China’s ‘mouthpiece’: Senator faces online backlash, calls to resign after 2 Michaels, Meng tweet

2021/10/04 Leave a comment

Hopefully, after the release of the Michaels, senators can stop defeating such motions and take a more principled stand against these human rights abuses and genocidal policies:

Last June, 33 Canadian senators voted to defeat a motion decrying China’s treatment of Uyghur Muslims as a genocide.

While they all faced criticism from some quarters, only one – Sen. Yuen Pau Woo, leader of the Independent Senators Group – seems to have been singled out as an alleged stooge of China’s communist regime, told to resign and “go home.”

Last week, Woo got a similar reaction when he tweeted about the release of Michael Spavor and Michael Kovrig, the two Canadians arbitrarily detained by China for nearly three years in retaliation for Canada’s arrest of Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou at the behest of the United States.

Woo tweeted that it was a “happy day” for the families of the Canadian men who became known around the world as the “two Michaels” and for Meng, who was simultaneously released and allowed to return to China. He urged Canadians to ponder the lessons learned from the affair.

He attached a link to an op-ed published in the Toronto Star that cited a former U.S. ambassador, Chas Freeman, saying that the “U.S., assisted by Canada, took Meng hostage in the first place as part of its trade-and-technology war with China.”https://platform.twitter.com/embed/Tweet.html?dnt=true&embedId=twitter-widget-0&features=eyJ0ZndfZXhwZXJpbWVudHNfY29va2llX2V4cGlyYXRpb24iOnsiYnVja2V0IjoxMjA5NjAwLCJ2ZXJzaW9uIjpudWxsfSwidGZ3X2hvcml6b25fdHdlZXRfZW1iZWRfOTU1NSI6eyJidWNrZXQiOiJodGUiLCJ2ZXJzaW9uIjpudWxsfSwidGZ3X3NwYWNlX2NhcmQiOnsiYnVja2V0Ijoib2ZmIiwidmVyc2lvbiI6bnVsbH19&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1441859293012107267&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fglobalnews.ca%2Fnews%2F8239522%2Fsenator-yuen-pau-woo-twitter-backlash%2F&sessionId=9cf2c0f941ed20ab9b0ab51ba030b1947357d4fe&siteScreenName=globalnews&theme=light&widgetsVersion=fcb1942%3A1632982954711&width=500px

That earned Woo a scathing rebuke from Chris Alexander, a former diplomat and one-time immigration minister in Stephen Harper’s Conservative government.

“By claiming Meng was ‘taken hostage’ by Canada, @yuenpauwoo has violated his oath as a Canadian senator and should resign,” Alexander tweeted.

“Mouthpieces for foreign propaganda … should have no place in Canada’s Parliament,” he added.

Alexander’s tweet was shared by others who variously referred to Woo as “pond scum” and a “Chinese commie f—” who should be “sent back to China along with Meng.”https://platform.twitter.com/embed/Tweet.html?dnt=true&embedId=twitter-widget-1&features=eyJ0ZndfZXhwZXJpbWVudHNfY29va2llX2V4cGlyYXRpb24iOnsiYnVja2V0IjoxMjA5NjAwLCJ2ZXJzaW9uIjpudWxsfSwidGZ3X2hvcml6b25fdHdlZXRfZW1iZWRfOTU1NSI6eyJidWNrZXQiOiJodGUiLCJ2ZXJzaW9uIjpudWxsfSwidGZ3X3NwYWNlX2NhcmQiOnsiYnVja2V0Ijoib2ZmIiwidmVyc2lvbiI6bnVsbH19&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1442119591782666240&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fglobalnews.ca%2Fnews%2F8239522%2Fsenator-yuen-pau-woo-twitter-backlash%2F&sessionId=9cf2c0f941ed20ab9b0ab51ba030b1947357d4fe&siteScreenName=globalnews&theme=light&widgetsVersion=fcb1942%3A1632982954711&width=500px

China has maintained from the outset that Meng’s arrest was politically motivated. Canada and the U.S. have strenuously denied it but plenty of American and Canadian experts nevertheless share Freeman’s view that she was a political bargaining chip.

That view was fuelled by former U.S. president Donald Trump, who was attempting to negotiate a trade deal with China at the time of Meng’s arrest and who said he’d intervene in her extradition case “if I think it’s good for what will be the largest trade deal ever made.”

John Manley, a former Liberal deputy prime minister and Canadian foreign affairs minister, said at the time that Trump’s comments had “given Ms. Meng’s lawyers quite a good reason to go to the court and say, ‘This is not an extradition matter. This is actually leverage in a trade dispute and it’s got nothing to do with Canada.”’

Woo notes that Manley and others who have echoed similar views have not been denounced as mouthpieces for China.

That’s a specific kind of opprobrium, he believes, meant to stigmatize people of Chinese descent and he’s worried about where the rising tide of anti-Asian sentiment in Canada could lead.

“I am Exhibit A, if you will, only because I have a bit of public profile,” Woo said in an interview.

“But there are many others in the community who do not have my protections and are genuinely fearful of the increasing typecasting and stigmatization that’s going on.”

