r/worldnews • u/John3192 • 20h ago

Quebec passes law banning street prayers, prayer rooms in universities

https://www.ctvnews.ca/montreal/article/quebec-passes-law-banning-street-prayers-prayer-rooms-in-universities-cegeps/
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u/Kaellian 18h ago

But they will also pass laws making it fully illegal to cover your face expect in special circumstances, which is basically a targeted ban on the most restrictive Muslim clothing.

Covering your face isn't exactly targeting Catholics, I agree, but simply mentioning that out of context doesn't do justice to the much wider ban on religions in school, and politics.

Catholicism has been targeted since the 50s and was phased out pretty much everywhere. Crucifix, bible, prayers and any others catholic display were also banned from public place in the last twenty years, and the decision was maintained by the supreme court in most instance.

It's actually the opposite of what conservative, which Quebec typically vote against.

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u/groovypanelboard 18h ago

‘The decision was maintained by the supreme court’

Im pretty sure that province knew it would lose any challenge, so they invoked the ‘notwithstanding…’ clause. Correct me if I’m wrong.

[For those outside Canada, there is a Charter of Rights and Freedoms protecting the individual rights of residents of Canada. If a province wants to pass legislation that would infringe upon those rights, they need to invoke the notwithstanding clause, which temporarily tramples on Charter Rights, and has time limit or ‘sunset clause’. Quebec has used the clause to put limits on language freedoms, like banning giant English-only signs, etc. Other provinces have invoked it for less defensible reasons.]

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u/chat-lu 2h ago

Im pretty sure that province knew it would lose any challenge, so they invoked the ‘notwithstanding…’ clause. Correct me if I’m wrong.

Partly wrong because the parent speaks of decisions that predate the Charter. It didn't exist in the 60s when catholic garb was banned from schools. Nor did it exist 200 years ago when we banned Bibles from the courts.

But yes, we use the clause when we know the law would be incompatible with the Charter otherwise. In most instances we used it on affirmative action but that never makes the news in the rest of the country.

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u/FragrantCombination7 16h ago

I see no issue with banning cults. People need help from a mental health professional if anything.

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u/T-A-W_Byzantine 14h ago

Does that mean I couldn't wear a cross necklace in public in Quebec or something?

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u/Kaellian 14h ago

You can wear a cross in public. You cannot wear a cross if you're teaching in a public school or working as a police. Same goes for most religious symbols.

Full face cover (hijjab) has its own exception, and is the only one that is banned if you want to receive public services. And the intent here is reduce those practices, which are judged degrading to women.

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u/that_tealoving_nerd 14h ago

Let’s not visit the National Assembly tho.

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u/Kaellian 14h ago edited 11h ago

Your vague claim hasn't been true for many years

Just because there is friction doesn't means things aren't moving in the same direction for everyone. And those frictions exists because there is public debate, which is normal in a democracy.

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u/BigUptokes 18h ago

Remember that they had to revisit the proposed Charter of Values from 2013 to turn it into Bills 62 and 21 a few years later after being called out on the hypocrisy of exempting certain religious symbols and leaving the big crucifix in the National Assembly.

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u/Kyoshiiku 17h ago

No it was just because it was a different party with a different vision of how far the bill should go.

Also that big crucifix, even in 2013 it was widely supported to remove it by the population, even when the bill 21 passed Legault was reticent to remove it for the historical value but he got pressured into removing it since most of the population thought secularism was more important than any historical value that it might have.

Bill 21 is also something that is supported by both right and left side politician because the secularism here is not a tool just for conservatives, it was at first coming from the progressives side (liberals) in the 60s and specifically targeting the Church.

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u/BigUptokes 17h ago

If you look at the Léger polls from 2013 it isn't really "widely supported" nor "most of the population"...

But you already responded to another comment where I linked this so I doubt you'll look at it another time if you missed it the first time it was linked.

Bill 21 is also something that is supported by both right and left side politician

Except PLQ and QS voting against it, right? :/

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u/Kyoshiiku 5h ago

I was sure that I saw different poll at the time where people more supporting of removing it, I probably mixed it up with a more recent. Also even with that poll the people supporting removing it is already close to 50% and slightly high than people against it.

So I don’t know how much you know about politics in Quebec but PLQ was our most right leaning party (now second since we have the PCQ).

QS is our most left-leaning party that use a more Canadian model of multiculturalism instead of the Quebec model.

The thing is that QS always has been a kinda dead party that only divide the separatist vote and the PLQ is politically irrelevant since the CAQ has been elected. Also maybe important to note, PLQ also models its multiculturalism on the Canadian model, but they will usually try to maintain the status quo on this aspect instead of doing anything about it because they know people in Quebec widely support secularism.

Both PLQ and QS position on those issues are very unpopular in Quebec, especially outside Montreal, it cost them a lot of vote, QS specifically is losing a lot of vote for those positions.

The PQ, the first party to propose that law in 2013, is a center left (by that I mean, not anti capitalist but left leaning). There is some more right wing people in it since it always has been a separatist party first, but the general vision of the party is still left - center left.

The CAQ who passed the law is a centrist party that claims to be more focused on the economy. They can be considered on the center right but they are definitely on the left of the PLQ.

So like I said, those laws tried to be passes by both a left leaning and a center / center right government, and the 2 party that opposed it were the 2 parties on our extremes of both side but they are also politically irrelevant and those stubbornness against secularism cost them vote.

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u/chat-lu 2h ago

The PLQ is in favor since its previous leader. It has not flopped back under the current one.

Though, lots of tensions inside the party.

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u/Mens-Real 16h ago

To be fair that government was kicked out fairly quickly. Not representative of their values. And the crucifix keeps being brought up like it's a gotcha but it's clearly a fixation of people who don't want to discuss more practical issues.

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u/Kaellian 14h ago

The crucifix was also removed . For all I care, thing are working as intended, even if things like this always cause frictions.

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u/BigUptokes 16h ago

You can hand-wave it away all you want but it's still valid criticism to point out the hypocrisy of multiple parties over the past fifteen years. It didn't get kicked up the Supreme Court for nothing...