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‘It’s 2021, it’s not 1950:’ Women politicians in N.S. show support for Robyn Ingraham – Global News

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Pamela Lovelace is no stranger to the sexism encountered by women in politics.

She ran for Liberal nomination back in 2013, and is now a Halifax regional councillor for District 13 and says she’s encountered all sorts of comments — because she is a woman — while trying to get elected.

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“I remember someone saying ‘why are you here? Why are you doing this, you have a family?’” said Lovelace. “I said, ‘well my opponent has a family too’ and the response was ‘yeah, he has a wife though.’”

While Lovelace says politics is still very much an old boys’ club and that it’s hard for women to get into office, she says parties should support diversity among their candidates.

READ MORE: Liberals face heat after N.S. election candidate says she was ousted over ‘boudoir photos’

She says it was discouraging to find out a Liberal candidate in this provincial election was kicked out of the party for posting and selling boudoir photos online.

“I was really disappointed to hear that the political landscape is talking about what a person has done with their body rather than the actual ideas that Nova Scotians care about,” Lovelace said.

Earlier this week Robyn Ingraham withdrew as the Liberal candidate for Dartmouth South. She originally posted online that it was due to mental health reasons, but then she later posted to her Instagram account that the party had taken issue with her boudoir photos and Only Fans account despite her having disclosed that during the nomination process.

A barber and small business owner, Ingraham also published an email she said she had sent to Rankin, which stated the party had made a mistake by forcing her out. “The misogynistic behaviour of those above you is not tolerable,” she wrote to the premier. “It’s not my job to make old white men comfortable.”


Click to play video: 'Former Liberal candidate says party ousted her over ‘boudoir photos’'



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Former Liberal candidate says party ousted her over ‘boudoir photos’


Former Liberal candidate says party ousted her over ‘boudoir photos’

On Friday, Rankin’s news conference in rural Cape Breton about tourism funding quickly turned into a barrage of questions from reporters about how the ousting of Ingraham occurred, what was said and who was responsible. He confirmed his team “assisted” Ingraham with her resignation statement and said he has been repeatedly trying to contact her to learn her version of events.

But in a brief interview with The Canadian Press at her barbershop in Dartmouth, N.S., Ingraham said she doesn’t plan to speak with Rankin.

“I haven’t spoken to him and I have no intention of speaking to him,” she said. “I just wanted my story to get out there.”

She also said she doesn’t want to run for any other party. “I just want to get back to running my business,” she said at her shop, called Devoted Barbers and Co.

READ MORE: Women still under-represented in Nova Scotia politics — ‘We need those voices’

Lovelace said what was done to Ingraham was an injustice.

“Let’s get her back on the ballot,” said Lovelace. “It’s 2021, it’s not 1950, so let’s move on to better politics in Nova Scotia.”

Claudia Chender is running as the NDP candidate for the same riding Ingraham has dropped out of and says this whole situation shows the double standard for men and women in politics.

“I think we are past the point where we should be embroiled in this type of situation as a scandal, but unfortunately we still have a lot of misogyny, frankly, in Nova Scotia and Nova Scotia politics.”

Chender says whether or not someone takes or sells revealing photos of themselves does not have an impact on how they can help the community.


Click to play video: 'Nova Scotia housing prices an election issue'



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Nova Scotia housing prices an election issue


Nova Scotia housing prices an election issue

“Political candidates should be judged on how are you going to make things better, how are you going to fix things?” said Chender.

“I think anything else that’s happening in their own personal lives that isn’t causing people harm is nobody’s business.”

Ingraham’s removal from the ballot has caught the attention of women across the country and many are showing her their support.

In a Twitter post, Mackenzie Kerr, a Green Party candidate in British Columbia posted her own boudoir  image with the caption “It’s time we change the definition of professionalism.”

READ MORE: Allegations of misogyny in premier’s office could impact recruitment of female candidates

Back in Nova Scotia, a former PC candidate for Dartmouth South says she can’t believe women are still being judged for taking control of their own bodies.