Woo was actually born in Malaysia and raised in Singapore before coming to Canada at age 16.

He has been accused of being unabashedly “Beijing friendly,” a mouthpiece and lobbyist for the Communist Party of China, even though he points out he’s “three generations removed from the mainland (China).”

He fears recent immigrants from China, who still have connections to family there, are considered even more suspect and are less able to defend themselves.

Woo points to reports suggesting that Chinese Canadians might have been influenced by or acting on the behest of China when they voted in last month’s federal election, resulting in the defeat of several Conservative incumbents who had advocated a hardline stance against Beijing.

“This is really a slanderous and dangerous way of thinking because it makes assumptions about Chinese Canadians ? who have views that may not be mainstream (and) it presumes that they are not able to think for themselves,” he said.

“The accusation that they are foreign agents or stooges of the Chinese government is a very, very serious allegation and, of course, hearkens back to the days of McCarthyism when careers were ruined and lives were lost and we have to be very careful not to go back to that place.”

One of those defeated Conservative MPs, Kenny Chiu, who lost his B.C. riding to a Liberal in the Sept. 20 election, told The Canadian Press that during the campaign there were WeChat posts he says contained false information about the Conservatives and allegations a private member’s bill he tabled would discriminate against Chinese Canadians. But he also said his party could have done a better job speaking directly to members of that community.

When Woo spoke against the motion labelling China’s treatment of Uyghurs a genocide last June, he argued that Canada, given its history of forcing Indigenous children to attend residential schools, should not try to lecture China from a position of moral superiority on human rights.

Rather, he said, Canada should appeal to its Chinese “friends” not to make the same morally wrong and societally damaging mistake of trying to repress and forcibly assimilate a minority group.

Sen. Peter Harder, the former government representative in the Senate who now sits with the Progressive Senate Group, made a similar argument.

Sen. Peter Boehm, a former senior Global Affairs bureaucrat and Sherpa for prime ministers at G7 summits, argued that the motion’s “few paragraphs of what passes for megaphone diplomacy” would accomplish nothing, other than to anger China and possibly hurt attempts to win the release of Kovrig and Spavor.

Boehm, a member of the Independent Senators Group, said in an interview that both he and Harder got “a few brickbats” for their speeches, including from his former colleague, Alexander.

Alexander could not be reached for comment in time for publication.

“What I was getting was ‘You’re an experienced diplomat, you should know better, shame on you.’ That was basically what I was getting from Chris Alexander and from others who consider themselves experts,” Boehm said.

But unlike Woo, he said: “No one has tweeted or commented that I should go back to China.”

Boehm agrees with Woo that “there’s a correlation here with anti-Asian racism on the rise in Canada and some of this is permeating into the utterances or what various Canadians who should know better are putting on their social media feeds.

“I think it’s unfair and demeaning.”

Source: https://globalnews.ca/news/8239522/senator-yuen-pau-woo-twitter-backlash/?utm_campaign=David%20Akin%27s%20🇨🇦%20Roundup&utm_medium=email&utm_source=Revue%20newsletter

Filed under foreign policy, Multiculturalism Tagged with , , , ,

EDITORIAL: The question you can’t ask in Canada

2021/10/04 Leave a comment

Good editorial in the Toronto Sun:

It says a lot that the most talked about moment in the leaders’ debate since Brian Mulroney nailed John Turner in 1984 for not rescinding Pierre Trudeau’s patronage appointments, had nothing to do with anything the leaders said.

Instead, it was the controversy over a question asked by debate moderator Shachi Kurl, president of the Angus Reid Institute, to BQ leader Yves-Francois Blanchet about Quebec’s controversial language and secularism laws.

The essence of their exchange was this:

Kurl: “You deny that Quebec has problems with racism. Yet you defend legislation such as Bills 96 and 21, which marginalize religious minorities, anglophones, and allophones. For those outside the province, please help them understand why your party also supports these discriminatory laws.”

Blanchet: “The question seems to imply the answer you want. Those laws are not about discrimination, they are about the values of Quebec … we are saying that those are legitimate laws that apply on Quebec territory … which is again, by itself, for Quebec.”

So, asked and answered. Except in Canada.

The post debate reaction — the criticism being that by even asking the question Kurl was falsely suggesting Quebecers are racists — was a sight to behold.

Everybody was upset. Blanchet was upset. Quebec Premier François Legault was upset. Pundits were upset. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Conservative leader Erin O’Toole and NDP leader Jagmeet Singh were upset — albeit belatedly since they didn’t raise any concerns when the exchange occurred.

Never mind that a Quebec judge had previously ruled Bill 21 is discriminatory, cruel and dehumanizing to Muslim women and others, but constitutionally valid due to the province’s use of the Charter’s notwithstanding clause.

Recently in the Globe and Mail Kurl wrote a column sensibly refusing to apologize.

But the most interesting part was Kurl explaining that, “every question was reviewed by the debate’s editorial team, which included representatives from all the networks that organized and produced it — CBC, CTV, Global and APTN. More than a dozen senior journalists and news executives had seen and vetted the questions I asked …”

Knowing that makes the spectacle of everyone running for the hills after the question was asked downright hilarious.

