Pressing State Matters: Canada Debates if Word ‘Fart’ Can Be Used in Parliament

While most people think of climate change and protecting the environment when they think of the Green Party, their leader in the Canadian Parliament is exercising her mandate by arguing whether the word fart is appropriate in legislative discourse.

During a powerful speech about taxes and unemployment in the House of Commons on Tuesday, Conservative MP Michelle Rempel stated that the government is treating Alberta like a “fart in the room that nobody wants to talk about or acknowledge.”

Despite the serious nature of her impassioned speech, the mention of the bodily function was too much for Green Party leader Elizabeth May to bear. She promptly interrupted Rempel to declare that using the word fart is “unparliamentary.”

“I hate to interrupt my friend in her speech, but I heard her say a word that I know is distinctly unparliamentary, and I think she may want to withdraw it,” May stated. She then spelled out the word, instead of saying it, as if using a curse word in a room full of children. “The word was f-a-r-t.”

Rempel, undaunted by the absurdity of May’s request, refused to strike the word from the record, and asked the Green Party leader whether she was “actually serious.” — Fallen Autumn Dandy (@PokeCardAddict) November 16, 2016