bigotry – mackaycartoons

Wednesday August 22, 2018

August 21, 2018 by Graeme MacKay

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Wednesday August 22, 2018

Trudeau stands by ‘racism’ comments to heckler

October 25, 2017

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is standing by his comments to a heckler last week after telling her she was intolerant.Trudeau was speaking at a rally in Sabrevois, Que., when a woman started yelling that she wanted back the $146 million from Quebecers that he’s “given to illegal immigrants,” referring to the amount the Quebec government says asylum seekers have cost since a recent surge in irregular arrivals.

“That intolerance with regard to immigrants doesn’t belong in Canada. That intolerance with regard to diversity, you don’t belong in Canada,” Trudeau said in French Thursday night.

February 23, 2017

“Madame, your intolerance doesn’t belong here.”

The woman then asked Trudeau if he was tolerant toward “Quebecois de souche,” a reference to Quebecers who can trace their ancestry to the earliest French settlers.

In a video posted online, Trudeau can be heard telling the woman her racism isn’t welcome.

The woman who confronted Trudeau was later the subject of debate on social media over her ties to white supremacist groups. She is a member of the Facebook group for Storm Alliance’s Quebec wing. The group says it is “made up of Canadian citizens whose goal is to make our Country stronger, to make it a Country that takes care of its own communities.” It was part of a protest last year at the Lacolle, Que. border crossing, against a rise in asylum seekers.

Speaking in Ottawa Monday, Trudeau said he won’t “flinch from highlighting the politics of division.”

“It’s important that we have people who come at problems from very different perspectives because that actually ensures that we solve them right,” Trudeau said. (Source: CTV News)

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Wednesday October 25, 2017

October 24, 2017 by Graeme MacKay

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Wednesday October 25, 2017

Trudeau, Scheer and Singh do the math in Quebec and none champion an anti-racist stance

The tepid response from federal leaders to Quebec’s ill-conceived and offensive Bill 62 tells us three truths about Canadian politics.

They are not comfortable truths.

September 14, 2013

It tells us that all three major party leaders may harbour suspicions that the bill forcing face coverings to be removed while accessing public services may be more popular both inside and outside Quebec than what might be expected.

They may be right. This has all the trappings of a Donald Trump presidential run or a Brexit referendum in that the louder the protestations and the deeper the indignation of the mainstream pundits, editorial boards and the elite, the more popular the candidate or the legislation.

Secondly, it tells us that the further from power one is, the easier it is to be the champion of rights and liberties.

And thirdly, because it is Quebec, we know that any federal intervention is seen as a political third rail, which would not be the case if, say, a government in Manitoba or Nova Scotia had passed such legislation.

This is particularly true when the Quebec premier is a federalist.

No one wants to poke the hibernating PQ bear, everyone is leery of meddling in provincial jurisdiction, particularly when you have opposition parties who believe Premier Philippe Couillard’s absurd bill does not go far enough. (Source: Toronto Star)

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Wednesday September 13, 2017

September 12, 2017 by Graeme MacKay

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Wednesday September 13, 2017

Jagmeet Singh praised for ‘calm and positive’ reaction to anti-Muslim heckler

Federal NDP leadership hopeful Jagmeet Singh is garnering praise for the way he reacted to a woman who accused him last week of supporting Islamic extremism, because he chose to come out against “all forms of hate” instead of emphasizing that he is Sikh rather than Muslim.

August 3, 2017

The Ontario MPP was interrupted by an angry heckler at a meet and greet last Wednesday in Brampton, Ont. The woman stood in front of the candidate and shouted as aides tried to usher her aside in an incident that was caught on video and shared widely on social media well beyond Canada’s borders.

The woman accused Singh of wanting to impose Shariah law, an Islamic legal code based on the Qur’an, and supporting the Muslim Brotherhood, an 89-year-old religious and political group. The exchange was caught on video and lasted more than four minutes.

“Many people have commented that I could have just said I’m not Muslim. In fact, many have clarified that I’m actually Sikh,” Singh explained in a statement.

“While I’m proud of who I am, I purposely didn’t go down that road because it suggests their hate would be OK if I was Muslim.”

A political science professor told CBC News on Monday that Singh took the right approach.

“It suggests the fact that he is not Muslim is irrelevant,” said Erin Tolley, an assistant professor at the University of Toronto.

“You can just imagine for example a white politician standing in front of a room and heard something racist being said. The exact wrong reaction is to say, ‘Well, I’m white, I’m not a person of colour, so this isn’t important to me.’”