Source: EDITORIAL: The question you can’t ask in Canada

Filed under Multiculturalism, Racism Tagged with , , , ,

David: Le taureau [Premier Legault denial of systemic racism]

2021/10/04 Leave a comment

Good commentary by Michel David:

Le premier ministre François Legault avait déjà gâché une bonne occasion d’élever le débat en se lançant dans une charge partisane totalement déplacée à l’Assemblée nationale le jour de l’anniversaire de la mort de Joyce Echaquan.

Il a été encore plus désolant de l’entendre justifier son refus de décréter un jour férié pour marquer la réconciliation avec les Premières Nations par le tort que cela causerait à la productivité de l’économie québécoise.

Le geste aurait pourtant été élégant, bien que la plupart des provinces n’aient pas suivi non plus l’exemple d’Ottawa. Mais faire valoir un argument aussi mercantile traduisait un manque d’empathie désolant. M. Legault aurait pu simplement dire qu’il préfère les gestes concrets aux commémorations symboliques ; on aurait difficilement pu lui donner tort.

Dans des provinces où la productivité est plus élevée qu’au Québec, comme l’Ontario, la Colombie-Britannique ou l’Alberta, il y a plus de jours fériés. Inversement, des provinces dont la productivité est moindre, comme Terre-Neuve ou la Nouvelle-Écosse, en offrent moins.

Ce n’est pas la première fois que son obsession économique lui fait oublier que le rôle d’un gouvernement est aussi de contribuer à bâtir une société plus humaine et plus juste. Lors de la réforme du Programme de l’expérience québécoise (PEQ), il ne semblait ni comprendre ni être touché par le drame vécu par ceux qui s’en étaient prévalus dans l’espoir de s’installer au Québec, et qui voyaient soudainement leur rêve brisé après avoir tout quitté. À ses yeux, la satisfaction des besoins du marché du travail constituait le seul critère.

Personne ne conteste la qualité du travail effectué par le ministre responsable des Affaires autochtones, Ian Lafrenière, dont le doigté a permis de renouer un dialogue qui était pratiquement rompu, mais la participation du premier ministre aux cérémonies de commémoration de la Journée nationale de la vérité et de la réconciliation aurait mieux témoigné de la détermination de l’État et de la nation québécoise à établir des relations avec les Premières Nations sur de nouvelles bases.

Tant que M. Legault s’entêtera à nier que les Autochtones sont victimes de « racisme systémique », il sera très difficile de les convaincre de la sincérité de ses intentions. Mais il semble voir rouge et fonce comme un taureau dès que ces mots sont prononcés. Cette semaine, il donnait l’impression d’avoir un urgent besoin de vacances.

Après avoir crié sur tous les toits qu’on cherchait à culpabiliser les Québécois, il s’est lui-même condamné au déni. Après la commission Viens, voilà pourtant que la coroner qui a enquêté sur la mort de Joyce Echaquan arrive elle aussi à la conclusion que le racisme systémique est bel et bien réel. Fait-elle aussi partie de ces wokes radicaux qui se complaisent dans le dénigrement du Québec ?

Évidemment, à partir du moment où M. Legault reconnaîtrait que les Autochtones sont victimes de racisme systémique, il deviendrait encore plus difficile de prétendre que les minorités visibles ne le sont pas. Les droits que des millénaires d’occupation du territoire confèrent aux uns rendraient-ils plus acceptable la discrimination envers les autres ?

Depuis trois ans, M. Legault s’est employé à redonner aux Québécois une fierté et une confiance en eux-mêmes que les lendemains difficiles du référendum de 1995 et la dégénérescence des mœurs politiques sous la gouverne libérale avaient mis à mal, mais il ne rend pas service au Québec en l’enfonçant dans un débat stérile dont il ne peut pas sortir grandi. L’année électorale s’annonce inquiétante.

Il est vrai que le concept de « racisme systémique » n’est pas facile à saisir, mais il est désolant de voir le premier ministre le déformer pour mieux le rejeter. À l’entendre, il s’agirait simplement d’une nouvelle arme utilisée par ceux qui se complaisent dans le Quebec bashing. En matière de relations avec les Autochtones, le Canada anglais n’a certainement pas de leçons à donner, mais la turpitude des uns ne saurait justifier celle des autres.

Les Québécois ont le sentiment qu’eux-mêmes ont toujours été victimes de discrimination depuis la Conquête. Ils sont donc bien placés pour comprendre à quel point la coexistence de deux cultures et de deux modes de vie peut être difficile, surtout quand on est en situation minoritaire.

Ils peuvent légitimement être fiers de ce qu’ils ont réussi à bâtir dans l’adversité, mais ils pourraient aussi tirer une grande fierté à avoir su aménager une société où chacun se sentirait chez lui, accepté et respecté tel qu’il est.

Le défi est de taille, mais M. Legault a démontré qu’il ne manque pas de cœur à l’ouvrage. On peut se féliciter d’avoir un taureau comme premier ministre, à la condition qu’il fonce dans la bonne direction.

