As in Quebec, many countries have laws that prohibit ostentatious religious symbols from teachers and government officials. Among others France, Belgium, Switzerland, the Netherlands, Norway, Denmark, Germany and Austria. Some of these countries have stricter laws than ours.
Canadian Ambassador to the UN Bob Rae, who has never denounced these countries, says our law 21 “goes against the Universal Declaration of Human Rights”. Yet Rae and Trudeau have never criticized France and other European democratic countries close to Canada on this subject.
Trudeau must therefore ask Bob Rae to start a campaign to force these racist and intolerant countries to respect human rights by renouncing their infamous laws.
The Bloc Québécois rightly accuses Rae of having “sullied” the image of Quebec internationally. The odious position taken by our ambassador to the United Nations is scandalously unacceptable. But it is applauded in English Canada.
Legault should appeal to France to support its position on the issue of the secularism of the state. He should ask Emmanuel Macron with whom he has excellent relations to publicly support his law on secularism. Especially that such a declaration in favor of the law 21 would be acclaimed by a good part of the French electorate in a presidential campaign dominated by questions of identity.
Legault’s reluctance on this subject is all the more surprising given that in an open letter, his Minister of Education, Jean-François Roberge, allied himself with his French counterpart, Jean-Michel Blanquer in an anti-woke statement. . The gist of their message: to bet on the school as “primordial bulwark against ignorance and obscurantism”. It is at the heart of the concept of the secularism of the state, dear to both governments.
Quebec is heading towards a decisive confrontation with the “Rest of Canada” on the subject of ostentatious religious symbols. At the very start of the Pandemic in April 2019, I wrote a post in which I wondered if Legault would dare to tighten the screws on the English on religious symbols. I think not. It has retreated on English-speaking CEGEPs, as it will do on Bill 21.
I fear that the Legault government is bending into a humiliating pirouette. The resurgence of the pandemic will be a good pretext to do nothing: now is not the time Let’s see!
English Canada, convinced that the independence movement is on the verge of death, will give Quebeckers, Legault and the CAQ an arm of honor. All anglophone or so-called municipalities in Quebec will defy the law. Hampstead Mayor William Steinberg has already called what he called the “Legault Law” “ethnic cleansing”. It is undoubtedly no coincidence that the current crisis has its origin in an English-speaking municipality in the Outaouais over a teacher wearing the hijab.
Legault is counting on his domination in the polls to quickly forget this affront. Perhaps he also thinks that Quebeckers like him are afraid of raising the ire of the rest of Canada and will secretly applaud his inaction.
If ever Legault stood firm on Bill 21. We would undoubtedly witness the rebirth of the partitionist movement. The English of Quebec, in particular in the West-Island where they are agglomerated, will want to live in ghetto in their own municipalities transformed into enclave “Canadian”. Remember the 1995 referendum. And that’s what Balarama Holness, the woke candidate for mayor of Montreal, proposed. Welcome to Anglo-Montreal, the 11th canadian province.