“It’s horrible because Robyn is experiencing what I went through,” said Jad Crnogorac.

Crnogorac is a fitness instructor and says she herself has had professional boudoir photos done and hasn’t been shy of posting those photos or bikini photos of herself online.

She says when she was nominated as a PC candidate the party knew all of this but says just before the writ dropped she was approached and asked to remove some of her photos.

“I was really really angry,” said Crnogorac. “This is why strong women don’t go into politics because someone always finds a way to drag you through it and it’s just not appealing.”

Crnogorac was ultimately kicked out of the PC party as a candidate after tweets deemed racist surfaced but she maintains there’s a double standard for women in politics versus men.

“The leader of a party can do something illegal and have two DUIs and still be the leader of the party,” she said, referring to Iain Rankin’s recent admission to past impaired driving charges.

“Why do we have to have this picture-perfect female versus the men who can do whatever they want and still be a politician?” she asks.

–With files from The Canadian Press

© 2021 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.

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Politics

Former PQ minister turns back on politics, records jazz album

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A former minister with the Parti Québécois (PQ) says his time in politics is over, and he’s ready to focus on his first love: the arts.

“People have to remember that I was dealing with the arts for 30 years before I went into politics,” Maka Kotto tells CTV News a day before boarding a flight to his native Cameroon for a music festival. “After 14 years in politics, I felt that I did what I had to do. And so, I decided to get back to my old practices.”

Kotto represented the PQ in the riding of Bourget from 2008 to 2018 and was also the culture minister in Pauline Marois’ short-lived government.

In addition to his time in provincial politics, Kotto represented the Bloc Québécois from 2004 to 2008 in the Canadian House of Commons — the party’s first Black member of Parliament.

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“It drained my energy and I lost contact with my family, with my friends. When I was inside, I didn’t realize that,” he said. “My mother went to the other side in 2018 and I couldn’t say good-bye… I wrote a song about that.”

Kotto says his mother’s death was a moment that notably marked him.

“This was very awful. Until now, I still suffer for that,” he said. “You see, when you’re investing in politics, you have many, many sacrifices that you’re facing.”

Closing the political door and turning his attention back to music and acting was an effortless decision for the 62-year-old.

“This was much, much more, easier than politics,” he said.

Kotto says he remembers his father not liking the idea of him getting involved in the arts as a child — he wanted him to “be a good student.”

“The last time I sang, I was between 16 or 17 years old,” he recalls. “That was in college, at the boarding school church. It was a French Jesuit boarding school in Cameroon.”

When asked what’s scarier: putting out a jazz album or working in politics, Kotto doesn’t miss a beat.

“Oh, politics is scary because you don’t have fun in politics. You have problems every day, every night, every morning and you have to solve real problems,” he said. “When you’re singing, it’s a passion…The only goal you have to reach is to share what you feel.”

Kotto says he worked for about six months on his album, collaborating with the likes of Antoine Gratton, Taurey Butler and the Orchestre national de jazz de Montréal (ONJ).

“We have a lot of fun. That was the goal, and I hope that everybody listening to this album will have the same fun as the one we had in studio,” he said.

A few words he uses to describe his music: fun, love and friendship.

The release of Kotto’s first album is scheduled for the winter of 2024.

 

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Trump campaign defends his ‘bloodbath’ warning. Hear what political strategists think

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Trump campaign defends his ‘bloodbath’ warning. Hear what political strategists think

The Trump campaign is saying that presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump was referring only to the US auto industry when he warned of a “bloodbath” if he wasn’t elected. Republican strategist Alice Stewart and Democratic strategist Maria Cardona debate what he meant.

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Trump campaign defends his ‘bloodbath’ warning. Hear what political strategists think

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Trump campaign defends his ‘bloodbath’ warning. Hear what political strategists think

The Trump campaign is saying that presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump was referring only to the US auto industry when he warned of a “bloodbath” if he wasn’t elected. Republican strategist Alice Stewart and Democratic strategist Maria Cardona debate what he meant.


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