When you witness a sudden change in the attitudes of a majority of people in your community it raises a number of questions. The first question you are bound to ask is how could so many people change their minds so fast. Perhaps what you should be asking yourself though is not why or how the change happened, but how much of a change was it really. What might have looked on the surface to be the truth about people's beliefs had no real depth and was as easily dispersed as topsoil in a dust bowl.
Canada has developed a reputation as being a tolerant country over the years and seemingly has some of the most liberal attitudes on issues of race, sexual identity, and gender discrimination. Ever since the implementation of the Canada's Charter of Rights and Freedoms in 1980 any legislation or activity that would allow for discrimination against anyone based on race, gender, religion, creed, or sexual preferences have been successfully challenged and overturned.
When this has been combined with Canada's willingness to support progressive legislation in the health care field like supplying patients with medical marijuana and our former reputation as Nobel Prize for Peace winner because of peacekeeping efforts it certainly makes us appear to be a kind and compassionate country. But there's a difference between what can be legislated and what are the genuine feelings of a people.
As long as people aren't confronted with situations that stretch there tolerances, they usually are able to live up to the laws of the land. Unfortunately, it looks like Canada's famous tolerance was only skin deep and at the first sign of trouble has up and vanished. Currently it's the ugly smell of racism mixed with xenophobia that's wafting around the halls of power and the streets of cities, towns, and villages.
It started innocently enough with Elections Canada, the government agency responsible for administering elections, declaring that Muslim women wouldn't have to remove their veil in order to vote, in spite of their being a new law in place requiring picture identification in order to vote. Elections Canada was willing to make an exception to this law in order to respect the traditions of devout Muslims if they did not feel comfortable revealing their faces in public.
Article comments
1 - Lawrence A. Oshanek
Funny you should mention I.D. used to vote.
I just filed a Constitutional Challenge of Calgary's bylaw requiring specified types of ID to get a ballot.
Contact me if you are interested in the case.
Lawrence A. Oshanek
2 - Nat
As a French Canadian with roots on both sides of the Quebec-Ontario border, I can tell you that xenophobia in Quebec is nothing new. This is a relatively small group that until recent decades grew and prospered with relatively little immigration. They really do see themselves as a distinct group and are utterly paranoid about protecting a so-called distinct culture. We are witnessing the lashing out of a wounded animal.(and good old Steve Harper is reaping the bigoted benefits)
As for myself, I'm a traitor to some Quebecois for living in Ontario and worse, for marrying a square head -"anglophone", and I'm a separatist frog to some in Ontario.
I agree with you that Canada has long wrapped itself in a thin veil of tolerance. Just look at the Caledonia stand off which has been going on without any real resolution for well over a year now. The media does not present us with both sides of the issue though. It focuses on how the poor woe-begotten rich white "905" is SO inconvenienced by the Native upstarts. The longer the stand off continues, the more open the racist slurs.