No, Maxime Bernier is not "Questioning An Orthodoxy"

So, CBC's Neil MacDonald published this screed defending Maxime Bernier's stream of tweets about "extreme multiculturalism" this week.

In an e-mail conversation about it, here's what I wrote, explaining why MacDonald is dead wrong:



I think more to the point, MacDonald is missing several aspects of the picture.

First of all, let’s consider the context in which Bernier’s tweets have been generated:

In early 2017, President Trump initiated some of the most draconian changes to US immigration (and in particular, refugee) policy that we have seen since the end of WWII. That created an environment where a lot of people who would have tried to settle in the US now found themselves endangered by that very prospect. This has resulted in an influx of irregular border crossings at various places in Canada (although hardly a large number overall), who immediately make an asylum claim (aside: Under both Canadian and International law, we are obliged to provide those people with safety while their claims are evaluated). Conservatives have been making noise about immigration ever since 2015 - and largely that has been built on the remnants of the Stephen Harper “Islam is evil” campaign in 2015 (remember the “barbaric cultural practices hotline”?), and in particular Trudeau’s decisive actions to bring in a large number of refugees from the Syrian civil war. While this has played well with the CPC “base” of supporters, most Canadians have largely ignored it (and well they should). We should also not ignore the fiddling that the CPC did to the immigration system as a whole, which had strongly racist overtones of assimilation.

Fast forward to earlier this year, and a few important events started to occur in (and around) Conservative propaganda streams:

1. The was a marked increase in conservative controlled media talking about “illegal” immigration in Canada - this was clearly visible on both PostMedia and “The Rebel” (you get to guess which was more noxious)
2. Conservative politicians have been increasingly seen in the company of known white supremacist organizations (especially Scheer, but also numerous other high profile idiots)
3. On Twitter, there has been an enormous upswing in overtly Islamophobic “bots” spewing material about “we’re letting too many into the country” 

In this context, we have Maxime Bernier spout a bunch of nonsense about “Extreme Multiculturalism”. It is very difficult to see this as anything other than implicitly racist dog-whistling. I will further point out that Mr. Bernier is “Pur Lain Quebecois”, and that movement has long veered very close to the rhetoric of white nationalists - just with a uniquely Quebecois twist on the concepts of who should be “in control”.

Second, Mr. Bernier did not “challenge an orthodoxy”. Calling a pluralistic, multicultural vision of Canada “an orthodoxy” is ignoring the degree to which this country has changed since Pierre Trudeau’s government made multiculturalism a formal part of our cultural policies in the 1970s. As my partner points out, a multicultural Canada is not an “idea” in her experience, it is a fact. For her, the foundations of multiculturalism are baked into the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, and have always been the reality. Bernier’s arguments about “extreme multiculturalism” presume that something has changed under Justin Trudeau, and yet nothing could be further from the truth.

Mr. MacDonald echoes what he believes is Bernier’s call for a “unified identity” in this country. He misses the point - we already have a unified identity. That identity is subtle and distinct in its ability to make room for those around us from other cultures, and allow for the development of an overall culture that reflects elements of all the cultures around us. It’s scary for people like Bernier who seek an absolute anchor for their sense of cultural identity - it is difficult in such an environment to quantify our sense of culture or identity. We do not find it anchored in overtly nationalistic symbols like flags, rather it is a more deeply held recognition that all who come here become part of the larger picture of our cultural mosaic. We adopt, and adapt because there is room to do so. While many new Canadians will continue to use a hyphenated identity label for themselves, their descendants become ever more part of Canada - free to honour their past, but also willing to live within the broader fabric of our society.

In short, MacDonald has missed both the context of Bernier’s comments, as well as the reality that Canada’s identity is in fact multicultural.  Bernier's arguments do not "question an orthodoxy", they attack the fundamental notion of what it is to be Canadian.