'Clearly a breakdown': Kenney condemns controversial essay, links firestorm to slow news week
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Alberta Premier Jason Kenney condemned a controversial prize-winning essay that's been criticized for being sexist and racist during his provincewide radio call-in program, but also appeared to downplay the controversy it generated.
Alberta Premier Jason Kenney condemned a controversial prize-winning essay that's been criticized for being sexist and racist during his provincewide radio call-in program, but also appeared to downplay the controversy it generated.
The topic was the first that host Wayne Nelson raised during Saturday's show on CHQR and CHED, and Kenney responded there was “clearly a breakdown” in how the judges assessed the essays, adding they “screwed up.”
Nelson had noted in the opening of the program that while summer is often slow for news, the past few weeks bucked that trend.
Kenney, when talking about the essay controversy moments later, said the fuss could be proof that “it wasn't a big news week.”
The essay urged women to forgo careers and focus on having children so the province doesn't have to bring in more foreigners, and it took third place in a government contest.
It was later pulled, along with the other two winners, from the government's website after criticism emerged on social media Monday.
“Clearly the essay was offensive, but maybe that is proof that it wasn't a big news week, Wayne, that in Alberta politics driven by Twitter, we've been talking about the third place (in) an essay contest no one's ever heard of,” Kenney said when Nelson referred to the controversy as a “firestorm.”
