Divorced lesbian new Premier of Ontario!

[ed_rex]

Some thoughts on the importance of historical context

Kathleen Wynne (left) with Sandra Pupatello.

And something is happening here
But you don't know what it is
Do you, Mister Jones?
— Bob Dylan, "Ballad of a Thin Man"

Early Sunday morning on Facebook, I posted a knee-jerk response to the selection of Kathleen Wynne as the Liberal Party of Ontario's new leader — and thus, the province's new Premier. Wynne won on the third ballot, edging out Sandra Pupatello. The women had been the front-runners right from the start. (Entirely coincidentally, but most serendipitously, Wynne's victory came only two days before the 25th anniversary of the Supreme Court of Canada's decision declaring that women have a fundamental right to control their own bodies.)

I wrote:

Those of you who think that nothing changes, please take note. In some very important ways, the world *is* getting better and it's important we remember that. A divorced, gay, woman is now Premier of Ontario.

Woman. Gay. Divorced. 30 years ago (or less!) any *one* of those facts would have automatically disqualified her.

That's a sea change, ladies and gentleman. A fucking sea change.

There is more to it than that, of course, and finding myself living in a country in which six of its 14 First Ministers are women does not mean we have reached Utopia.

But it is significant.

So significant that it deserves not just an emphasized paragraph all of its own, but consideration at some length. The perfumes of change.

Comments

[silverflight8]

\o/ A sea change indeed!

I had no idea. I was going to read and then I hit this stupid article: http://www.thestar.com/news/insight/article/1320603--ontario-liberal-leadership-why-a-woman-leader-will-change-little closed the link with extreme prejudice.

Excuse me, I don't want women in politics because I think they're more "polite" aka womanly. I want it because I don't like people being disqualified for a job that they are qualified and good at doing, because they were born some way. How that hasn't gotten through to the columnist's head is beyond me.

(I'm just letting off steam, don't worry. He's just clueless.)

Valve open

[ed_rex]

I stopped around the third time he said "I can accept that" even though it was pretty clear that either he didn't, or she shouldn't.

From the URL I was half-expecting a lamentation I could agree with — that the quality of being female doesn't mean we're about to experience a socialist utopia. But I am old enough to remember Golda Meir, Indira Ghandi and Margaret Thatcher and I have know a great many women as friends; I long ago gave up any illusions that there is much innate mental difference between the sexes.

Anyway, a little venting here is fine ...

ETA: At least, it's fine if I like you.