Equal opportunities

Prevent and punish

Racism, antisemitism, sexism and homophobia still produce discriminatory behaviour, sometimes going as far as physical violence. We condemn them without nuance and without exception. In the face of this, the State has two duties: to prevent and to punish.

Prevention starts at school. That is where, from the earliest age, children learn that everyone is equal before the law and that all discrimination must be rejected. This requirement flows directly from the universalism at the heart of the liberal project: treating others as our equals before treating them as different.

An intercultural model, not multiculturalism

That universalism translates into a clear rule: no differential treatment based on beliefs. None. The “reasonable accommodations” tried out for a time in Quebec show where that path leads: you start with the right to be different and you end up with different rights. Our vision of equality can accommodate no cultural relativism whatsoever.

The right to be different exists, but it is exercised within a framework: a foundation of shared values and principles, recognised by all and non-negotiable. This is not multiculturalism, where each group lives by its own rules. It is an intercultural model: the same rights and the same duties for every citizen.

The freedom to decide for yourself

Everyone must be free to practise their religion, to change it, not to believe at all, and to reject any dogma. Between women and men, the same principle applies: the freedom to decide for yourself, without being subjected to gender stereotypes that hold back individual ambitions.

The same reasoning applies to everything else: origin, age, belief, orientation, culture, social background. No one should be confined to the box they were born into. That is the deeply emancipatory dimension of the liberal project.