Legault talks about guaranteeing freedom of debate at the university, Martine Delvaux of UQAM talks about government "police"
The Prime Minister of Quebec, François Legault published this Saturday morning an encouraging text on Facebook.
We hear a lot about academic freedom and freedom of speech these days. I am thinking in particular of the history of the University of Ottawa, which shocked a lot of people, myself included.
We see that a handful of radical activists are trying to censor certain words and certain works. We see a movement coming here from the United States and frankly, I find that it does not resemble us.
What is really worrying is that more and more people are feeling intimidated. They feel forced to censor themselves, for fear of being insulted and denounced in the public square.
Professors are being asked to erase the works of some of our great writers, such as Anne Hébert, Réjean Ducharme, Dany Laferrière or Pierre Vallières. It's absurd. It goes against the very idea of the university.
And then it's not limited to campuses. In the fall, I experienced it myself when activists tried to censor my reading suggestions because I recommended a book by Mathieu Bock-Côté, which dealt precisely with the excesses of political correctness. .
Recently, a university lecturer testified in a newspaper that she had been denounced and harassed
for using the words "man" and "woman"!
It goes too far. The situation is getting out of hand. I think it's time for us to have a serious discussion together. The use of certain words can hurt, and the pain of those who feel it must be recognized. On the other hand, their just cause must not be hijacked by radicals who want to censor, muzzle, intimidate and restrict our freedom of speech. Between injury and censorship, we have to draw a line.
While it may be healthy to question certain conceptions or behaviors and avoid offending or hurting, we should not sacrifice our freedom of expression. We have to stand up so that bullied people know that they have the right to present facts and ideas,
and that we will be there to defend them.
The same goes for people who are victims of racism. They need to know that hate speech,
racist acts or discrimination will not be allowed to pass.
Freedom of expression is one of the pillars of our democracy. If we start making compromises on this, we risk seeing the same censorship spill over into our media, into our political debates. We won't want to say anything more. No one will dare to talk about immigration, for example, if every time we discuss this subject, we are shouted nonsense. Nobody wants that. Not me anyway.
This problem started with our universities, and I think that is where we will have to solve it first. The Minister of Higher Education, Danielle McCann, is looking into this with academia to act quickly. Our universities should be places of respectful debate, uncensored debate and the search for truth, even when the truth may shock or provoke. We are going to do what is necessary to help our universities protect our freedom of expression.
But we also have a responsibility there. We all have a duty to defend our fundamental principles in the face of intimidation attempts. If we start to censor ourselves for fear of being insulted, or if we do not defend someone who is a victim of this, we are playing the game of the radicals. I understand it can be scary, but we have to stand up, stay firm. The more of us who refuse to give in to the intimidation of a minority of radicals, the more the fear will recede.
Happy Saturday everyone.
Your Prime Minister
We see that a handful of radical activists are trying to censor certain words and certain works. We see a movement coming here from the United States and frankly, I find that it does not resemble us.
What is really worrying is that more and more people are feeling intimidated. They feel forced to censor themselves, for fear of being insulted and denounced in the public square.
Professors are being asked to erase the works of some of our great writers, such as Anne Hébert, Réjean Ducharme, Dany Laferrière or Pierre Vallières. It's absurd. It goes against the very idea of the university.
And then it's not limited to campuses. In the fall, I experienced it myself when activists tried to censor my reading suggestions because I recommended a book by Mathieu Bock-Côté, which dealt precisely with the excesses of political correctness. .
Recently, a university lecturer testified in a newspaper that she had been denounced and harassed
for using the words "man" and "woman"!
It goes too far. The situation is getting out of hand. I think it's time for us to have a serious discussion together. The use of certain words can hurt, and the pain of those who feel it must be recognized. On the other hand, their just cause must not be hijacked by radicals who want to censor, muzzle, intimidate and restrict our freedom of speech. Between injury and censorship, we have to draw a line.
While it may be healthy to question certain conceptions or behaviors and avoid offending or hurting, we should not sacrifice our freedom of expression. We have to stand up so that bullied people know that they have the right to present facts and ideas,
and that we will be there to defend them.
The same goes for people who are victims of racism. They need to know that hate speech,
racist acts or discrimination will not be allowed to pass.
Freedom of expression is one of the pillars of our democracy. If we start making compromises on this, we risk seeing the same censorship spill over into our media, into our political debates. We won't want to say anything more. No one will dare to talk about immigration, for example, if every time we discuss this subject, we are shouted nonsense. Nobody wants that. Not me anyway.
This problem started with our universities, and I think that is where we will have to solve it first. The Minister of Higher Education, Danielle McCann, is looking into this with academia to act quickly. Our universities should be places of respectful debate, uncensored debate and the search for truth, even when the truth may shock or provoke. We are going to do what is necessary to help our universities protect our freedom of expression.
But we also have a responsibility there. We all have a duty to defend our fundamental principles in the face of intimidation attempts. If we start to censor ourselves for fear of being insulted, or if we do not defend someone who is a victim of this, we are playing the game of the radicals. I understand it can be scary, but we have to stand up, stay firm. The more of us who refuse to give in to the intimidation of a minority of radicals, the more the fear will recede.
