Advocacy News - Chinese Canadians to Harper: not all alike

February 18, 2021

Chinese Canadians to Harper: not all alike
Chinese Canadian National Council

The Chinese Canadian National Council (CCNC) has issued a statement to Conservative Leader Stephen Harper that takes him to task for assuming all Chinese Canadians - and other ethnic minorities - hold the same position on the same-sex marriage issue.

"Throughout this debate, we have stated very, very clearly that it is incorrect to say all Chinese or other ethnic minorities are against equal marriage," said Kristyn Wong-Tam, spokesperson for the CCNC. "We now want to make it very clear to Stephen Harper that he is wrong. And, more so, we want him to know it is patronizing and insulting to us for him to have suggested - in the House of Commons - that the ethnic minorities are monolithic in their opposition to civil marriage being extended to gays and lesbians."

The CCNC was responding to Mr. Harper's statement: "Up until a few years ago, even within the modern era of the Charter, Canadian law and Canadian society took for granted that marriage was intrinsic by definition an opposite-sex institution. So obvious was this, until now, a formulary statute was never adopted by this Parliament. This view was not even restricted to the numerous faces and cultures that have populated our great country from all corners of the earth, though it has been a universal view among them [CCNC emphasis added]."

Ms Wong-Tam said the Chinese Canadian National Council supports the government's gay marriage legislation because its members believe that no minority group should be excluded from civil society -- and that includes civil marriage.

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