The Legault government

Unionist wrote:

Not kropotkin. "THE LEFT". I have never heard of anyone, left, right, or butterscotch, who says anyone who wants to come to Canada any old time must be allowed in, no questions asked, refugee claimant or not. If kropotkin actually advocates that, then he needs to give himself a serious shake. But I don't believe he advocates that for one second.

Well, then what else can the phrase "No one is illegal" possibly mean? If the state doesn't have the right to declare ANYONE illegal and boot them out of the country, doesn't that mean that anyone who wants to come to the country can do so, no questions asked?   

"No one is illegal" does not mean open borders. It means advocacy for equal treatment for people in the country who are not citizens or permanent residents. 

http://rabble.ca/toolkit/rabblepedia/no-one-illegal 

Pondering, people are talking about the woman (seems her name, which I provided, has vanished again, as so often happens) because you brought her up, implying she was an ordinary Quebecoise woman with valid concerns. She isn't. I agree with votd: these things can be discussed. 

I'm more concerned, frankly, that the Legault government wants to lower legal immigration numbers, leading to serious labour shortages. My local Tim Horton's even reduced hours severely due to inability to get enough employees. 

swallow wrote:

I'm more concerned, frankly, that the Legault government wants to lower legal immigration numbers, leading to serious labour shortages. My local Tim Horton's even reduced hours severely due to inability to get enough employees. 

I don't support Legault's immigration cuts at all, but I am concerned by the way "labour shortage" has become received wisdom. When there's a real labour shortage, wages spike. People weren't flying to Fort McMurray to get $13/hr jobs in the oil sector. Québec's employers have just bet that they can cut hours and beg the government to supply them with sufficiently desperate people while hoarding wealth at the top. If jobs at Olymel paid $75/hr, Canadians from coast to coast would be taking French classes.

18,000 immigration claimants, meanwhile, are going to be sent back to the beginning of the line under Bill 9. I know people this affects and it is brutal for them.

Which as a CAQ policy I guess is back on topic. 

Pondering wrote:

Militancy has its place. Occupy and the Yellow Vests of France made and are making a difference. Neither could get elected to office. That is why social movements and political parties can't be one and the same thing. They have different purposes even if topics and positions overlap.

Two Québec student strikers did get elected to office – one for the PQ, and one for QS, which is explicitly a party allied with social movements. Social movements are every bit as valid sources for politicians as the more traditional politician-generators like business executive suites and the military high command. Some (like the yellow vests) are poorly organized and incoherent at best, but not all.

All we can ask is that people educate themselves. I suggest starting with UN refugee documents, for instance this one on the term "illegal" this one is very short and though it addresses Europe, could jsut as well work for Canada: https://www.unhcr.org/cy/wp-content/uploads/sites/41/2018/09/TerminologyLeaflet_EN_PICUM.pdf

Sample excerpt: "Under international law, everyone has the right to leave a country, including their own. All those arriving at borders have innate human rights and specific human rights protection needs. Labelling all migrants trying to reach Europe through unofficial channels as ‘illegal’ is inaccurate and increases their exposure to prejudicial treatment." Please do consider reading or skimming the bullet points, it's only 2 pages. 

Pondering, I hope you might consider distinguishing between "This means X" and "The way I understand this phrase is X." Sorry if this sounds confrontational, but words have power and I think it is worth thinking about how we use them so that we don't inadvertently cause harm. I agree some of the explanations could be done in plainer langauge, but it seems clear to me: people are not "illegal," that dehumanizes them and is contrary to treaties Canada has voluntarily signed. The "no one is illegal means open borders" stuff is just your interpretation; I'd ask that you please consider the possibility of perhaps reconsidering your interpretation and allowing the possibility that you may, in this case, be mistaken, through no ill will on your part. 

Swallow wrote:

"No one is illegal" does not mean open borders. It means advocacy for equal treatment for people in the country who are not citizens or permanent residents. 

I can believe that, though I will say that if the movememt is being misunderstood as advocating open-borders, it might partly be connected to the self-applied No One Is Illegal label.

That said, I think there are still a lot of people who would be racist against immigrants regardless of what one movement called itself, since racists don't tend to repsond to issues on a micro level(ie. they didn't just start foaming at the mouth about immigration after hearing that the group is called No One Is Illegal). Still, whatever perception exists that the movement advocates open-borders is likely resultant partly from their name.

Pondering wrote:

We have no intrinsic right to establish borders. All borders are might makes right. We are animals and like animals we establish a territory and keep the competition out.

I wouldn't phrase it in such sociobiological terms. Suffice to say, we are humans, and humans like to decide who can and cannot live in the territory they inhabit.

And, actually, we've gone animals one better, and established written and immutabe boundaries about who can go where(aka borders), as well as conditions for entry. As opposed to just spraying or growling a bit to mark your loose territory for the duration of time that you are hanging around there. Almost certainly connected to our capacity for long-term thinking and abstract thought.

