Tag: minorities

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Another win for Legault as Bill 21 is upheld

Graphic by Carleen Loney / The Concordian

The Court of Appeal of Quebec upheld Bill 21 as it “does not offend Canada’s constitutional architecture” according to the Court.

Nestled in the picturesque Maurice region of Quebec, rolling hills and farm fields surround the little town of Hérouxville, Quebec. In 2007, the town of around 1,300 inhabitants sparked the ongoing debate of “laiïctié” or secularism in Quebec. 

On Jan. 25, 2007, the town adopted a code of conduct that would prepare immigrants for life in Hérouxville, Quebec. The code named “Les normes de vie de la municipalité Hérouxville” (standards of living for residents of Hérouxville) was quick to gain attention from around the world for being steeped in islamophobia. Although the code did not overtly single out Muslims, the language used was very pointed. 

After the code was harshly dragged through international news casting Québec in a poor light, the Premier at the time, Jean Charest, launched the Bouchard-Taylor Commission on Reasonable Accommodation in Quebec. Released in 2008, the Bouchard-Taylor commission found that the wearing of religious signs should be prohibited in the performance of duties that ‘embody the State and its necessary neutrality. In the commission it states that police officers, Crown prosecutors and presidents of the National Assembly of Québec are prohibited from wearing religious symbols but that teachers, public servants and other government employees should be allowed to do so.

Now 17 years later, Québec has garnered the same negative light as it did back in 2007.

On Thursday, Feb. 29, the Quebec’s Court of Appeal upheld Bill 21. This decision means that the court supports the secularism law and found that the Act “does not offend Canada’s constitutional architecture or the unwritten principles of the Constitution, nor does it offend any pre‑Confederation statute or principle having constitutional status.” 

Bill 21 prohibits school teachers, principals, or any public workers in positions of authority from wearing religious symbols. 

First announced in 2019 the bill was unusual in its preemptive use of the notwithstanding clause. The clause gives parliaments in Canada the power to override portions of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms when passing legislation. Because Québec used the clause before the bill was even challenged it raised brows to the fact that they knew it was going to be contested by the groups that it limits.

Dr. Saul Carliner, Chair of the Department of Education at Concordia said that this bill is unnecessary and limiting a province already struggling with finding enough teachers. “We also have to live with one another, and one of the beauties of diversity is […] it’s a lot easier to be tolerant of other people when there’s someone you come in contact with everyday.” 

Carliner grew up during the Martin Luther King Riots in the United States. During this time, the schools utilized forced–busing, which meant they would bus kids in from afar to achieve a more diverse population. He attributes his understanding of justice and the situation at the time to his classmates that came from racialized communities. 

“If you’re gonna live in any major or even intermediate sized city in Canada or really even the world, they are very diverse places,” said Carliner. “Imagine you’re a kid who’s from a visible minority and all of your teachers are not. It’s like, where do I fit in here?”

We reached out to the sponsor of Bill 21, Member of the National Assembly Simon Jolin-Barrette to hear his take on the Court’s decisions. Unfortunately, an interview was not possible but he did offer to answer questions via email. 

“In effect, Bill 21 allows all religions to coexist in society with one another peacefully and in an equal manner,” said Jolin-Barrette’s office. 

He continued to say “The bill on state secularism does not aim in any way to alienate religious minorities or to protect people of Christian faith. On the contrary, it is a vector of rights and equality.” 

As for the status of Bill 21, currently there is a high likelihood that it will be passed up to the Supreme Court of Canada where it could potentially be knocked down.

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There’s an elephant in the newsroom, and here’s what we can do about it

Canadian Media has a problem with the representation of minority groups

According to Brent Cunningham in Re-thinking Objectivity, “[the] understanding of ‘the other’ has always been – and will always be – a central challenge of journalism.”

The media in Canada at large creates a world of reductive, selective or idealized images of “the other” that misrepresent them by using the experiences of a few people and allowing them to speak for a whole group.

Also, the rhetoric used in Canadian media often makes distinctions between majority and minority groups by establishing a sense of ‘us and them,’ which makes minority groups largely invisible and communicates the message that they are not full participants in Canadian society.

While newsrooms need to invest more time and effort in digging deeper and understanding these minority groups’ issues, most media producers are doing the opposite: content production  choices are mainly made by journalists who come from the same majority-group of the Canadian population. At the same time, most media producers rarely make the effort to change  their hiring processes or news story choices. And the outcomes of this state of denial are  catastrophic.

