Feminist Philosophers

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A first for Ontario, a first for Canada January 27, 2013

Filed under: gender,politics,sexual orientation — jennysaul @ 8:00 am

First woman premier in Ontario, first openly gay premier in Canada! And the final two candidates for the post were both women.

 

10 Responses to “A first for Ontario, a first for Canada”

  2. Louis Says:
    January 28, 2013 at 1:07 am

    She’s getting the Kim Campbell treatment, though. Her position’s unbearable: the opposition has a majority of seats and a sharp lead in the polls.

  3. Philosochick Says:
    January 28, 2013 at 1:17 am

    Louis: It’s Canada: we have parliament and the possibility of minority governments. That doesn’t make her position “unbearable” (I’m not sure you if you really meant “untenable”). It’s quite possible to have a long run of successful minority governments.

  4. Louis Says:
    January 28, 2013 at 3:32 am

    English isn’t my first language – I probably misused “unbearable”. I meant something like “very uncomfortable”. As if her seat was on fire.

    What keeps minority governments alive are incentives for the opposition to keep it like that. And it seems to me that they’re exceptionally slim here. The liberals have held power for too long, unions are in an open war against them, they’re trailing in polls and they have a rookie leader. And if Wynne is taking the wheel of a sinking ship, she’ll be remembered as the one who sank it (like Kim Campbell).

    Leading in the polls is Andrea Horvath’s NDP, though, so the liberals losing an early election doesn’t mean the end of an Ontario led by a woman.

  5. Philosochick Says:
    January 28, 2013 at 11:22 am

    Louis: Your final paragraph is really, really sexist and misogynistic. No one raised Mike Harris’ gender as a note-worthy feature of his running Ontario into the ground (metaphorically speaking).

  6. Louis Says:
    January 28, 2013 at 2:11 pm

    Philosochick: I didn’t mean it to be so, and still fail to why. My perspective is that I’m upset about Canadian politics giving women the worst roles, which makes my angry at it.

    Anyhow, I’d be grateful if you could tell me my mistake. I mean to be an ally, and pouring sexism in a discussion, even unwillingly, is definitly something I want to avoid.

  7. Sherri Irvin Says:
    January 28, 2013 at 7:32 pm

    I didn’t see any sexism in Louis’s comment. I thought his point was simply that even if the Liberals fall from power, next up is the NDP, so Ontario might still have a female premier (Horwath).

    He also suggests it would be unfair if a female premier were blamed for the sinking of a ship that was already on its way down when she took the helm.

  8. Philosochick Says:
    January 28, 2013 at 9:03 pm

    Ontario has no danger of going under with a woman at the helm, because if Wynne goes down there’s Horwath.

    It’s the former part that reads as sexist to me: it communicates that “going under” is worse if there’s a woman at the helm than if there’s a man.

  9. Louis Says:
    January 29, 2013 at 2:16 am

    Philosochick: Ok, thanks. Not at all what I meant (Sherri expressed it much better than I), but I’ll be more careful.

  10. beta Says:
    January 30, 2013 at 7:29 pm

    I didn’t read Louis’ comment as in any way sexist. He said my thoughts exactly.


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