Tories decry NDP’s ‘double standard’

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This article was published 05/03/2016 (3590 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Two days after it became an election issue, the Manitoba Progressive Conservatives Friday blasted both the Liberals and the NDP for sexist comments by their candidates.

Fort Rouge PC candidate Audrey Gordon, surrounded by four other female Tory hopefuls, said the NDP was hypocritical for calling for Southdale Liberal Jamie Hall to step down when one of its own candidates — Wab Kinew in Fort Rouge — had spouted sexists and homophobic rap lyrics in the past.

 

“Offensive and hateful comments like those made by former Liberal candidate Jame Hall in Southdale and current NDP candidate Wab Kinew in Fort Rouge devalue and degrade women and have no place in 2016 in rap music, literature or politics,” Gordon said.

She said it did not matter that Kinew had apologized sometime ago, and his party has said he’s turned his life around and has become a “feminist male.”

Gordon said the governing party was simply employing a double standard in keeping Kinew as a candidate.

 

“I’m focussed on the double standard and the message that we’re sending to our young people,” she said.

Hall, nominated on Tuesday, was called out by the NDP on Wednesday for referring to women as “whores” and “skanks” on social media. Liberal Leader Rana Bokhari refused comment until Thursday and then announced that Hall had tendered his resignation and she had accepted it. She said the party has since since cut all ties with Hall, who had also done work on the Liberal website.

The Progressive Conservatives refused comment about Hall’s online language when asked on Wednesday. They were also silent on Thursday.

During the week, observers pointed out that Kinew had once used derogatory lyrics in his past career as a hip hop artist. The NDP has defended their star candidate, saying he’s apologized and changed.

Meanwhile, Gordon criticized Bokhari, whom she is running against in Fort Rouge, for the delay in denouncing Hall’s online language.

“Ms. Bokhari took 24 hours to think about it. What’s there to think about?” she said Friday. “Wrong is wrong and right is right.”

Gordon didn’t directly respond about why the Tories were silent on the matter the previous two days.

“Well, we’re speaking out now,” she said.