One of the issues with political dynasties, be it the emperors of ancient China or the Progressive Conservatives of modern Alberta, is how they view their own history and their role in shaping it. Dynastic perceptions tend to have selective memory, often quite consciously so, and as anyone who has ever read George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four knows, tries to establish the current situation as always having been the situation, and popular memory is manipulated to reflect that new reality.
In that novel of a grim dystopian future ruled over by Big Brother in which all aspects of life are tightly controlled, Oceania is in a perpetual war with one or the other of two alternate super-powers; Eurasia and Eastasia. The Party, known as Ingsoc and headed by the mythic and iconic Big Brother, engages in historical revisionism so that as alliances change from Oceania-Eurasia against Eastasia to Oceania-Eastasia against Eurasia and back again, all facts are altered to reflect the new alliance has always been an alliance and that the new enemy has always been the enemy.
Alberta’s Progressive Conservatives are certainly not Ingsoc, nor exerts anywhere near the control over Albertans that Ingsoc and Big Brother exerted over the citizens of Oceania, but they do engage in historical revisionism.
Kent Hehr, the Liberal MLA for Calgary Buffalo, recently challenged the current positioning of the PCs as some sort of champion of LGBTQ rights during the lead-up to the provincial election and following Premier Redford’s appearance at both the Edmonton and Calgary Pride celebrations. Predictably, he has come under fire from some quarters for daring to do so.
"Many PC candidates are busy trying to convince voters that their party has somehow been born again – that its lengthy history of ill will towards gay and lesbian people and the maligning of the LGBTQ community are all sins that have now been conveniently and painlessly expunged," he wrote on his website.
He of course engages in a bit of partisan politics himself, pointing out the provincial Liberals, unlike their nemesis the Progressive Conservatives, have a history of supporting LGBTQ rights and initiatives.
He correctly points out it was the PCs who fought against the direction by the Supreme Court of Canada to include sexual orientation be ‘read into’ provincial human rights law following the 1998 Vriend Decision. Prior to that landmark case, ‘sexual orientation’ was not a protected characteristic in what was then known as the Individual Rights Protection Act and, as a result, it was perfectly legal to discriminate against lesbians and gay men in areas of housing, employment, and access to public services.
"In what can only be described as a particularly sad chapter in our province’s history and an exercise in sheer pigheadedness, those same PCs stubbornly refused to amend the legislation up until just three short years ago [his emphasis] – that’s eleven years of foot dragging, complaining about judge-made law, pouting, openly condoning discrimination, and railing against equal rights for all Albertans."
Under the Klein administration, equal marriage was also vigourously resisted with Premier Klein going so far as to threaten to invoke the Charter’s notwithstanding clause in order to have Alberta ‘opt out’ of the federal law supporting same-sex marriage. It was all just his usual bluster and Alberta, like every other province and territory in Confederation, eventually accepted the reality of equal marriage, albeit with pockets of reactionary resistance.
Redford’s administration has called for an assessment to amend or possibly repeal Section 3 of the Alberta Human Rights Act which prohibits the publishing or displaying of discriminatory statements, notices, signs, symbols or emblems. This section has come in for its share of controversy as it has been used, in the view of many social conservatives, to ‘silence’ those who speak out against LGBTQ rights or the advocating of those rights.
Hehr links that to relatively recent legislation tabled by members of the PC party such as Ted Morton’s Bill 208, Protection of Fundamental Freedoms (Marriage) Statutes Amendment Act, 2006, and then-Justice Minister Redford’s own support of Bill 44, Human Rights, Citizenship and Multiculturalism Amendment Act, 2009.
Both failed to pass but, had they passed, ‘conscience rights’ would have been enshrined in legislation allowing those who opposed solemnizing same-sex marriage to opt out of doing so and, in the case of Bill 44, creating a formal process by which any discussion of sexual orientation or other LGBTQ issues, as well as comparative religious courses and sexuality in general, would have been quashed in Alberta’s public school system. And yet during the election, Redford and the PCs made considerable noise against the Wildrose Party’s platform on ‘conscience rights’, suggesting it was nothing short of bigotry and homophobia.
Bill 44 was promoted as giving power back to parents in deciding what their child should be taught. On the surface this seems reasonable, but what it meant in reality was any view parents believed countered what was being taught at home would not be seen as exposing youth to different ideas, and thereby challenging them to think about issues, but as a direct assault on family control and ‘’family values’’.
If at home the parents held to Creationism and opposed evolution being taught, then evolution lost out. Or if at home the parents believed salvation could only be attained by accepting Christ as Saviour and all other religions were false and dooming their adherents to everlasting hell, then the child could not be exposed to any alternate concepts of religious belief. So too with the belief that heterosexuality was ‘normal and healthy’ and everything else wasn’t.
Hehr essentially ‘calls out’ Redford on her, and her party’s, hypocrisy over their "consternation" concerning anti-LGBTQ statements (in)famously made by a couple of Wildrose Party candidates during the days leading up to the election.
Perhaps the Redford PC’s have turned over a new leaf and are moving more towards the centre. Certainly much has been made by some of Redford’s reputed ‘Red Tory-ism’ and about how the provincial conservatives are, in fact, more Liberal than Conservative (or more liberal than conservative; pick one...). But the proof is in the pudding, as they say.
If the Tories under Redford have seen the light and are, in fact, moving away from the staunchly social conservativism of their past - which will likely alienate the rural vote but perhaps up their stock in the large urban centres of Calgary and Edmonton - we need to see that.
Redford and her inner circle need to do more than make token appearances at Pride celebrations or pose wearing rainbow boas for photo ops with drag queens. They need to be seen supporting LGBTQ-affirmative motions in the Legislature, to be seen speaking out against anti-LGBTQ initiatives brought forward by social conservative interests, be they MLAs or independent lobby groups such as REAL Women or Concerned Parents.
The (seemingly) eternal struggle between The Right and progressive politics is real. It may not be as polarized in Canada as it appears to be in the States, but it exists nevertheless and is becoming more polarized with each success of either side. So far, the progressive side of the equation appears to be winning out, but the tide could change any time.
The PCs need to take a definitive stand and not waffle in the political wind. If a political party cannot stand on its principles, whatever they may be, what do they stand for? Political revisionism is weak and unprincipled. I don’t much care which side they come down on. If they decide to remain true to their conservative roots and steer more to the right, so be it. If they decide to re-examine the social conservativism at their base, make some changes and adapt, I’d support that. Doesn’t mean I’d vote for them. Just pick one and stop talking out of both sides of their mouths.