Source: https://www.ledevoir.com/opinion/chroniques/637374/chronique-le-taureau?utm_source=infolettre-2021-10-02&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=infolettre-quotidienne

Filed under Multiculturalism, Racism Tagged with , ,

Indo-Canadians tend to vote Liberal. But will they continue to do so?

2021/10/02 Leave a comment

Interesting discussion of the generational differences:

For nearly two weeks, pundits have scoured pre-election surveys and post-election exit polls to analyze the voting patterns of Canadians in granular detail. So it’s surprising that scant attention has been paid to how Canada’s burgeoning immigrant communities voted.

Among immigrant groups, Canada’s large and rapidly growing Indo-Canadian population deserves particular consideration. According to the 2016 census, there are nearly 1.4 million people of Indian origin residing in Canada, accounting for four per cent of the population. Those numbers have grown dramatically since then; today, Indians represent the largest group of new immigrants in the country. In 2019 alone, more than 80,000 Indians made their way to Canada from India — one-quarter of all immigrants arriving that year.

For years, the Indian community in Canada — much like other ethnic minorities — has been perceived as a strong votary of the Liberal party. But the community’s rising socio-economic profile and young demographic skew, combined with the emergence of the Indo-Canadian NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh, have raised questions about its political leanings.

On the eve of the election, we collaborated with YouGov on a nationally representative survey of Indo-Canadians. Our survey of 724 citizens of Indian origin suggests that the Indo-Canadian community continues, in large measure, to support the Liberals, with 38 per cent of respondents indicating their support of the party — twice the number that planned to vote Conservative. One in five (21 per cent) backed the NDP.

Remarkably, this breakdown is nearly identical to the distribution of Indo-Canadian votes in both 2015 and 2019, according to our analysis of the Canadian Election Study. How do we explain the voting habits of Indo-Canadians?

For starters, on a standard left-right ideological spectrum, Indo-Canadians strongly skew left. Nearly three in four Indo-Canadians self-identify on the liberal half of the scale. When it comes to the issues topping their agenda this election season, respondents identify the same bread-and-butter issues that weigh on most Canadians’ minds: health care and COVID-19, the cost of living, the state of the economy. 

If the Indian diaspora exhibits a leftward tilt, why don’t more of them vote for the NDP? Indeed, for many Indo-Canadians, Singh’s allure is undeniable. Nearly half of respondents reported that Singh’s leadership of the NDP makes them more enthusiastic about the party, in large part due to his Indian and/or Sikh roots. Furthermore, when asked to rate their views of Canadian political leaders on a sliding scale from 0-100, Justin Trudeau and Singh are virtually deadlocked — Singh earns an average rating of 67, with Trudeau at 65 and Conservative Leader Erin O’Toole lagging at 49.

However, Singh is handicapped by the one impediment that has arguably prevented many Canadians from voting NDP: the party is perceived to have little shot at forming the government. One in four Indians say the primary reason they do not vote NDP is because they do not want to waste their vote. 

On the other end of the spectrum, when asked why they do not identify with the Conservatives, survey respondents reported that the party is too influenced by big business and seeks to cut public services. On everyday economic issues, Conservatives appear out of step with the left-of-centre policies Indo-Canadians favour. Misaligned policies on the right and limited electability on the left seem to funnel Indo-Canadian voters to the Liberal camp. 

The seeming stability of the votes of the Indo-Canadian community, however, elides deeper changes underway. While older voters (above 30) favour the Liberals over the NDP by a two-to-one margin, younger Indo-Canadians split their vote almost evenly between the two. The divide between first-generation Indo-Canadians (who came as immigrants) and second-generation citizens (born and raised in Canada) is starker. While half of naturalized citizens support the Liberal party, just one in three born in the country do so. The NDP is the principal beneficiary of this shift: the party’s vote share among second-generation Canadians is twice as large as among their first-generation counterparts. Indeed, country of birth is the single most important predictor of whether Indo-Canadians are likely to vote Liberal, even after controlling for age, education, gender and religion. 

The relative absence of a religious divide is worth emphasizing, as it stands in contrast with the voting attitudes of Indians in another large, English-speaking country — the United Kingdom. There, Hindus have abandoned the left-of-centre Labour Party in droves and embraced the Conservatives, which has given British Indians prominent cabinet berths and adopted pro-India policies. In Canada, partisan polarization on religious lines is not so evident in the Indian community. But differing views over how Canada should engage with India’s government and concerns that the Liberal party favours Sikhs over the Indo-Canadian community at large could trigger a realignment.

Looking forward, the voting behaviour of the community will be shaped by two competing demographic trends. As the size of the diaspora increases, so will the number of young, Canadian-born Indians who are eligible to vote — increasing popular support for the NDP. At the same time, the sharp increase in recent Indian immigration will boost the numbers of naturalized citizens, who are more likely to support the Liberal party. The net effect of these trends, and how the Conservatives respond, will determine if the stability in the voting preferences of the Indo-Canadian community continues.

Caroline Duckworth and Milan Vaishnav are with the South Asia Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Devesh Kapur is Starr Foundation Professor of South Asian Studies at the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies.

