HESA: How bad is it going to get in Ontario? Really bad. 

2024/01/31 Leave a comment

Usual frank and insightful analysis:

This isn’t just cluelessness. The Ministry here isn’t even clueful with respect to understanding how to even get a clue in the first place. The cluetrain? It has left the shed but there’s nobody on board (ok I will stop now).

So, all of this is bad, certainly, but it’s arguably not as bad as Colleges Ontario’s 1326-word statement responding to the federal changes, which is a masterclass in failing to read the room. Go on, read it. Utterly self-centered, all about protecting their revenue schemes, no sense whatsoever that the whole reason this scenario is occurring is that they lost social license to keep bringing in more international students and that the public has serious (albeit not necessarily well-founded) views about the quality of PPPs and the quality assurance. Tone-deaf is putting it mildly.

(Of course, Colleges Ontario is a membership organization, and when it comes to membership organizations, they necessarily go with the lowest-common denominator. My guess is that there a few colleges that probably know this statement was a bad idea, but the ultras won out.)

(Also: I am taking bets on when the rest of the sector decides to throw Conestoga under the bus for ruining the international student thing for everyone else. Issuing acceptances for 34,000 study permit students in 2023 alone—in a city with under 400,000 students—was an absurd cash-grab with no thought as to impact on the local community. As soon as the distribution of spots starts, you know the other colleges are going to argue hard against Conestoga getting a share of 2024 visas based on its 2023 share. Should be amusing).

Meanwhile, Ontario universities had not issued a joint statement as of Sunday evening (when this blog was written) but as near as I can tell, the universities’ position is going to be “colleges created this problem, any balancing of student visa numbers should be done on their backs, not ours.” Which has a certain truth to it but is a long way from the full truth (within the university sector, you can expect Algoma will attract antagonists the way Conestoga does in the college sector, albeit on a more modest scale).

In other words, everything here in Ontario is a mess. It will be an interesting to compare Ontario’s…omnishambles…what British Columbia’s plan looks like. My understanding is that it will be published Monday (tomorrow for me, yesterday for you). I apologize in advance that due to extensive work commitments this week, I won’t be able to cover the BC announcement until next week. ‘til then: keep your eyes peeled. These files are moving fast.

Source: HESA: How bad is it going to get in Ontario? Really bad. 

Filed under Immigration Tagged with , ,

Omidvar: Be wary of simple solutions on the foreign student issue

2024/01/31 Leave a comment

IMO, a reasonably targeted and focused set of measures:

Blunt instruments draw blood from all parts of the body, when a sharp scalpel is better suited to the surgery. Mr. Miller has chosen a blunt instrument. It will certainly draw blood. The underbelly of the industry, that he refers to as “puppy mills,” should and will close down. The limitation of postgraduation work permits to students from those institutions will limit the number who end up working behind the tills at big box stores and other low-paying outlets. Will these chains raise wages to get the staff they need? Will unemployed Canadians work in the retail, hospitality and tourism sectors over a sustained period of time? These are questions we don’t have the answers to.

We now face the serious risk that domestic students will face a drop in the quality of education they receive as universities and colleges lose fees from international students they have come to rely on. Provincial governments need to wake up. The “blue-ribbon” task force struck by Ontario Premier Doug Ford has made sensible proposals on stabilizing funding for universities and colleges, such as “a one-time significant adjustment in per-student funding for colleges and universities to recognize unusually high inflationary cost increases over the past several years,” and “a commitment to more modest annual adjustments over the next three to five years.” These types of recommendations need to be heeded and implemented promptly.

We have allowed ourselves to get tangled up in a sticky problem of our own making by all levels of government. But we can untangle ourselves from it if we go back to the basics of education. Providing high-quality education for Canadian students should not be reliant on external forces. Providing excellent education for foreign students must become an aspiration so we can educate young people from all over the world and they can take a bit of Canada back with them. Unfortunately, in higher education in Canada today, the tail is wagging the dog.

Ratna Omidvar is an independent senator from Ontario.

