American Muslims Are 2 Times More Likely To Have Attempted Suicide Than Other Groups

2021/08/12 Leave a comment

Of note. Wonder if there are compable studies for Canada:

For an entire year that involved emergency room visits, legal proceedings, involuntary unemployment and the death of loved ones, Mehran Nazir struggled with a depressive episode. He would find his mind flooded with self-destructive thoughts. He’d faintly hope his plane from Newark to San Francisco would crash or that he would doze off at the wheel of his car and end up in a fatal accident.

The normally extroverted Nazir would lie paralyzed in bed for hours doing nothing, not wanting to speak with family and canceling plans with friends.

It came to a head when Nazir found himself on the brink of suicide. In his darkest moment, he drafted a will and decided where it would happen.

Eventually, Nazir found comfort in journaling. And when he shared his writings online, he quickly found that other Muslims shared his struggles.

“I realized that this is not something that is unique in my history,” Nazir told NPR. “This was not a random occurrence.”

Nazir was right. U.S. Muslims are two times more likely to have attempted suicide compared with other religious groups, according to a study published last month in JAMA Psychiatry. Nearly 8% of Muslims in the survey reported a suicide attempt in their lifetime compared with 6% of Catholics, 5% of Protestants and 3.6% of Jewish respondents.

“Anecdotally and in clinical settings, we’re definitely seeing an uptick in suicides and suicide attempts,” Dr. Rania Awaad told NPR. She’s the director of the Muslim Mental Health & Islamic Psychology Lab at Stanford University and a researcher on the study.

At the heart of these numbers are several issues

Researchers attribute the high suicide attempt rate to two factors: religious discrimination and community stigma — both of which, they say, prevent Muslim American communities from seeking mental health services.

Earlier this year, a murder-suicide involving a Muslim family in Allen, Texas, sent shock waves through the community. Brothers Farhan Towhid, 19, and Tanvir Towhid, 21, both of whom reportedly battled depression, made a pact to die by suicide and kill the rest of their family so they wouldn’t have to live with the grief. Since then, public discussions on mental health, trainings on suicide response and healing circles have taken on new urgency.

“We have a very long way to go,” Awaad said. “There is just the beginning of a discussion that is happening now.”

There’s still a community stigma surrounding mental health

Naureen Ahmed, now 39, remembers how her family would visit her mother, Seema, at a psychiatric hospital. But the family never openly discussed why she was there.

Some days, Seema would sing along to Bollywood music at home wearing red lipstick. Other days, she’d walk around the house brandishing knives — or jump out of the car on the highway, threatening to kill herself.

Ahmed, a social butterfly at school, was hesitant to invite friends over because she never knew which side of her mother she would get that day.

It wasn’t until she was 25 that Ahmed finally learned why her mom acted that way: she had bipolar depression and schizoaffective disorder, her grandparents told her.

“It was difficult to say it out loud, this secret that I had held inside my entire life,” Ahmed told NPR.

Of the many factors that prevent families or individuals from seeking mental health treatment, stigma is “perhaps the most significant,” according to a 2013 study that looked at the cultural backgrounds of Muslims.

“If you believe that your mental illnesses will bring shame on you or your family, then you tend to stay silent about it,” said Dr. Farha Abbasi, founder of the Muslim Mental Health Conference. Through the conference, hosted by Michigan State University for 13 years, Abbasi hopes to destigmatize mental illness within the Muslim community using open dialogue.

After Ahmed’s mother died in 2012, she created SEEMA to support families like hers who are shamed by the stigma of mental illness, are isolated by their communities or are suffering alone.

SEEMA, launched in 2018, hosts support groups with licensed therapists at community centers and mosques and awareness workshops highlighting the importance of mental health and how to care for someone struggling with a mental illness.

“We need to have these conversations to destigmatize and bring awareness because people think that they’re alone,” Ahmed said.

Religious discrimination makes them more vulnerable

Abbasi, who has studied the impact of growing Islamophobia on Muslims’ mental health, says she was not surprised by the results of the Stanford study.

“Right now, the exposure to toxicity is making us more vulnerable,” Abbasi told NPR.

