Page's Own Speech from the Throne

By Marcia Barhydt

This week's trophy goes to Brigette DePape, the Parliamentary Page, who quietly pulled a cardboard stop sign out of her skirt with the words 'Stop Harper' printed across and walked onto the floor of the Senate during the speech from the throne.

Like so many other urban legends, Brigette is a smash hit on Facebook, where I counted at least 17 pages to like or dislike, depending on your personal interpretation of the rebellious act.

To become a page isn't easy; it's an elite posting for a young person interested in entering politics, or looking for a prestigious job that exposes the applicant to a piece of history...

They write an exam concerned with both Parliamentary procedure and current events followed by a personal interview. Next, they have a one-on-one interview to assess some heavy duty behavioural skills that include teamwork, judgment, and integrity.

If they're hired, they make $11,807. That number seems small of course, but to be able to add this posting to their resume will help net lots more dollars when they enter the real business world.

So, why would a nice young girl like Brigette Depape do anything to jeopardize this prestigious employment? The obvious answer is probably the correct one: she wanted to make a statement. Well, she did that in spades, didn't she?

I'm a big proponent of freedom of speech and I think her silent protest was wonderful. But could she have found a better venue than the Senate floor? Might the House of Commons, which is where the voice of all Canadians is heard, been a more appropriate venue?

And might it have been wiser for Brigette to make her protest BEFORE the election? When her voice may have influenced the outcome of the election?

She has generated a ton of support on Facebook. When I last checked, a simple search of her name nets some 18 groups, including the main group with over 5,000 members. Amusingly, some of the pages on Facebook include: “Brigette DePape has more balls than Stephen Harper,” “True Canadian Patriot Brigette DePape,” and “This Bud's for you.”

Brigette's biggest payback for tossing her Parliamentary Page job to the side is that she's already been offered a job from American filmmaker Michael Moore, who said that her protest was both "powerful and iconic"

A second payback for this silent demonstration is that there is a "Stop Harper" rally planned in Ottawa for June 10. Maybe that's where Brigette might have planned her coup and kept her job.

No matter what your politics, I think we all need to acknowledge her commitment to her cause and realize that the petite young woman is doing exactly what we might have wished to do ourselves.

Maybe we need to listen to our inner Brigettes more often?