Source: Be wary of simple solutions on the foreign student issue

Filed under Immigration Tagged with , ,

‘A Constant Drumbeat’ of Racial Essentialism‘

2024/01/31 Leave a comment

Similar to the case of Toronto principal Richard Bilkszto and DEI training of the Kojo Institute:

That surviving claim concerns whether De Piero was subject to a hostile work environment. Penn State’s approaches to race and DEI, as described in his complaint, “plausibly amount to ‘pervasive’ harassment,” Beetlestone ruled. She qualified her ruling, noting that “discussing in an educational environment the influence of racism on our society does not necessarily violate federal law.” In fact, a workplace “dogmatically committed to race-blindness at all costs” would “blink at history and reality,” she wrote, adding that training on concepts such as white privilege, white fragility, and critical race theory “can contribute positively to nuanced, important conversations.”

She is clearly not an “anti-woke” ideologue. Still, the ruling declared, “the way these conversations are carried out in the workplace matters: When employers talk about race—any race––with a constant drumbeat of essentialist, deterministic, and negative language, they risk liability under federal law.”

What did De Piero describe that struck the judge as plausibly constituting that “constant drumbeat”?

After the murder of George Floyd in 2020, all Penn State faculty and staff were told to attend a “Conversation on Racial Climate” on Zoom. During the session, Alina Wong, an assistant vice provost for educational equity, “led the faculty in a breathing exercise,” De Piero’s complaint states, “in which she instructed the ‘White and non-Black people of color to hold it just a little longer—to feel the pain.’”

On at least four other occasions in 2020 and 2021, the judge wrote, De Piero “was obligated to attend conferences or trainings that discussed racial issues in essentialist and deterministic terms—ascribing negative traits to white people or white teachers without exception and as flowing inevitably from their race.” One session involved a presentation about “White Language Supremacy.” Another included examples of ostensibly racist comments “where every hypothetical perpetrator was white,” the judge continued.

The ruling noted De Piero’s claim that he was subject to “race-based theories condemning white people for no other reason than they spoke or were simply present while being ‘white,’” and that his supervisor “spoke of race conscious grading” and accused white faculty of unwittingly reproducing “racist discourses and practices” in the classroom. Once, faculty members even had to watch a training video titled “White Teachers Are a Problem.” In 2021, De Piero told an administrator that he felt harassed and singled out because of his race and asked that anti-racism training sessions be stopped. He filed a report with the Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission. He also filed a bias report with Penn State’s affirmative-action office. A staffer there allegedly told him, “There is a problem with the white race,” and urged him to keep attending anti-racism workshops.

In ruling that these and other allegations “plausibly amount to ‘pervasive’ harassment,” Judge Beetlestone did not necessarily conclude that everything happened just as De Piero claims. But if events did happen that way, she reasoned, then Penn State is “plausibly” guilty of creating a hostile climate. When I asked Penn State for comment on the factual accuracy of De Piero’s complaint, a spokesperson replied that the university does not comment on ongoing litigation.

Whether or not De Piero prevails at trial, Beetlestone’s ruling could have an effect on how schools approach DEI. The kind of DEI programming described in De Piero’s complaint is widespread on college campuses; I’ve encountered many examples of similar programming through my reporting. Now lawyers may scrutinize that programming partly with Beetlestone’s ruling in mind. And colleges hoping to avoid liability or costly lawsuits may study the fact pattern that Beetlestone saw as plausibly unlawful. If they’re doing anything similar, they may reconsider.

That’s why people who see DEI initiatives as racist or regressive are excited by this lawsuit—which was filed with financial support from the Foundation Against Intolerance and Racism, a civil-liberties group—while supporters of DEI initiatives are lamenting it. As the writers of the open letter criticizing the case put it, “We understand the stakes of this lawsuit, which regardless of its outcome will have a chilling effect on [DEI] and antiracist initiatives throughout systems of higher education.”

College administrators should facilitate the free speech of professors (including vocal supporters and opponents of progressive DEI initiatives) regardless of race, not train or compel faculty to adopt essentialist or discriminatory views. Aside from all of the legal questions about what constitutes a hostile workplace or a discriminatory DEI initiative, institutions involved in these disputes ought to ask themselves: Is diversity, equity, or inclusion really advanced by an administrator saying the white race has a problem, or by white professors being asked to hold their breath in order to feel pain? Legal or not, that sounds like prejudiced, alienating nonsense.

