So I decided to vote at the advanced polls a few days back to avoid what little congestion might occur had I decided to vote on May second. With this said, I ended up going to an advanced station set up in the local Shriner's Club. The place was entirely empty, and it was a pretty sad sate of affairs.
I'll admit, I've been rather pessimistic lately. The Liberal party has now had what I believe to be two weak leaders, consistently caving in and voting in support of the Conservatives time after time to avoid the election that they would inevitably face sooner or later anyway. Ever since they supported the extension of the Afghanistan mission under Stephane Dion, I've found it hard to truly view them as a viable form of opposition to this government. Of course, the Liberal party has tried to justify their stance, once even blaming the extension on the NDP for bringing down Paul Martin's government in 2006 (By this logic, had the NDP not had brought down the Martin government, the Liberals would not have been in opposition, and therefore, not voted for the extension). Hardly a feasible argument...
What really puzzles me throughout this election though is the unabashed support that many have for Harper's Conservative government. Without going into too much detail, this government has attempted to rule with an iron fist in ways unprecedented, not only during my lifetime, but for generations. Under Harper's government, our parliamentary system has been prorogued twice to merely keep his party in power, we have lost our UN Security Council seat, and taken a combative role overseas that has been quite foreign to our "Peacekeeping" stance that was once respected as a form of peace brokerage. This government has even been found in contempt, a historic first in this nation for any ruling party, and even wants to change the "Government of Canada" logo to "Harper Government".
With all this said, it's a wonder that Mr. Harper has managed to keep a grasp on power as long as he has. Still, when the election was forced, many conservative MPs have made smug remarks about the opposition parties "wasting" tax-payers' dollars with this process. This was brought up in my riding during our debate by Jim Flaherty, the federal finance minister. What Harper, Flaherty, and other members of their party fail to realize is that they have continually failed to achieve a majority government, and therefore, facing elections are part of the democratic process in any "free" country. This government appears to have acquired the attitude that they attain almost a type of inaleiable "right" to govern, and how dare anyone question their rule. This obnoxiousness is exactly why we're having this election now. Had they taken a different attitude and actually worked with the other parties, we could have easily avoid this election, but their stubborn, hardline stance has left the other parties no choice, but to force the election.
Let's say I even put these previous factors aside for a second and simply look at a couple recent examples of the dispicible voting record of the Harper government. In late 2010, I e-mailed Mr. Flaherty on behalf of Amnesty International, urging him to support the Liberal's Bill C-300. This bill would hold Canadian corporations more accountable for their actions in other nations after various atrocities were committed recently against those that protested unethical mining in foreign countries. Amnesty's plea can be read here. I received a vague response back from Flaherty (or one of his assistants e-mailing under his name) stating how he also respected human rights, but would be unable to support such legislation. To make a long story short, every single Conservative MP sitting in parliament voted against this bill, as can be viewed Here. With the lives and safety of individuals being jeopardized, this party displays a fine example their desire to be a collection of partisan hacks.
Another example of the partisan nature comes more recently during the latest reading of Bill C-389; also known as "The Trans Rights Bill". This was a crucial piece of legislation introduced to parliament by NDP MP Bill Siksay. Quite simply, this bill would would amend the criminal code to recognize hate crimes towards gender identity and expression to provide further protection for this marginalized group. We may have come a long way in the past few decades in terms of accepting diversity, yet trans people, especially mtf (male to female) individuals still face an incredible amount of discrimination, and even physical threats of violence in our society on a daily basis. One merely just has to pull up a few random statistics such as these to these how self-evident this fact is:
"55% of transgender youth report being physically attacked. (GLSEN. (2003). The 2003 national school climate survey: the school related experiences of our nation’s lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender youth.)"
"74% of transgender youth reported being sexually harassed at school, and 90% of transgender youth reported feeling unsafe at school because of their gender expression. (GLSEN. (2001). The 2001 national school climate survey: the school related experiences of our nation’s lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender youth.)"
"In a survey of 403 transgender people, 78% reported having been verbally harassed and 48% reported having been victims of assault, including assault with a weapon, sexual assault or rape. (Wilchins, R., Lombardi, E., Priesing, D. and Malouf, D. (1997) First national survey of transgender violence. Gender Public Advocacy Coalition.)"
I could pull up more stats, but I believe I've made my point. I've seen the same consistent stats ever since I was researching data for human rights papers I was writing in undergrad, which was several years ago now. Clearly, this bill was necessary, and I find it appauling that all but six members of the Conservative Party voted against this legislation. I was hoping to press the Minister for International Cooperation, Bev Oda tonight about this with a question I submitted when I attended a debate for the Durham riding, but to little surprise, she was a no-show. There aren't even any bogus arguments to put forth against this piece of legislation. This government has clearly failed to honour and protect the dignity of Canadian citizens here.
Even within this past week, there was the beating of a trans woman Chrissy Lee Polis that was filmed by mocking McDonalds employees in Maryland that simply stood by and watched. Some of you may have seen the video and Change.Org petition that I posted on Facebook earlier this week. Over 141 000 average people have taken action and signed this petition in outrage, yet Bill C-389 had 135 MPs vote against it.
The questionable logic of some of these MPs baffles me. There were also seven Liberal MPs that voted against the bill. I see a great twist of irony in some of these cases, such as the vote by Gurbax Malhi. I'm mentioning Malhi since he was the first Sikh to wear a turban in Canadian parliament. His insistence for Canada to honour his religious dress changed our laws to allow him this freedom of religious expression in parliament. That's fine, we're supposed to be a tolerant nation. Yet through his vote against C-389, Mr. Malhi somehow failed to connect the dots between the similarities of protecting and honouring his form of expression, and the rights of expression of trans people. I don't care if an MP doesn't fully understand transgenderism, or even plans to. I've never been harassed or assaulted for being transgendered, but I've been harassed and assaulted for being different, so I do have empathy for anyone that also has similar circumstances, and would surely hope our government would do everything in its power to minimize "acceptance" of any forms of violence to any particular group. Discrimination seeds from the same roots, regardless of its application.
The premise here was rudimentary, to simply protect the rights an freedoms that any human being should be entitled to. I am just thankful that this legislation did pass, and I applaud the six Conservatives who demonstrated substance by going against the party line, as well as the NDP and Bloc, and *most* of the Liberals who were also supportive. I have lost any respect I once had, however, for the 126 Conservatives, and 6 Liberals who tried to stop this legislation...
Despite my inherently negative tone in this post, I am somewhat optimistic about the recent polling results. It's kind of interesting, actually. A week or so ago, it looked like this would be a third installment of more of the same; Conservative minority with a Liberal opposition. However, since after I voted, the NDP has recently picked up support, and even surpassing the Liberal party. It really seems that Jack Layton's party and creditability have been legitimized to the masses as now the attack ads are focused upon the NDP. Even the fact-opposing outpost Sun TV has posted a front page "Top Story", claiming Jack Layton had a massage in a questionable area... Fifteen years ago...
This was of course, after their paper was done producing an article on who the "hottest" female candidates were... This must be at the height of dirty tricks to carry out a few days before the election. A huge issue made over a total non-issue. A sleazy and desperate attempt like this shows that the NDP is definitely making opponents in both parties very nervous. This "orange wave" as some call it may quite possibly lead them to be the official opposition with this election. I guess it goes to show that however mundane politics can be, upsets do happen anywhere and everywhere. Although the possibility of an NDP opposition has been an idea very long overdue, I'm still happy to use the saying "better late than never" here...