Source: https://www.thestar.com/opinion/contributors/2021/10/01/indo-canadians-tend-to-vote-liberal-but-will-they-continue-to-do-so.html

Filed under Multiculturalism, Politics Tagged with , , ,

Australia: Why Diversity Seems Easier Said Than Done in Politics

2021/10/02 Leave a comment

Australia’s political representation is much worse than Canada (haven’t yet seen the final 2021 numbers for Canada which a number of researchers are working on):

Recently, I’ve been reporting on the controversy over Labor’s pick to represent Fowler, where Tu Le, a young lawyer and the daughter of Vietnamese migrants, was passed over, with the party instead choosing Kristina Keneally, a party leader and white woman. I’ve been using it as a starting point to examine why Australia’s Parliament lags behind other English-speaking countries when it comes to cultural diversity.

I’ve talked to people from across the political spectrum, including many young people of color within the Labor Party who have led the debate. For them, the controversy is just the latest example of the dissonance between a country that claims to be the most successful nation when it comes to multiculturalism and a governing elite that is reluctant to address diversity at the cost of political convenience.

What I wasn’t able to go into much in my article (coming soon) was the details that party members shared about the barriers they faced on every rung of the political ladder. It all added up to a picture of a two-tiered political system that sees people of color as fine community representatives or liaisons but not cut out for higher leadership positions, and treats immigrant communities as expandable membership bases or voting blocs.

A few caveats: they had differing views about the Fowler preselection. They had nothing against Kristina Keneally and her qualifications for office. They stressed that underrepresentation is a problem across all parties, not unique to Labor — it’s just particularly disappointing when the party that purports to champion diversity doesn’t make good on its promise.

Ethnically diverse members regularly have their worth tied to their communities, said Joseph Haweil, 30, mayor of Hume City in Melbourne. “Very often there’s a feeling if you’re someone from a multicultural background and you walk into a branch meeting without already having signed up five or 10 people from your community, you’re a nobody.”

Migrant communities are courted for fund-raising and to build a base for internal power struggles, but afforded little genuine engagement, said Tu Le. “When you go to a Cabramatta branch meeting, half the people there have no idea what you’re talking about, they’re just there because someone signed them up,” she said. “How parties engage with local communities — it’s one-sided, it’s not participatory.”

There’s a huge pool of untapped talent within the Labor party, she added, that gets overlooked because “we’re just seen or categorized in certain ways that don’t let people see our full potential.”

“There’s two different set of rules,” said Kun Huang, 30, a Cumberland councilor in Sydney. A person of color needs to simultaneously demonstrate that “you can bring along your community” and that they have appeal to those outside their own ethnicity, he said, but if you’re not a minority, “you just need to know the right set of people and you’re in.”

The system privileges party insiders who spend their time around other party members, shoring up support for internal preselections and ballots, said Charishma Kaliyanda, 33, a Liverpool councilor in Sydney. If you’re busy engaging with or volunteering for cultural or community organizations, “you have less time to do the organizational work that you need to do to build up that support.”

“There’s a really disjointed relationship between the skills you may have being from a different cultural background or being a community advocate, and how they’re valued in a political sense,” she added.Sign up for the Australia Letter Newsletter  Conversation starters about Australia and insight on the global stories that matter most, sent weekly by the Times’s Australia bureau. Plus: heaps of local recommendations. Get it sent to your inbox.

The other question I’ve been asking is: what needs to change?

It seems that the first step is acknowledging the issue. In N.S.W., party members are putting forward a platform change at the next state Labor conference to formally recognize the underrepresentation of racial minorities in leadership positions, including Parliament, and commit to improving representation in the party.

Party members also said change needs to happen at every level — from how members are recruited, to who is given staff positions, to who gets preselected.

“I don’t want to see a situation where the party just randomly picks, say, a Chinese Australian so that it fulfills the diversity image,” said Mr. Huang. “I want the party to select good local candidates who have been contributing to the party and who have been active.”

If there aren’t candidates who fulfill both those criteria, he added, “our job is to recruit more culturally diverse members into the party.”

Tim Soutphommasane, Australia’s former racial discrimination commissioner, theorized that we may be starting to see two different understandings of “multiculturalism.” There’s the one celebrated by the majority of the political class that “would see things as pretty good the way they are and would understand any underrepresentation as an issue that’d be fixed with time,” he said.

Then, there’s a more political form that sees underrepresentation as a matter of urgency and asks: “If we really are the most successful multicultural country in the world, why does the leadership of our society look much like it did during the era of White Australia?”

“The lesson here should be clear,” he added. “Multicultural voices will need to be more assertive. Power is rarely shared or gifted. It needs to be contested and won. But that’s not easy, especially when there is a strong social pressure for our multiculturalism to be nice, polite, compliant — anything basically but disruptive.”

My article about why Australia’s halls of power don’t look like our population will be out in the next few days.

Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/01/world/australia/why-diversity-seems-easier-said-than-done-in-politics.html

Filed under Multiculturalism, Politics Tagged with

Feds find no bias in racial profiling by traffic stop study in Canada

2021/10/02 Leave a comment

Of note:

There was no evidence of bias found in a federal study on racial profiling by traffic police in Canada.