Source: ‘A Constant Drumbeat’ of Racial Essentialism‘

Filed under Multiculturalism Tagged with , , , ,

Sean Speer: Canada really is broken right now [on immigration]

2024/01/31 Leave a comment

Of note:

A major factor behind these trends is the Trudeau government’s mismanaged immigration policy. We still don’t have an adequate explanation for what’s behind the unprecedented increase in the number of non-permanent residents into the country. Was it a deliberate policy strategy? If so, why? And if wasn’t, how did it happen? 

This past year shouldn’t be viewed as a one-off either. Virtually all of the biggest year-over-year increases in the number of non-permanent residents have during the Trudeau government. It’s hard not to conclude therefore that it has amounted to either a purposeful or inadvertent policy strategy that seems to have been pursued without any consideration of the externalities. As economist Ben Rabidoux recently put it: “If this government were actively trying to stoke anti-immigration sentiment, it would be indistinguishable from current approach.”

Source: Sean Speer: Canada really is broken right now

Filed under Immigration Tagged with

B.C. seeks leniency as Ottawa reins in international student numbers

2024/01/31 Leave a comment

Apparent contradiction between the Premier’s call for leniency and the more “we’re getting on with it approach” of the Minister of Post-Secondary Education and Future Skills:

B.C. Premier David Eby is pressing the federal government to bend on its new cap on international students, after learning of the significant reduction in the number of foreign postsecondary spaces that his province will be able to fill in the coming year.

He said the province wants some exemptions to allow more international students in some high-demand fields such as truck drivers, nurses and early childhood educators.

…Both B.C. and Ontario have responded by promising to impose stricter measures on the postsecondary sector. Selina Robinson, B.C.’s Minister of Post-Secondary Education and Future Skills, announced changes on Monday that are meant to eliminate exploitive practices by “bad actors” in the system….

source: B.C. seeks leniency as Ottawa reins in international student numbers

Filed under Immigration Tagged with , ,

Globe editorial: Ottawa’s next immigration emergency [asylum claimants]

2024/01/30 Leave a comment

Similarly, a pattern in the Globe’s coverage of and commentary on immigration with the needed critical eye:

A pattern has emerged in Liberal immigration policy over the past year: Ignore mounting evidence of trouble, dismiss rumbles of criticism and, finally, take the smallest possible action to avert an all-out calamity.

There was abundant evidence for months that the pace of new arrivals, particularly temporary migrants, was putting unacceptable strain on housing in big cities and other social infrastructure. But it was not until November that the Trudeau government took the tentative step of tamping down the growth in permanent immigration – misleadingly referred to as “stabilizing” by the government. Even with the change, permanent immigration targets will rise this year and next, with an extra 55,000 people admitted over that two-year span.

Last week, there were half-measures to curb the eye-popping growth in the ranks of international students, with Immigration Minister Marc Miller announcing a two-year cap on international study visas. But that cap is being imposed with visas already at historically high levels.

…

In the first 11 months of last year, 128,690 people made asylum claims in Canada, more than double the number in the prepandemic year of 2019. Claims from Mexican nationals in 2023 accounted for 17 per cent of the total, nearly double their proportion in 2019….

source: Ottawa’s next immigration emergency

Filed under Immigration Tagged with , ,

Why is Canada so vulnerable to foreign meddling?

2024/01/30 Leave a comment

Good BBC article, citing good analysts and experienced government officials:

“Generally speaking, we have been neglecting national security, intelligence, law enforcement, defence, and so on,” Thomas Juneau, a political analyst and professor at the University of Ottawa, told the BBC.

While it is tough to determine whether Canada is uniquely vulnerable compared to its allies, Mr Juneau argued that other countries have done a far better job in addressing the issue.

An outdated system that is slow to adapt

One glaring problem, Mr Juneau said, is the out-of-date act governing the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (csis). It is almost 40 years old, designed with the Cold War in mind, “when the fax machine was the new thing”, he said. 

Because of this, he said, the nation’s primary intelligence agency has been limited in its operations, focused on sharing information solely with the federal government.

This means possible targets are often left in the dark. 

That was spotlighted by Mr Chong’s story. He only discovered that he had been an alleged target of Beijing through the media, despite csis having monitored threats against him for at least two years.

