He’s not off the hook yet. Remember, there were two complaints pending against him for his Maclean’s article about Islam and demography, one before the Canadian Human Rights Commission and the other before the British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal. The latter’s still being processed; as of this morning, the former no longer is. A snippet from the decision quoted on Steyn’s website states that his views were “not of an extreme nature” within the meaning of Canadian statutes, but that’s pure pretext. Ezra Levant, another conservative Canadian martyr to free speech (and there are many), peers through the smokescreen:

With an RCMP investigation, a Privacy Commission investigation and a pending Parliamentary investigation, they’re already fighting a multi-front P.R. war, and losing badly. Not a day goes by when the CHRC isn’t pummelled in the media. Holding a show trial of Maclean’s and Steyn, like the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal did earlier this month, would be writing their own political death sentence…

“There’s nothing to see here, people! So turn your TV cameras off, and let us continue on our work without your scrutiny! We promise not to target famous Canadians — at least not for a little while. We’ll keep picking on under-lawyered weaklings. We’ll continue to build up our jurisprudence, continue our 100% conviction rate, continue building legal precedents. So when we come for Maclean’s next time, we won’t have to blink.”…

The only question remaining is whether Heather MacNaughton, chief kangaroo of the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal, will convict Maclean’s. The “jurisprudence” is there; Maclean’s surely is “guilty” of “likely” “exposing” someone to “hatred or contempt”. Everyone’s guilty of that; so the only question is who gets charged.

…and how often they’re charged. Presumably, a separate complaint could be filed with the human rights tribunal of any province where Maclean’s was circulated. Follow the link to the National Review piece up top and you’ll see that Steyn initially was looking at three proceedings, not two. (The third apparently wasn’t taken up.) So it’s on now to British Columbia, where the Maclean’s case will jockey for position on the docket with a hate crimes complaint against a stand-up comedian for making gay jokes in a comedy club. Yes, really. Watch the clip at the end of that last link for the particulars. Exit quotation: “How can I be arrested because I’m an a**hole?”