The symposium was titled ” Talking about racism in psychiatry: an important but difficult conversation”.
Posted at 5:00 a.m.
The DD Cécile Rousseau would never have thought it would be so difficult. Not between psychiatrists, surely capable, she told herself, of analyzing with detachment the social tensions that divide Quebec. She was wrong.
It was so difficult, in fact, that the conversation just didn’t happen.
It was June 3, at the annual conference of the Association of Psychiatric Physicians of Quebec (AMPQ). In preparation for the symposium, the Dr Pierre Lalonde had prepared a presentation, in which he questioned the existence of systemic racism in the medical world.
The Dr Lalonde was unable to present his point of view; Faced with pressure from certain members, the AMPQ canceled its presentation without even hearing it.
Before we go any further: there are no good guys or bad guys in this story. It would be too easy to make another illustration of the cancel culture in Quebec.
Too easy to use it to fuel the fire of this divisive and divided debate: for some, Quebec would be invaded by woke censors, while for the others, it would be stuffed with racists who ignore each other…
The reality, thank God, is much more nuanced. The big question is whether there is still room for nuance, precisely, in this painful debate.
That’s what the D believedD Cécile Rousseau, co-president of the AMPQ congress, when she offered a forum to Pierre Lalonde, a psychiatrist specializing in schizophrenia.
Without sharing the position of his colleague, the DD Rousseau thought it important to give it a voice, especially since many Quebecers — including psychiatrists — deny the notion of systemic racism.
“I work a lot in extremism, so I’m not so afraid of contradictory points of view”, explains the DD Rousseau. We need to hear these points of view. Understand them, she says. “It’s important and it’s our job, too, as psychiatrists.
“Are we able to talk about our disagreements? Are we able to survive our disagreements? That’s the bet I made. ” She lost.
The Dr Pierre Lalonde feared being demolished on social networks. So he looked for someone to accompany him. He was sent to Philippe Lorange, a master’s student in sociology at UQAM “quite intense, recognizes the psychiatrist, vindictive perhaps, but not racist”.
On this subject, not everyone shares the opinion of D.r The Londe.
It was Philippe Lorange’s presence at the symposium that set things on fire. Described as a “young and brilliant intellectual” by columnist Mathieu Bock-Côté, the student made a name for himself in 2020 by publishing a “manifesto against university dogmatism”.
In October, he denounced on Facebook the “catastrophic environmentalists” who are getting angry because of the climate when they should be alarmed at the “thousands of weekly deaths in Europe” caused by a “conquering jihad”.
In short, Philippe Lorange is a polemicist, who is clearly not afraid to go into outrageous exaggeration to assert his point of view.
On May 21, three psychiatrists wrote to the DD Rousseau. Resident doctors and psychiatrists should be able to attend the symposium, they argued, “without being confronted with a feeling of insecurity caused by the presence of certain people like Mr. Philippe Lorange who writes several racist and homophobic remarks on social networks “.
The AMPQ quickly accepted their arguments.
There was no good decision possible, regrets the DD Rousseau. “If we weren’t censoring, we were saying to a group to which we gave little voice within our association: the fact that you feel threatened is not important. And if we censored, we provoked an anger that was just as legitimate: why don’t we have the right to speak?
“We were falling back into polarization, again. »
Cécile Rousseau recognizes this: she screwed up. “I didn’t want to hurt anyone. I said to myself that we were probably capable of looking together at these fractures that divide us and that divide Quebec society. »
However, Quebec cannot avoid this debate, believes this specialist in cross-cultural psychiatry. “We need places to talk about these things. It affects universities, health services, community organizations, etc. »
We have to talk to each other. Without censorship. Without treating the other as a stubborn racist or a dogmatic ideologue.
Of course, that might hurt. “You can’t settle difficult questions without it being a little unpleasant and a little hurtful,” said the DD Rousseau.
This idea of safe space, an absolute safe space where everything would always be comfortable, it’s a decoy, she believes. We have to talk to each other, even when we don’t agree. Even when it shocks us. Because we will never understand the other if we refuse to make the effort to listen to him.
Cécile Rousseau also plans to address the theme of systemic racism again, delicately, intelligently, at the next AMPQ congress. “Because if the psychiatrists who treat emotions and social fractures, if we ourselves, are not able to talk to each other about that… we won’t succeed. »