Analysis: Politics of fear in Election 2025

It's not that it's a liberal, progressive, or conservative tactic; it's all of them, what they're using to instill fear, and how.

As I was reading some more thoughts from Preston Manning this morning, I was reminded of a post I’ve had sitting in my drafts on the politics of fear. Something didn’t seem right about it, so, in the drafts it stayed, but I’ve included some of the thoughts in recent posts. After some surprising exchanges on the socials over the weekend, I realized that I left it in the drafts folder because it only focused on one party; and they all do it — they just seek to strike fear over different topics that are near and dear to their most ardent supporters.

Progressives stoke fear of losing rights and social safety nets

The first time I ever heard the phrase “God-given rights” was at the inaugural convention for the United Conservative Party in 2018. Call me a woman, or annoyingly skeptical of faith-based doctrine, but until that moment I had absolutely no idea that centuries of laws were against God. I kid; they were against everyone who wasn’t created “in his (anglicized) image”.

It’s not even just that the history of my own country is rife with examples of rights being granted and applied unequally, it’s the present. From provincial governments ripping away rights, and the horrifying stories of U.S. citizens being shipped to countries they have never been, women losing access to healthcare… that fear has never been more relevant.

Progressives know this and they know their supporters understand that, for many people, their rights are only as strong as the political will to maintain them. Worse, if the political will to actively undermine them exists — as appears to be the “new direction” of the U.S. that Danielle Smith claimed Pierre Poilievre would be “in sync with” — it’s a reminder of how fragile those rights always will be for some of us.

Progressives championed a Charter of Rights and Freedoms (1982), single-payor health care (SK:1947 for hospital, 1962 for physician, federal: Public Health Care Act 1984), employment insurance (1940), and a public pension plan (1965). Each of these additions to the social safety net were ratified at the federal level under Liberal governments, while healthcare coverage began at the provincial level, in Saskatchewan, under Tommy Douglas’ NDP government. Edit: the Supreme Court struck down Canada’s abortion laws in 1988. Documents from the Mulroney cabinet show tensions within the PC cabinet over the ruling, leading them to try and re-criminalize with Bill C-43.

There are those who decry these attempts by progressives to “fearmonger” over what some refer to as “wedge issues”. Of course, they wouldn’t be wedge issues if the “big tent” of conservatives didn’t include so many people who think doctors and nurses do better work when they have a limitless profit margin. Or people who believe that their faith or personal moral values should prohibit healthcare/education/science/reading options for others. Or those who don’t feel they personally benefit enough from having access to publicly available services. Without that, there would be nothing to “wedge”.

The Charter of Rights and Freedoms also “intended to ensure that everyone is treated with the same respect, dignity and consideration (i.e. without discrimination), regardless of personal characteristics such as race, national or ethnic origin, colour, religion, sex, age, or mental or physical disability, sexual orientation, residency, marital status or citizenship.” A blueprint, if you will, for equity of access, diversity of experience and opinion, and barrier-free inclusion for all.

The goal was to prohibit discrimination based on the above criteria, but it has since been weaponized by those who feel that in an attempt not to discriminate against the people who were historically exempted from “God-given rights”, it has instead become discriminatory practice by not solely benefitting those who held the privilege since human society began.

The question, for those who have been targeted as undeserving of these so-called “God-given rights” is not “does this threat exist”, but “when does it not?” As we watch the utter disaster unfolding in the U.S. over the past 90 days, the answer is “it depends who forms government”.

Typical fear-mongering against electing a progressive government is “uncontrolled” spending. One of the most common arguments against programs and services that help others is that too many Canadians never find themselves struggling so much that they will ever benefit personally. I didn’t say it was a good argument.

It’s boiled down to a cost determination to remove humanity from the decision-making process. Like when Ford Ltd. decided it was cheaper to pay out individual claims rather than proactively address a problem they knew was killing and/or maiming their customers. Basically.

