Look at the world, and Quebec politics isn’t so bad
The disputes here are relatively minor, compared to the rest of the world these days
I was asking visiting friends from England about Brexit and they looked at me glumly, as if I was trying to poison them.
They said they can’t talk about it anymore, since the topic divides families, neighbours and friends and leaves everyone exhausted, or depressed.
In the U.S., it’s a similar situation as the Great Trump Divide makes political dinner talk treacherous and explosive.
In long-boring Ontario it’s hard to discuss provincial politics, now that Premier Doug Ford has divided Toronto’s suburbs from the city and many families down the middle.
Out West you can’t talk pipelines, which divide Alberta from B.C., motorists from environmentalists and oil workers from everyone else. In fact, you can barely breathe because of the forest fires.
It’s all a sign of our increasingly divided era where CNNers live in one bubble, Fox News viewers live in another and me often trumps we.
In Europe, there are seething tensions over immigration in Italy, Hungary, Germany, France and elsewhere, as a Pandora’s box creaks open.
Yet amid all this there’s one small place where it’s easy to breathe and speak your mind — Quebec, a near-political Shangrila for our times.
For a change, we have no great society-shredding battles — just small ones over hijab-wearing, or the closing of a Robert Lepage play.
Sure, some anglos have continuing disputes with Bill 101 and Bonjour-Hi — and everyone complains about our Barrette Medicare Diet.
But in Montreal our only truly harrowing existential question is:
Which way do I go to avoid construction traffic?
Overall, we have no huge societal divides, no obvious white rage movement, or large-scale hate groups.
The Parti Québécois, long the Great Divider, is practically turning comic — offering selfdeprecating election slogans that make fun of their plunging poll numbers.
They include: “The Party Québécois. Seriously.”
Also: “What’s the difference between a péquiste and a dentist? There aren’t any! Both are struggling, but working for your well-being.”
For neverendum decades we Quebecers were the problem child of the Western world, watching our parents slug it out for custody, as the world shrugged.
Anglos wondered whether to Leave or Remain, while francos couldn’t talk to their families across the referendum gulf. Yet now, in this crazily hot, eerie summer we are a society at peace.
Yes, we face a provincial election, but without the country-shattering stakes of the past, unless you suffer from permanent electoral anxiety.
Premier Couillard shouldn’t be as unpopular as he seems, given Quebec’s booming economy and low unemployment, but his political health was badly damaged by his health minister.
Also, the Liberals have been in power for most of 15 years and that does beg some thought, now that “sovereignty” is an endangered word and the neverendum has come to an endum.
CAQ Leader François Legault seems a serious, seasoned politician far from The Trump-Ford mould.
But Legault does make minorities nervous by harping about hijabs and reducing immigration in an aging province that needs immigrant workers. In a society where we seem to be getting along better than anywhere, why provoke tensions?
Meanwhile our Canadian PM, Teflon Trudeau, may not be his philosopher-king father, but in a world of angry, populist leaders and a U.S. president storming his way through strippers, Trudeau seems a decent enough guy.
Two separate groups of friends just returned from the U.S. describing similar experiences. Americans inundated them with envious compliments about Canada — including some Trump-weary Republicans.
Trudeau’s star is also rising due to Trump’s trade war, Maxime Bernier’s bombast and Saudi Arabia’s assault on our pipsqueak protest in favour of women’s rights.
And while “Quebec values” talk can be aggravating, so far it’s just talk.
Look at Denmark, where immigrant kids are being forcibly separated from their families for 25 hours a week, from age 1 — to learn “Danish values” in daycare.
Or Italy, which is blocking boatloads of desperate refugees, or Hungary and the Philippines — fast becoming nasty nations. Or poor decimated Venezuela.
It’s too soon to know where Quebec voters will land after Couillard’s 39-day Long Campaign March.
Polls say we will likely elect Premier Legault but that’s what they said about supposed Prime Minister Mulcair and supposed President Hillary.
For the moment, try to appreciate that you live in one of the least divided, least angry, most trouble-free spots on Earth.
You can curse the construction traffic till 2021, and you probably will for much longer.
You can complain about the steaming summer, if you’re willing to spend all winter cursing the cold — then curse the remedy, too.
But according to Environment Canada we’re due for four more summers as hot as this one.
You can fume about our closed Mount Royal road and the shuttered Jeanne-Mance Park’s North baseball field, as I do — but in the end we are living in an enviable moment and a relatively kind and gentle society.
The problem kid is now the model one and the model kids have big problems.
Vive le Québec équil-libre!
Overall, we have no huge societal divides, no obvious white rage movement, or large-scale hate groups.