Charte: Drainville répond aux critiques de ses collègues | Le Devoir

2014/04/16 Leave a comment

The debate has started within the PQ regarding the role or not of the proposed Charter in the election results:

Dès le lendemain de l’élection, le député de Lac-Saint-Jean, Alexandre Cloutier, est l’un de ceux qui ont affirmé que le PQ aurait dû « se concentrer sur ce qui faisait davantage consensus » plutôt que de s’acharner à vouloir adopter la charte dans son intégralité. Selon lui, le PQ aurait pu légiférer sur les signes ostentatoires en concluant un compromis avec la Coalition avenir Québec (CAQ).

Jean-François Lisée a pour sa part indiqué qu’il trouvait exagéré que la charte interdise le port de signes religieux ostentatoires dans les hôpitaux, les universités ainsi que dans les municipalités. Le député de Rosemont a aussi confié qu’une période de transition plus longue aurait été préférable pour mettre en place les mesures de la charte. Le PQ avait notamment prévu une période d’un an pour les employés de l’État et de cinq ans pour les fonctionnaires du milieu universitaire, médical et municipal.

Charte: Drainville répond aux critiques de ses collègues | Le Devoir.

Drainville, for his part, demonstrates his total ignorance of Canadian multiculturalism, and remains in at least a defensive if not denial mode:

Le modèle de multiculturalisme canadien préconise une forme de cohabitation côte à côte dans laquelle les différentes communautés vivent séparément. Il n’y a pas dans le multiculturalisme de volonté de construire une fondation commune. Nous croyons le fait que de définir clairement un espace où les différentes religions ne s’immiscent pas dans le rapport entre les citoyens et leur État est un gage d’égalité et de respect pour tout un chacun. L’État, comme une grande table où tous les citoyens sont invités à venir s’asseoir. Peu importe leurs différences de sexe, d’orientation sexuelle, d’origine, de croyance ou de non-croyance. L’interdiction du port de signes religieux pour les employés de l’État visait cet objectif. Tout le contraire d’exclure.

Évidemment, nous étions conscients que nous en demandions à certaines communautés plus qu’à d’autres. Nous en étions conscients et préoccupés ; d’où la création d’une période de transition d’un an pour tous les employés de l’État et jusqu’à cinq ans pour les employés du réseau de la santé, des municipalités, des cégeps et des universités.

La charte des valeurs, un premier bilan

Filed under Charte des valeurs québécoise, Interculturalisme, Multiculturalism Tagged with , ,

New Policy Accommodating Sikh Kirpan at Canadian Missions Abroad

2014/04/16 Leave a comment

Another application of the Supreme Court’s Multani decision (allow Sikh children to carry the kirpan at school). Reasonable accommodation and responding to community concerns. Timing of announcement, of course, is political (on Vaisakhi)

Will be interesting to see if any commentary on this decision outside of Quebec:

Visitors to Canadian missions who declare themselves to be Sikhs will be permitted to retain their kirpans when entering the missions, provided their kirpans are secured within a sheath, attached to a fabric belt and worn under clothing across the torso. They should also be in possession of the four other Sikh articles of faith.

New Policy Accommodating Sikh Kirpan at Canadian Missions Abroad.

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Meet a Few “Citizens of Convenience”

2014/04/15 Leave a comment

Along with some illustrative scenarios, some of the questions I suggest in considering whether one is or is not a citizen of convenience in my recent piece in New Canadian Media:

Is it only time away from Canada following becoming Canadian that counts? Or should the reasons for being away from Canada also be a consideration? Examples include:

  • Someone working abroad for a Canadian or a non-Canadian firm

  • Someone working for an international organization like the UN, WTO or non-governmental organization

  • Someone moving abroad to accompany a spouse

  • Someone moving abroad for study

  • Other contributions to Canada

Meet a Few “Citizens of Convenience” – New Canadian Media – NCM.