This is essentially a rhetorical war over the speed of the euphemism treadmill. I understand the argument that "illegal" is dehumanizing, but I've heard "sans-papiers" – a French term which on the surface is as value-neutral as it gets, literally "without papers" – used in exactly the same way I've heard people talk about "illegals". Targeting the language instead of the underlying attitude seems to me to be of minimal use. I've seen a lot of changes in acceptable language in my life, but they haven't tracked with changes in mentality. That's why dog-whistle politics exists. (On a side note, terms like "illegal" or "undocumented" don't only apply to people crossing at Roxham Road to apply for refugee status – they also apply to the more typical case of someone who comes on a short-term visa and stays after it's expired. Those people don't have the same treaty protection refugee claimants do.)

Never mind.

Pondering wrote:

And yet I, who regularly read the news, watch the news, and come here, have never heard that clear message you speak of. The slogan is the message the majority of people hear and react to. 

Are voters that concerned or even aware of No One is Illegal? It seems to me that they play a minuscule part in the consciousness of the average voter.

Unionist wrote:

Take this discussion to another thread, please. This is getting ridiculous.

Okay. Anyone interested can check the Activism forum in a couple of minutes.

Having spent his entire life as a sovereignist until founding CAQ in 2011, I think Legault is still pursuing that goal. While he showed almost no interest in climate change during the election, he shifted gears afterwards. I believe he realized building more hydropower and getting off fossil fuels would not only be more popular, it would make Quebec less dependent on the rest of the country for energy. 

Pursuing the scapegoating of Muslims and other religious minorities also provides him with a potential opportunity for conflict with the Trudeau federal government on a highly emotional issue that helps create a wedge with the federales. 

Making Quebec less dependent on Canada for resources and created friction on an ongoing basis, leads to challenges of federal government authority that produces a dilemma for the federales: let him do what he wants as he builds step-by-step more autonomy for Quebec until almost no strings remain or take on the challenge and risk a fight where Quebecois possibly feel alienated from the Ottawa government.

https://twitter.com/jfrobergeQc/status/1147103127725850625

Hey look Roberge discussed education with Malala Yousafzai, a woman he believes is unfit to be a teacher because of a religious symbol she wears and posed for a photo with her. I wonder if he brought up the importance of teachers not wearing religious symbols to her before taking that photo.

pietro_bcc wrote:

https://twitter.com/jfrobergeQc/status/1147103127725850625

Hey look Roberge discussed education with Malala Yousafzai, a woman he believes is unfit to be a teacher because of a religious symbol she wears and posed for a photo with her. I wonder if he brought up the importance of teachers not wearing religious symbols to her before taking that photo.

I'm not sure if there's a real contradiction there, despite the optics being a little ironic. 

Most of us here probably support abolishing religious school boards. But we could probably imagine ourselves meeting a teacher from a Catholic school, and finding that they have insighful things to say about the education system overall, even if, ultimately, we'd prefer that their particular school-boards didn't exist in their current form. 

A Quebec Superior Court justice has rejected a request to temporarily suspend parts of the province's new religious symbols law, though he did agree it raises "serious" constitutional questions.

Justice Michel Yergeau said Thursday the court must defer, at this stage, to the power of elected politicians to pass legislation they believe is in the public good. 

https://tinyurl.com/yymfszcp

"But it's our culture!!" is often used as an excuse by those who simply want state endorsement for their religion, but this is one instance where I can see it having some merit, especially if we're talking about stuff, like the stained-glass windows mentioned, that go back over two centuries.

The Al Rashid Mosque in Edmonton, claimed to be the third oldest in North America, is now maintained at least partly at government expense, on the grounds of the Fort Edmonton historical park. Can't imagine many people would think that means the Alberta government is in the business of forcing Islam down everyone's throat.  

Only $5 million is going to repurposing them. The other $15 million is subsidizing churches staying open under their existing management – in addition to all the other subsidies and tax exemptions they already receive.

"laïcité"

If the government had purchased the buildings, maintained the artifacts as heritage objects and repurposed all of the buildings that would be fine. But if the churches want to keep the properties the only thing the Quebec government should offer them is a Vatican phone number.

Pondering wrote:

I don't think there was any fear of indoctrination. As the article explains there is a grandfather clause that applies to all religious symbols. 

I am against Bill 21, I'm just pointing out the hypocrisy and dishonesty of the government.

The rhetoric used by the government in supporting this law (specifically the sections dedicated to education) stated that it was necessary to apply it to teachers because the children seeing those symbols on an authority figure would pressure them into adopting those religious views. These were the justifications given by the government. Clearly ridiculous and bigotted justifications, but the justifications given.

I am aware that there is a grandfather clause which protects their jobs. But it is a clear example of hypocrisy to say that children seeing religious symbols on their teachers causes religious indoctrination and then to deny parents the ability to pull their children from classes where this supposed religious indoctrination is occuring.

CAQ to introduce electoral reform bill today

Be still, my beating heart.

alan smithee wrote:

It will be decided by referendum in 2022...I wouldn't hold my breath

We all know how successful referendums on electoral reform are.