This Tuesday, the very day of her swearing in as Premier of Alberta, Danielle Smith, leader of the United Conservative Party, made a statement of staggering social irresponsibility.
According to her, people who refused to be vaccinated against COVID would constitute the group of people who, in the world and even since her own birth in 1971 (!), would have suffered the most discrimination.
For meme Smith, the unvaccinated would thus sit at the top of the groups victimized by discrimination. Before even, one would have to believe, women, people of color, disabilities, Aboriginals, LGBTQ, etc.
Above all, an electoralist
At first glance, it’s libertarian delirium to the power of ten. However, because it comes from the mouth of a prime minister – and not that of an anti-vax conspiratorial fellow – this statement is far from trivial.
Worse still, it falls on the same week that Canada, as elsewhere, enters an 8e pandemic wave. So also that today begins the work of the commission of inquiry into the use by Justin Trudeau of the Emergency Measures Act.
(Recall that in February, this action was aimed precisely at ending the endless illegal occupation of Ottawa by hundreds of anti-vax conspirators brought together by the so-called “freedom convoy.”)
The real danger
The real danger is this. When elected officials like Danielle Smith spread such ramblings for primarily electoral purposes, they reinforce the same conspiracy theories which, however, are opposed to the democratic institutions of which they themselves are a part.
Among this part of the electorate, they nourish a deep feeling of persecution. By crowning the unvaccinated with the status of the most discriminated group of the last half-century, Mr.me Smith does this very voluntarily.
Inevitably, these elected officials at the same time encourage a hyper-individualism which, throughout the pandemic, has had the effect of “normalizing” the dissociation of part of the population from the rest of society.
For elected officials, it is a shame. Impossible to say otherwise.