In a culture as diverse as Canada’s, rhetorical appeals to shared values are empty statements
By Mohamed Sheriffdeen
Illustration by Ben Buckley
If you pay attention to political rhetoric, nearly every speech issued by someone campaigning for your vote embraces the idea of “our values” or “our shared values” or “our core values.”
President Obama is enamoured with the phrase, and you cannot skim through Thomas Mulcair’s website without stumbling over the term repeatedly (a brilliant drinking game if you can hold your liquor). It can be used as a weapon, a commitment to a relationship, and even be glossed over when suitable.
In a draft of the ‘Canadian Foreign Policy Plan’ leaked by CBC News in Nov 2012, a commitment to economic negotiations with China was made, glossing over cavernous ideological schisms and approaches to individual freedoms. To wit: “we will need to pursue political relationships in tandem with economic interests even where political interests or values may not align.” This stance canonizes a dollars-first mindset despite a commitment made by our PM in November 2006 to not “sell out important Canadian values, our belief in democracy, freedom, human rights . . . to the almighty dollar.”
So what are values anyway? The term is shifting and fluid, a catchall thrown together to bestow upon you, the voter, a belief that your government has your best interests at heart; whether that term is concrete or simply addresses economic, social, cultural, religious and/or political ideologies that occupy the public imagination at any given moment is up for debate.
It is hard to presume that those cultural values harboured by every single demographic in this or any country are held across the board, and indeed the argument can be made that those “values” espoused in North America are Judeo-Christian ideals that swing right and left on a decade-by-decade basis.
It is the commitment to these“values” that convinced John Baird to embarrassingly flex imaginary international political clout when Palestine was granted a confirmation of statehood by the UN. It is the commitment to these ‘values’ that led Harper’s government to circumvent parliamentary dissection of individual mandates within their highly publicized omnibus budget bills in the so-called interest of economic security. Harper once screamed that, “corruption is not a Canadian value!” when Paul Martin had the audacity to associate Liberal values with those of all Canadians.
Indeed, the amount of rhetoric and projection is so thick that it shrouds clear conversation — one cannot argue hypotheticals. So, the question remains, what are our values? They are whatever we need them to be. The idea is a useless and outdated political tool. It is impossible to identify an individual set of values with all Canadians; the cultural, religious and political diversity in our country is staggering and not all individuals may feel they are aptly represented by government, but politicos still make hay by rallying around a single, presumptuously unifying flag.
Why? Because the need to believe in something greater than the individual is a stirring call. “Our values” is the broadest, vaguest phrase in modern politics, but it allows the listener to fill in the gaps, crowd-sourcing national policy, in a grotesque vote grab that alienates the people it intends to unite.
Prevailing conditions in our southern cousin illustrates the danger of this approach. Values can be used by an individual or a group to promote an inconsistent agenda and assume an executive role with a presumed morality. Exercise gun control? Not a chance, it infringes
upon our rights.
But what about individuals with alternate lifestyles and sexualities? Do they deserve the right to enter into unions and pass on death benefits to their partners? If they violate our values, god no. What rights or values are divine? Which are human constructs, and which can truly be universally applied? Nobody really knows, and neither does your government. Prattling on about a shady, undefined set of values belittles our intelligence and drives us away from a secular government whose sole focus should be the establishment of rules and regulations derived from a clear focus on the common good. Let us move on from the white noise and demand clarity.
