After only five months in office, Émilise Lessard-Therrien gave up the role of female co-spokesperson for Québec solidaire last week. The former member for Rouyn-Noranda–Témiscamingue had nevertheless worked hard to obtain the support of members and thus become the first co-spokesperson for Québec solidaire to proudly represent rurality. And replacing the great Manon Massé, let’s face it, was no easy task either.
In the process, the National Commission for Women of Québec Solidaire denounced Tuesday the muzzling of women and “the growing influence of people not democratically elected” within the party.
Unfortunately, there does indeed seem to be a “small, tight-knit team” around the male co-spokesperson, Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois. For a party that calls itself feminist, this trend seems very strange.
As is the case in the majority of political parties, an “alpha male” mentality seems to exist – or to have recently taken hold – within Québec solidaire. In any society, sporting or political formation, the alpha male is a dominant man, enthroned at the top of a group, who is clearly distinguished by his ascendancy over other members, which gives him numerous advantages, including privileged access resources (human, media space, decision-making power and the rest).
It is clear that Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois is a formidable politician and a formidable orator. But a question seriously arises: is there really space for a female co-spokesperson within the Orange Party?
Is the space occupied by the male co-spokesperson, Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois, in fact, to the detriment of the place provided for the female co-spokesperson? More importantly, does this woman, this female co-spokesperson for Québec solidaire, really access the position and does she truly share power with the man in the situation in question? Or has all this been, for several years, not just a simple illusion, a facade of communication?
According to Émilise Lessard-Therrien herself – who appears to be a tenacious woman, let’s face it – she had “trouble finding [s]we space” within the team. However, is it not precisely the role of the Québec solidaire management team to assist it, to give it all the place it deserves, and not the opposite? How is it that a woman duly elected by the members of a so-called feminist political party has to fight so much and exhaust herself so quickly to be heard and have access to the place that duly belongs to her? ?
In 2019, what’s more, Québec solidaire opposed the adoption of Law 21 relating to the necessary secularism of the State, “in particular because of the inclusion of the derogation provision, which made it possible to subtract it to the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, as well as to the Quebec Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms.”
And in July 2022, Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois added a layer to the sexist Trudeauist multiculturalism, declaring nothing less than “that a united government would “allow the wearing of religious symbols so that everyone can work in Quebec, regardless of “import one’s beliefs”, but the platform [de Québec solidaire] once again dodged the question. “We should not deliberately upset the French-speaking majority, who are largely in favor of the law.”
While women all over the world see their most fundamental rights violated, being forced to wear the veil or the burqa in Iran or Afghanistan, for example, under penalty of torture and arrest, here in Quebec, we have chose, as a society, secularism. The necessary secularism to live in an egalitarian society, where religion is clearly separated from the State.
But Québec solidaire instead chose to ignore this strong French-speaking majority largely in favor of the Law on State Secularism. Like the Liberal Party of Quebec, Québec solidaire still prefers to celebrate “diversity” and multiculturalism at all costs, ignoring the simple fact that the Islamic veil is sexist. And let’s be clear here: all religions are inherently sexist.
Québec solidaire calls itself a feminist and independence political party. And unfortunately, we believed in it for a long time. However, we know today that these two labels are essentially decorative. And after having cherished the hope of finally representing the regions and rurality, Québec solidaire could very well become again what it has always, deep down, been from the beginning, that is, the party of the orange line.