BY PAULINE MAROIS
Fellow citizens of la Belle Province, let me begin with an appeal to my record as premier. You elected me based on my platform of not being Jean Charest. And haven’t I done exactly that? Haven’t I, since my election, been a person with an entirely different name and set of DNA than Jean Charest? So, considering the extent to which I have kept my campaign promises, I know you will forgive the liiiiiiiittle hiccup that I’ve come across with my secularism charter.
Now listen, I know that some of you think that this whole thing is a blatant attempt to manufacture an identity-related issue, so that my party actually has something to talk about during the next election, even though the province is more interested in things like educational reform and social inequality.
Ha ha ha! You guys!
You’re probably the same people that think that my resistance to multiculturalism has to do with a concern that it reduces the Quebecois to just another ethnic group underneath the umbrella of Anglo-Canada, and denies their special role as co-founders of Canada.
Some people do think that, but for me, personally, it’s all about the discrimination, baby!
Really, this isn’t like the thing with kirpans in schools, or Bill 101. Sure, there may have been an undercurrent of racism that blended with genuine concerns in those cases. But with the secularism charter, there are no actual issues to cloud the discrimination. This baby is as pure as French wine.
White wine.
There is one problem, though.
See, legislative discrimination is fun as balls, and we’re gonna want to do it again later.
But if we stop people from wearing religious headwear, then how will we be able to pass further legislation saying who is, and who is not, welcome in Quebec? After all, if Jewish people stop wearing Kippas, then how will I be able to tell them apart from real Quebecois? For all I would be able to tell by looking at them, they could be as Franco-Canadian as Montreal-style bagels or smoked meat!
Ultimately, if I can’t pass any more legislation that targets racial and religious minorities, will I have to start actually governing my province and looking out for the interests of my constituents?
Because I think we can all see that that would be the top of a very slippery slope.
Obviously, I’ve got a lot of thinking to do about whether or not to actually move forward with this secularism thing. In the meantime, I would like to kindly ask that all Quebec residents continue to talk about identity politics, and refrain from thinking about why their university fees have still gone up.