“Most participants were stopped by police for traffic violations and some were aware of why they were being stopped even before speaking to police,” said the report called National Justice Survey 2021.

“These participants acknowledged they were speeding or committing some other traffic violation such as not coming to a complete stop at a stop sign. A few were pulled over for having expired license plates.”

The poll, which cost $147, 463, was conducted last February and March following coverage of the May 25, 2020 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis and the Black Lives Matter demonstrations that followed.

Ekos Research Associates polled 3,211 people across the country including doing follow-up interviews with Black, Asian or Indigenous drivers.

Of the Black drivers surveyed, all said they were stopped for routine infractions.

Source: Feds find no bias in racial profiling by traffic stop study in Canada

Filed under Multiculturalism Tagged with , ,

BONOKOSKI: The media is biased on diversity. Let the students rise up 

2021/10/02 Leave a comment

Ironic Bonokoski article given that much of Sun/Postmedia commentary reinforces the belief that mainstream media has a left-wing bias (of which, of course, Postmedia is part):

The non-partisan think tank the Macdonald-Laurier Institute (MLI) has launched an essay-writing contest for students, claiming the “dominant mainstream media narrative seems to offer a single, simplistic, politically biased view to represent all people of colour on the most important political and cultural issues.”

It cited no example of that bias.

The contest rules don’t implicitly say that ‘white people need not apply’ but it is certainly inferred that white students would not have the world or personal experience to address the issues.

“A diversity of opinions from individuals with different backgrounds represents a strong measure of a successful democracy,” said MLI Senior Fellow Jamil Jivani.

“Young Canadians deserve to be heard, especially those whose opinions are often left out of public debate.”

This essay competition, says MLI, is part of the institute’s Speak for Ourselves project, which “seeks to amplify the views of people of colour whose dissent from mainstream narratives might leave them without a platform for expressing their opinions.”

The contest winner — with essays limited to 750 to 1,000 words and open to students 25 and younger — will receive a $1,500 prize and have their essay published in MLI’s Inside Policy magazine.

According to MLI Munk Senior Fellow Shuvaloy Majumdar, “Supporting true diversity and inclusion is much more important than succumbing to the narrow ‘culture war’ debate being perpetuated in much of society.”

As Jivani notes, successful submissions will be those that provide “a unique and compelling argument or commentary on issues of race, racism, and diversity — the kind of argument you might not read in the opinion sections of Canada’s major papers or in a university classroom.”

The deadline for submissions is midnight Nov. 29.

The World Economic Forum recently put out a paper on the need of the media and entertainment industries to expand diversification, stating that it opens the door to increased profits.

“Diversity, equity and inclusion (DE&I) has recently become one of the most trending topics in the media and entertainment industry,” said the forum.

“But embracing diversity isn’t only about doing the right thing.

“Analysis shows that ethics and profits are two sides of the same coin. There’s financial logic to making sure that content — and those who create it — are authentically and inclusively representative of today’s society.

“For example, movies that lack authentic and inclusive representation underperform by around 20% of their budget at the opening weekend box office.

“In advertising, 64% of consumers in a Google survey said that they had considered buying or had made a purchase after seeing an ad that they considered diverse or inclusive.

“Similarly, other sectors have sizable untapped opportunities from increased diversity and inclusion.

“However, true diversity includes diversity of thought and, in this respect, minority communities are as diverse as any other communities in our country,” says the Macdonald-Laurier Institute.

“This essay competition is an opportunity for students across Canada to challenge the dominant mainstream narrative on race and racism in Canada.

“Reflecting from a place of personal experience is encouraged and, in doing so, a successful essay will exemplify true diversity — the diversity of thought — in our country,” it offers.

“This is to say, the winning essay will be one that provides a unique and compelling argument or commentary on issues of race, racism, and diversity — the kind of argument you might not read in the opinion sections of Canada’s major papers or in a university classroom.”

So, there’s the ground rules.

We in the media are allegedly one dimensional.

Source: https://torontosun.com/opinion/columnists/bonokoski-the-media-is-biased-on-diversity-let-the-students-rise-up?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=truncated_content&utm_content=opinion_columnists&utm_term=mark_bonokoski

Filed under Multiculturalism Tagged with , , ,

Immigration adds 1.4 to 1.5 years to U.S. life expectancy, study says

2021/10/02 Leave a comment

Interesting study for both first and second generation immigrants, and the factors influencing shorter lifespans of non-immigrants:

If immigrants to the United States formed their own country, their pre-COVID-19 life expectancies would exceed or match those of the world’s leaders in longevity -; Swiss men and Japanese women. A new study by USC and Princeton researchers estimates that immigration adds 1.4 to 1.5 years to U.S. life expectancy at birth. In 2017, foreign-born life expectancy reached 81.4 and 85.7 years for men and women, respectively. That’s about 7 and 6.2 years longer than the average lifespan of their U.S.-born counterparts.

