In the spirit of the electoral season I want to make a promise: this election will end soon. And to double down I promise to keep my promise – it really will end.
The fact that it is almost over feels like the best part of this dreadful election. It is tough for me to write that because I usually love elections. But then again I still hold hope that they will be a time of meaningful, rational discussions about issues that are relevant to our current and future lives. I continue to live in hope.
What may be most ironic or perhaps just plain sad is that this election is the only one I can say both ignored women and then proceeded to use women as props in a nasty discussion. Talk about doubling down.
In several of the debates, the only woman leader of a national party wasn’t invited to the podium. Okay I get that her party doesn’t hold a lot of seats and their national polling numbers are single digits, but could we just for a minute give the illusion that we are more than a country of white male leaders? To her credit the female leader did try enter the fray by simultaneously tweeting while the guys were on stage. For her efforts most commentators mentioned her participation in a “aw shucks isn’t it cute how that plucky woman tried to speak” kind of way.
Then there was the Women’s Debate. Don’t feel bad if you missed it because there wasn’t one. Lots of non-profit organizations worked hard to replicate the one and only nationally televised leaders’ debate on women’s issues that happened in the 1984 election. But when a couple of the leaders said thanks but no thanks the debate morphed into a series of video interviews with some of the leaders. An event was held in Toronto (and streamed online) where edited clips of the interviews were played and then discussed by panelists. I don’t blame the organizers for the difficult to watch event. They did the best with what they had. The real problem was that so many campaign war rooms and leaders decided that a real live exchange of ideas – a debate! – aimed specifically at women just wasn’t worth the time. In the Munk Economic Debate, the transcript reveals that the word “woman” was uttered three times. You feeling the love yet?
Then the tone of the campaign turned on a piece of cloth. Two women wanted to take a ceremonial oath while wearing a niqab. Suddenly all the leaders were talking about women. In fact they talked non-stop about what we should wear and about whether or not we were oppressed. Politicians from across the country positioned themselves as champions of equality and promised to save us from pretty much every evil except of course, wage parity and gender based violence.
Who says an election is a terrible time to discuss serious issues? (Kim Campbell has been saddled with this misquote since 1993.) Until this election I didn’t know that women wearing niqabs is actually a far more serious issue and threat than the one thousand plus missing and murdered Indigenous women in this country. I feel so much safer and smarter now. Thanks guys.
So it’s been a tough election for women, but it’s not over. As promised earlier it will be over soon, but just like every other election, you have the last word. You get to vote.
It is time to think about your relationship with the federal government. What do you want it to look like? What do you want your country to look like? Then do your homework: look at party platforms; talk to the candidates. Decide who best represents your interests and values and then go put your X beside their name on a ballot. You have no greater honour or duty.
And I still live in hope. I hope that if we increase the number of women who vote this election, the more likely we’ll be treated with respect in the next one.
