Calgary, Canada’s commitment to tolerance was tested Easter Sunday when a pastor protested a “drag queen story hour,” an event designed to get children together with drag queens.
The result: Pastor Derek Reimer, 36, spent the weekend behind bars and is facing eight new charges. The Calgary Police confirmed that they are “investigating” the charges as “hate-motivated.”
The Easter arrest is Reimer’s third in five weeks. What he actually did, apart from demonstrate his clear disagreement with trans ideology, is somewhat unclear. But it does appear that he utilized a megaphone or perhaps a microphone attached to a loudspeaker.
At one arrest, police reportedly recorded him saying things through some sort of loudspeaker that “offended” some of the participants in “the drag queen story time,” which is another name for the event that offended Reimer.
The Calgary City Council reacted swiftly to Reimer’s initial arrest, passing the Safe and Inclusive Access Bylaw, which was specifically designed to exclude protesters such as Reimer, prohibiting protests within 100 meters of a recreation facility or library entrance.
U.S. observers might note that, south of the Canadian border, sex offenders who have sought out children frequently are forbidden from coming within a similar distance of facilities at which children are known to gather.
Another pastor spoke on the matter.
“Pastor Artur Pawloski, who knows Reimer and made international headlines himself when he was repeatedly arrested and jailed for keeping his Calgary church open during the pandemic, told Fox News Digital that Reimer’s arrests indicate the government’s ‘open hatred toward Christianity.'”
Pawlowski said Reimer “decided he felt that God is calling him to expose that, to stand against that,” Fox reported.
U.S. observers of the nation to the north have become concerned by what some regard as Canada’s growing authoritarianism and harshness in dealing with nonconforming citizens. Canadian citizens possess the protections of neither the U.S. Constitution nor the Bill of Rights, of course. Canadians still are speaking out, albeit usually without a bullhorn.
The Calgary City Council also modified its current public behavior bylaw to include the term “intimidation,” according to the CBC.
Whether or not Reimer is intimidated remains to be seen.
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