First they came for the ---holes, but I was not an ---hole.

Anthony Furey writing in Canada's National Post:

Compare that [Bill C-10, which would allow government to decide what film productions receive certain tax credits, and which has inspired much public outcry] to what could happen if a human rights tribunal decides against [magazine] Maclean's [for publishing Mark Steyn's opinions regarding Islam]: It could order the private magazine to publish material and images against its editors' wishes. Let me repeat that: The state will order Maclean's to publish something it does not want to publish. Isn't that what China does? So why don't ear-to-the-ground, free speech-loving Canadian artists denounce it?

At a trendy Toronto Annex watering hole, I recently posed this question to a lead scion of the left. Without hesitation he said, "Because Mark Steyn's an ---hole." "That may be," I responded. "He may also be right-wing, and you may be left-wing. But those are very poor reasons to deny a person or group their Charter rights." The fellow conceded my point, but I could sense he didn't understand how easily he could come to find himself in the same position in the near future.

Disturbingly common, this blind spot -- glee that some rule or another is being used against the other people, without even the most self-serving awareness "Hey, in a different political climate, this rule might be used against me too!"  I can't decide if it's a failure of empathy, of logic, or of long-term thinking.