Citizenship and Immigration committee   to the definition of “barbaric”. Is that an appropriate term to use in this case? Mr. Gora.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  I certainly believe we should endorse this bill in terms of curbing all those malpractices that have been mentioned in this bill—polygamy and forced marriages.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Absolutely.

Citizenship and Immigration committee   is coming from a party whose leader, the Liberal leader, did not want to call these practices barbaric. We will say exactly what this is. They are barbaric cultural practices and they have no place in Canada. Starting from Mr. Gora, could you please comment on the semantics

Citizenship and Immigration committee  I personally believe that calling a spade a spade should not a problem in a free society. I was born and raised in a Muslim family and in a Muslim South Asian culture. First of all, we have to define the culture. When someone asks me who I am, I say that I am Punjabi, South Asia

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Thank you. Mr. Gora, it's quite disturbing to hear of the cleric in the Toronto area, I believe you said, who made the comment that if he had a choice between Islamic law and Canadian law, he would follow Islamic law. Of course, that's his interpretation of Islamic law; I don't

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Yes, sir. Before I comment on that, I'll just add one line on, as you said, Canadian law versus faith-based laws. Certainly it's not just one cleric who is saying this. This is the basis for the whole sharia law and what some of the clerics look for. We as Canadians need to fig

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Mr. Gora.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  I certainly feel that this bill would provide an additional tool in terms of tightened legislation against polygamists and forced marriages issues, because what we have seen and what we see today is that polygamy cases, for instance, are not registered and they don't come under t

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Thank you, Mr. Gora. Mr. Gora has submitted his brief to us, and it will be translated. The document will be distributed to the members of the committee as soon as it is available in both official languages. Before I give the floor to Ms. Desloges, I would like to welcome

Citizenship and Immigration committee   this is important in a context where our society is increasingly relativist and, in a rush to respect other cultures, we often overlook the fact that there is a reason why our own Canadian culture has developed in the way that it has. Much has been made, as my friend Tahir just mentioned

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Thank you very much. Honourable Chairperson of the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration, honourable members of Parliament, good morning. My name is Tahir Gora. I am the director general of Canadian Thinkers' Forum, which is a not-for-profit organization and a think

Citizenship and Immigration committee  I want to welcome everyone to the 44th meeting of the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration. Today, we are continuing our study of Bill S-7. Thank you very much to our two witnesses for joining us today. From the Canadian Thinkers' Forum, we have Tahir Gora

Public Safety committee  Thank you very much. We're over time, Mr. Easter. On behalf of the committee, I would like to thank Mr. Tod, Mr. Gora, Ms. Shahida, and Mr. Neumann so much for your informed and informative comments tonight. We certainly appreciate it. Your perspectives are certainly

Public Safety committee  I'm not an Internet lawyer or expert on how to address Internet radicalization. Through our research we see so many Facebook groups and pages in Arabic, Persian, and Urdu, and I'm sure Canadian law enforcement agencies probably don't have full access to the content on those Faceb