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On Monday, March 10, the Quebec minister responsible for secularism, Jean-François Roberge, announced the establishment of a study committee to strengthen the Act respecting the laicity of the State or Bill 21. As this project targets Muslim communities in the province more than ever, we met with Maria*, Emy*, and Rana Awada, three women who wear the hijab, to give them a voice on expanding these measures.
We met Maria, a Montreal artist, in her apartment near Little Italy. Once we were comfortable, she talked about her academic, professional and personal experience as a hijabi woman in Montreal. The subject is delicate and the emotion can be heard in her voice, which trembled slightly.
The social pressure she was subjected to for expressing her faith started early and influenced her academic and professional career. “My experience as a veiled woman during my studies was demoralizing, even before the law was officially introduced,” she explains.
She was destined for a career as a philosophy teacher, but the adoption of Bill 21 narrowed her horizon. She then considered entering the field of education, but was discouraged by teachers and classmates. “I have been told many times throughout my career. It wasn't always ill-intentioned, but people don't understand how much it hurts.”
Maria's story is not an isolated case. Throughout her career, she saw Muslim women abandon teaching careers because they did not feel that they were being given a place in this environment.
“After my studies, I went to work in the community, with other women who looked like me. I was afraid to go out into the wider world, to confront society and to have to live situations with non-Muslim people that would still be destabilizing, who would remind me that I am a problem and that I do not belong in this society”, she says, tears in her eyes.
Today, with the threat of the expansion of Law 21, Maria feels this pressure even more. “For many Muslim women, there is this anxiety that is always present in your heart. And this situation is really exacerbating it,” she says, moved.
On a daily basis, the young woman is already making a lot of effort to avoid potential aggressions linked to wearing a hijab. She hasn't taken public transportation since she suffered a traumatic physical assault nearly 10 years ago. She carefully chooses the public places where to wear her hijab. Sometimes she doesn't even wear it for safety reasons.
“The current situation is so demoralizing and anxiety-provoking. (...) My headscarf is so important to me, but the situation is so unbearable that sometimes, when I go out in public, I don't wear it and, for me, it's so violent...” explains Maria.
According to the young woman, the repercussions of an extension of the law will weigh above all on the shoulders of Muslim women. They are the ones who have to live with the constant pressure and the gaze of others. They are the ones who have to change their lifestyle and adapt to a society where they feel less and less accepted.
Reinforced and constant social pressure
Recall that Law 21, adopted in June 2019, prohibits authority figures — such as judges, police officers, prison guards, and elementary and secondary school teachers — from wearing religious symbols when exercising their duties. The law has prompted numerous legal challenges because of its impact on fundamental freedoms.
With the expansion of this law, the ban on wearing religious symbols will apply to all types of private or public schools, hospitals, daycares and much more. For Minister Roberge, it is a question of avoiding “religious abuses” within Quebec institutions, but also in public spaces.
For his part, Minister Drainville also announced yesterday that he will table a bill to strengthen secularism in schools. In a video posted on social media, he said he was “shaken by what happened in Bedford and other schools. That's not a Quebec school,” he said.
Bedford School as an example
The establishment of the study committee announced by the minister responsible for secularism is motivated in particular by the Bedford elementary school affair, which Jean-François Roberge described as a “canary in the coalmine”.
Recall that last October, the Minister of Education, Bernard Drainville, issued an investigation report about “a majority clan” of 11 teachers of North African origin who had established “a climate of fear and intimidation” among students and other staff members of Bedford. Teachers have been suspended by the Centre de services scolaire de Montréal and nearly 20 other schools have come under the microscope of the ministry.
But why make the connection between the origin of these suspended teachers, religious gatherings in public and secularism?
Zeinab Diab, a doctoral student in religious sciences at the University of Montreal, is not surprised by this desire to strengthen Bill 21 and use the Muslim community as a target. “If it had not been Bedford, there would have been another incident to instrumentalize and fuel the discourse of secularism. Bill 21 establishes a nationalist political project,” she explains.
“It's easier to say that Islam is the problem,” she sighs. "We don't look any further, we don't get to the root of the problem, which is that the education system is getting worse and worse. For 30 years in Quebec, it has worked well to say that Muslims are the problem.”
The main interested parties excluded
The study committee announced by the minister responsible for secularism is co-chaired by two lawyers, Christiane Pelchat, former president of the Council on the Status of Women, and Guillaume Rousseau, professor of law at the University of Sherbrooke. Its mandate is to verify the proper application of the law in various institutions in the province.
