You should remember: it was less than a month ago when I posted this Ethics Quiz with the question, “Should the government protect historic structures and artifacts that relate to dark events and less than admirable figures (by today’s values) in local and American history?” Something stupid is in the air, and that air has clearly reached Canada. For there is another controversy there about a couple wanting to erase all references to their historic home’s “less than admirable figure” by today’s [woke] values.”

Dr. Arnold Mahesan, a wealthy fertility specialist of Sri Lankan descent, and his wife, entrepreneur and former “Real Housewives of Toronto” actressRoxanne Earle, whose family comes from Pakistan, bought a house for $5 million in 2022 with a Toronto heritage designation in an affluent midtown Toronto neighborhood. The couple is adamant that the city should remove the heritage restriction from their home because, in their view, the original owner held racist opinions. Opinions.

Stapleton Pitt Caldecott, a former Toronto Board of Trade president, built the two-and-a-half story, 9,000-square foot house in 1906. He was opposed to immigration—the current residents of the home the descendants of immigrants, you will note—and also he believed immigrants should assimilate into their new country’s society and culture. Imagine that!

Oh-oh. I agree with that aspect of Caldecott’s beliefs. Well, there goes the prospects of 2707 Westminster Place being designated the “Jack Marshall House”!

“Stapleton Caldecott would’ve been appalled by us living in the house he commissioned,” Mahesan told a meeting of the Toronto Preservation Board, using a variation of Rationalization #32, “The Unethical Role Model.” He also complained that he and his wife only discovered that their home was a designated heritage property last year, when they decided that they wanted to modify the house’s steep stairway from the sidewalk. That fact means that they must have the city’s permission before making any major changes to the property. To this, I say: “Tough noogies!” (and old Arlington, Mass. playground expression). “Let the buyer beware” has some unreasonable applications, but not this one. They paid millions for a house without checking its history and legal status. That’s their misfortune.

Nevertheless, the crusading couple applied to the board to have the designation repealed on the grounds that it was approved by the city in haste, because adequate research would would have revealed that its original owner and builder “held views that should have excluded it from preservation.”

Wow. Imagine if the United States regarded the historic homes of its important figures excluded from preservation because the owners held views in previous centuries that wouldn’t be tolerated by today’s progressive fanatics. All the plantations would be razed, like the Carter Plantation, John Tyler’s amazing Sherwood Forest, along with George Washington’s Mount Vernon, Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello, Andrew Jackson’s The Hermitage, William Randolph Hearst’s mansion, the magnificent Newport summer estates on the Astors and Vanderbilts (among others)…heck, even the White House could be replaced by McDonalds! A lot of the famous residents of that place had outrageous beliefs, including the current one.

The board turned down the couple’s request—GOOD!— but also weenied out so they wouldn’t be accused of being complete traitors to “the cause.” The TPB concluded the home’s designation had less to do with its association with Caldecott than with home’s unique design and structure, and voted to remove all references to Caldecott from city documents that explain the house’s significance. The man built the house, approved the design, and lived in it. He has been airbrushed out of Toronto history, not because of anything he did, but because of his opinions. And that’s still not enough for the Angry Celebrity Immigrant Fan Couple: Mahesan told the board that only removing all references to Caldecott amounts to “putting our thumbs over that part of history.” He and his wife want to rewrite Toronto’s history entirely so there’s no evidence that the horrible man who didn’t hold the “right” beliefs more than a century ago ever existed.

(So they can alter a stairway…)