'Liberals are engaging in bad faith politics': Feminist Conservatives fight back

Stella Mizak, an 18-year-old business student, says she was shocked by what she heard while door-knocking with Conservative party candidates in April’s federal election. She heard it over and over from homeowners, she said: “I can’t believe you’re supporting a party that wants to take your rights away.” It’s perplexing, she sighs: A woman being told she’s not a feminist because she’s seen to be “voting away my rights” by voting Conservative. “I think all women should have the right to choose what life they want for themselves,” Stella says, “and being told that you have to vote Liberal, you have to think this way to be a woman, I think that’s the opposite of what feminism is, and I think the Liberals are actually undermining what feminism is.” Stella is vice-president of provincial affairs for the University of Calgary campus conservative club, recruited as part of a drive to broaden the membership of what was once “a boys club,” admits club adviser Seniru Ruwanpura, “with the same 15 to 20 people showing up at every event.” Hundreds of new members have been added to the club’s roster, which now has a female membership of about 30 per cent, reports Seniru, a 22-year-old software engineering grad. Seniru and Stella are acutely aware that political parties of the right are becoming increasingly male-dominated, and parties of the left increasingly female-dominated. I sit down with the two of them on campus — in a quiet boardroom on the fourth floor of the brand-new Hunter Student Commons building — to discuss what’s to be done, at the University of Calgary or anywhere, to repair this gender gap. In the background, there’s a buzz emanating from the nearby Hunter Hub for Entrepreneurial Thinking; a place where ideas collide and give birth to tech startups. Our conversation is far more intimate. Stella says people are attuned to U.S. politics, and many of her female acquaintances raise questions about abortion, even when it isn’t an issue in Canada. “Liberals are engaging in bad faith politics on the abortion issue,” Seniru adds. These non-issues are being used to wedge people against each other, he says, as a way “for the Liberals to retain power and maintain the status quo.” “It’s very ironic,” Seniru explains, “that older voters and people on the left, they were so concerned about the impacts of the U.S., about secession, about all this sort of stuff, but they don’t realize how much American politics has permeated the discussion here.” People thinking that Pierre Poilievre, the Conservative leader, was anti-women or anti-abortion, Seniru continues, is really about what’s happening with the American right. “If we want Canada to be this independent country — which people are so ‘elbows up’ about — we need to understand what impacts their politics have on our culture,” he concludes. American politics can be a distraction, we agree, and labelling Canadian conservatives as MAGA acolytes is manipulative. But we also agree the federal Conservatives could have done better in the last election, engaging more effectively with female voters, making stronger connections between issues that matter to women — for example, reducing violent crime on streets. “There was a way their platform could have taken down a lot of this rhetoric on the left about women’s rights,” Stella says, “because, frankly, it’s just sensational.” “The weaponization of feminism, weaponizing what it is to be a conservative,” Stella observes, “is really frustrating.” There are many women in the conservative movement, she suggests, pointing to Rona Ambrose as one example, who are strong independent thinkers and wouldn’t join a party that’s actively trying to harm them. Yet it’s sometimes difficult to have rational discussions with people, Seniru observes, when they can’t explain what underpins their distrust of conservative leadership. “When I speak with female friends, some of them are conservative, some are not,” Seniru says. Some just believe these things about Poilievre — such as, he’s anti-immigrant. “When I ask why, they say, ‘Oh, it’s just the vibe that I get.’ How do you try to course-correct a vibe?” he shrugs. Do optics influence public perceptions of equality; for example, Prime Minister Mark Carney’s gender-balanced cabinet? Seniru is skeptical; he sees Carney’s decision to not appoint a gender-balanced cabinet during the election as a ploy to convince conservative-learning voters he wasn’t a DEI crusader, like his predecessor. However, he notes, once elected, Carney reverted to diversity quotas. Stella’s response is more personal: “I never want to be told that I got my job or that I’m in a position of power because there’s a quota,” she declares. “Being told that because I’m a woman, things are going to be harder,” that’s a message that can be very harmful, she adds. “We support women when they are liberal and as soon as an unapologetically conservative woman comes to the front,” Stella asserts, “all of a sudden, that support goes away.” Pointing to people like Alberta NDP opposition leader Naheed Nenshi — who refers to Alberta Premier Danielle Smith as a “pick-me girl” and “selfie-queen” — Stella suggests this idea of empowering women disappears when the female doesn’t fit the narrative of what we think a girl boss should be. Although social media is often identified as a culprit in the deepening divide between young men and women, both Seniru and Stella credit Poilievre’s success to a solid online presence over the last few years. And yet, we agree, where are the female influencers in this space? That could make a difference. Conservative females in Canada can’t seem to find their Jordan Peterson. And all that sloganeering in the last election, how did that land with young voters? Both Stella and Seniru roll their eyes and submit: You might attract attention with slogans, but younger generations, males and females, also crave substance. “We’re tired of having Boomers think we just care about funny memes,” Stella says, with a chuckle.

• If this had been any other election, Poilievre would be prime minister
• Poilievre built a new Conservative party. He’ll need to build another: Full Comment podcast

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