Conservatives use fear of things they don’t have to address

Conservatives generally own fear-based messaging with a consistency that is, in my opinion, unmatched. What I’ve noticed is that conservatives have many solutions for problems that don’t exist. Not just that they don’t exist right now, as progressives use; ones that don’t actually exist but prey on feelings of vulnerability.

I’ve addressed the fear of crime in recent posts because it’s the easiest one to debunk. A quick recap is that the people who are most afraid of being victims of crime can be counted on to show up and vote (55+). Statistically, those who are most likely to be victims of crime (young men aged 15-30), aren’t nearly as worried about it. Conservatives typically target that fear of crime, and offer the “tough on crime” agendas to get those votes. Is it a real fear based on feelings of vulnerability? Absolutely. A real threat backed up by data on victims of crime? Not so much.

Now, if you want to talk about financial crime, those statistics are completely reversed, but you don’t see conservative ads promising to “get tough” on guys in three-piece suits, do you? No. It’s tattooed dudes in hoodies they’re worried about. To be fair, it’s grainy video of them also holding guns, which makes a difference for those ads. Still. No suits.

It’s the same as Liberals banning “scary-looking” guns rather than guns that have a particular capability or something. Not my area of expertise but I’ve read a few arguments and see there’s a legitimate complaint.

For financial concerns, they usually stick to government spending, but also use “the economy”. Conservatives have been pretty good at branding themselves as great fiscal managers but in my experience it’s that their supporters simply don’t care if conservatives run deficits. Something about being good at managing the economy, which will pay for their deficit spending, but also demanding tax cuts for everyone so they can’t.

Typically, they’ll use a fear of economic hardship, and they’ve been exceptionally good at blaming other parties for global problems. Take the recession of the 1980’s for example. I was in my thirties before I found out that recession didn’t just hit Alberta, or Canada. I was always told that’s why we don’t elect Liberals here — because they caused a massive recession in the 1980’s. So, imagine my surprise when I found out it was a global recession on multiple continents and wasn’t caused by Pierre Trudeau’s National Energy Program. Blew my freaking mind, I’ll tell you.

Of course, it was finding out I’d been lied to for most of my life that really pissed me off.

When Stephen Harper had to deal with the 2007-08 financial crisis caused by lax banking regulations in the U.S., no one blamed Mr. Harper for it because the other parties knew it wasn’t caused by his government. Opposition parties also weren’t claiming that to be the case which probably makes it easier.

The other tactic is bullying. It’s not new, but it is becoming more… commonplace outside of rural communities than it used to be. Think of the convoy. I’m not saying it doesn’t exist at all in urban areas, but one could move to the other side of the city and probably escape the glowering neighbour, or at least spend time elsewhere surrounded by people who aren’t glowering at them. If you’re on the receiving end in a small town, however, there’s very few places you can go to escape it.

It’s also why so many paper candidates for progressive parties show up in rural areas; conservative neighbours aren’t always great about allowing someone they disagree with to feel comfortable in their community. Local candidates running for non-conservative parties have had their businesses boycotted or were personally threatened. And most of the people in rural areas simply accept this as a potential result if they decide to run. It’s not great.

The governing party in Alberta has had some less than stellar moments in Question Period over who the opposition NDP might vote for in this election. A vote for a non-conservative is a vote against Alberta they said. And you all thought we lived in a democracy.

Finally, I’d add the threats of Alberta “separation” and a national unity crisis, as well as the Bloc’s overtures to separatist sentiment in Quebec to that list. The people who are threatening them are, I believe, perfectly willing to punish us all for not voting the way they want.

Between running on non-problems, against mythical ones, and bullying tactics, conservatives are very good at using fear. With their message discipline — it’s generational, man — I really do think they’re the absolute star of this show.

Liberals/Progressive Conservatives can pick and choose

My view may be a little rosy since I no longer have a progressive conservative party in Alberta. When you’re stuck between a right-wing option that can feign reason, and a left-wing option that’s trying to keep its base but also fill the gap between, it can feel like there’s light years of space in between. I feel like life is better when one can move freely around in between without hating one another. That’s the idealistic vision in my rearview mirror, anyway.

