There are lots of Canadians who have a viscerally negative reaction to the name Trudeau -- father and son. Susan Delacourt writes:
Justin Trudeau has now said it twice — there are Canadians, he admits, who won’t believe him, no matter what he says.
Who are these Canadians? They are obviously not Liberal supporters, the prime minister says. “No matter what I say, people are going to wonder — if they didn’t vote for me — whether or not they can trust me,” Trudeau told reporters on Friday.
They are also disproportionally men.
What's going on?
“So 36 per cent of men in Canada, over one in three, have a very negative view of the prime minister,” says Abacus CEO David Coletto. “They really, really don’t like him.” Women who reported “very negative” views, on the other hand, numbered around 26 per cent. “Men tend to dislike the prime minister more than women,” Coletto says.
“I mean, Stephen Harper wasn’t beloved or loved at any point when he was in office, and people didn’t really like him,” Coletto says, “But it wasn’t as deeply emotional … They usually didn’t like him because they fundamentally disagreed on policy, whereas these people disagree with Trudeau on policies but it goes far deeper — they don’t like him as a person.”
It’s new for Canada too, Coletto argues, more similar to the kind of hostility shown in the United States to former president Barack Obama and former presidential contender Hillary Clinton.
When Coletto focused in on the demographic details of this 36 per cent of male voters, some of his findings were not a huge surprise. A strong current of negativity is linked to geography, demography and politics. If you’re a man who despises Trudeau, you’re more likely to be over 45 and from Alberta or Saskatchewan.
Half of this group places itself on the right of the political spectrum, 38 per cent in the centre and nine per cent on the left. About 60 per cent of them voted Conservative in the last election, 13 per cent voted for the People’s Party of Canada, seven per cent for the NDP and just three per cent for the Liberals. Again, no surprise.
Sociologically, they couldn’t be described as comfortable, either with Canada at present or their own lives. They’re less happy in their general outlook, which Coletto found interesting; on a 10-point scale, men with very negative views of Trudeau place themselves around the 5.9 mark, compared to 6.9 per cent for men with milder views. “That’s a big difference,” Coletto says.
In this poll, Abacus asked the negative voters what it was about Trudeau they disliked, and what words they would use to describe him. Some of the most common were “idiot,” “phoney,” “arrogant,” “liar” and “corrupt.”
The dislike, in other words, is intensely personal. When Coletto asked which Trudeau policies ticked off the men who have very harsh views, they cited his handling of the pandemic and budgets, corruption and wasteful spending. Coletto says it’s unlikely Trudeau could reverse these people’s views with different policies; they’re not going to view him positively, as the prime minister himself admits, “no matter what he says.”
Trudeau knows who hates him and why. And he knows there is nothing he can do about it.
Image: Western Standard
10 comments:
“No matter what I say, people are going to wonder — if they didn’t vote for me — whether or not they can trust me,”
Actually, no Mr. Trudeau, because this:
"As Prime Minister, I’ll make sure the 2015 election will be the last under first-past-the-post system"
https://twitter.com/JustinTrudeau/status/646114034463338497
Even people who voted for you are quite aware they can't trust you.
- kh
Long story short, the Cons' relentless Trudeau bashing is having its desired effect on right-wingers, and not so much on anyone outside the right-wing media bubble. Without knowing if there's been any shift in attitude over time, it's hard to know what to make of this, especially since PP is polling very low outside Saskberta, and especially low among women.
That has been Trudeau's greatest blunder, kh. And he will never live it down.
The polls seem to indicate that opposition to Trudeau is centered in Alberta and Saskatchewan, Cap. That's not enough to put Poilievre in the Prime Minister's office.
Thanks for kh"s comment taking care of my preamble and Owen's affirmation as to JT's immense stumble. I have always thought that Trudeau has often misjudged and maligned many who don't see his sugar coated opinions as those to live by. In my 70 years in this country i didn't realise that I lived in a country of "Institutionalised Racism" until he told us we were. I wasn't prepared for the fact that by expressing my opinion on the BDS movement made me an Anti-semite. His comments on National Women's day that Trans men are women does little to appease those feminists or supporters of women in sport issues by defining them as practicing trans hate. He is often too quick to define all Canadians as either with him or against him and therefore "haters". I think we should all kind of take a breath here and tone back the rhetoric. I will though, will always have an"immense and passionate dislike " for him.
Definition of Hate
feel intense or passionate dislike for (someone).
"the boys hate each other"
We definitely need to dial back the rhetoric, zoombats. We only have to look south to see what happens when you don't do that.
Those who dislike Trudeau, Jr most likely didn't like Trudeau Sr or their parents didn't.
why they didn't like Trudeau Sr. is easy. He didn't suffer fools gladly, didn't care what people thought of him, had a vision for Canada. He was a different type of politician. What people may forget is while he was P.M. Canada was able to bring their Constitution to Canada from G.B. and then write a new one, which gave us rights we did not enjoy previously. That Constituion held up against 9 pieces of Legislation Harper passed through Parliament by Harper and comopany.
The other great change Trudeau Sr made was the new U.I Act of 1971. It raised rates. Prior to 1971 U.I./E.I. weekly payments were barely enough to pay the rent and certainly not groceries. There was no sick or maternity leave from U.I./E.I. If you were sick and couldn't work, it was too bad. You had to go on welfare and they usually refused you if you owned a house or in some cases wanted your house. Prior to 1971 some women who needed their jobs took their 2 week vacation to give birth and then returned to work. Trudeau's changes provided for 15 weeks of paid leave, 66 2/3 of their insured income. Those benefits have expanded over the decades although some governments reduced the weekly amount and reduced the number of people who qualified for E.I. When the 1971 Act was passed it was the closest Canada got to having a guaranteed income--8 weeks of work and you were good for about 6 months of U.I.
Trudeau did more to change this country than other P.M.s I wasn't a federal Liberal but I certainly respected Trudeau Sr. for the work he did and the changes he made to our country.
Trudeau Sr. left his mark on Canadian history, e.a.f. We'll have to wait to find out what historians think of Trudeau Jr.
The vote-system-broken-promise may be Jr's biggest blunder
but
The irony of kh's comment is that the same 36% who hate Trudeau would never embrace Pro-Rep.
Unfortunately, PoV, that's probably true.
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