Canada is still burning witches

Canada likes to present itself as America’s friendly neighbour to the north, a paragon of kindness and inclusivity. But beneath the flannel shirts and wholesome, outdoorsy image, it has turned into a laboratory for woke extremism. This is the nation where ‘compassion’ means ushering citizens towards state-assisted death, and where the bank accounts of anti-lockdown protesters are frozen to ensure public safety. The latest victim of Canada’s smothering embrace is nurse Amy Hamm.

A single mother with 13 years’ unblemished service, Hamm has been suspended from her post and slapped with a $94,000 (£50,000) bill by the British Columbia College of Nurses and Midwives (BCCNM). Her offence? Daring, in her own time and away from patients, to criticise gender ideology.

Her ordeal began in 2020, when she helped fund a Vancouver billboard declaring ‘I ♥ JK Rowling’. That modest act was enough to spark a complaint and set in motion years of persecution. From there came a 332-page report cataloguing her social-media activity, which the BCCNM branded ‘discriminatory and derogatory’.

Among the offending comments was her (accurate) observation that ‘trans activists [are] determined to infiltrate or destroy women-only spaces’ – condemned because it cast activists in a ‘negative connotation of improper, illegal, aggressive and destructive conduct’. Another post, mocking straight people who adopt ‘they / them’ pronouns and a ‘dumb haircut’, was judged harmful because it ‘indirectly disparages transgender people’.

Hamm has never hidden her views. She has described ‘gender identity’ as ‘anti-scientific, metaphysical nonsense’ and stressed that her concern is with safeguarding women and children. She has now launched an appeal, noting ‘biological reality matters, and so does freedom of expression’.

Canada is ground zero for transgenderism. Since Bill C-16 passed in 2017, the nebulous notions of ‘gender identity’ and ‘gender expression’ have been given legal protection, embedding activist dogma deep within the machinery of the state. What might once have been dismissed as a foolish fad is now enforced from the bench, the classroom and the clinic. Small wonder critics have taken to calling the country ‘Tranada’.

And now, to enforce compliance, examples must be made of ‘unkind’ citizens who speak up. Canadian women’s rights activist Meghan Murphy felt so hounded she left for Mexico, while psychologist Jordan Peterson has been dragged through years of state-backed attempts to muzzle him.

As for Hamm, no patients ever complained. No evidence of harm was presented. Not a single trans-identified person claimed to have suffered because of her words. Still, the BCCNM pressed on. What followed was 23 days of hearings across 18 months, with Hamm’s career left in limbo. She wasn’t even permitted to testify until three years into the process. When she did, she explained: ‘I’m there to do my job and to follow the policies of the organisation… I limit my advocacy to when I’m outside of work.’

That should have been the end of it. Instead, the panel found her guilty of unprofessional conduct because she had occasionally identified herself as a nurse online – linking her profession to statements that might cause offence. She was not punished for mistreating a patient, or even for breaking a workplace rule, but for expressing opinions her regulator disapproved of.

The punishment is staggering. Hamm must cover nearly $94,000 in costs – though enforcement is stayed pending her appeal to the British Columbia Supreme Court. Almost $38,000 of that sum went to the college’s expert witness, Dr Greta Bauer, who told the panel mothers should be called ‘birthing people’ and dismissed Hamm’s concerns as frivolous.

Two weeks after the verdict, Hamm was dismissed from her job with Vancouver Coastal Health, without severance pay. For a single mother, the financial and personal toll is brutal.

Hamm’s case exposes the rot in Canada’s professional bodies. Even the panel conceded the nurse was motivated by a genuine belief in women’s sex-based rights. But sincerity counted for nothing. What mattered was not harm done, but the possibility someone might be offended.

Canada likes to present itself as a progressive nation built on kindness. But ‘care’ ought to include protecting the right of citizens to speak freely without fear. What has happened to Hamm is anything but compassionate or enlightened – it has more in common with the vindictiveness of a medieval tribunal. Her name has been blackened, her ruined career left dangling like a body in gibbet. The message to professionals is clear: speak out, and you’ll be next on the scaffold.

Jo Bartosch is co-author of the upcoming book, Pornocracy. Pre-order it here.