Saying it with a smile

Christian white supremacy has been part of the fabric of Turtle Island since colonization. The short history of Canada includes the genocide of Indigenous people, concentration camps for those of Japanese descent, and legislated exclusion of those who weren’t white from immigration. This isn’t the distant past; there are many alive today who have been personally impacted by these policies.

Political discourse had been slow to acknowledge these wrongs but in the mid-2010’s there was a return to Christian white supremacy talking points following a global wave of neo-nationalist sentiment. Of note was the Conservative anti-Muslim rhetoric of the 2015 Canadian federal election, the anti-Muslim rhetoric and actions in the campaign and subsequent presidency of Donald Trump, and the implementation of Quebec’s anti-Muslim niqab ban.

The end result has been that more Canadians today have anti-immigrant sentiments than five years ago, that 37% view immigration as a threat to white Canadians, and that 68% of Canadians want a ban on Muslim religious wear. Meanwhile in 2017, a white Canadian murdered six and injured nineteen at a mosque in Quebec City.

Corresponding with this rhetoric has been an explosion of Christian white supremacist groups:

• La Meute was founded in 2015 and among other things organized multiple anti-immigration demonstrations in Quebec City.
• The Proud Boys was founded in 2016 and among other things disrupted an indigenous ceremony in Halifax.
• Soldiers of Odin was founded in 2015 with a Canadian chapter in 2016 and among other things organized an anti-Muslim event in Edmonton.
• Storm Alliance was founded in 2016 and among other things organized protests at locations asylum seekers have been using to enter Canada.
• The Northern Guard was founded in 2017 and among other things assaulted anti-racist demonstrators in Edmonton.
• The Worldwide Coalition Against Islam was founded in 2017 and among other things organized an anti-Muslim rally in Calgary.
• Yellow Vests Canada was founded in 2019 and among other things assaulted people at Hamilton Pride.

Three political parties have also been formed and are running in the 2019 Canadian federal election:

• The National Citizens Alliance was founded in 2014.
• The Canadian Nationalist Party was founded in 2017.
• The People’s Party of Canada was founded in 2018.

There was a further entrenchment of Christian white supremacist views in the political discourse when the People’s Party of Canada was invited to the leader’s debate. The official platform for the People’s Party of Canada states that they would:

• Repeal the Multiculturalism Act and eliminate all funding to promote multiculturalism.
• Strip protections for trans and gender non-conforming people from the Canadian Human Rights Act. This is framed as repealing Bill C-16.
• Pass a motion to say Parliament shall not condemn Islamophobia. This is framed as repealing M-103.
• Prevent the Canadian Human Rights Act from prohibiting hate speech. This is framed as opposing section 13.
• Withhold funding from post-secondary institutions that decline to rent spaces for white supremacist events. This is framed as upholding freedom of expression.
• Prevent immigrants from sponsoring their parents.

Founding party members include a former leader of a Neo-Nazi group, a former member of Soldiers of Odin, and a Pegida Canada official. The party’s leader, Maxime Bernier, has also been promoting anti-Muslim conspiracy theories about “infiltration”, defended posing for photos with members of the ultra-nationalist Northern Guard, and refused to denounce the Islamophobic attack that killed fifty-one worshipers at a mosque in Christchurch.

The decision to give the People’s Party a seat at the nationally aired debates will by association normalize the racist, Islamophobic and transphobic views espoused by the party. This will increase the number of violent acts against the targeted communities.

It was a mistake to invite the People’s Party to the leader’s debate. What I want to examine in this article is why this outcome was deemed acceptable in the first place.

It’s about perception

One way of conceptualizing the mechanics of prejudice is with the following pyramid:

In this model each layer enables the layer above it; the more widespread the acts in one layer, the greater the likelihood of acts in the layer above. There’s also a point in time in which each layer becomes socially unacceptable.

It’s arguable where each political party stands in this pyramid, although all are represented. What I can say with certainty is that Christian white supremacist groups dabble in the upper two tranches, and their contemporaries on the political side seem to be vying for the layer below. That said, the ultimate political aspirations of the nationalist parties is quite clear: the elimination of visible Muslims and trans people from Canada.

There exists an opportunity right now to curtail the spread of these views. This would require the Leaders’ Debate Commission and media organisations to decline giving white supremacists a platform and lend credibility to their views. The People’s Party is still relatively obscure, the project of a Conservative defector following a failed leadership bid. It has no seats in Parliament. If mainstream organisations keep breathing life into these views, however, there runs the risk of the People’s Party becoming too big to ignore.

Yet organizations have chosen to support the People’s Party. I posit that this is for reasons related to perception: the image of Maxime Bernier and the appearance of fairness.

Let’s start with Maxime Bernier. The imagery disseminated of him is largely indistinguishable from that of the leaders of mainline parties. Contrast that with the visuals of the leader for the Nationalist Party which is more aligned with what white people imagine a white supremacist to look like.

• 

• 

When Maxime Bernier is interviewed on television, he has a calm disposition, his tone is soft, he is jovial, and affirms his points using language familiar to mainline politicians. He appears respectable.

That leads to the perception of fairness. The decision to invite Bernier to the national debate stage was at the discretion of the Leaders’ Debates Commission. They said that it was based on 30% of constituents in two electoral ridings stating they were considering voting for the People’s Party, enough for the party to potentially win a seat. I speculate that the number was this high among constituents because unlike leaders of other fringe parties Bernier appears respectable. I suspect that the Leader’s Debate Commission then decided upon this outcome for the same reason. This was subsequently framed in the media as a fair decision.

I argue that this respectability and fairness is based on an incomplete picture rooted in white Christian sensibilities. If those were expanded to be inclusive of Muslim and trans viewpoints, I don’t believe that Maxime Bernier and the People’s Party would appear respectful. His candidates are openly harassing Muslim Canadians and members of the 2SLGBTQ community. They are unabashedly racist. His own rhetoric peddles in fear mongering and conspiracies.

In the end, saying things with a smile goes a long way towards legitimizing what’s uttered with those who aren’t targeted by the thinly-veiled vitriol. Mainstream organisations that provide a platforms already vet their invitees based on perceptions of respectability as they don’t wish to place their own organisation in disrepute. These organisations must be representative of more than white Christian viewpoints when making such judgments, or they inadvertently become amplifiers of this Christian white supremacy.