U.S. Muslims were more likely to report suicide attempts than those from Muslim-majority countries, according to the Stanford study. As a religious minority in the U.S., Muslims are highly vulnerable to religious discrimination, which is associated with depression, anxiety and paranoia.

According to 2020 polling from the Institute for Social Policy and Understanding, 60% of Muslims reported personally experiencing religious discrimination. And the FBI’s latest hate crime statistics in 2019 suggest that, of the reported 1,715 victims of anti-religious hate crimes, 13.2% were victims of anti-Muslim bias.

“There’s just trauma over trauma over trauma,” Abbasi says. “The impact of growing Islamophobia, the violence that is being directed against Muslims, all that is having a huge impact on mental health.”

They sometimes find it hard to reconcile their feelings and their faith

Last November, 39-year-old Chicago investor Jessica Ali broke down after separating from her husband.

“I felt that I was unworthy and there was no reason for me to live,” she said. Ali, a mother of three, had attempted suicide for a third time. The first two were in 2008 and 2018. “I started believing that I was crazy, that I must be a bad Muslim.”

That was until she joined a Muslim support group. It was there that Ali, who was diagnosed with severe depression, first came to terms with her mental illness.

“It’s very likely that when you’re sitting at the masjid, somebody in your praying row has felt this way,” Ali told NPR.

Now, Ali takes medication and visits a therapist.

But unlike Ali, some Muslims may not get the help and support they need.

To help jump over these hurdles, Muslim mental health professionals across the country are providing more culturally appropriate and religiously sensitive resources for Muslims.

Culturally appropriate resources can help

Dr. Sameera Ahmed, executive director of The Family & Youth Institute, a Muslim nonprofit, developed a suicide prevention toolkit in 2017 that helps Muslim American families navigate suicide risks, intervention, assessment and prevention.

“There may be mental health providers available, but if an individual doesn’t trust the system, they’re not going to use it,” Ahmed told NPR. “We try to translate the research into culturally and religiously tailored mental health resources that are community informed and disseminated by Muslim American mental health professionals.”

In 2017, the Khalil Center, which offers Muslims faith-based mental health services, launched a hotline that provides a “safe and empathic space” for those in crisis situations. “There’s more awareness happening,” Khalil Center psychologist Dr. Fahad Khan told NPR. “We have seen a rise in those who are seeking services.”

Imams have an integral role in community mental health because Muslim Americans may be more willing to seek help from religious leaders. That’s why Awaad started a campaign to train 500 Muslim leaders on suicide response in their communities by 2022.

“A number of imams came forward and said, ‘We as the religious and community leaders of the Muslim community really need to step up to this discussion,’ ” Awaad said.

Dr. Heather Laird, founder of the Center for Muslim Mental Health and Islamic Psychology, found that Muslims were more likely to seek psychotherapy if it aligned with Islamic values. So she ignited a movement toward Islamic psychology. By Laird’s definition, Islamic psychology is the treatment of the mind and soul within an Islamic context.

As for Nazir, he uses a combination of therapy and journaling to tend to his psychological wounds.

“This battle for mental health is not necessarily you solve it, you cure it, you move on,” Nazir said. “For me, it’s an ongoing journey.”

Source: American Muslims Are 2 Times More Likely To Have Attempted Suicide Than Other Groups

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Italy’s citizenship law back in focus as multicultural stars triumph at Tokyo Olympics

2021/08/12 Leave a comment

Of note. Will see extent to which if influences the policy debates:

Italy’s enthusiasm over its Olympics success, driven in part by multicultural athletes, has once again reignited debate over its citizenship law and the bureaucratic hurdles faced by thousands of young people.

The debate comes on the heels of Italy’s best performance in history at the Olympic Games, with 40 gold medals from a diverse band of athletes from a variety of backgrounds, including the country’s new star, Texas-born sprinter Lamont Marcell Jacobs.

The debate was sparked anew after the head of Italy’s National Olympic Committee, Giovanni Malago, complained of the bureaucratic headaches confronting Italian-born athletes who want to compete for their country but lack citizenship.

Under its current path to citizenship, Italy is an outlier in Europe, providing rights based on blood ties rather than based on where children are born – an idea known as “ius soli”, or “right of the soil”.