Filed under Citizenship Tagged with ,

Ontario Liberals to target ethnic voters with demographic database software

2014/04/15 Leave a comment

More on “shopping for votes” and targeting key demographics, this time ethnic communities:

A Liberal source said the software processes census data that can then be fed into Liberalist and matched to individual addresses. It would show, for instance, which houses or apartments are likely to contain Italian-speaking residents, allowing a campaign to target them with Italian-speaking volunteers.

The software lets users see where particular cultural groups are clustered, so they can tailor their campaign efforts to the community. If the tool identified a neighbourhood with a high number of Muslim residents, for example, a campaign can structure its canvassing efforts around prayer times, the source said. The program has already been used by the federal Liberals.

Pitney Bowes makes a range of commercial software generally used by companies for marketing campaigns or to analyze demographic data when determining where to do business.

Provided with a sketch of her briefing, including the software, Ms. Sorbara declined to be interviewed.

“I don’t comment publicly on campaign strategy and would therefore not have had anything to add to your outline,” she wrote in an e-mail.

The PCs are believed to already have sophisticated technology for determining where key voting demographics are and how to reach them. Their techniques are a closely guarded secret, but one insider said the party overhauled its program after the 2011 election and further tweaked it after two by-elections last winter.

Ontario Liberals to target ethnic voters with demographic database software – The Globe and Mail.

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British government must proceed with caution in reviewing Muslim Brotherhood

2014/04/15 Leave a comment

Interesting commentary on the review of the Muslim Brotherhood in the UK and some of the domestic and international risks that Dr. Hellyer of the Royal United Services Institute in London and the Brookings Institution in Washington DC thinks are significant:

The likely outcome of the review is not a terrorist designation, if the evidence being relied upon is the same that has been available thus far. There is evidence to suggest the Muslim Brotherhood is sectarian, permissive of incitement, and other such unsavoury characteristics, including a willingness to engage in violence for political ends. Such characteristics differ widely across the organization, depending on the country. However, it would be difficult for such evidence to amount to a terrorist designation for the Brotherhood. It is dubious to think that the review will deliver such a verdict unless the Brotherhood changes quite dramatically between now and the time the review is completed. Such a designation, it ought to be remembered, would have to stand up in a British court of law.

The review, therefore, is likely to deliver a rather unflattering picture of the Brotherhood, but not result in a terrorist designation. The timing of its delivery is also quite important to note: it is due to happen in July, which is close to when parliament ends its session in the UK. It is also when the Arab world will slow down owing to the summer holidays, Ramadan and Eid. Indeed, it is entirely plausible the review will be completed, and its results are not even reacted to by very many people at all. However, the UK government will be able to note that it has taken the concerns of its allies in the region seriously, without actually doing very much at all.

British government must proceed with caution in reviewing Muslim Brotherhood – The Globe and Mail.

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Finding a cure for hate | Toronto Star

2014/04/15 Leave a comment

Interesting and lengthy article on trying to understand the psychological and medical reasons behind hate, an initiative by Dr. Izzedin Abuelaish, of U of T’s Dalla Lana School of Public Health, who became famous after most of his family was killed by an Israeli rocket in Gaza, and became the basis for his book, I Shall Not Hate.

For his part, Abuelaish likes to think of hatred as a disease or mental disorder. It certainly works, metaphorically — hatred spreads from person to person, like an infection, he says. It can metastasize, like cancer; it can be chronic, like diabetes. People are not born with hatred, he believes; they acquire it from the environment, just as people are exposed to bacteria or second-hand smoke.

Others at the workshop were hesitant to brand hatred as a disease or disorder. Much controversy has come from the “great tendency of psychiatry to turn issues that are popularly in the human condition into mental disorders,” noted Dr. Alexander Simpson, chief of forensic psychiatry with the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) in Toronto.

“To hear a universal human experience — an expression of negative emotion like hate — being someway turned into a disease is the sort of thing that psychiatry’s been told off for doing for the last 30 years,” Simpson said. “I have some reluctance to consider that.”

He raised the possibility that perhaps hatred can be likened to blood pressure; we all have it but when it reaches a certain level, we get sick.