Hal Niedzvieki wrote in his controversial The cultural appropriation prize editorial – where he denied that cultural appropriation exists – that writers need to break the ‘write what you know rule’ by writing about people who live beyond their own worlds.

While I appreciate Niedzvieki’s creative endeavour to represent other worlds that exist alongside that of white middle class people, I think Indigenous and racialized writers have more competent authority by way of their lived experiences to write about their own culture and community.

Across television and radio platforms in Quebec, experiences of marginalized communities are whittled down not even to trauma or fables of defying the odds, but rather worse, to delusional thinking. “What systemic racism?” cried La Joute’s hosts Luc Lavoie, Paul Larocque and Bernard Drainville as a comment on the Quebec government’s final release of a consultation about systemic racism in September. The rhetorical question makes light of what members of minority groups go through in Quebec and treats it as something that has never existed.

What adds insult to injury is the fact that Canadian media is anything but diverse. A 2010 survey by the Ryerson DiverseCity Counts project found that members of visible minority groups were vastly underrepresented in newsrooms, where they held only 3.2% of decision-making positions in print media in Toronto.

In 2016, a survey by Canadaland showed that 90% of CBC’s staff were white. Another questionnaire was conducted by CBC/Radio-Canada in April 2018. It collected race and identity based data from its employees who participated voluntarily. The questionnaire showed that 15.4% of CBC staff were from visible minorities, only one percent more than the year before.

There is a tendency to not be open about sharing race-based demographics of the people working in these newsrooms.  Another Ryerson study analyzed over twenty years of columns in the Globe and Mail, Toronto Star, and the National Post to gather data about the demographics of all journalists who worked there.

It was quite a challenge to get this information – newsroom management in Canada admitted that they do not collect race-based data on newsroom staff. Likewise, mainstream Canadian media outlets often refrain from responding to surveys of the same nature, and hardly react to any calls to action.

Without this data, how can we approach who is telling these stories? Getting a clearer picture in this regard can go a long way in solving this dilemma.

In his Re-thinking Objectivity, Cunningham also comments on how reporters tend to lean more on “existing narratives because they are safe and easy.” This is where the danger lies.

In her Ted Talk The Danger of a Single Story, Nigerian storyteller Chimamanda Ngozi said “show a people as one thing over and over again, and that is what they become.”

Hence, relying on existing popular media narratives about minority groups will take us back to square one: inferiorizing and excluding  “the other,” simply because they are consistently told  through the lens of a detached, misinformed narrator.

And then we find ourselves entangled in a vicious circle: first the media others its minority citizens by sticking with one representation of them; next, the idea becomes a culture; then, hiring practices start to embrace that culture; after that, newsrooms lacking in diversity  tell the same “us versus them” single stories. And so on.

Overlooking the importance of a diverse Canadian media reveals a troubling double standard, and a gap between what it preaches and what it practices.

A big part of solving a problem lies in acknowledging that there is one.

Newsrooms are still refusing  to take part in surveys that investigate media diversity: mainstream newspapers are not reacting to calls for action such as the one raised by the Canadian Journalists of Colour (CJC), white talk show hosts are discussing systemic racism without seeing the need to invite a racialized guest and many white writers still find themselves entitled to rob the voices of others in pursuit of creative genius and literary recognition.

Sadly, more journalists of color are just leaving the newsroom and the whole industry behind, as in the case of Sunny Dhillon, a Globe and Mail reporter who quit because of a disagreement about a story that involved race.

Activists have already done the research and the data is revealed: there is a problem, and it should no longer be overlooked. The gap between the theories of journalism and the practices of newsrooms should not exist.

We clearly need more interactive multi-dimensional reporting methods and less one-way flow reports told by certain gatekeepers or power structures.

Change needs to be top-down: news managers, producers and leaders should take action. Newsrooms should self-report diversity statistics on a regular basis in the interest of transparency and equal opportunity employment. Representation needs to be increased in Canadian media, with more training and mentoring for novice journalists. 

In a nutshell, the work of diversity and inclusion in Canadian media should start from its newsrooms. 

 

Graphic by @sundaeghost

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Minorities can have racist tendencies

They say stereotypes are there for a reason. That they wouldn’t exist if someone hadn’t experienced similar behaviour in a number of people from that specific group, and that stereotypes are not akin to racism. 

Let’s sit back and ponder on that for a second. For understandable reasons, it seems that people tread around the word “racism” very carefully, and try as hard as they can to not be associated with it. Because racism led to slavery, and still to this day, leads to discrimination, and downright violence.