Singh wanted to defuse the situation, she said, highlighting that hate of all forms is wrong, whether it’s directed at your community or not.

His response also signals that Singh, who wears a turban, has experience dealing with direct threats because of his outwardly religious appearance. (Source: CBC News)

This cartoon received an unusual amount of criticism through the mackaycartoons Facebook Page:

Republished in a number of publications. Below the Edmonton Journal and the Western Star, Corner Brook, Newfoundland:

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Thursday February 16, 2017

February 15, 2017 by Graeme MacKay

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Thursday February 16, 2017

Liberal MP’s anti-Islamophobia motion set for debate on Wednesday

Members of Parliament will debate a motion to condemn Islamophobia and track incidents of hate crime against Muslims in the House of Commons next week.

Motion 103 was tabled by Mississauga, Ont., Liberal backbencher Iqra Khalid last fall, but will be discussed in the aftermath of last month’s mass shooting at a Quebec City mosque. It calls on government to “condemn Islamophobia and all forms of systemic racism and religious discrimination.”

The text of the motion also asks the government to:

Recognize the need to quell the increasing public climate of hate and fear.
Request the heritage committee study how the government could develop a government-wide approach to reducing or eliminating systemic racism and religious discrimination, including Islamophobia.
Collect data to contextualize hate crime reports and to conduct needs assessments for impacted communities and present findings within 240 calendar days.

The motion, scheduled for one hour of debate on Wednesday, has generated a backlash online, with petitions garnering thousands of signatures opposing the motion.

January 31, 2017

Some critics have mischaracterized M-103 as a “bill” or a “law” rather than an non-binding motion.

Some have warned that Canada is moving towards criminalizing Islamophobia or even to the implementation of Islamic law, called Shariah, in Canada.

Barbara Kay, a columnist for the National Post and contributor to The Rebel Media, said she worries about M-103’s potential impact on freedom of expression and special protections for a single religious group.

“There are a lot of countries in Europe where criticism of Islam, even if not entrenched in law as a hate crime, are being interpreted by police and law enforcement, social workers — the whole spectrum of the state apparatus. They have been internalized by those within the public service as wrong, and if not criminal then absolutely morally wrong, and therefore Muslims are a group that must be protected from this very offensive speech,” she said in an interview with CBC.

Kay said anti-hate speech laws have traditionally targeted human beings, not ideas. She questioned the need to single out Islamophobia, and argued there are more hate crimes against Jews than Muslims in Canada. (Source: CBC News)

Corner Brook, Newfoundland

Wednesday December 9, 2015

December 8, 2015 by Graeme MacKay

By Graeme MacKay, Editorial Cartoonist, The Hamilton Spectator – Wednesday December 9, 2015

Donald Trump’s Muslim US ban call roundly condemned

Republican presidential hopeful Donald Trump has provoked condemnation from across the political spectrum, by saying Muslims should be banned from entering the US.

Republicans, Democrats, Muslim leaders, the UN and foreign leaders criticised the call as dangerous and divisive.

Mr Trump said many Muslims nursed a “hatred” towards America.

He said they should be banned “until our country’s representatives can figure out what is going on”.

His campaign manager said that would apply to “everybody” – would-be immigrants and tourists. But Mr Trump told Fox News it would “not apply to people living in the country”, adding that Muslims serving in the US military would “come home”.

Mr Trump’s statement was delivered as the US comes to terms with its deadliest terror attack since 9/11.

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Last week a Muslim couple, believed to have been radicalised, opened fire and killed 14 people at a health centre in San Bernardino.

Mr Trump’s proposed ban prompted a horrified reaction from Republicans and others.

Rival candidate Jeb Bush called Mr Trump “unhinged”, while former US Vice-President Dick Cheney said it “goes against everything we stand for and believe in”.

White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest later challenged the Republican party to denounce the leading candidate, and said that the proposal “disqualifies him from serving as president”.

Mr Earnest said that the Trump campaign had a “dustbin of history” quality to it, calling the candidate a “carnival barker” with “fake hair”.

The UK’s Conservative Prime Minister David Cameron said they were “divisive, unhelpful and quite simply wrong”, while his French counterpart Manuel Valls said Mr Trump “stoked hatred”.

UN refugee agency UNHCR said it was concerned that the rhetoric was putting an “incredibly important” resettlement programme for vulnerable Syrian refugees at risk. (Source: BBC News)