With respect, suggesting in an election platform document that rather than earning a lving apart from her male partner, a woman might consider taking up arts and crafts is not at all socially just. Unless of course we see the advancement of women as being part of the Old Left.

While I agree that the battle lines are changing, the fundamental schisms amongst those who consider themselves to be on the left (or anti-global/anti-corporatist if you prefer) are still there. Class, race and gender are still the primary drivers behind the movement. The light of criticism needs to be cast on the GPC’s eagerness to ignore two out of three of these with its Income Splitting policy. I say this risking an image of being on a single issue crusade.

I didn’t say May was responsible for moving the party to the right, rather that I believe that she bears some respnsibility. As party leader she should.

She’s also in the fortunate position to not have her personal views scrutinized too closely. But I wonder what will happen when the support begins to climb. If I were her I would give Stockwell Day a call to find out “What Not To Answer” (or Wear…poor old Stock).

And again, and perhaps most importantly, I press these two points that perhaps go more toward the democratic nature of the party rather than its ideological soul searching:

What of apathetic “I’ll just vote Green” votes. In May’s Writ Day stump speech she almost went there, saying something to the effect of ‘get engaged’ but she stopped short of addressing it. Choosing instead to tell us not to watch the US election.

Also I believe it’s important for the GPC to align itself on the Canadian political spectrum as Canadians understand it. This complicity (and refreshingly Stuart you don’t demonstrate it) with being labelled on the left must stop.

Maybe though, that responsibility shouldn’t lie with May or the GPC. Maybe it lies with the other parties aligned on our spectrum.

I’m not sure that Elizabeth May is responsible for turning the Greens away from social justice as you suggest. It’s there, but the dominant tendency in the Green party is to approach it from a right of centre perspective.

Rather than Left vs. Right, I think that the internal battle is between those who have internalised a corporatist mentality and those who identify with the anti-global movement, which is anti-corporatist. By and large, the Old Left has been eliminated from Canadian politics. History moves on and the battle lines change.

By the way, you can Reply to a specific comment by clicking on the (Reply) link beside the comment title, or selecting it in the drop-down menu below the comment window. Then the comments are nested nicely.

Right Centrist? Is it not then incumbent on the party to make this clear to voters? Rather than slyly rely on support (and read $1.75 a vote here) from people who believe otherwise. Also, that scourge of apathy I wrote of. The “None of the Above” support, that seems to swing the GPC’s way. It’s a factor that is never addressed in the discourse, mainstream or otherwise, and it should be.

On May. Does she not bear some responsibility for continuing to turn the Greens away from social justice? Her personal views are problematic, and she is perhaps worse than Harris for complicity in the labelling of the GPC as “leftist”.

http://www.rabble.ca/aa/go2.php3?sh_itm=b5e11c862a88da8826b0248743b6cb76&type=fed&url=http://www.rabble.ca/news_full_story.shtml&external=

Long URL! And yes, the Greens are spotty on social justice, largely because most of the newer Greens are disaffected Liberals or dispossessed Red Tories. Canada’s Greens are Right-centrist, with some progressive views.

My question is what of Harris and May?

Harris the former Tory and May the former member of Mulroney’s inner circle.

Much of the GPC’s fortunes have been built under these two and they both have coloured pasts and presents when it comes to the left wing support the GPC courts.

Under Harris the GPC was about as far from the International Green movement as it could get. See this article from the last election:
http://thetyee.ca/Views/2005/12/16/GreensArentGreen/

Under May the GPC has shown it’s spotty on Social Justice isssues. The biggest spot being the GPC’s embracing of Income Splitting. A policy that they are apologetic for in the text of their platform. Even going so far as to acknowledge its effect on the regression of women.

May herself is on the pro-life side of the abortion debate, a fact that may have cost her the by-election in London North-Centre. Not to mention that the humanist values of the Green movemment run contrary to May’s efforts to become a member of the clergy.

It seems the GPC is willing to sell itself out, not only in its selection of leaders, its momentary and monumental slips into political opportunism, but perhaps more strikingly its complicity with the Canadian media labelling it as “on the left”. The GPC has also done nothing at all to discourage that scourge of voter apathy that finds the young and the underinformed expressing “I’ll just vote Green…they’re running right?”

I keep waiting for someone to call the GPC to the carpet on these facts. Layton had his shot when May raised Income Splitting during the debate. But, alas, the NDP has unfortunately for our democratic process, decided that it wasn’t to its political advantage to have its leader question May on the issue.

Sometimes I feel as though I’m alone in the forest screaming these facts about the GPC and either people don’t want to hear it, don’t care or would rather it just be kept quiet.

I can only hope that a few people read this post, then a few more read it, then a few more start talking about it and then maybe the GPC will be under the scrutiny the Green movement in Canada needs.

Rob,

Sackville, NB

But I think we can agree that we need to APPLY the Green Principles to REAL SOLUTIONS for British Columbia. Can you agree with me here?

1) the South Park episode of Smart Car drivers who, rather than filling their city with smog, are now filling their city with smug: wikipedia, video

2) the book “Rebel Sell” available here