Canada has since launched public consultations into how the law governing csis can be amended to better inform and protect individuals who could be a target.

The source of Canada’s security complacency, argued Richard Fadden, a former csis director and national security advisor to two prime ministers, is that Canada has lived in relative safety, largely protected from foreign threats by its geography: the US to the south, and surrounded by three oceans.

“I mean, nobody is going to invade Canada,” he said. 

Canada’s allies – like the US and Australia – have been quicker to adopt certain tools to help catch bad actors, such as establishing a registry of foreign agents and criminalising acts that can be classified as interference.

In December, Australia convicted a Vietnamese refugee who was found to be working for the Chinese Communist Party, thanks to a law it passed in 2018 that made industrial espionage for a foreign power a crime.

Such laws are not only important for charging and convicting culprits, but can also help educate the public and deter other nations from interfering, said Wesley Wark, a leading Canadian historian with expertise in national security.

Diaspora groups are especially vulnerable

Mr Wark said the country’s diverse population has also made it a convenient target for foreign states.

“We are a multicultural society and we have gone to great lengths over decades to preserve and protect that,” he said.

But diaspora groups, especially those vocally opposed to the government of their country of origin, have naturally become a target.

British Columbia lawyer Ram Joubin has had a first-hand look at the threats facing dissidents in Canada, particularly those from Iran. 

While investigating people with ties to the Iranian regime who call Canada home, Mr Joubin said he has heard from Iranian-Canadians who say they have been followed and harassed by regime agents in their own communities.

“We’ve had death threats, knock-on-the-door type of death threats,” he said. “And then we have a lot of people with their families in Iran being threatened because they engaged in some sort of activism.”

Csis has previously said it is aware of alleged intimidation attempts. The Iranian government has not commented publicly on these allegations. 

In Mr Joubin’s experience, reporting these incidents to officials like the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) has been a challenge, especially when additional work is needed to establish a credible criminal or civil case.

Both the RCMP and csis were criticised after the murder of Hardeep Singh Nijjar, a Sikh separatist that was killed in June in British Columbia, which Canada has alleged was done with the involvement of Indian government agents – something India denies. 

Prior to his death, Mr Nijjar had said that police were aware he was a target of an assassination plot. 

Questions were raised about whether something could have been done to stop his killing after the FBI said it was able to foil a similar assassination plot in November against another Sikh separatist leader in New York City. 

Mr Fadden said the events of 2023 represented a seismic shift in Canada’s psyche, forcing the country to finally confront the issue of foreign interference.

“Despite a deep reluctance on the part of the government to hold a foreign inquiry, they were compelled to do it,” Mr Fadden said. “I think if there hadn’t been that shift, we wouldn’t have an inquiry.”

The inquiry, led by Quebec appellate judge Marie-Josée Hogue, will be conducted in two phases, ending with a final report in December that will include recommendations on what Canada can do to deter future interference.

Some have expressed concern about the inquiry’s short mandate, and whether its recommendations will be wide-ranging enough and implemented as Canada inches closer to an election year that could see a change in government.

But in the meantime, Mr Fadden and others said they believe urgent action is needed.

“There are two big issues: there’s interference in our elections,” Mr Fadden said. “But there’s also interfering and scaring members of the diaspora in this country, which is a very serious matter.”

“We have a responsibility to protect people who are in Canada, and I don’t think we’re doing as good of a job on this as we could be.”

Source: Why is Canada so vulnerable to foreign meddling?

Filed under Multiculturalism Tagged with , , ,

Jump in illegal crossings causes speculation amongst residents of Canada-U.S. border states [southbound]

2024/01/30 Leave a comment

Of note:

The number of apprehensions in the border sector that includes Vermont, New Hampshire and part of New York state rose to 6,925 last year from 1,065 the year before, according to figures from U.S. Customs and Border Protection. About half of these were Mexican nationals, with significant proportions from India and Venezuela as well.

The totals are still modest compared to those on the U.S. border with Mexico. The entire frontier with Canada saw fewer than 200,000 apprehensions last year, a little more than 6 per cent of the 3.2 million nationwide total.

But the increase has prompted Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley to argue for building a wall on at least part of the Canada-U.S. border. Before quitting the race this month, Vivek Ramaswamy and Ron DeSantis also endorsed such a policy. New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu announced a tenfold increase of state trooper patrols in the area.

