Trudeau’s first debate will be on racism, but not when it’s in French
There is no question the federal election debate on Oct. 7 — the first which the blackfacetarnished Justin Trudeau will anoint with his presence — will largely be about race.
It is unavoidable.
None of us can unsee what we recently saw.
Canada’s national public broadcaster, the CBC, however, appeared bent on shifting the focus from Trudeau’s racist role-playing, first by having panel members express “deep disappointment” to changing the narrative hours later to suggest most Canadians are privileged white folk who are quietly racists and more than likely prone toward discriminating against people of colour.
It was almost spellbinding to watch.
It was as if it was choreographed by senior CBC editors to get their main man off the hot seat and get people talking more about racism in Canada generally, and not digging deeper into Trudeau’s blunders.
NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh, who had the most eloquent and personal response to Trudeau’s multitude of “hurtful” blackface scandals when the story first broke, has even written to debate commissioner David Johnson, the ex-governor general, asking him to rescind his preliminary ruling to allow Maxime (Mad Max) Bernier, leader of the nascent wild-and-weird People’s Party of Canada, to join the debate.
“Mr. Bernier’s conduct risks bringing the debates into disrepute,” the NDP leader told Johnson. “He has eagerly courted outright racists for his new party.”
When the one-two-three punch of Trudeau’s blackface misadventures first emerged (with the PM later confessing there could be more, but he can’t for the life of him say how many more), Singh spoke very powerfully about the “hurt” he felt and shared with millions of other racialized Canadians.
“When you’ve got a prime minister that is mocking the lived realities of Canadians, it can inflame those tensions and give more oxygen to those who believe in discriminating (against) people based on the way they look,” he said.
“That’s why it’s deeply concerning. Who is the real Mr. Trudeau?” Singh asked reporters. “Is it the one behind closed doors, the one when the cameras are turned off that no one sees?
“Because more and more, it seems like it is.”
As Radiyah Chowdhury wrote in Chatelaine, “Sorry, Mr. Trudeau, ignorance like (yours) is not a luxury racialized people can afford.
“Donning race as some sort of costume to wear at a gala is a privilege I can’t even fathom as a brown woman.
“We do not get to go home and wash our skin off.”
How many times did Trudeau get to go home to wash off his skin? Apparently too many times for him to definitively remember — which is likely the first truth we have heard from him in memory.
When the debate shifts three days later to French, watch for the race card to be kept almost ace down so as to not offend Quebecers over their majority support of Premier Francois Legault’s Bill 21, which effectively bans the wearing of religious symbols in provincial public service jobs — such as teachers, police, Crown prosecutors and corrections officers.
Hence, no hijabs, no yarmulkes and no turbans at work.
The province, after all, could again determine our next prime minister, and so the stakes on winning Quebec are high.
Arguing in the French-language debate against Legault’s discriminatory legislation, even if on the side of angels, would be a little too perilous.
Yet it could be used as irresistible bait for entrapment.
But what leader has enough guts to go there first?