If the opposition and its supporters can’t figure out a way to compete on a level beyond rumors, personal attacks, and wardrobe critiques, then they’re in big trouble.
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. © Andrej Ivanov / AFP
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced recently that he and his wife of 18-years, Sophie Grégoire Trudeau, were amicably separating, leaving some Canadians jealous that they couldn’t do the same. Immediately, the rumor mill went into overdrive.
Some on social media suggested that the split involved an affair between Trudeau and very much married Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly — to the point that her name trended for days on Twitter — all because the two had been photographed looking close, and some observers apparently fail to grasp the nature of touchy-feely French-Canadian culture. Others suggested, even more outlandishly, that he was involved with his left-wing coalition partner, NDP leader Jagmeet Singh — again, married and a new father — or even French President Emmanuel Macron. Still more gossip-mongers seemed convinced that Trudeau deliberately timed the announcement to lay the groundwork for an eventual coming out. None of these are in any way substantiated, of course, but that’s the kind of gutter-level interest that the announcement sparked.
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What flew much more under the radar is the fact that Trudeau asked for privacy in the announcement of his split. While Trudeau himself generally (and admirably) avoids ad hominem attacks on his political opponents, he nonetheless made intrusion into private lives official policy with the Covid jab mandates, which should have remained a private choice made between every citizen and their own doctor. Forcing Canadians to inject themselves with a dodgy substance of even more dodgy effectiveness just to go to the gym or grab a burger isn’t exactly keeping your nose out of people’s private business. Neither is blocking people’s bank accounts just because they chose to support the Freedom Convoy movement when they stood up against these mandates and Trudeau overreach into the personal sphere.
The fact that rampant speculation about affairs overshadowed the actual policy hypocrisy doesn’t bode well for the state of Canadian politics.
Will the split harm Trudeau politically? Hardly. It’s not like back in the 1980s when his father was Prime Minister and split from the job just months after doing the same from his wife, Justin’s mom, Margaret. Since then, divorce has become infinitely more normalized, as has bachelorhood and singledom. And in a country where a woman who self-identifies as a man can marry another woman, both self-identifying as straight, and have kids who can also choose their own gender, does anyone seriously think that anyone’s going to bat an eye at a boring “old school” separation?
Trudeau himself has gone a long way in actively promoting this kind of “open mindedness.” He travels around to Pride Parades like groupies follow rock bands, but that doesn’t mean that he personally knows the LGBTQ alphabet. “I will never apologize for standing up for LGDP…LGT…LBG…LGBTQ+ kids’ rights to not have to undergo conversion therapy,” Trudeau said back in 2021. So when just days after his separation, Trudeau posted a photo on social media from a movie theater while dressed in a pink hoodie that read, “Love you more,” alongside his teenage son, also dressed in pink, with the Barbie movie poster looming in the background and the caption, “We’re team Barbie” — it wasn’t getting limbered up for his coming out. Come on, now — has he even bothered to tell us what his pronouns are? He was just trolling — and pandering. In other words, playing the simple-minded like a fiddle.
Remember, this is a former drama teacher who politically survived photos unearthed back in 2019 of himself dressed up for an “Arabian Nights” gala in 2001 — looking more like Aunt Jemima from the pancake syrup bottles. He regularly shows up on the world stage with NATO logo socks, or Eid Mubarak socks, or Canadian maple leaf socks, or rubber ducky socks, or Chewbacca socks, or Royal Canadian Mounted Police socks… It’s not like it’s entirely out of character for him to dress up for a movie. But that didn’t stop critics from concluding that the kid in the photo with him — his son — must be his new boyfriend.
Would it have been any better if he’d have done the opposite — like, if he’d have dressed up as a manly macho man and hung out with cops, firefighters, construction workers, or Canadian cowboys? Yeah, that’s a lot more manly. Just ask the Village People.
Pinning hopes of ousting Trudeau in the next Canadian federal election, set for October 2025, on precarious personal attacks is a losing strategy. Anyone who has to play in that register in order to beat Trudeau is totally incompetent. Trudeau has messed up enough when it comes to substantial policy issues that you really don’t need to look any further. Those who criticize or attempt to counter Trudeau primarily on shallow matters completely unrelated to his ability to run the country only play into the same brand of dumbing down that keeps Trudeau in power.
Trudeau has successfully played shallow-minded and easily led morons like a fiddle by hitting all the woke or politically correct notes that make them feel good about electing him. They figure that by voting for a guy who sounds and acts so “woke,” they’re a good person. It makes them feel that they’re contributing to the continued projection of Canada as open and tolerant — rather than just a country whose voters’ minds are so wide open that they’re falling out.
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Trudeau has made an entire political career of dominating the virtue signaling playing field and succeeding in keeping nearly all debate within its limits. The Freedom Convoy fiasco proved that when he’s dragged into the policy realm and challenged by a critical mass of people with the ability to actually think outside of the establishment dogma he promotes, then he loses and ultimately folds.
Commenting on the guy’s outfits, his marriage, or his presumed proclivities, all because it’s such low-hanging fruit, or easy and fun for the average idiot to grasp without much effort, only serves to enable him. The opposition needs to leave Trudeau on that field, alone, with his pink shirts, and start focusing on ways to inform and educate Canadians while capturing their interest and imagination in the exact same way that Trudeau has been able to in favor of his own political agenda.
The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.