Children born in Italy to foreign parents must await their 18th birthdays before applying for citizenship, beginning an arduous process that can take four years, one that Malago described as “a Dante-esque circle”.

After Interior Minister Luciana Lamorgese said Malago’s criticism was valid, far-right leader Matteo Salvini, head of the populist Lega party, retorted that the minister would be better served controlling the countries’ borders than rekindling “ius soli”.

In Italy, the far-right has linked the debate over citizenship with the ongoing migrant crisis, which this year has seen 31,777 migrants land on the country’s coasts, more than double that in the same period in 2020, according to interior ministry figures.

“I think the important thing is that for these kids we have to think of social inclusion,” Lamorgese told La Stampa daily on Tuesday, noting that the issue went beyond Italy’s young athletes.

“They have to feel an integral part of society,” she said.

‘Full-fledged Italian’

There are various paths to citizenship in Italy — Jacobs’ citizenship was accorded through his Italian mother despite being born in the United States to an American father — but that involving children of two foreign-born parents is the most complicated.

Case in point is 17-year-old pole vaulter Great Nnachi, who was born in Turin to Nigerian parents, and is already a champion. Having broken records throughout her teens, she most recently won a junior title with her personal best of 4,01 metres in February.

But her records are not recognised by the state, as she is not technically Italian, and she cannot compete for Italy in international competitions.

“Despite being a full-fledged Italian, I can’t represent my country in sports,” Nnachi told La Stampa Tuesday. “I’m an Italian champion but I can’t demonstrate it outside the border.”

Italy’s national statistics agency Istat calculates there are about 800,000 minors in Italy who would receive Italian nationality were “ius soli” adopted, while some 60,000 newborns a year would become automatically Italian.

According to Italy’s Olympic Committee, 46 of its athletes who competed in the Tokyo Olympics this year were foreign-born.

Source: Italy’s citizenship law back in focus as multicultural stars triumph at Tokyo Olympics

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Lawyer who called for elimination of citizenship tests named to bench

2021/08/11 Leave a comment

I thought the right-wing press might notice Avvy Go’s appointment. Will be interesting to see how she manages the transition from a very public activist to being a more discrete judge:

A Toronto legal activist who questioned the need for immigrants to take immigration citizenship tests and said the COVID-19 pandemic has created an increase in racism in Canada, has been appointed a federal judge.

Blacklock’s Reporter said Avvy Yao-Yao Go has also lamented the “shameful history” of Canada’s first Prime Minister, John A. Macdonald.

Go had been director of a Toronto law clinic that criticized Canadians for “anti-China sentiment and white supremacy.”

Go described herself in a 2020 commentary in the Globe & Mail as a lawyer “fighting for social justice” and cohesion.

“The past several years of turmoil both in the United States and Canada have taught us our democracy is fragile and that structured racism, if left unchecked, poses a serious risk to social cohesion,” wrote Go.

Attorney General David Lametti appointed Go to the bench on Friday saying he was confident she will “serve Canadians well.”

Go was director of the Chinese and Southeast Asian Legal Clinic of Toronto. The federally-funded group in a June 1, 2020 submission to the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights complained of widespread racism in Canada.

“In contrast to the image of Canada as multicultural and welcoming, many Canadians have been emboldened to use the pandemic as a license to exhibit hate and racism,” said the submission to the UN.

“Moreover, since the outbreak of the pandemic, anti-Asian hate speech has proliferated on social media platforms fueled by right-wing extremists who are using the pandemic as an opportunity to stir up racist ideologies.

“The collision of conspiracy theories, anti-China sentiment and white supremacy has rendered dangerous results, including the movement of racist theories and messaging from the fringe to the mainstream.”

The group earlier received a $301,904 grant from the Canadian Heritage department.

“While the Prime Minister has remarked that ‘hate, violence and discrimination have no place in Canada’ and his government stands with ‘Asian-Canadians across the country,’ his government has failed to take any concrete steps to address the surge of hateful violence and messaging that has arisen during the pandemic,” said the report.

Meanwhile, Go in numerous commentaries and letters to editors criticized Canadians’ treatment of racial issues and proposed abolishing the citizenship test as a “hollow screening” of immigrants.

“The moment I became a true Canadian was the very moment when I began to challenge the Canadian system,” the Hong Kong-born Go wrote in 1998.