But in case you didn’t already know, you don’t need to beat someone with a stick, use slurs against them or look at minorities in disgust to be racist.

When you browse for the definition of the word “racism,” you won’t get just one. The main definition as given by the Merriam-Webster dictionary, is “a belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race.” Any other interpretation is a variation of that exact principle, extending it to not only racial prejudice, but an ethnic one too.

Therefore, whether we wish to admit it or not, stereotypes are racist—having an opinion about a certain ethnicity or race based solely on hearsay and social conventions is racist. Here are some examples. 

When someone says Latino men are cheaters who will toy with your emotions until they get bored, and go onto the next, that’s racist. When Latinas are equated to crazy women with attitude, that’s racist. When people “can’t tell the difference” between Far-Easterns, that’s a whole level of rude. When Russian women are always seen as prostitutes, that’s racist. When Arab women are seen as either oppressed veil-wearing women, or sensual belly-dancers with all of Daddy’s money to spend, that’s racist. When Arab men are considered terrorists, that’s racist. 

Now here is where I get a tad problematic and add to the generalization. When I hear such statements, I get even more enraged when it comes from a person of colour or a fellow minority. Simply because, someone who isn’t the latter wouldn’t be able to understand how it feels to be limited to negative connotations that date back to an age of discrimination. A white person wouldn’t be able to understand how it feels to stay silent when someone equates your people to terrorists because of the perpetuation of a false image.

So, when I hear a minority who has been a victim of discriminatory and crude comments regarding their race and ethnicity participate in this hateful discourse, it makes me sick—to say the least. What’s worse is when a minority uses their status to justify their racism.

“Oh, I’m Lebanese, I get to publicly insult all Arabs, because I am one, and I don’t get offended.” Honey, no. Just … no. Criticize if you must, no one is feigning perfection and claiming no culture has faults. But when your criticism further intensifies an already-racist image, that’s when you need to check yourself. Because you might not be offended, but many suffer at those unjust racist claims—and yes, it is your business.

To be clear, I am not exempting myself from this equation. I by no means am innocent of racial bias, and the tendency to equate something to someone just because of what it says on their passport. But moving to Montreal and experiencing this mosaic of culture made me realize that if I were to stay in this city, and if I just want to be a decent human being, I better get used to getting all my prejudices crushed—and I am not complaining. 

Graphic by Sasha Axenova

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The boy who cried ‘hate crime’

Graphic by @spooky_soda

Hoax or no hoax, Jussie Smollett’s story can be a lesson to everyone

On Jan. 29, Empire actor Jussie Smollett was allegedly brutally attacked by two masked individuals in the city of Chicago. The beating went as far as Smollett finding himself on the brink of death, as a noose was put around his neck, and his ribs were fractured. Smollett later went on to say that both men were yelling, “this is MAGA country,” along with racist and homophobic slurs, ultimately branding the attack as a hate crime, according to The Washington Post. However, a spokesperson from the Chicago Police Department informed many news outlets that “there is no report of that being said,” according to Complex. And so, investigations got to the bottom of this alleged hate crime.

While the Chicago Police Department further studied the case, Smollett received an impressive amount of online support from many Hollywood stars outraged by this supposed hate crime against Smollett’s race and homosexuality.

On Feb. 20, however, Smollett was allegedly indicted for fabricating the entire story, of staging the attack, and was taken into custody, according to Esquire. Dissatisfied with the amount of money he was making on Empire, he supposedly created this entire scenario in order to gain sympathy from Hollywood producers and actors. While his involvement in the “hate crime” is still to be determined, as there are a number of news outlets with different theories pouring out everywhere, it is the reaction from the masses that I wish to discuss.

I personally remained skeptical about Jussie Smollett from beginning to end. I was particularly taken aback by his “I’m the gay Tupac” claim, at a performance on the Troubadour stage in West Hollywood, according to Complex. His insistence on advertising the event led me to question his sincerity, and ultimately, the truth behind what happened. When news broke out that he made up the whole story, I was not surprised, but rather disappointed to the core. And now, I’m just completely confused as to how to feel.

However, Jussie Smollett is not what angers me, because he is not the first, nor the last person of colour to use their minority status to gain stardom, or sympathy for that matter. Back in 2016, after Donald Trump was appointed president, a Muslim student at the University of Michigan claimed she was followed by an intoxicated man urging her to remove her hijab, lest he sets it on fire. As the investigation went on, the absence of any evidence rendered this story false, according to CNN.

