By Michael Regenstreif
The Free Thinking Film Society was thrust into the national media spotlight last month, thanks, it seems, to the interference of the Iranian Embassy in Ottawa, questionable responses from Library and Archives Canada, and unequivocal support from members of the federal cabinet.
I left the Bulletin office a few minutes after 5 pm on January 18 and was about to head downtown to grab a quick bite to eat before heading to Library and Archives for the Free Thinking Film Society’s screening of Iranium, a new documentary critical of Iran’s Islamist regime, including its efforts to acquire a nuclear bomb, a matter of paramount concern to Israel and most other Western democracies, including Canada and the United States, as well as to moderate Arab regimes in the Middle East.
The event was also to feature a presentation by Clare Lopez, a former U.S. Central Intelligence Agency officer and expert on Middle East and counter-terrorism issues.
I was tuned to CBC Radio and heard an announcement that the Iranium event was cancelled under circumstances that included an objection from the Iranian Embassy in Ottawa, a couple of envelopes with mysterious white powder that had been dropped off at the Library and Archives building (the white powder turned out to be harmless), and calls to Library and Archives from “members of the public” threatening protests if the film screening was allowed to proceed.
The CBC had Fred Litwin, the Free Thinking Film Society’s director, on the line and he said he’d received a call at 4 pm from Library and Archives telling him there were protesters inside and outside the building, that security could not be assured, so the event was cancelled.
My first thought was to wonder just who the “pro-nuclear Iran” protesters would be.
In a chronology that he repeated to me on the phone a few days later, Litwin said that he immediately headed to the Library and Archives building, arriving at 4:50 pm. There were no protesters, just employees leaving.
Litwin was then told there were no actual protesters, just the supposed “threat of protests.”
It turned out that the cancellation that day was the second time Library and Archives Canada officials had pulled the plug on the scheduled screening.
The day before, Litwin was notified that the screening was being cancelled because of “complaints.” The complaints, he later learned, were from the Iranian Embassy.
Litwin contacted the office of Federal Heritage Minister James Moore, which wasted no time in having Library and Archives Canada reverse the cancellation.
At first, the Library and Archives Canada officials tried to get the Free Thinking Film Society to move the screening to the Museum of Nature (at a substantially increased rental fee), but the society held its ground and, within hours, and with obvious pressure from Moore’s office, the screening was reinstated at the Library and Archives auditorium.
The cancellation and reinstatement the day before happened so quickly that news of it didn’t circulate widely until after the subsequent cancellation the next day, just three hours before the Iranium event was to take place, in the wake of the threat of protests and the white powder hoax.
Given the circumstances of the cancellation, it was inevitable, and entirely predictable, that it would become a major story. It was equally inevitable and predictable that the federal government could not allow the Iranian Embassy or threats from protesters to have veto power over an event in a federal government building mere steps from Parliament Hill.
How could the Library and Archives Canada officials not understand that? How could they have capitulated to a complaint from the Iranian Embassy so easily?
The Free Thinking Film Society’s screening of Iranium, including the presentation by Clare Lopez, was rescheduled for Sunday, February 6, 7:00 pm, at Library and Archives Canada.
Had the Iranian Embassy not interfered in the first place, a few hundred people would have seen Iranium on January 18. Instead, millions of people across Canada were made aware of the film thanks to the news reports.
That’s what happens in a free society when you try to suppress free speech or, in this case, free thinking.
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