Finding a cure for hate | Toronto Star.

Filed under Hate crimes, Racism Tagged with

Separatism was dealt a blow, but don’t think it was knocked out – The Globe and Mail

2014/04/14 Leave a comment

Good thoughtful commentary and advice by André Pratte of La Presse (but in the Globe):

That’s where the duty of the rest of Canada, the federal government and Quebec federalists begins. First and foremost, we should resist the temptation to put up the “Mission Accomplished” banner. Second, we have to get French-speaking Quebeckers more involved in national institutions, beginning with the Government of Canada. It is not good for either the province or the country that Quebec is so weakly represented in the federal cabinet as it has been in recent times. And finally, we need to constantly and intelligently promote federalism, so that Quebeckers not only reject independence but embrace the Canadian work-in-progress.

Separatism may not be a threat in the near future. But beware of the sleeping dragon. And in the meantime, we should be careful about the mutual indifference that has come to characterize the relationship between Quebec and the Rest of Canada. That indifference could surreptitiously lead to a de facto separation.

Separatism was dealt a blow, but don’t think it was knocked out – The Globe and Mail.

Don Macpherson of the Gazette reminds us of the risks of raising expectations and constitutional negotiations (Don Macpherson: Only federalists can awaken the sovereignty movement). ButDaniel Weinstock wants to reopen constitutional discussions, as they end up being more polarizing:

If on the other hand, political leaders in the ROC interpret this election (and perhaps also the last federal election, that saw the Quebec electorate reject the Bloc Québécois en masse for a federalist party) as giving rise to an historical opportunity, a main tendue inviting them to complete Canada’s coming to full self-consciousness as a multinational federation united by the political will to affirm the individual rights of all Canadians and the legitimate aspirations to self-determinations of all of its constituent polities (Quebec, to be sure, but also the First Nations with whom we share our land), then, perhaps, the right answer to the question with which I began this post is that the 2014 election will come to be seen as the moment at which the sovereignist movement died.

Now, I concede that there is not much political hay to be made for any party at this historical juncture in Canada in adopting, and in acting on, the latter interpretation. Some political leaders in the ROC are just as depressingly prone as are some of the political leaders in Quebec to give a great deal of weight in their political decision-making to the short-term electoral costs of standing up for minority rights. The mark of the true statesperson is however to look beyond the next election, (I think Kant said that) even if in doing so he or she is looked upon askance by voters.

The Ball is in ROC’s Court | In Due Course.

Conrad Black is equally wanting to stir things up:

Quebec is ready to deal

Filed under Government, Multiculturalism Tagged with ,

Zero-tolerance on FGM doesn’t have to be an attack on multiculturalism

2014/04/14 Leave a comment

A reminder that change works best from within, and the role that governments, organizations and people can play in making these kinds of cultural changes. Much more productive than just labelling cultures and religions. How best to encourage such dialogue in a way that engages, rather than dismisses, is the challenge:

The problem is that many on both sides of the debate feel they have to pick a side. That supporting multiculturalism is somehow inconsistent with supporting rights for minorities – including women. But we know that cultures are not as fixed and unchanging as powerful advocates within them may like to make out – they shape themselves to the conditions around them, to social and economic imperatives, and they often liberalise rapidly in new worlds and environments by combining a healthy recognition of traditions, backgrounds and cultural practices with new and modernised interpretations of what it means to belong to that culture in a globalising world.

We also know that change within cultures can only happen when advocates and allies within those cultures are empowered to change minds and hearts around them – and this is where governments must focus their efforts when tackling such problems. The most powerful voices are always those on the inside, not the outside – and governments would do well to work with those voices in order to amplify them.

That has been the real success of the campaign on FGM – its increased visibility in the past two years, and the way in which it has made voices more prominent. Campaigners such as Leyla Hussain, an FGM survivor from the campaign group Daughters of Eve are so important for this very reason, as are political advocates such as Jennette Arnold AM and Diane Abbott MP – who have campaigned on this issue and taken a strong position of leadership for some years. All three of these speakers were present at a meeting of the Fabian Women’s Network last week. Abena Oppong-Asare, who chaired the discussion spoke eloquently about the role FGM has played in regulating women’s bodies, desires and self-expression in different cultures.