Source: Jump in illegal crossings causes speculation amongst residents of Canada-U.S. border states

Filed under Immigration Tagged with , , ,

Des immigrantes enfermées à double tour dans la violence conjugale

2024/01/30 Leave a comment

A noter, probablement le meme chose d’ailleurs au Canada:

Les immigrantes sont surreprésentées dans les maisons d’hébergement, au point qu’elles y forment une majorité dans la région de Montréal. Les acteurs de terrain constatent non seulement que le phénomène est en augmentation, mais aussi que les femmes ont des statuts de plus en plus fragiles.

Une dizaine d’immigrantes victimes de violence ont témoigné au Devoir dans les derniers mois. La plupart ont demandé d’être présentées sous des prénoms d’emprunt pour des raisons de sécurité dans cette enquête. C’est Caroline, venue avec un permis de travail lié à son conjoint étudiant. Ou Mélissa et Sofia, mariées dans leur pays d’origine à un homme déjà installé ici et dont le parrainage a été retiré une fois la violence dénoncée. C’est Ivonne Fuentes, parrainée par un Québécois en région.

Ce sont deux femmes à qui un conjoint avait promis un parrainage jamais déposé, et qui se sont retrouvées sans statut avec un nouveau-né. C’est une réfugiée mariée ici qui craint son ex-conjoint et l’exclusion de sa communauté d’attache. C’est Silvia, tombée enceinte alors qu’elle n’avait qu’un visa de touriste et qui a vécu deux ans et demi sans statut avec son autre petite fille. D’autres, aussi, déjà résidentes permanentes, mais convaincues que leur conjoint ou la police avaient le pouvoir de les expulser si elles portaient plainte, comme Lucienne.

Les trois associations de maisons d’hébergement pour victimes de violence conjugale du Québec sont sans équivoque : la proportion des femmes nées à l’extérieur du Canada hébergées dépasse nettement leur poids dans la population en général.

Dans les 46 établissements membres du Regroupement des maisons pour femmes victimes de violence conjugale, elles représentaient 69 % des femmes dans la région de Montréal et 51 % à Laval. Dans la région de la Capitale-Nationale, elles étaient 27 %, ce qui dépasse donc largement la proportion d’immigrants de 6,7 % dans la population générale.

La moyenne générale à l’échelle de la province était de 19 % l’an dernier au Regroupement, et de 26 % dans les maisons d’urgence de la Fédération des maisons d’hébergement pour femmes (FMHF).

Quant à l’Alliance des maisons d’hébergement de deuxième étape pour femmes et enfants victimes de violence conjugale (Alliance MH2), les immigrantes y ont représenté l’année dernière les trois quarts des femmes hébergées à Montréal et le tiers de celles hors métropole. La « deuxième étape » désigne l’accès à un appartement et à des services pour une durée plus longue après un logement d’urgence de quelques mois. En moyenne, dans leurs 18 maisons présentement en fonction sur tout le territoire, c’était près de la moitié des femmes hébergées qui étaient nées à l’extérieur du Canada.

Nous avons aussi parlé au cours des derniers mois à une trentaine d’autres personnes liées au milieu de la violence conjugale. Intervenantes en maison d’hébergement, travailleuses sociales, spécialistes de l’accueil des immigrants, policières, avocates et une infirmière : toutes ont dû s’adapter à cette nouvelle réalité, souvent avec des ressources insuffisantes, des programmes inadéquats et des lois qui ne la prennent pas en compte.

Plus précaires

Ce qui inquiète encore davantage les maisons d’hébergement est que les statuts précaires sont de plus en plus courants.

Demandeuse d’asile, étudiante étrangère, travailleuse, femme parrainée par son conjoint : environ une femme sur dix en hébergement n’a pas de statut permanent, selon les regroupements consultés et le dernier diagnostic de Statistique Canada. C’est plus de trois fois la proportion des femmes temporaires dans la population en général.

« La ligne est mince pour ces femmes-là de tomber sans statut », observe Katia Jean Louis, agente de liaison à la Maison pour femmes immigrantes de Québec.