Liberals and Progressive Conservatives are in a unique space where they can accommodate a leader who pulls policy to the left and one who pulls policy to the right. They can also accommodate one who has strong progressive ideals and fiscal discipline.

In their world, they get to use both the tactics of the other parties; they can easily hop on the fear of crime bandwagon, and also stand up for the Charter. They can champion fiscal discipline and the social safety net. One doesn’t have to agree or disagree with the party to envy their ability to speak to more Canadians about things that concern them.

It’s easier to fear things you don’t know, however, which is why their gun bans have more appeal to their base. I’m not saying no gun users vote liberal, but since they’ve been able to get away with a “looks scary” gun ban policy, I feel fairly confident there’s certainly fewer.

Why this isn’t a “non-problem” for the liberals to campaign on is because we are inundated with stories of mass shootings in the U.S., and far fewer, but shootings in Canada as well. People view it as a problem and a “gun ban” appears to address it. Border security and increased police resources would address it better but that costs money. Wouldn’t want to be accused of spending too much, would we?

Again though, it’s good faith vs bad faith criticisms. Donald Trump threatened economic sanctions if we didn’t get the border secured better for them, and the conservatives didn’t run around pulling their hair out demanding to know who and how we’re going to pay for it because they agreed that we needed to spend the money.

Of course, they turned around and blamed the liberals for not doing it sooner, but they didn’t suggest Mr. Harper should have. Too close to home, I guess.

A great complaint from conservatives today is that the Liberals have formed government more than they have. I could interject that that sounds like a real problem they could address with less rigid policy, or leadership, and meet Canadians where a majority obviously want to go in the future, but that’s a real solution and doesn’t really fit the moment we’re in.

One of the reasons, I’d say, is because liberal and progressive conservative governments have the ability to shift with what the electorate is asking for. Both parties can take a centre-right stance when the electorate demands, and shift to a centre-left when the electorate demands. You don’t hear the NDP whining about why they’ve never formed government — they’re just happy to be able to influence policy outcomes. They have been frozen out of that in Alberta, but they had the audacity to form government once, so…

Winner or loser?

A lot of conservatives hated that the Liberals benefitted from the Trump administration’s threats against Canada (and maybe that helped start the fight with the Ontario PCs as well — I couldn’t say). This is perhaps when the difference between how each party incorporates fear in their campaigns became more stark to me. There was a real threat, something that the conservatives should have been able to capitalize on simply because I actually think they’re better at the politics of fear.

I believed much of the lies they peddled for most of my life, so why not give them credit for it?

Yet, they not only couldn’t do it, they seemed to purposefully go out of their way not to. I realize their “big conservative tent” has a disproportionate number of Donald Trump stans, but they still should have been a contender, in my mind. Unless the problem was too real and they didn’t want to bring attention to the fact that they don’t want to come up with real solutions.

In facing a real problem that will require real solutions, they could be held accountable.

It reminds me of Jason Kenney’s staunch belief that jobs, economy, and pipelines would come roaring back to Alberta if only a conservative government were in power. I like to think he’s smarter than that but one of the best pieces of advice I’ve ever heard for candidates and political parties is “don’t believe your own press releases.” Just like reality has apparently taken a vacation down south, I’m afraid that this is exactly what today’s conservatives have done. After decades of using the lies to convince their voters, they’ve forgotten that it was just a tactic to gain votes.

Pierre Trudeau’s NEP really was the cause of the 1980’s downturn, the other side really is evil, and a conservative government simply being in power will be enough to unleash the free market and the economy will grow, grow, grow. Private industry will be dropping capital like undergarments at a Rolling Stones afterparty.

I wish I was just being cheeky.

The election is Monday and I hope there is some serious introspection within the conservative party about their future. And if they somehow win, I guess I’ll have my own introspection to deal with. The difference is that I can guarantee the latter will happen.

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