Those affected by the strengthening of this law denounce the lack of listening and interest of these experts. “The two lawyers responsible for analyzing the situation have in the past defended Law 21. The process is not objective, quite the contrary! ” .
There is no question of consulting the main stakeholders for this new stage. No experts in religious sciences or sociology and no members of the community will be at the ministry table to discuss it.
Diab is adamant: “It will only add fuel to the fire! ”
“If it goes on like this, I'm definitely leaving Quebec! ”
This is also Emy*'s opinion. We met her in a café on Ontario Street. The establishment being empty, she could speak freely. Quickly, we understood that an expansion of Bill 21 could mark a major turning point in her life.
Arriving from Algeria at the age of five, she recalls her time in primary school and the catechism courses taught to her classmates. She also remembers the big crosses that decorated the walls of schools and the small silver crosses that hung around the neck of her teachers. Enough to make her feel a difference in treatment between religious affiliations: “It's really double standards,” she says, discouraged.
Before getting a job as an assistant director in a private daycare, Emy adapted her veil style. “Before, I wore the veil correctly, I covered my neck. Now I don't hide my neck anymore, I'm wearing earrings. I'm making it a bit more stylish. It's the maximum I can do to adapt to Quebec society,” she explains.
But after more than 10 years working in the field of education and child care, Emy is experiencing some discomfort. She feels that her treatment has changed. Since the announcement of the expansion of Bill 21, her family has been thinking about major changes: “If it continues like this, it is certain that I will leave Quebec!" she said sharply. "I have only known Quebec in my life. (...) But if they don't want us, we'll go elsewhere.”
An enlargement that hurts and isolates
Like Emy, Zeinab Diab believes that Quebec society offers Muslim women great uncertainty and insecurity. “They resist, they find strategies to continue to exist, despite the extremely hostile context. Some go to private schools; they reorient themselves and go to other paths. This project thwarts their plan B, their plan C”, she declares.
According to the intellectual, this legislative initiative will considerably narrow the career choices of these women, further isolating them from life in society. She describes this isolation as “social death.”
For the author of a thesis entitled “Resisting Law 21: Between Social Death and Survival Strategies, Muslim Praxis and Sisterhood in the Quest for Social Justice”, the recent drop in the CAQ in the polls is driving and accentuating these nationalist and populist projects. “[The government] wants to give the impression of doing something concrete, something proactive. However, if we look at the education sector, the health sector, housing — everywhere things are going wrong! But we're not watching that. We are turning to a constructed problem aimed at Muslim communities.”
However, affected communities are not surprised by such an announcement. “My research respondents tell me: they knew it would go further. We are very disappointed, but we are not surprised. It has worked like this in Quebec for 30 years. With each new election campaign, we add a layer! ” she notes.
The fight goes on
Rana Awada is a teacher in a public sector primary school. For her part, she has had few intense experiences in connection with wearing a headscarf in the exercise of her duties.
“I consider that I was lucky to have had good experiences in the schools where I worked, but it is still a fight on behalf of all Muslim women who can or cannot work in these conditions,” says Rana.
On her TikTok account, where she has over 30,000 followers, she wants to express her religious identity. She produces content in which she talks about her daily life as a teacher and encourages young people to get started in the field. “On social media, I am often asked: 'Are you encouraging me to continue despite all the doors that are closing?' My answer is that there are always possibilities when you are passionate. In my opinion, there will always be options,” says the teacher.
“It's a shame that we have extra weight. Everyone is supposed to have the same opportunities, with equal skill. It's all in the head, not what's around the head! ” she adds.
She wants to represent the Muslim community as best she can. “Despite the adoption of the law in 2019, I did not give up, far from it. I would never let a law forbid me from doing what I love and being who I am. Today, I have the chance to make my voice heard in schools and on my platforms. I will continue until the end,” she says proudly.
Rana evokes some concerns following the announcement of the expansion of Law 21, but she still wants to represent hope for her community. “If I remember anything from all this, it is that giving up our dreams and opportunities for a law like this is like letting them win and giving up too easily everything we are fighting for. In my opinion, it is important to create opportunities for yourself, even if they are taken away from us,” she says.
Uncertainty and combativeness are therefore the key words for the future of women wearing religious symbols in public. “I am here and I am bringing the skills I have to the society in which I live. I respect others in their differences, in their beliefs and in their practices because it is part of living together. It's the step we need to take forward. We still have a lot of work to do,” concludes Rana.
Asked about the extent of the new measures envisaged, the office of the minister responsible for secularism referred us to the official press release. No comments will be made on this subject.
* First names have been changed to preserve the anonymity of interviewees.