It is in this direction (of leadership, advocacy and dialogue with communities) that governments must look – if they are to reconcile protecting rights of individuals with the objection that cultural practices are a no-go area for policy makers because those policy makers “just don’t understand”.

New Statesman | Zero-tolerance on FGM doesn’t have to be an attack on multiculturalism.

Filed under Multiculturalism, Religion Tagged with ,

Ontario Catholic schools grapple with court’s no-religion ruling: Walkom | Toronto Star

2014/04/14 Leave a comment

One of the historic anomalies in Ontario is a publicly funded separate Catholic school system that was part of the initial bargain of Confederation. A recent court decision allows students to opt-out of religious instruction. Tom Walkom of the Star:

The public sphere is inclusive. Religion is not. With religion, you are either in or out. You are either part of a body of believers or you are not.

Some religions, including Christianity, welcome converts. Many preach tolerance toward other faiths.

But in virtually every religion, there is a fundamental distinction between those who accept certain precepts as true and those who do not. And non-believers are — by definition — wrong.

Ontario’s Catholic schools have already found it hard to navigate the tricky path between church orthodoxy and public acceptability, most recently over the issue of gay-straight student clubs.

Thanks to a 1997 court decision, they have managed to retain the right to discriminate in employment. Catholic schools need not hire non-Catholic teachers.

But if they can’t make their students experience even a little bit of Catholicism — if, in order to qualify for government support, they are simply public schools with a dress code — why bother?

Ontario Catholic schools grapple with court’s no-religion ruling: Walkom | Toronto Star

Chris Selley in the National Post:

The Progressive Conservatives at least tried to address this bizarre inequality: Leader John Tory proposed extending funding to schools of other religions, and was trounced for his efforts by an electorate that then instantly forgot about the issue. They won’t go down that road again. That the Liberals and New Democrats can live with a single, publicly funded religious school system that considers homosexual acts “objectively disordered,” and buses students to pro-life rallies, only gets more astonishing every year.

One might thank Mr. Erazo for shining some light on this absurdity. But alas, nobody’s paying any attention. You can’t stop Ontario’s march of incoherent progress.

Get on your knees and opt-out

Filed under Multiculturalism, Religion Tagged with , ,

Philippe Couillard is in a secular charter mess of his own: Siddiqui | Toronto Star

2014/04/12 1 Comment

While there is merit to Siddiqui’s points, there is a strong current, whether we like it or not, in Quebec that fears the “other.” Bouchard and Taylor recommended their laicisme ouvert in recognition of this reality. Let’s see the detailed proposal before being too critical:

Irony is that the premier-elect stands compromised on the very issue that Quebecers have soundly rejected — defeating not only the PQ government but the charter’s chief architect, Marois, in her own riding, and the five militantly pro-charter women she had backed it (including four Muslim and one Jewish), each full of contradictions and wild conspiracy theories against Muslims and Jews.

Had Couillard taken a principled position, he would now have had the golden opportunity to put an end to all the anti-Semitic, anti-Islamic and anti-Sikh nonsense that has been peddled in the name of secularism.

Another of his mistakes was to accept that hijab equals militancy. He formed a Liberal panel to study “fundamentalism,” including the radicalization of young people. To mitigate the proposal’s Islamophobic undercurrent, he said the panel would also tackle Christian fundamentalists who won’t have their children vaccinated. That’s a matter for public health authorities, as jihadism is for police, to tackle, not politicians pondering basic rights and freedoms.

The premier-elect made it worse Tuesday by elevating his internal party proposal into the broad official quest for consensus on the charter — “to prevent certain manifestations of fundamentalism.”

Philippe Couillard is in a secular charter mess of his own: Siddiqui | Toronto Star.

Filed under Interculturalisme, Multiculturalism Tagged with , ,

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