Smollett is not the first one to cry wolf and diminish people in real danger. Smollett is just one of the many examples that white supremacists use to make their cases. When they see instances where hate crimes happen to be hoaxes, they use it as a way to push their own narratives about minorities and “social justice warriors” who are all just “too sensitive” and have victim mentalities.

But, if Smollett really did plan the entire attack, then I by no means blame anyone who passes judgment onto him.

What hurts the most about Smollett’s alleged actions is that he has completely shut a door already ajar to minorities’ voices. It is by no means a secret that minorities face many obstacles when it comes to confessing hate crimes and sexual abuse. I go as far as saying that white men and women have a higher chance of being believed when coming forth with sexual abuse stories than people of colour. Nations are tainted with racial biases. It is unfortunately innate, and it’s going to take more than a few marches to get rid of this bad seed.

When the Jussie Smollett hashtag was trending all over Twitter, the amount of hate speech I saw was intense—specifically coming from white supremacists. Men, and women with MAGA all over their profiles were claiming that hate crimes are nothing but another form of fake news.

While I don’t believe this was ‘fake news,’ seeing a gay African-American man like Jussie Smollett be willing to compromise his own community for personal greed makes me wary of the world we live in. For a minority to put other minorities at risk of further discrimination is not only bewildering, it is disgusting.

Hate crimes are not a joke. They are not hoaxes, and it is never okay to use them for personal gain. Hate crimes are a real issue, and if we’re not careful about how we use those words, we will forever fall prey to white supremacist discourse of ‘fake news’ that pushes the idea that leftists or people of colour are too sensitive, and that there is no racism in America—which is perhaps the biggest hoax out there.

Graphic by @spooky_soda

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Editorial: The complexities behind the legalization of marijuana

graphic by @spooky_soda

Marijuana legalization is on the horizon. The people have spoken, and as of Oct. 17 they’ll be tokin’. Yet, the legalization process is more complex than simply lifting the ban on getting high; the way it is executed can mean the difference between freedom for citizens and more centralized state power.

Policing marijuana and other substances has been a method of controlling populations—particularly by criminalizing certain groups—for a long time. Enforcing substance laws is often used as a tool by powerful groups to further their goals. This often invokes keeping poor people, racial and gender minorities, and other disenfranchised groups at the lowest of our class structure.

The way the war on drugs campaign started proves this. As admitted by Richard Nixon’s former assistant to the president for domestic affairs John Ehrlichman: “We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin. And then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities.” This is pretty clear evidence that the prohibition of marijuana is not about any moral issues with consumption of the drug. So legalizing marijuana is clearly a good thing, because it’s a step toward ending arbitrary means of state control.

This is the stance that was taken by the Bloc Pot political party in the recent Quebec election. Their main platform highlighted the prohibition of marijuana as a tool for the state to control and disempower its citizens. While they are in support of legalizing marijuana, they point out the problems with governments controlling that legalization process. The party also advocates for marijuana to be left out of the Criminal Code and the Canadian government’s control completely.

Quebec premier François Legault of the Coalition Avenir Québec (CAQ) will soon have to confront the task of implementing marijuana legalization in Quebec. One of the stipulations in his legalization plan is bumping the legal age from 18 (as was previously intended) up to 21. How he implements and regulates the rest of the law will affect more than just the minute details around buying weed; it could be the difference between maintaining oppressive social structures or granting people autonomy.

Legault, who ran on the promise of reducing immigration in Quebec by one fifth and imposing a “Quebec values” test on immigrants, doesn’t have the greatest track record with minorities. The CAQ’s immigration policies are outside the realm of marijuana legalization, but the reality is that generating and maintaining laws about personal issues like consuming marijuana only lends more power to the state to intervene in people’s lives. As essayist Jackie Wang argued in her book, Carceral Capitalism, right-wingers and neoliberals only want reduced state control until it involves policing the lives of minorities—a contradiction no doubt. It is likely that even as marijuana is legalized, it will still be heavily policed/regulated, which will disproportionately affect minority communities. Therefore, we will need to pay attention to the details surrounding legalization and make our voices heard if they are unjust.

The legalization of marijuana will not dissolve problematic structures in society any more than it will cure cancer, but leaving the police out of as many parts of our lives as possible is something that is in the best interest of the vulnerable members of our society, and thus something we should all strive for.