Ces femmes détenant un visa temporaire font souvent passer le maintien de leur statut avant leur santé ou leur intégrité physique. Celle qui a demandé à se faire appeler Caroline* tenait par exemple avant tout à conserver son emploi, si difficilement trouvé : « Je restais tétanisée, je faisais de mon mieux pour protéger mon visage. Je ne voulais pas que cela se sache à mon travail », dit-elle après avoir décrit trois moments où son ex-mari lui a donné des coups.

« Je voulais pouvoir faire un permis de travail. […] C’était devenu invivable dans la maison, mais je suis restée quand même », raconte-t-elle, étant donné que son permis était lié à celui de son mari.

Temporaires ou permanentes, « le point commun de toutes les femmes immigrantes, c’est vraiment la peur. Car c’est ce qui est inculqué par la personne violente : “Tu vas être expulsée dans ton pays, tu ne peux rien faire, tu n’as pas de droit ici” », expose Mayranie Lacasse, coordonnatrice de l’Inter-Val 1175.

Les femmes qui nous ont raconté leur histoire n’ont pas toutes séjourné en maison d’hébergement après avoir quitté leur partenaire violent. Mais toutes l’ont dit et répété à leur manière : l’immigration les a rendues plus vulnérables à la violence conjugale. Même pour Lucienne, arrivée du Cameroun au Québec depuis 2011, dont l’ex-mari lui disait qu’il avait le pouvoir de l’expulser du pays, puisqu’il l’y « avait fait venir ».

Au-delà des préjugés

« Je peux vous dire que le processus d’immigration en soi, c’est stressant, indépendamment de la violence conjugale. Donc, une femme qui est dans ce processus-là se retrouve […] dans une situation de double vulnérabilité par rapport à la violence conjugale », observe notamment Mme Jean Louis.

Ce n’est pas à cause de leur personnalité ni de leur culture que ces femmes sont plus vulnérables, soulignent des chercheuses et des intervenantes. L’immigration et tout ce qui l’encadre ici au Canada créent des « contextes de vulnérabilité », explique la chercheuse Sastal Castro-Zavala, professeure de travail social à l’Université du Québec à Rimouski (UQAR).

Certains contextes « peuvent favoriser la domination, la prise de pouvoir et les oppressions, et donc rendre plus facilement vulnérable à cette violence-là », explique-t-elle. Elle donne l’exemple du parrainage, qui « crée des inégalités à l’intérieur d’un couple », notamment à cause d’une « dépendance » accrue et presque totale au conjoint qui contrôle les démarches d’immigration.

C’est ce qui est arrivé à Mélissa, une femme du Maghreb, qui raconte qu’elle ne savait pas comment prendre l’autobus même après plusieurs mois passés ici. « J’ai voyagé, j’ai étudié à l’université, j’avais mon côté indépendant. Mais en arrivant ici au Canada, un pays de droit avec un mari pareil, j’étais en prison », expose-t-elle.

« L’immigration, beaucoup font le mélange avec culture. On dit : “Ah ! les femmes immigrantes, [leur] culture est violente.” Il faut faire attention parce que beaucoup de femmes immigrantes se trouvent dans un contexte de vulnérabilité. Elles ne se séparent pas, [ce n’est pas] pour une question culturelle, mais pour une question structurelle » expose Mme Castro-Zavala.

Cet amalgame a la vie dure et il est parfois un « éléphant dans la pièce » : comment aborder le fait que les immigrantes sont surreprésentées dans les maisons d’hébergement sans alimenter les préjugés envers certaines cultures ?

Les femmes nées ici « ont peut-être d’autres réseaux que les maisons d’hébergement », dit Maud Pontel, coordonnatrice générale de l’Alliance MH2. Elles ont notamment plus souvent « des capacités financières pour, par exemple, déménager ou peut-être de la famille chez qui elles peuvent aller habiter ».

Ne plus se taire

Il ne faut pas non plus ignorer le poids et l’influence de la famille restée au pays : « Il arrive qu’une femme vienne nous voir et, pendant qu’elle nous parle, son téléphone ne fait que sonner, la famille l’appelle sans arrêt », raconte Rose Ndjel, directrice d’Afrique au féminin. Ce centre de femmes du quartier Parc-Extension reçoit trois ou quatre femmes par semaine, évalue-t-elle, qui sont victimes de violence, que ce soit pour leurs besoins alimentaires, d’intervention ou de référence.

