The separatists, they are coming! Or not!

Gerald Butts is a very smart man, a clear writer and a fine thinker. So when he writes something eloquent about a subject on which I know a lot, I pay attention. But I also want to offer a slightly less panicky take on all the things.

By way of cutting to the chase, let me say that I have no reason to suspect or believe that anything federal politicians do or abysmally fail to do will make Quebec separatism come back. That’s because most Quebecers don’t give a shit about what federal politicians do or abysmally fail to do. They’ve consciously uncoupled from the rest of the country a long time ago.

I like that Butts starts his piece with Brexit. I was in England the day of the vote and I remember people talking about it a lot but you know the Brits. They just stiffened that upper lip some more and moved on. Perhaps a little more sideways than usual, but still. True, their politics have been a shambles ever since. They’ll recover, I’m sure.

Post-Brexit Britain is very much unlike what I expect Quebec would be if there ever was a successful separation referendum which there won’t. For one thing, as a rule Quebecers aren’t cold fish like the legendarily unflappable anglais. We don’t think showing emotions is wrong. There would be lots of those on display in a post-yes world.

But seriously? I don’t see another separation referendum anytime in the next 3-5 years, or even in the next forever years. For two important reasons: 1) the third way between separatism and federalism, which has been called autonomism when it was was successfully introduced by the CAQ party under the current premier’s leadership even though it was sort of tried by Mario Dumont’s old ADQ back in the day, is proving to be the goldilocks of identity politics finally and 2) why bother? Quebec’s already checked out in the ways that matter.

There is no need formally to separate, not for most people. The costs would be high and the benefits, meh. Best to work within the current constitutional framework and systemically endeavour to get whatever measures, policies and concessions are necessary to ensure Quebec remains its adorably distinct self.

Butts, however, is very right about one thing with regards to Quebec separation. The rest of Canada is “utterly unprepared for its consequences, and our neighbours [the U.S.] are not remotely attuned to its possibility.” A good thing it doesn’t matter, eh.

Canada is not ready to mount a riposte to a hypothetical separatist campaign because it doesn’t know how to articulate the advantages to be found in remaining married. Canada is the spouse that’s given up and settling for tatty sweatpants. It knows its partner is living its best life and it wishes it could follow, but it can’t so it goes back to watching TV by itself.

In 2015 Justin Trudeau said Canada was the first post-national state, something that caused a nasty stir among the more traditionally minded among us (call them the New Loyalists). Of course Trudeau was right. It had been true for a long time; as the New Loyalists never miss an opportunity to remind us, the multiculturalism brought on by the prime minister’s father is chiefly to blame for Canada losing its sense of self.

Which is, of course, complete and utter bullshit.

The whole concept of nationhood is fiction. It is a story people tell themselves about who they think they are. It can be a good thing — it can help bring people together and rally them around commonly shared values. Quebecers, in that respect, are a very strong nation. The concept can also be a bad thing — it can serve as an excuse to keep strangers out and mistreat entire categories of people not deemed worthy of belonging. Most countries you’d actually want to live in, with the partial exception of MAGALAND, have a version of the first one. Canada doesn’t have a convincing story to pitch. I can guarantee you the two founding people thing is 100% useless when trying to woo a Quebecer who knows who she is and why.

The problem with the federalist side, certainly during and since the 1995 referendum, is that it doesn’t actually have anything to sell to Quebec voters beyond the convenience of keeping their passports and the same money. In 1980, the federalist sales pitch was basically a slightly edited version of “what, you’re not gonna vote for those dirty hippies, are you?” — it worked, too, much better than the 1995 tasteless blancmange, as evidence by the vote results.

But what about now? What exactly should we be fearing? Is Butts right that the next leader of the opposition in Ottawa might be the separatist guy?

I dunno. Maybe?

Yves-François Blanchet (who in a previous life was an agent for artists such as Éric Lapointe, Caroline Néron, Kevin Parent and La Chicane) is surprisingly good at federal politics for someone who, as far as I can tell, didn’t set out to be successful at Westminster democracy — he studied anthropology in college, for pete’s sake. He can smell good opportunity from miles away and seems effortlessly able to be exactly in the right position at the right time to take advantage of it. He is disciplined and he keeps his priorities organized. Oh, and he doesn’t give a shit whether you like him or not, especially if you’re not a Quebec voter.

His MPs are equally disciplined, they know their files, show up at committees, don’t speak out of turn and generally work competently. Which is more than you can say about the other parties.

I wouldn’t be surprised to see the Bloc, under this leader, continue to gain in influence on the Hill, and use it to get things that benefit Quebecers. That is literally what the people who voted for that party, voted for that party to do.

To equate a strong Bloc in Ottawa with the coming of a third referendum out of Quebec City, however, is a giant step too far. Canada is not relevant enough in Quebec to be worth the expense and bother of another referendum.