Parti Québécois Under Fire Over Proposal To Ban Religious Symbols!
While majority of Quebecers would oppose such racist policies but within the French-Canadian population there is a large racist, pro-French contingent. In the past opinion polls have suggested that such policies enjoy broad public support in Quebec. A majority have told pollsters they supported the turban ban and also viewed hijabs and kippas as a cultural threat. French-Canadians need to realize that no one has sympathy for hypocrites. Why should Canadians give a damn about French-Canadians as a distinct society if they don’t care about or respect the rights of minorities!
MONTREAL — Racist Quebec politicians primarily from the separatist Parti Québécois government are unnecessarily inflaming racial tensions with their racist proposals that are intended to restrict the wearing of religious head gear even though the proposals are likely to end up in the political trash can.
A proposal that could ban hijabs, turbans and other religious symbols among public workers in Quebec is coming under fire from all sectors as the Parti Québécois government prepares to table a controversial Charter of Quebec Values in the fall, reported the Globe and Mail newspaper.
A news agency reported Tuesday that the minority government of Premier Pauline Marois would seek to prohibit religious symbols in the public sector. The rules would apply to everyone from public-school and university teachers to daycare and hospital workers, although some institutions could seek exemptions.
The proposed policy will prohibit public employees from donning Sikh, Jewish and Muslim headwear in the workplace.
According to the QMI Agency, the rules would not apply to the prominent crucifix in Quebec’s National Assembly, which has been defended by successive provincial governments as an artifact of Quebec’s heritage. However, wearing an “ostentatious crucifix” on the job would be verboten, according to the report.
The reported changes were vividly condemned by Charles Taylor, a prominent intellectual and co-chair of a high-profile commission that studied the issue of religious accommodations in Quebec in 2007.
Taylor compared them to Russia’s restrictions on gays and called Quebec’s possible move “Putinesque.”
He said Quebec institutions must remain neutral but state employees must be free to express their religious convictions.
“Hydro-Québec isn’t Hydro-Catholic, Hydro-Muslim, Hydro-Atheist,” he told the TVA network. But “employees are individuals. They are free.”
He called the reported proposals “absolutely draconian” and said they would create obstacles to immigrants’ integration in Quebec.
While majority of Quebecers would oppose such racist policies but within the French-Canadian population there is a large racist, pro-French contingent. In the past opinion polls have suggested that such policies enjoy broad public support in Quebec. A majority have told pollsters they supported the turban ban and also viewed hijabs and kippas as a cultural threat.
French-Canadians need to realize that no one has sympathy for hypocrites. Why should Canadians give a damn about French-Canadians as a distinct society if they don’t care about or respect the rights of minorities!
The PQ’s proposed secularism charter, which has become a cornerstone of its agenda, risks running into political headwinds. Quebec Liberal leader Philippe Couillard says he’ll oppose new rules that divide Quebeckers.
“If the sought-after goal is a strategy to divide Quebeckers, foment the idea that Quebec is under siege and at risk, we’re not there,” he told the Presse Canadienne.
Justin Trudeau became the first prominent federal politician to oppose Quebec’s controversial plan to ban religious headwear for public employees.
The Liberal leader castigated the idea and said the Parti Québécois government would damage Quebec’s reputation if it proceeded with such a policy.
Other party leaders, meanwhile, avoided comment.
The Prime Minister’s Office, for its part, said: “It’s a debate that will occur at the provincial level,” while Multiculturalism Minister Jason Kenney tweeted late Wednesday that “freedom of religion is a universal principle.”
The previous day NDP Leader Tom Mulcair, whose party has nearly five-dozen seats in Quebec, sidestepped the issue by calling the leaked report a “trial balloon.”
Meanwhile, Trudeau was forthright in his opposition, telling he media the purported plan was responding to a non-existent problem and said he couldn’t understand which rights the PQ was seeking to protect that weren’t already protected in the Canadian or Quebec charters of rights.
He said state institutions should indeed be neutral, like the Quebec government says, but he added that the individuals who work there are entitled to their religion and freedom of expression.
Dr. Sanjeet Singh Saluja, who wears a turban as part of his faith, said Wednesday that the PQ’s controversial “Charter of Quebec Values” would drive people from the Sikh, Jewish and Muslim communities away.
“The sad thing is I don’t know if I’d be able to stay here in Quebec,” said Saluja, an emergency-room doctor with the McGill University Health Centre.
