January 9, 2005
The federal government has decided a T-shirt bearing racial slurs directed at virtually every major ethnic group does not violate Canada's hate propaganda laws and can be legally imported.
The T-shirt is printed with the message: "I (expletive) HATE: Spics, Dotheads, Honkeys, Japs, Wops, Kikes, Wetbacks, Gooks, Chinks, Camel Jockeys, and the French - BUT I (HEART SYMBOL) NIGGERS!"
Canada Border Services Agency intercepted the T-shirt when it was shipped across the border to an unnamed Canadian customer. But the agency's prohibited-imports unit decided the printed slogan is not hate propaganda because it merely expresses an opinion and does not incite hatred.
"The way it's written, although it may be offensive, it is considered a personal opinion," agency spokesperson Michel Proulx said.
If the phrase had ended, "And you should, too," it would have been considered a promotion of hate and blocked from import, he said.
But Proulx added he couldn't imagine anyone in Canada wearing the garment.
"I don't think you'd walk a block in Toronto and come out alive," he said.
The head of the Canadian Race Relations Foundation said she is disappointed by the agency's narrow interpretation of the law.
"These terms are clearly derogatory terms and are hateful," Karen Mock said.
While she conceded applying the hate law can be complex, she said the message clearly exposes identifiable minority groups to contempt.
"It's sad that they took such a legalistic view."
The shirt is the product of a controversial Las Vegas-based Internet company.
The company has been the subject of legal action over products targeting child stars Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen and late actor Christopher Reeve. It received cease-and-desist orders against shirts with the phrase "I (expletive) the Olsen Twins before they were famous" and another that read "I bought Christopher Reeve's wheelchair on eBay."
The company insists its products are intended only as humour.
"We're not a hate site. I always think that no reasonable person could think that these are meant to be taken seriously," said director of operations Gary Cohen.
"We are looking for people to have a strong reaction to these things that nobody wants to talk about and make them think about what their own views are."
He said the Canadian government's decision shows it understood the intent of the message on the shirt.
Other shirts in the company's inventory make light of rape, pedophilia, abortion, school shootings and Adolf Hitler - "love him or hate him, he killed a ton of Jews."
But Cohen said the T-shirt that generated the strongest reaction is a parody of the I Love New York graphic, in which the heart symbol is replaced by the image of a passenger jet.
He didn't expect too strong a reaction to a recently created shirt with the picture of a cresting waves and the slogan "I surfed the Tsunami 2004" written in Asian-styled characters.
The company's best-selling shirt bears the slogan "I support single moms" with an image of an exotic dancer swinging around a pole.
Cohen would not say who ordered the T-shirt that triggered the Canada Border Services Agency review. He said the company sends "a good amount" of shirts to Canadian customers.
Ottawa Citizen