Happy Saturday everyone.
Your Prime Minister
Let's see if this text will be followed up.
Martine Delvaux, professor of “literary studies” at UQAM, who had already defended wokes students in this dossier (see Universities: after the word “negro” which has become taboo, the ban on “woman” and “ man ”for transphobia? ) immediately reacted on the same medium,
invoking the specter of government police.
Martine Delvaux, professor of “literary studies” at UQAM, who had already defended wokes students in this dossier (see Universities: after the word “negro” which has become taboo, the ban on “woman” and “ man ”for transphobia? ) immediately reacted on the same medium,
invoking the specter of government police.
Ironic to see these zero tolerance proponents claim that censorship, harassment and bullying would be the exceptions. As if it were an excuse for these people who do not tolerate the slightest "micro-aggression" ...
Martine Delvaux's membership in the Department of Literary Studies could lead one to believe that she is interested in an erudite way in literature, in the great classics, it is not. She specializes in "feminine pain", "feminist studies", "Jacques Derrida" and "women's literature". On Derrida and the other "deconstructors", reading Epidemic of Occidentalophobia seems to have struck the Anglo-Saxon academic world and Parodying the vocabulary of gender studies: a new successful genre?
The comments of Martine Delvaux's supporters are worth their weight in gold:
Martine Delvaux's membership in the Department of Literary Studies could lead one to believe that she is interested in an erudite way in literature, in the great classics, it is not. She specializes in "feminine pain", "feminist studies", "Jacques Derrida" and "women's literature". On Derrida and the other "deconstructors", reading Epidemic of Occidentalophobia seems to have struck the Anglo-Saxon academic world and Parodying the vocabulary of gender studies: a new successful genre?
The comments of Martine Delvaux's supporters are worth their weight in gold:
Remember that the Alberta Conservative government is demanding that post-secondary educational institutions in Alberta comply with the Chicago principles . The Chicago Principles were written in 2014 by the University of Chicago's Committee on Free Speech and released in January 2015. They reiterate the importance of as much freedom of speech as possible on campus. According to its promoters, universities, by nature, must refrain from limiting the spread of even hurtful or unpleasant ideas. The limit is that the laws are respected and that there is therefore no defamation, no threats or harassment. More details here: Alberta demands more freedom of speech on campus.
However, we believe that we must go beyond this necessary freedom of expression. We must question the public funding of universities and departments of ideological studies (women, gender, races) whose value for the taxpayer is more than doubtful.
Nadia El-Mabrouk on Facebook recalls that: “It is true that the government's hold on the progress of university research is very thin. In particular, the Quebec government has no control over the operation of scientific journals or the parameters of federal research grants. On the other hand, it would be very judicious to look at the provincial and ministerial grants granted, and to question the responsibility of the government, through these grants, in the whitewashing of
scientifically unfounded ideas and the institutional capture. smoky theories. "
Extract from Mathieu Bock-Côté's reaction
It is also a very good thing to see the political class announce that they will stand up to them, as François Legault has just done, who explained in his words today that the ideological intolerance which presents itself under the sign of virtue is a real danger for the democratic spirit. The issue of freedom of expression in general and academic freedom in particular is at the heart of public life. Freedom of expression must be fervently defended and we can only rejoice to see the Prime Minister take this issue personally, making it a national priority. A few months ago, moreover, Paul St-Pierre Plamondon had already pleaded for action on the issue. Whatever their shade of blue, the nationalists agree to defend democracy against the woke movement.
The panicked reaction of the woke movement, which is draped behind the principle of university autonomy to hide its hold over an institution it has hijacked to make it an ideological war machine is revealing. Some tell us that the university is able to regulate itself. Yet she has proven the contrary for years, and in the most grotesque way possible. Several rectors themselves, and many professors, are today tempted by a supposedly virtuous censorship. Many students suffer from this environment which operates under the rules of ideological control.Through its hold on the university, and especially, on the departments of social sciences, the left woke exerts a true ideological hegemony on the company: it controls the conditions of production of the dominant ideology, and this, well beyond social science departments.
But it would be a mistake to believe that this movement is simply the act of radical militants that it would suffice to confront for the civilized debate to resume its rights. We are not only in front of isolated oddballs. The woke movement, I repeat, represents only the new wave of the deployment of political correctness, which has been hegemonic in the university for much longer. Wokism, in a way, is radicalized and fanaticized political correctness. This is not, however, an unexpected drift, but the most complete expression of the dominant ideology in academia.We should not speak of the drifts of wokism, but of wokism as a drift. But to find out, you have to take an interest in the cultural war he is waging in the world of ideas and in his methods.
This ideology also dominates cultural circles, the granting agencies that support them, and is very present in the media, as we can see at Radio-Canada, which subjects its employees to compulsory ideological re-education workshops. This ideology is also found to varying degrees in the public service and more broadly in the marketing and human resources departments of several companies, which normalize its rhetoric without really knowing what they are doing. Authoritarianism likes to hide behind the noblest intentions. In the name of what it calls "diversity", the woke left is dragging our society into racialist regression. She fabricates prohibitions, transforms words into taboos and makes the title of certain works unpronounceable.
