The Pro-Family Movement: Are They For or Against Families?

Marguerite Andersen is a professor of French studies at the University
of Guelph.

Eichler’s analysis of various pro-family and virulently anti-feminist movements in Canada is a lucid warning that echoes those in Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale. These are warnings that ought to be taken seriously if we do not want to return to the patriarchal and unjust world of the past.

Eichler examines the charges that the movement makes against feminism and, by looking at feminist positions, assesses whether or not the charges are accurate. She analyzes the policy positions of the so-called pro-family organizations in order to determine whether these organizations are, in fact, pro-family. She concludes that the assertions made by the movement are false, the policies potentially detrimental to the well-being of Canadian families; she adds that the continuous propaganda coming from organizations such as the REAL Women of Canada is a challenge that feminists must take seriously.

Eichler, who is of German origin, is well aware of the fact that it is possible to censure intellectual movements. The Nazis destroyed and forbade certain artistic movements, they destroyed Jewish culture and heritage in Germany. A fundamentalist regime could easily annihilate the advancement that women have been able to attain and reduce them, again, to their biological functions. We must, as Atwood recently said in an interview, hope that Canada is too reasonable to allow fanatic movements to take over. But let us not ignore the conclusions that academic researchers present, nor the fearful premonitions that artists express.

The publications of the Canadian Research Institute for the Advancement of Women are of excellent quality. They are easily readable and thus accessible to anyone outside the academic world. In the present volume, the bibliographical notes and references are somewhat inconsistent in their presentation. CRIAW should have edited those with greater care. But the importance of the text, and of Eichler’s analytical perspicacity and thoroughness are undeniable.