Wednesday, October 25, 2017

Alive And Well



There was a time I foolishly thought we had outgrown racial and religious prejudice. The ascension of Donald Trump has underscored the fact that racial prejudice is alive and well. And now Bill 62, in the province I know only too well, has confirmed that Lionel Groulx's ghost still stalks the body politic. Martin Patriquin writes that the bill is "Racist. Misogynist. Xenophobic. Anti-Muslim. Anti-religion. Hateful. Divisive."

But Philippe Couillard's Liberals will not suffer any political consequences for passing it into law:

To understand why, let’s look at who traditionally supports the Quebec Liberal party. Since the founding of the Parti Québécois in 1968, the QLP has had a Bon Cop Bad Cop relationship with the leading sovereignist party. As the province’s federalist bulwark against the nasty separatists, it harvested the support of anyone wishing to remain within Canada: anglophones, big businesses, the financial sector and the many French Quebecers who didn’t buy into René Lévesque’s dream. And almost all the immigrants.

The PQ’s nativist bent only pushed Quebec’s immigrant population deeper into the Liberal bosom. When he blamed the separatist loss of the 1995 referendum on “money and some ethnic votes,” Premier Jacques Parizeau undid years of good work by the likes of Lévesque and Gerald Godin, his first immigration minister, who tried like blazes to sell the virtues of sovereignty to Quebec’s cultural communities.

The trend continued in 2013, when the PQ introduced the so-called “Quebec values charter”, which sought to purge “conspicuous” religious articles from the bodies all those drawing government paycheques. As QC125.com poll aggregator Philippe Fournier points out, the PQ’s support among non-francophones took another nosedive in the wake of its this particularly noxious gambit.

The PQ never was able to appeal to non-francophones. They have no where to go except the Liberals. And the Liberals can expand their appeal to nous autres. There are lots of votes under rocks. And politicians know how to mine them.

Racial and religious prejudice is alive and well.

Image: Canadian Civil Liberties Association

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

And once again, taxpayers will foot the bill when the courts kick this legislative trash to the curb. I wish there was some way of making Philippe Couillon personally responsible for paying those court costs.

Cap

Owen Gray said...

The new law taps an old vein in Quebec, Cap. It's been there long before Couillard's birth. And, unfortunately, it will probably survive him well into the future.

Lorne said...

Given the likelihood the law will eventually be deemed unconstitutional by the Supreme Court, I have wondered, Owen, if Quebec will invoke the notwithstanding clause. If it does, it will be defining itself for a long time to come.

Steve said...

I have to respectfully disagree. The law was supposed to keep religion out of public life
and I know they have gone back on the cross.

I am a little more informed than the average citizen about living life in a Muslim Kingdom. Its a Trump wet dream to say the least, and I fear the power of that religion. Islam is like
a Tony Robbins experience in a deprivation tub. I have had nothing but good times and good friends living in some measure most of two decades in a Muslim way. My biggest complaint
no bacon at breakfast. That is not to say its a good idea in any way.

Just how long do you think it will be until we have the Muslim Party to contend with
along with the bloc?


Owen Gray said...

There's so much I love about Quebec, Lorne. But, there is a saying in the province which some of us used ironically: "Quebec se faire." -- which translates roughly as "Quebec knows how to." Quebec knows how to do somethings very well. And it knows how to do somethings very badly.

Owen Gray said...

What you neglect to consider, Steve, is the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The law will be challenged as a violation of the Charter.

The Mound of Sound said...

The law has nothing to do with keeping religion out of public life. And the veiled notion of a caliphate emerging in Canada is also bullshit.

Owen Gray said...

We live in an Age of Galloping Paranoia, Mound.