There are blows that scrape morale even when you see them coming from afar. No surprises in the election results; no subject that had not already been extensively dissected in the pre-election period. The questions directed to the leaders throughout the campaign precisely sketched the outlines of the results, and here we are. The CAQ wave we expected, the emergence of a partisan force to the right of the CAQ right, the collapse of traditional opposition, but without great gains for the progressive alternative. It was all heard.
There was something pathetic in the optimism displayed by all the chefs, without exception, on Monday evening. A Paul St-Pierre Plamondon speaking of reborn love and hope, his eyes wet, no doubt, from being elected himself, despite the historical beating inflicted on the rest of his party; a strangely bustling Dominique Anglade; a Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois celebrating the status quo (although it is necessary to underline the arrival, in the united rows, of three new high quality deputies, and the capture of two liberal strongholds on the island of Montreal). Only Éric Duhaime could celebrate a moral victory. But for once, it is a moral victory that sends shivers down your spine.
The post-electoral subject that has emerged is therefore the “democratic distortion” induced by the voting method. And for good reason. The lack of representativeness of the first-past-the-post system has never been so grotesquely illustrated. 41% of the vote for 72% of the seats, an official opposition having received fewer votes than the two other parties represented in the National Assembly – which will not even obtain the status of a parliamentary group. Sounds like a bad joke.
Since Tuesday, François Legault has reiterated his firm refusal to reform the voting system, while saying he is ready to “discuss” with Québec solidaire and the Parti québécois, good prince, so that they can still obtain certain advantages. We recognize the Prime Minister’s special affection for paternalistic ways of doing things. He made his hand during the pandemic: everything to look affable, without forcing himself to concede even a crumb of power. Don’t worry, dad will take care of you. Above all, people should not be called to the polls too often and the elections suddenly lose their beautiful atmosphere of coronation…
Still, the lack of representativeness of the electoral results is not what is most demoralizing in the new parliamentary landscape. Beyond the composition of the National Assembly, the message from the ballot box is clear: Quebec is on the right, on all fronts — despite the illusions that we cherish on this subject and the rhetorical pirouettes that we perform to stretch the definition of the “centre” ever further to starboard.
However, the ballot boxes have spoken. Quebec has no problem with saying the worst horrors about immigrants, with barely offering the living minimum in terms of the environment and with allowing a symbolic gap to widen indefinitely between the metropolis and the regions. To put it trivially, a large proportion of the electorate seems ready to fight to the end for the right to live in their car, if only to differentiate themselves from the accursed Montrealers, with their public transport, their foreigners and their English speakers.
We must also name this: beyond the CAQ tidal wave, the shortcomings of the voting system are the only barrier that has prevented a resounding entry of the libertarian right into the National Assembly. Nearly 13% of voters sent this signal, and the electoral campaign clearly showed us that the ideology conveyed by Éric Duhaime’s Conservative Party is advancing in the media space without meeting the slightest resistance.
It slips, it flows, we are even told without laughing: you know, if it is not written in full in the program, extreme right, it must be something else, something else more acceptable. Let’s not judge the erratic remarks of the militant base, let’s not judge the past remarks of the party leader, let’s not draw any parallel with the rise of populist and fascistic discourses all over the world. In fact, even before any contextual analysis, one would sometimes believe, to hear certain experts, certain analysts, that they have never, in their life, encountered passive aggressive and manipulative people; that they have never had to decipher speeches that reveal their perversity half-worded.
Everyone understands what hides behind the presentable mask of the extreme right, especially those who support it. Everyone understands that she uses a carefully chosen vocabulary to excite morbid passions, designate scapegoats, exacerbate fractures and describe a social order based on violence, the law of the strongest and the hierarchy of lives. And despite everything, we act as if.
We cling to limited and literal analyses, out of interest or recklessness, who knows, but one thing is certain, on this point, we will go back to the biting of the fourth estate. The tone of the campaign that is coming to an end indicates that the next four years will give us many opportunities to exercise this critical muscle. Hopefully these opportunities will be properly seized.