April 21, 2007
In defence of "rural values..."
From: The ECP Centre - No Apologies Column
Big City Elitism Will Fade Into Irrelevancy
Friday, April 13, 2007
Quebec's provincial election of two weeks ago, which saw Premier Jean Charest's Liberals diminished to 48 seats - forming Quebec's first minority government since 1878 - the Separatist Party, the PQ, suffer a resounding defeat, and moderate conservative ADQ, headed by Mario Dumont, surge from five seats to 41 to replace the PQ as the official opposition, has once again demonstrated that Canada's media juggernaut - big city nationals and dailies like the Globe and Mail and the Toronto Star - are so far out of touch that they are destined to fade into irrelevancy - along with their prejudices.
No Apologies is available for you to listen to on our website (www.ecpcentre.org) for free. Every week a new broadcast of No Apologies will be uploaded to our website for your listening pleasure.
Canada's few independent newspapers hailed the event as a major paradigm shift. Lorne Gunter, columnist for The Edmonton Journal, called it a major "shift in power that may lead to interesting political times across the nation"
But on the front cover of Canada's major dailies, the vile venom of secular-liberalism, masquerading as tolerance and political correctness was pungent and raw - so raw in fact, defibulaters must have been operating at maximum capacity at both the Globe and Mail and the Toronto Star, which found the electoral results a cardiac catastrophe.
True to big city form, Mark Abley, one time columnist for the Montreal Gazette, but writing for the Star, interpreted the event as only a secular liberal can.
"I'm not saying that most of the people who voted for the ADQ on Monday are homophobic racists who want women to stay in the kitchen."
Abley does mean to offend. He's just offering an observation. And for Abley the observation is that "rural" Canada, a place that gives succor and comfort to racists, bigots, chauvinists and Christians, is at war with the cultured sophistication of big city life.
"We're not just bigger; we're different. In North Bay and Riviere-du-Loup, almost everybody's skin is white. Immigrants are few and far between. Gay people are equally scarce on the ground; most of them have moved to larger cities."
And that's why, for the Toronto Star, the election results can mean only one thing, rural Canada wants "revenge."
"The Quebec election forms part of a wider trend throughout Canada and beyond. Think of it as the revenge of the rural vote."
Funny, isn't it - whenever liberals lose, the reasons have to do with humanity's baser instincts like "anger" and "revenge." But whenever conservatives lose, it's about embracing "change" and "progress."
That's the kind of in-depth and sophisticated analysis one can expect from the Star.
John Ibbitson, writing for the Globe and Mail, and perhaps the most glib and elitist journalist in circulation, was opaque, and he was irate.
"Canada's rural regions continue to harbour obnoxious attitudes" he wrote, and "intolerance remains a force in Canadian politics."
Never mind that Canadian progressives like Ibbitson don't believe their own tripe about tolerance and understanding. And never mind that both papers represent the epitome of big city elitism - and offer observations that probably have contributed to liberal losses as much as anything else.
What their columns demonstrate is that, at the root of big city elitism is a very base and deep-seated hatred for anyone who holds to traditional values, even if, as is the case with the ADQ, those values are benign at best - after all Dumont, the leader of the ADQ is no poster boy for social conservatism.
Neither the Toronto Star, the Globe and Mail, nor John Ibbitson have held a special place in my literary world, and the two columns cited about the Quebec election serve only to demonstrate that the writers and their ilk are impervious to reason.
But I was nevertheless struck by a certain profundity in one of Ibbitson's lines.
"So, to all the ADQ backbenchers and small-town mayors who disparage the latest batch of new arrivals, this message: Go ahead. You and your prejudices will fade away, and your towns will disappear, unless you can find a way to attract the very people you love to denigrate."
His words ring with a certain prophetic foreboding - but the problem for him (and big city newspapers) is that he's really prophesying about their future.
Because the future lies with rural Canada, and those still having families - you know those people you big city secularists love to denigrate.
