Are Quebecers less tolerant than other Canadians? Ongoing debate about secularism and religious symbols has led many observers to ask this very question. Premier François Legault denies that racism or Islamophobia exists in Quebec, even after a gunman opened fire in a Quebec City mosque in 2017, killing six people and wounding 19 others. Two years later, the Quebec government established Bill 21, a religious symbols ban for public employees. The province's increasingly diverse new reality is sometimes embraced and sometimes met with hostility from alt-right groups and emboldened anti-immigrant sentiment. What does diversity mean for the Quebec identity? Who gets to consider themselves a Quebecer? The author, a young journalist who moved to Quebec City from Saskatchewan, has some critical questions for the adopted province she loves.

Raquel Fletcher is the Quebec National Assembly reporter for Global News. She was born in Regina, Saskatchewan, and is a graduate of the University of Regina School of Journalism. She is a world traveler, proud francophile, and dog lover. She lives in Quebec City.

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