« Ça arrive que, quand la femme fait valoir ses droits dans la maison, elle devient désobéissante aux yeux du mari », constate-t-elle. Il est arrivé que des hommes « viennent jeter les valises des femmes devant le centre », rapporte Mme Ndjel. Mais pour elle, ces femmes entament leur propre prise de parole, après des années du mouvement #MoiAussi. Dans une marche organisée à la fin octobre 2023, elle les y encourage : « Si vous voulez parler fort, allez-y ! »

Devant les besoins de plus en plus criants, l’organisme communautaire a fait des demandes pour créer La Maison Augustine, une maison d’hébergement spécialisée dans les contextes d’immigration.

Une ressource pionnière de ce type, Le Bouclier d’Athéna, constate que, malgré certaines améliorations, les besoins de ces femmes tardent à être pris en charge : « Nous avons vu beaucoup de femmes qui, malheureusement, ne peuvent pas être traitées dans le réseau des services sociaux existants ; 80 % de tous nos cas nous viennent du réseau de services existants. Ce sont les autres maisons d’hébergement, les CAVAC, la DPJ, les hôpitaux, etc. », dit Melpa Kamateros, la directrice générale de l’organisation.

Pour celle qui y travaille depuis plus de 30 ans, « il n’y a pas le même filet de sécurité », surtout pour celles qui ne parlent pas le français ni l’anglais. Elle reste tout de même optimiste, souvent encore étonnée de la force de ces femmes : « Dès qu’elles prennent les renseignements, elles sont prêtes à partir. Elles sont prêtes à prendre leur vie en main. »

Source: Des immigrantes enfermées à double tour dans la violence conjugale

Filed under Immigration, Multiculturalism Tagged with , , ,

Marche: When extremist activists drive the left to oblivion, what will remain?

2024/01/29 Leave a comment

Well worth reading:

…The foundation of Canadian multiculturalism rests on a basic piece of common sense: Leave your shoes at the door. Importing the world’s geopolitical nightmares into our country would end multiculturalism, and right quick. If the police and the courts allowed Ukrainian Canadians to vandalize the businesses of Russian Canadians who support Vladimir Putin, or if Sikhs were allowed to vandalize the businesses of Narendra Modi’s supporters, the result would be chaos, despite the entirely justifiable rage of those communities.

But common sense, as usual, doesn’t apply when it comes to the Jews.

Naomi Klein, Canada’s most famous living political writer, is a prime example of how far the left has declined into self-consuming purification, having become a prominent defender of hate-motivated mischief over the past three months. “The extraordinary raids, arrests and property seizures of the Indigo 11 represent an attack on political speech the likes of which I have not seen in Canada in my lifetime,” she wrote in the aftermath.

Ms. Klein’s defence of the Indigo 11 is grounded in the idea that Indigo is a fair target because Ms. Reisman has supported Israel and its military, co-founding an organization that provides scholarships and other awards for soldiers in the Israeli Defence Forces. By her logic, hundreds of thousands of Jews in this country could become legitimate targets, given that, through one vehicle or another, a vast number has given money to the state of Israel and, thus, the IDF, at some point over the course of their lives. She has also staunchly defended Ms. Jama, whom she has called “morally courageous” – a woman who, just to reiterate, claimed that the reports of the rapes committed by Hamas on Oct. 7 were “misinformation.”

Ms. Klein, of course, has just published a book about misinformation – and her book is still available behind the very window that was vandalized. Boycotts, divestment and sanctions are for others, one supposes.

The old phrase typically used to describe such loud and credulous cause-pushers was “useful idiots.” But describing tenured radicals such as Ms. Klein or academics such as those among the Indigo 11 as useful would be a misnomer: They are quite useless. Everywhere they survive, they are losing. Academic humanities departments, which regularly promote identity politics using government funding, are struggling: In Ontario, there was a 20-per-cent decline in undergraduate enrolments in the humanities between 2008 and 2017. The extremist champions of the establishment left are driving progressivism toward a lonely, impotent future….

Source: When extremist activists drive the left to oblivion, what will remain?

Filed under Antisemitism, Multiculturalism Tagged with , ,

← Older posts