Graphic by @spooky_soda

 

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Women denouncing war

Participants of all genders and races united to oppose the impacts of war, militarization and occupation. Photo by Savanna Craig

Protesters march down Ste-Catherine Street in solidarity with women who face occupation, militarization and war

“One, two, three, four, we don’t want your fucking war,” chanted a crowd of approximately 150 people along Ste-Catherine Street on Nov. 26, denouncing violence against women—specifically regarding the oppression and violence faced by female minorities. “Five, six, seven, eight, organize and demonstrate,” the group continued to sing as they marched towards Dorchester Square.

“I am an immigrant woman of colour, and we come in all shapes of anger,” said Maya Acosta to the crowd of 60 people in Norman Bethune Square, where the group initially met at 1 p.m. The march was organized by The International Women Alliance (IWA) and Women of Diverse Origins (WDO), two grassroots-based women’s organizations.

“I’m here because the biggest form of violence is war and militarization,” said Jennie-Laure Sully, a participant at the event who works for Mouvement contre le viol et l’inceste, an organization that helps women who are victims of sexual violence.

She said there are many things the population can do to stop violence against women. “But if we don’t address the issues of war, militarization and occupation, then we’re missing a big part of what we need to do,” said Sully.

“We support peace, democracy and social justice,” said Nancy Brown, a member of the Raging Grannies, to the group of people assembled in Square Dorchester after the march along Ste-Catherine Street. Four members of the Raging Grannies, an activist group of older women who mock the stereotypical image of grandmothers, began to sing an anti-war tune to the group.

“It’s time to say no,” they shouted following their tune, as the crowd clapped and cheered.

“As we stand here, women are being raped and killed,” Ellen Moore, a member of the Raging Grannies, told The Concordian. “We’d like it to change—we grannies have the time and we have the rage.”

“Women are not put into the spotlight often,” said Moore, adding that women of minority groups face great oppression in war.

She said we are very lucky not to live in places deeply affected or conflicted by war. “That’s why I’m [at the demonstration]—because I can be,” said Moore.

This article has been updated for accuracy purposes. The Concordian apologizes and deeply regrets the error.

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Dealing with the police as a visible minority

Graphic by Charlotte Bracho.

How my experiences and perceptions of the police have changed over time

As a person of colour, I’ve grown up to learn that professionals might not always help me. In airports, my family and I are always scrutinized—it’s become comical when my mother’s hijab and my father’s brown skin are glared at.

I’ve sat quietly as police officers show lack of interest when my mother’s car gets hit—instead of looking into her eyes, they stare at her scarf. I’ve sat quietly when my father’s explanations are ignored and instead, police officers smirk at his accent and refuse to listen.  

I read the news and I feel angry at the way people of colour are mistreated in the United States, and even in Canada. The things I see and have dealt with reinforce my negative idea of them. Usually, I steer clear of police officers because I have the perception that they’re more likely to be rude to me, than helpful.

However, a recent video spread on social media has made me question my misconceptions about police officers. On September 21, Leon Shand, a man in a wheelchair, was being harassed by a Montreal police officer who identified himself as Officer L’Heureux. Shand was in the middle of crossing the street when the light turned red. L’Heureux confronted him for being in the intersection and then aggressively pushed his wheelchair and searched through his bag without a warrant. After seeing the video, I was disgusted by the way Shand was treated. I was outraged when the police officer said, “I’m going to give you a fucking ticket. You asked for it.”  

My reaction was to immediately revert to my bias about police officers. Shand, who is black, was at the wrong place at the wrong time. My first thought was, “It’s because he’s black and in a wheelchair.” After a few moments, I realized I made a hasty generalization.

How was I to know whether or not Officer L’Heureux acted like that because Shand was black? I found myself questioning the opinions I’ve held for so long. Why was I so quick to jump and label the officer as racist?

Many believe that Canada doesn’t have a race problem when it comes to policing—but that’s not necessarily true. Statistics Canada tracks fatal police shootings when an officer is criminally charged, however statistics regarding race are not recorded. According to The Guardian, between 2005 and 2015, the number of black convicts in Canadian prisons has jumped by 69 per cent. In another report released by CBC News, the province of Ontario will be reviewing the way police officers interact with indigenous peoples, after a series of deaths whilst in police custody.

Although these statistics and facts do exist, I can’t rely solely on them and my experiences when I label police officers as rude or racist. I’ve realized that perhaps there is more to Officer L’Heureux—maybe he was having a bad day, or maybe he’s drunk on the authority that’s been handed to him. The main thing is—I don’t know everything.

I can’t possibly justify my own misconceptions and biases without confronting the possibility that maybe I’m wrong. While experiences do factor into our perceptions of people, we shouldn’t typecast police officers, especially when so many people are trying to hold them accountable for doing the same to civilians.

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