David Emerson: Where’s the “Whore”? by neil
Late last week on CBC Radio One, I had the pleasure of hearing Liberal MP Hedy Fry – among others – take a run at Conservative Minister of International Trade David Emerson during the nascent stages of this most recently convened session of Parliament. That it is the first session undertaken by Stephen Harper’s minority Conservative government certainly raises the volume of criticism.
Emerson’s post-election party switcheroo has been drawing the ire of his constituents, opposition MP’s, and even members of his new party. Emerson’s party-swap, his disdain for his riding’s collective wishes, and his adamant statements about shaking off “trivial” concerns in order to serve “the Canadian people” through an important position in the current government has been a rather stinky affair. Harper’s own endorsement of and flacid support for Emerson has been the stuff of trite rhetorical flourish; apparently, Emerson’s the right man for the job and Harper’s self-celebrated willingness to look beyond party lines – much like Emerson’s “willingness” to serve beyond his old party affiliation – constitutes the real ethos of Candian duty and public service. Harper has made it clear that Emerson has ample Cabinet experience that would only benefit the country and the government’s profile. Besides, according to Harper’s rhetorical sandwich, why would any well-reasoned Canadian stoop to personal attacks in order to prevent Emerson from making this contribution to governance and the common political wealth of Canada?
As Hedy Fry’s line of questioning makes explicit, Emerson has been an opportune target for pinning hypocrisy on a government intent on pushing through ethics and conduct legislation vis-a-vis MP and ministerial conduct, which is to say this is all one more half-arc in the spiral of hypocritical, self-referential, and near-cybernetic discourse of parliamentary political practice. Of course, that the Liberals lead the charge in condemnation is not without some irony, if it can even be called that: perhaps irony ceases when playing and calling the hypocrisy card becomes the very mode of operation. This is the stuff of murky integrity soup.
It is worth noting that Emerson’s move, though, has not been sexualized, gendered, and pathologized like Belinda Stronach’s floor-crossing last year. Throwing off the Conservatives and choosing to become a Liberal, Stronach was the target of sexualized and gendered remarks seeking to connote her move as the work of a slutty and promiscuous philandering bitch. Stronach’s being embroiled with Peter Mackay – now the Minister of Foreign Affairs – only amplified her potential as a target for sexualized comments that questioned her loyalty to the Conservative Party, as if her romantic falling-out with Mackay signified further her standing as a hysterical whore on all accounts. Nasty stuff.
We haven’t heard the voiciferous sexualizing and gendering of David Emerson and that’s no coincidence. Though his motives have been questioned, he retains his manhood, his male privilege, and the ability to frame the switch in terms of procedure and intent. Emerson’s move is rendered, then, as the product of miscalculation and misreading, of improper reasoning on his behalf. It may be scheming, corrupted, and inexcusable but it is still the stuff of decision. He’s right or wrong, good or bad, depending on where you stand. The Stronach incident unfolded in an entirely different way. Her loudest critics defined and reduced her to some naturalized and rudimentary standing as an unruly woman without scruples tied unapologetically to the whimsy of her “innate” feminine drives. Eemerson, meanwhile, retains his normative masculine standing as a political operator.
Hedy Fry may have proceeded in this critical direction to point out these descriptive and conceptual biases; I haven’t checked the transcripts. What remains is that the crux of this scenario is very much the problem of a cultural politics of governance and institutionalized political practice. To simply call Emerson a whore misses the point because it elides the most basic (if abstract) questions we ought to be asking: who gets to become what and in what context? Who is motivated by what and why is that motivation available and attributable? Why do “they” have that determining privilege and power as such?
April 10th, 2006 at 12:11 pm
emerson is a whore- you can tell by the looks he gives harper, the way he sits- all the signs are there.
just kidding, but man what an excellent and infuriating thing to point out. people’s choices get read in disburtingly gender biased-ways, and that ain’t cool man.
not that i am enamoured of poor little rich girl, i haven’t heard her say anything un-robotic.