Demographers knew that immigrants lived longer. The main question that we set out to answer was, How much is this really contributing to national life expectancy trends? Our results show that they’re making an outsized contribution to national life expectancy.”

Arun Hendi, the lead author of the study and assistant professor of sociology and public affairs at Princeton University

The study was published in the September 2021 issue of SSM Population Health, by Hendi and Jessica Ho, an assistant professor of gerontology and sociology at the USC Leonard Davis School of Gerontology. Their work provides new insights on how immigrants contributed to national life expectancy trends over nearly three decades, from 1990 to 2017.

The research suggests that immigrants are responsible for approximately half of the recent U.S. gains in life expectancy. Moreover, the gap in life expectancy between foreign-born and native-born residents is widening.

In fact, the researchers say, Americans’ life expectancy would steeply decline if it weren’t for immigrants and their children. Under that scenario, U.S. life expectancy in 2017 would have reverted to levels last seen in 2003 -; 74.4 years for men and 79.5 years for women -; more closely resembling the average lifespans of Tunisia and Ecuador.

Study shows diverging trends during the last decade

Prior research has shown that between 2010 and 2017, overall U.S. life expectancies saw an unprecedented stagnation. The plateau has been largely attributed to drug overdose deaths among adults in their prime working ages and slowdowns in the rate of improvement in cardiovascular disease mortality. But this new study shows that immigrants experienced life expectancy gains during this period, while the U.S.-born population experienced declines.

“If it weren’t for immigrants, our national life expectancy stagnation that we experienced since 2010 would instead be a national decline in life expectancy,” Ho said. “For them to have that large an impact is unexpected because they represent a relatively small proportion of the U.S. population.”

In addition, while the immigrant advantage was already present in 1990, the research shows that the difference between immigrants and the U.S.-born has widened substantially over time, with the ratio of American-born to foreign-born mortality rates nearly doubling by 2017.

“When compared to immigrants’ life expectancy, the U.S.-born are doing poorly. Much of this is related to their very high mortality at the prime adult ages,” said Ho, an expert in the social determinants of health and mortality. “Low mortality among prime-aged immigrants doesn’t just help the foreign-born -; it helps the U.S.-born too. Prime-aged adults are likely to be in the labor force and raising children. This means that they contribute to higher tax revenues and slower population aging.”

Hendi says this is particularly relevant today because those prime adult ages are where the country is losing years of life due to drug overdose mortality and other preventable causes of death.

“The fact that immigrants are doing well suggests that there is a capacity to thrive in the U.S., but the U.S.-born aren’t fulfilling that potential,” he said.

Immigrants are a small but influential share of the U.S. population

Immigrants make up under 15% of the U.S. population, up from around 8% in 1990 but still a small percentage of the total. Hendi and Ho cite healthy behaviors and the changing selectivity of the immigrant population as factors that may contribute to their influence on total life expectancy.

“Immigrants tend to be healthier in part due to the selective migration of those who have the health, resources and stamina to migrate to the U.S., and this selectivity may have grown stronger,” Ho said.

The researchers highlight the role of increases in high-skilled immigration, which is partly reflected in changes in countries of origin as immigrant streams shift from Mexico to places like India and China. They also note that there may be pro-longevity characteristics of immigrant populations, regardless of country of origin, including a lower propensity to drink, smoke and use drugs than U.S.-born residents.

“Many of America’s immigrants come from lower-income, less-developed nations, leading some to worry that these immigrants bring their home countries’ high-mortality conditions with them and thus drag down America’s national average longevity,” Hendi said. “But the results say just the opposite. Far from dragging down the national average, immigrants are bolstering American life expectancy. A big part of the story appears to be that immigrants take fewer risks when it comes to their health.”

The study additionally found that the children of foreign-born residents retain some life expectancy advantage but do not fare as well as their parents.

Hendi and Ho used data from the National Vital Statistics System and the U.S. Census Bureau to estimate life expectancy levels among foreign-born, U.S.-born and total populations between 1990 and 2017.

The team plans to examine COVID-19’s impact on immigrant life expectancies. A January 2021 study by USC and Princeton researchers found the COVID-19 pandemic had significantly affected life expectancy, with stark declines in life expectancy among Black and Latino populations. A separate USC study last July of a large diverse group of Medicaid enrollees found Latino patients had starkly higher odds than whites of testing positive for COVID-19 as well as higher odds of hospitalization and death.

Source: Immigration adds 1.4 to 1.5 years to U.S. life expectancy, study says

Filed under Immigration Tagged with ,

Saint-Jacques: After the two Michaels’ release, Canada must work with allies to challenge China’s bullying tactics

2021/10/01 Leave a comment

Sound commentary:

The return of Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor to Canada should be celebrated as they were unfortunate pawns in the geopolitical contest between China and the United States. Let’s hope that they can get back to a normal life quickly ‒ and that Canada was not forced to agree to egregious demands from China to guarantee their release.

As we take stock of this sad episode, we have to look at our China policy from the perspectives of security, trade and co-operation. The starting point should be the defence and protection of our values and interests. As trust has been broken, future Canadian engagement with China will have to be a lot more selective to areas that serve our interest, and be implemented in a consistent manner.

