Poilievre needs to make sex-based rights an election issue

Being timid about gender ideology is a mistake

Experimenting with Grok

Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre’s campaign strategy is too timid, and the polls—if they can be trusted—are showing it.

What’s missing from his campaign is clear: Poilievre needs to take a bold and unabashed stand against wokeness—and particularly against gender ideology.

It seems the biggest impediment to his doing so, despite his history of anti-woke and reality based comments on sex and gender, is a fear of being compared to U.S. President Trump. Trump campaigned on anti-wokeness, and defended women’s rights with an executive order, issued on his inauguration day this Jan. 20, declaring that there are two sexes. It was glorious.

While Canadians are rightfully angry with Trump over his tariffs and obnoxious annexation commentary, that does not—and will not—change the fact that Poilievre’s base, and the majority of Canadians, are sick to death of woke nonsense. We want to know that Poilievre feels the same way. Not via his offhand comments on wokeness, or by his jokingly deflecting a journalist’s question about the number of genders that exist—but by coming out and telling us: I will protect women’s spaces and sex-based rights, because I know what a woman is.

And he needs to say it—on repeat—on the campaign trail. His near silence on women’s sex-based rights has been, to me and dozens of women I’ve spoken to, a crushing disappointment.

One year ago, Poilievre defended sex-segregated sports and spaces for women, and said—reasonably—that medical transition should be restricted to consenting adults. Three months ago: he promised to say “no” to males in female prisons, should he become prime minister.

But now, he’s silent on the campaign trail.

We know that you are not Trump, Poilievre. Those who understand the scourge of wokeness on our country—its institutionalization of repressive tolerance, and its devasting impact on women’s rights and our freedom of expression, for instance—also understand that to rail against wokeness is not Trumpian. It is the only path forward for a free and prosperous Canada.

Besides, Poilievre won’t be able to change the mind of any Canadians who have already bought into that sloppy, baseless logic that says anyone who shares a talking point with the U.S. president is no different than the U.S. president. So forget them.

Poilievre needs more to offer than promises on taxes, crime, and houses. Because Liberal leader Carney—who is now facing credible academic plagiarism accusations—has done nothing but steal and repackage Poilievre’s campaign ideas. Recent polls suggest that Canadians may be falling for Carney’s campaign plagiarism, and may be willing to elect this unelected prime minister to the office he holds—but certainly does not deserve.

The Liberals, and Carney, in his economic advisory role to Justin Trudeau, got Canada into the mess we are in. Carney has never expressed a word of dissent over Trudeau’s hyper-woke “Lost Decade.” His begging for another Liberal chance is really just a plea for Canadians to inflict themselves with Stockholm Syndrome. No thank you.

An official email advertising a Conservative rally last week in Surrey, B.C. read: “A fourth Liberal term with Mark Carney in office will be just like the previous three. It'll mean higher taxes, higher housing costs, more food bank lineups and raging crime in our streets. We can’t let that happen. Only a Common Sense Conservative government led by Pierre Poilievre will put Canada first and axe the tax, build the homes, fix the budget and stop the crime. Let’s rally together to help make it happen and bring home the Canada we know and love.”

Great—but it's too tame.

Right now, Conservatives are scarcely standing apart from the Liberals. Part of me expected that Poilievre had a revised campaign strategy to launch after the writ dropped—a strategy that would shock and awe Canadians and drive the Liberals into negative polling numbers. That didn’t happen, unfortunately.

It now appears that if the Liberals are to slip in the polls, it will be due to their own gaffes and scandals. (Which, by the way, they are handsomely delivering on.)

As a co-founder of Canadian Women’s Sex-Based Rights, I’ve had the pleasure of speaking to hundreds of Canadians who oppose gender ideology over the past several years. A near-universal theme, in conversations with women from across the country and political spectrum, is that they want a leader who will firmly oppose the misogyny and falsehoods of gender ideology. So far, the Conservative party has largely shied away from this topic.

That’s a mistake.

We women are half of the population. We aren’t a minority, and our concerns are not fringe. We do not want to be left guessing as to how a Conservative government plans to address our valid outrage about the erosion of women’s rights in Canada since the passage of Bill C-16—the bill that opened the door to gender self-identification policies.

If a Poilievre PM is going to remove males from female prisons, does that mean he plans to repeal C-16? Is there a plan at all?

Poilievre, please don’t be timid on women’s sex-based rights. We are waiting to hear from you.

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Thank you for reading.

If you haven’t heard, I was fired from my 13-year job as a registered nurse with Vancouver Coastal Health last week—all because of my outspokenness on women’s rights and free speech. (I will be sharing updates publicly.)

Thank you so much to all who support my work here. If you’re able to do a paid subscription, it would be immensely appreciated.

Amy