We must therefore have an overview of the situation.Those who, in the media, denounce student censors without taking an interest in the ideological foundations of their censorship claim, without even realizing that they sometimes embrace them, participate in the general confusion. From this point of view, if we really want to stand up to Wokism and undertake a democratic reconquest of public space, we must understand the institutional mechanisms by which it exercises such a hold over the university, which it transforms into a indoctrinate and recruit, in addition to too often fabricating a false pseudo-scientific knowledge, but authentically delusional that continues to bluff too many social actors even if, from time to time, well-organized university hoaxes reveal its grotesquery.
How do granting agencies work today? How does the process of hiring professors promote the creation of ideological coteries that no longer have anything to do with academic freedom? How do fanatic student associations allow themselves to have militia behavior on campus? We must not be content to pose for the defense of freedom of expression: we must restore the institution that should never have betrayed it. It is in the name of freedom that we must commit. The freedom to think, to debate, to reflect. This battle, which must be fought, will allow us to say that Quebec knows how to resist North American ideological delirium and confirms,
in the most beautiful way possible, its reputation as a Gallic village.
However, we believe that we must go beyond this necessary freedom of expression. We must question the public funding of universities and departments of ideological studies (women, gender, races) whose value for the taxpayer is more than doubtful.
Nadia El-Mabrouk on Facebook recalls that: “It is true that the government's hold on the progress of university research is very thin. In particular, the Quebec government has no control over the operation of scientific journals or the parameters of federal research grants. On the other hand, it would be very judicious to look at the provincial and ministerial grants granted, and to question the responsibility of the government, through these grants, in the whitewashing of
scientifically unfounded ideas and the institutional capture. smoky theories. "
Extract from Mathieu Bock-Côté's reaction
It is also a very good thing to see the political class announce that they will stand up to them, as François Legault has just done, who explained in his words today that the ideological intolerance which presents itself under the sign of virtue is a real danger for the democratic spirit. The issue of freedom of expression in general and academic freedom in particular is at the heart of public life. Freedom of expression must be fervently defended and we can only rejoice to see the Prime Minister take this issue personally, making it a national priority. A few months ago, moreover, Paul St-Pierre Plamondon had already pleaded for action on the issue. Whatever their shade of blue, the nationalists agree to defend democracy against the woke movement.
The panicked reaction of the woke movement, which is draped behind the principle of university autonomy to hide its hold over an institution it has hijacked to make it an ideological war machine is revealing. Some tell us that the university is able to regulate itself. Yet she has proven the contrary for years, and in the most grotesque way possible. Several rectors themselves, and many professors, are today tempted by a supposedly virtuous censorship. Many students suffer from this environment which operates under the rules of ideological control.Through its hold on the university, and especially, on the departments of social sciences, the left woke exerts a true ideological hegemony on the company: it controls the conditions of production of the dominant ideology, and this, well beyond social science departments.
But it would be a mistake to believe that this movement is simply the act of radical militants that it would suffice to confront for the civilized debate to resume its rights. We are not only in front of isolated oddballs. The woke movement, I repeat, represents only the new wave of the deployment of political correctness, which has been hegemonic in the university for much longer. Wokism, in a way, is radicalized and fanaticized political correctness. This is not, however, an unexpected drift, but the most complete expression of the dominant ideology in academia.We should not speak of the drifts of wokism, but of wokism as a drift. But to find out, you have to take an interest in the cultural war he is waging in the world of ideas and in his methods.
This ideology also dominates cultural circles, the granting agencies that support them, and is very present in the media, as we can see at Radio-Canada, which subjects its employees to compulsory ideological re-education workshops. This ideology is also found to varying degrees in the public service and more broadly in the marketing and human resources departments of several companies, which normalize its rhetoric without really knowing what they are doing. Authoritarianism likes to hide behind the noblest intentions. In the name of what it calls "diversity", the woke left is dragging our society into racialist regression. She fabricates prohibitions, transforms words into taboos and makes the title of certain works unpronounceable.
We must therefore have an overview of the situation.Those who, in the media, denounce student censors without taking an interest in the ideological foundations of their censorship claim, without even realizing that they sometimes embrace them, participate in the general confusion. From this point of view, if we really want to stand up to Wokism and undertake a democratic reconquest of public space, we must understand the institutional mechanisms by which it exercises such a hold over the university, which it transforms into a indoctrinate and recruit, in addition to too often fabricating a false pseudo-scientific knowledge, but authentically delusional that continues to bluff too many social actors even if, from time to time, well-organized university hoaxes reveal its grotesquery.
How do granting agencies work today? How does the process of hiring professors promote the creation of ideological coteries that no longer have anything to do with academic freedom? How do fanatic student associations allow themselves to have militia behavior on campus? We must not be content to pose for the defense of freedom of expression: we must restore the institution that should never have betrayed it. It is in the name of freedom that we must commit. The freedom to think, to debate, to reflect. This battle, which must be fought, will allow us to say that Quebec knows how to resist North American ideological delirium and confirms,
in the most beautiful way possible, its reputation as a Gallic village.
For an independent school in Quebec
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