Canada needs to recover its voice. Ottawa must call China into question when it transgresses obligations undertaken through international treaties. This includes problems such as the trampling of human rights in Xinjiang, Tibet and Hong Kong, the militarization of the South China Sea, the undue pressure on Taiwan and Beijing’s refusal to collaborate with the World Health Organization to investigate the origin of the COVID-19 pandemic.

After the case of Meng Wanzhou, it is not impossible that we will be asked again to arrest a prominent Chinese citizen at the request of a foreign country with which we have an extradition treaty ‒ or that we will have to arrest someone here who is engaging in espionage or interference activities. We have to put mechanisms in place to prevent future hostage taking. One way would be for Canada to develop criteria that would trigger common responses, including sanctions, by countries that have signed the Declaration Against Arbitrary Detention in State-to-State Relations. All these countries have realized that what happened to the Michaels was pure hostage diplomacy and that it could happen to their citizens, too.

Canada should also ban Huawei from its 5G development to ensure that the company’s equipment cannot be used for espionage and to align with the United States. It must also become a lot more active to prevent Chinese interference in domestic affairs, including cyber espionage. A good starting point would be to look at the four foreign interference laws adopted by Australia.

To prevent China from using trade to punish opponents, Canada should impress on Washington that it needs to make the World Trade Organization functional again by allowing arbiters to be appointed to panels. Countries could then launch actions against China when it imposes punitive sanctions(this would apply to other countries that enact these measures as well). Canada could suggest an alliance to Australia and U.S. (to start), whereby they agree not to increase exports to China beyond their historical share of a given product if one of them is victim of such sanctions. Trade data for the first six months of 2021 show that our exports to China have increased by 23 per cent on a year-to-year basis. This gives us more leeway to take strong measures as China will always need our agri-food products, iron and copper.

There are, of course, areas where it is in our interest to pursue co-operation with China. For example, on the environment, Canada already has a reputable record of providing assistance. This can facilitate business opportunities for Canada to provide China with clean technologies, liquefied natural gas and hydrogen to help reduce its coal emissions. On public health and pandemics, Canada should continue to collaborate with China ‒ especially to ensure it doesn’t cut corners. There’s also people-to-people exchanges: Chinese people like to travel to Canada for tourism and appreciate Canadian education for their children. We also have our own homework to do: Let’s increase Canadian literacy on China by devoting more resources to Mandarin training and centres studying the country’s politics, economics and culture.

But demonstrating strength, first and foremost, is key. To be successful, this new engagement strategy will have to be implemented in close collaboration with like-minded countries. An impending test to do so will be at Beijing’s 2022 Winter Olympics. Let’s propose that delegations to the opening ceremony be limited, and that foreign leaders not attend. The more we speak with one voice and the more China will be forced to stop its bullying tactics.

Source: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-after-the-two-michaels-release-canada-must-work-with-allies-to/

Filed under foreign policy Tagged with ,

Le Pen Joins French Conservatives Seeking Immigration Referendum

2021/10/01 Leave a comment

Here we go again, with a race to the bottom:

After trying to moderate her image for months, far-right leader Marine Le Pen went back to basics by casting a national conversation about immigration as a battle for the soul of France and renewing a pledge to hold a referendum on the issue if she defeats Emmanuel Macron next year.

“The April 2022 election will be about our civilization,” Le Pen said during a press conference on Tuesday. “Will France remain France, or be brushed aside by the uncontrolled torrent of massive migration flows that will wipe out our culture, our values, our way of life.”

Le Pen said she’d consult the French about changing the constitution to “drastically” reduce immigration. She pledged to introduce a law that will prevail over international treaties and allow her to breach European Union legislation if a majority of citizens backs the idea.

“What we are offering is a ready-for-use solution,” she said.

Several presidential hopefuls on the traditional right are seeking tougher rules on who is allowed to live in the country, including Michel Barnier and Xavier Bertrand.

And though Macron ran as a centrist in 2017, he has since become more conservative and his government has also talked about the need to control immigration. On Tuesday, it said it will reduce the number of visas granted to Algerians, Moroccans and Tunisians to protest their countries’ refusal to facilitate the return of nationals in “an irregular situation” in France.

But Le Pen’s harsher tone may be more the result of the threat posed by ultra-right media personality Eric Zemmour, who has been publicly toying with a run. He has previously demanded a referendum to overhaul immigration law as well as a short-term moratorium on entries. He links immigration to terrorism.

Le Pen is placing second in surveys of voting intentions, after Macron, though polls show support for Zemmour rising and cutting into her voter base. If Zemmour joins the crowded contest, he’d likely increase the chances Le Pen would be knocked out of the second round and throw the race wide open.

During the press conference, Le Pen said she wants to make it illegal for people from different countries to live in closed communities as a way of preserving their traditions and ban undocumented people from regularizing their situation. The Schengen accord, which allows free circulation for people in Europe, would need to be renegotiated, she said.

Source: Le Pen Joins French Conservatives Seeking Immigration Referendum

Filed under Immigration, Multiculturalism Tagged with , ,

← Older posts

Newer posts →