For several months, I've been receiving hateful, racist comments, that purport to be from Dimitri the Lover at Your Ward News. These comments are left on various blog entries on TorontoMike.com. Until yesterday, my policy was to delete and ignore.
Yesterday, this individual submitted a comment on the entry about the episode of Toronto Mike'd with Chuck D. Here's that comment, which was held for moderation because I've banned the keywords "your ward news".
This is now, sadly, a regular occurence. I was going to delete and ignore, but then this unrelated comment was left on the most recent Open Mike.
Getting attacked by both sides really irked me, so I tweeted about it.
This is a shitty time for anyone hosting an open online forum. Here are two comments left on https://t.co/MlGsga4Aq9 over the past 24 hours. pic.twitter.com/sFEx1jpJqB— Toronto Mike (@torontomike) July 28, 2019
Here are typical anti-Semitic comments left when I have on a guest of the Jewish faith.
Here's a comment left on my entry about TMLX3, a recent gathering of Toronto Mike'd listeners.
You get the idea of what I've been dealing with. A little Googling revealed that "Dimitri the Lover" from Your Ward News is an alias used by James Sears. James Sears (who has two 1991 convictions for sexual assault) was recently found guilty in the Ontario Court of Justice on two counts of "">wilful promotion of hatred against an identifiable group – Jews and women" under Canada's Criminal Code".
Two men behind a free Toronto-area newspaper that promoted legalizing rape and denied the Holocaust occurred were found guilty on Thursday of promoting hatred against women and Jews.
In delivering his decision in the case of James Sears and LeRoy St. Germaine, Ontario Court of Justice Judge Richard Blouin called evidence of their guilt overwhelming.
Your Ward News editor not guilty of uttering death threats Federal government issues permanent postal ban on hate speech publication Sears, 55, the editor in chief and St. Germaine, 77, the publisher, had argued Your Ward News was meant to be satire, but Blouin found nothing funny about their views. If what they were doing didn't amount to wilful hate promotion, the judge said, nothing would.
"YWN repeatedly and consistently dehumanized Jews and women," Blouin said in his ruling. "Both men were fully aware of the unrelenting promotion of hate."
The comments purporting to be from Sears come from TOR exit node addresses. As a result, there's no way to confirm if they're from Sears or someone pretending to be Sears. I exchanged emails with James Sears today and he denies these are from him.
Since these comments are coming from different anonymous IP addresses, the only surefire way to stop them is to disable commenting on this site. I've had open commenting on this site since 2002 and I'd like to keep it that way. I hate the idea of one bullying bigot forcing my hand.
Illegitimi non carborundum.