Yours for our culture,
Tristan Emmanuel - ECP Centre President
Big City Elitism Will Fade Into Irrelevancy
Friday, April 13, 2007
Quebec's provincial election of two weeks ago, which saw Premier Jean Charest's Liberals diminished to 48 seats - forming Quebec's first minority government since 1878 - the Separatist Party, the PQ, suffer a resounding defeat, and moderate conservative ADQ, headed by Mario Dumont, surge from five seats to 41 to replace the PQ as the official opposition, has once again demonstrated that Canada's media juggernaut - big city nationals and dailies like the Globe and Mail and the Toronto Star - are so far out of touch that they are destined to fade into irrelevancy - along with their prejudices.
No Apologies is available for you to listen to on our website (www.ecpcentre.org) for free. Every week a new broadcast of No Apologies will be uploaded to our website for your listening pleasure.
Canada's few independent newspapers hailed the event as a major paradigm shift. Lorne Gunter, columnist for The Edmonton Journal, called it a major "shift in power that may lead to interesting political times across the nation"
But on the front cover of Canada's major dailies, the vile venom of secular-liberalism, masquerading as tolerance and political correctness was pungent and raw - so raw in fact, defibulaters must have been operating at maximum capacity at both the Globe and Mail and the Toronto Star, which found the electoral results a cardiac catastrophe.
True to big city form, Mark Abley, one time columnist for the Montreal Gazette, but writing for the Star, interpreted the event as only a secular liberal can.
"I'm not saying that most of the people who voted for the ADQ on Monday are homophobic racists who want women to stay in the kitchen."
Abley does mean to offend. He's just offering an observation. And for Abley the observation is that "rural" Canada, a place that gives succor and comfort to racists, bigots, chauvinists and Christians, is at war with the cultured sophistication of big city life.
"We're not just bigger; we're different. In North Bay and Riviere-du-Loup, almost everybody's skin is white. Immigrants are few and far between. Gay people are equally scarce on the ground; most of them have moved to larger cities."
And that's why, for the Toronto Star, the election results can mean only one thing, rural Canada wants "revenge."
"The Quebec election forms part of a wider trend throughout Canada and beyond. Think of it as the revenge of the rural vote."
Funny, isn't it - whenever liberals lose, the reasons have to do with humanity's baser instincts like "anger" and "revenge." But whenever conservatives lose, it's about embracing "change" and "progress."
That's the kind of in-depth and sophisticated analysis one can expect from the Star.
John Ibbitson, writing for the Globe and Mail, and perhaps the most glib and elitist journalist in circulation, was opaque, and he was irate.
"Canada's rural regions continue to harbour obnoxious attitudes" he wrote, and "intolerance remains a force in Canadian politics."
Never mind that Canadian progressives like Ibbitson don't believe their own tripe about tolerance and understanding. And never mind that both papers represent the epitome of big city elitism - and offer observations that probably have contributed to liberal losses as much as anything else.
What their columns demonstrate is that, at the root of big city elitism is a very base and deep-seated hatred for anyone who holds to traditional values, even if, as is the case with the ADQ, those values are benign at best - after all Dumont, the leader of the ADQ is no poster boy for social conservatism.
Neither the Toronto Star, the Globe and Mail, nor John Ibbitson have held a special place in my literary world, and the two columns cited about the Quebec election serve only to demonstrate that the writers and their ilk are impervious to reason.
But I was nevertheless struck by a certain profundity in one of Ibbitson's lines.
"So, to all the ADQ backbenchers and small-town mayors who disparage the latest batch of new arrivals, this message: Go ahead. You and your prejudices will fade away, and your towns will disappear, unless you can find a way to attract the very people you love to denigrate."
His words ring with a certain prophetic foreboding - but the problem for him (and big city newspapers) is that he's really prophesying about their future.
Because the future lies with rural Canada, and those still having families - you know those people you big city secularists love to denigrate.
Yours for our culture,
Tristan Emmanuel - ECP Centre President
