeau. The War Measures Act, which among other things allowed the dissolution of the Canadian Nazi Party, called the National Social Party Chrétien, was replaced in 1988 dall'Emergencies Act, which is a much more reasonable text and submit it to the suspension of civil rights voted by Parliament to the dictates of the Constitution of Canada.
And yet, a form of emergency legislation exists in almost every liberal democracy in the twenty-first century. This does not mean that Western democracies will conform to the fascist or communist regimes prohibit free speech or political, as some commentators seem to believe the fact. It does not mean that, because the measures are exceptional, in fact, exceptional, must be approved by a majority of Parliament usually qualified and often are subject to the Constitution, as is the case today in Canada.
It just means that a democracy, as a body, has white blood cells, able to come to the defense when a threat affect the internal life of the organism. I want to push to make another observation, less peaceful, and perhaps less universally shared, some commentators on my post stigmatized by the fact that in Calgary the 12 neo-Nazis risked being lynched by 200 anti-Nazis, to the point that Police in Alberta has had to run to their rescue to prevent the two groups facing each other.
Now, I think that if you have the courage to tell the Nazi preaching violence and hatred, to argue that gays, Jews and blacks are inferior animals, it is possible that sooner or later when trying to express these ideas in public, you come across a group of gays, Jews, blacks or non-white supremacists who want to accept the level of discussion you propose - violence - and they play you for the good.
'S life, rather than democracy. And if I find sacrosanct that the police, paid by all taxpayers including the Nazis, it takes action to defend the neo-Nazis, I do not condemn the violent reaction of those Canadians, maybe gays, Jews, blacks and whites do not supremacists. So, to paraphrase John Belushi still: "I hate them, the Nazis of Alberta."
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