The trend of people being punished for private views continues, this time in Canada, where a Nurse has been ordered to pay legal costs of nearly $100,000, had her nursing licence suspended for a month and lost her job because of her online posts.

Amy Hamm of British Columbia was investigated by the British Columbia College of Nurses and Midwives after they received two complaints about her support for a billboard which said “I ♥ JK Rowling”. The billboard was in support of the famous author who has spoken out against men encroaching on women’s spaces.

The College investigated three years’ worth of Hamm’s online posts and after issuing a 332-page report, hauled her before a disciplinary committee.

According to a report from Spiked:

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’.

Much like HRLA clients Dr Jereth Kok and Jasmine Sussex here in Australia, these comments were all posted on her own time and on her own personal social media accounts. There were no complaints about her nursing performance, and no complaints from her patients about any posts.

They punished her anyway.

Her posts also made no reference to how she treats transgender people in her job, and, in fact, she has said she always uses “preferred pronouns” in dealing with patients in line with her employer’s policy.

However, because she identifies herself as a nurse on her social media profiles, the College found standing to discipline her.

As is often the case, the process became the punishment with Hamm forced to sit through 23 days of hearings stretched over 18 months, resulting in her paying the large legal costs of the case and having her nursing licence suspended. Two weeks after the verdict, Hamm was dismissed by her employer Vancouver Coastal Health.

Hamm’s ordeal is yet another example of broadly written anti-discrimination laws resulting in harsh punishments for private speech.

Hamm will be appealing the outcome to the Supreme Court of British Columbia.

In Australia, HRLA will continue to oppose these assaults on free speech and work with those in facing similar punishment for speaking the truth on their own time.

^{Image source: Spiked. Canada is still burning witches}