There they sat in the National Assembly, beneath the crucifix above the speaker's chair, 113 members present, and one by one they rose, every last one of them, to register a vote in favour of religious intolerance. It may be that a majority of their constituents approves, and in democracy majority rules, but that doesn't make it right.
The vote was to formalize a ban on kirpans, the ceremonial daggers worn at all times by devout Sikhs as a profession of their faith, in the National Assembly building. It followed on the heels of an incident last month in which a Sikh delegation was turned away from the building when the members declined to hand over their kirpans at the security desk. Ironically, they had been invited to make a submission to a committee debating reasonable accommodation of religious minorities in the province.
Without exception, the MNAs, including the premier, felt it necessary for one reason or another to impose the kirpan ban in the building, even though no other legislature in the country has seen a need to do so and the kirpan is not deemed a threat in the federal Parliament. Sikhs are also free to wear kirpans to the Supreme Court, which has ruled that the kirpan is not a weapon and can be reasonably worn even in schools.
The National Assembly motion was put by the Parti Quebecois, whose spokesperson on the issue, Louise Beaudoin, said its purpose was to force the governing Liberals to take a stand on the matter and to affirm that while multiculturalism might be a Canadian value, it is not a Quebec value, even though it is a fact of life in the province. Indulging intolerance, it would seem from what she says, is a Quebec value.
[But then, playing to the xenophobic element in Quebecois society has long been stock in trade for the PQ.->35015] From the Liberals, however, one might have expected better than Immigration Minister Kathleen Weil's pathetic contention that for her party the kirpan is strictly a security concern. Apart from the fact that the Sikh religion proscribes the use of the kirpan as an aggressive weapon, Sikhs would readily agree that kirpans should be tightly bound in sheaths and worn beneath clothing.
If security is really the Liberals' concern, they should also ordain that the Assembly restaurant be henceforth limited to plastic knives and forks. Or do they think that only Sikhs would run amok in the building if allowed possession of pointed implements?