In a 2014 commentary in the Toronto Star, Go lamented the “shameful history” of Macdonald, “architect of racist law” that saw Canadians “forced to live in nightmarish conditions while Macdonald pursued his dream to unite Canada.”

“Given the stark human rights record under his belt, why should Canadians celebrate John A. Macdonald’s birthday?” wrote Go.

In a 2013 letter to the Globe, the judge wrote: “The term ‘visible minority’ is fraught with issues, the key one being it uses ‘white’ as a standard against which everyone else is measured.”

“As we prepare to mark Canada Day, Ottawa must admit past wrongs particularly against Chinese-Canadians,” she wrote Toronto Star editors in 2003.

Go was one of thirteen new federal appointees named to the bench Friday.

Source: Lawyer who called for elimination of citizenship tests named to bench

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Return of ‘protected ridings’ sees N.S. riding with full slate of Black candidates

2021/08/10 Leave a comment

While in general not in favour of “protected riding” or deliberate drawing of borders based upon ethnic ancestry or visible minority or other groups, in some cases like this one can be justified to improve representation.

At the federal level, this largely happens more or less organically for the larger groups given settlement patterns:

In the provincial riding of Preston, just east of Halifax, a historic political race is underway.

“One of the things that’s really important, and I think so many people are talking about, is the fact that all three of us are local in particular and African Nova Scotian,” Liberal candidate Angela Simmonds said of the candidates facing off to represent the riding.

Simmonds, along with NDP candidate Colter Simmonds and Progressive Conservative candidate Archy Beals, make up the slate for the largely African Nova Scotian riding in the Aug. 17 general election. It’s believed to be the first time in the province’s history an electoral district has all Black candidates.

It’s thanks in part to the reinstatement two years ago of Preston, along with three largely Acadian ridings — Argyle, Clare and Richmond. In 2019, the Liberal government introduced legislation to bring back the so-called protected ridings after the previous NDP government did away with them in 2012, saying there were too few voters in them.

With the reinstatement, the province once again has 55 ridings, up from 51 in the last election.

Other provinces have ridings of varying sizes, typically to ensure rural voters are well represented. But Nova Scotia’s protected ridings are unique for the fact that they shield so-called “historical minorities” from redistribution, said James Bickerton, a political science professor at St. Francis Xavier University.

The ridings were initially formed in the 1990s to ensure effective representation of Acadian and African Nova Scotian voters and to protect them from electoral redistribution, “which would dilute the populations considerably to the point where minorities would no longer be the majority within the constituency,” Bickerton said.

He was on the electoral boundaries commission that concluded in 2012 that the ridings should remain. But he said the commission was threatened by then-attorney general Ross Landry, who claimed the recommendation did not respect the commission’s terms of reference.

The movement to reinstate the special districts followed a court victory by the Acadian Federation of Nova Scotia. The province’s Appeal Court ruled that the redrawn map violated democratic rights guaranteed in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

“Effective representation was at play … the argument being that Francophones and African Nova Scotians could only have effective representation if they had representatives in the legislature from their communities,” Bickerton said. “Protected ridings doesn’t guarantee it, but it certainly makes it much more likely.”

Andrew Griffith, a fellow at the Environics Institute, a public opinion and social research organization, said ridings with large minority populations tend to elect candidates with similar ethnic and cultural backgrounds. He gave the example of Indo-Canadians.

“If you look at a place that has a large Indo-Canadian population, whether immigrants or citizens, the candidates and the MPs tend to come from those communities,” Griffith said. “Having your electoral districts be aligned not only to the overall population balance, but to recognize that some communities may be relatively under-represented because they’re too dispersed across the province or across the country, I think it’s a valid rationale.”

Glenn Graham, a political science professor at St. Francis Xavier University, echoed the sentiment, adding that the goal of the ridings is effective representation, not necessarily absolute voter parity, which is the idea that each vote carries the same weight. Voter parity, however, could also limit the voices of minority voters, he said.

When the latest changes were made in 2019, the four protected ridings had voting populations ranging from 6,451 in Argyle to 10,781 in Preston, well below the provincial average of 14,356 electors per riding.

“With all the major political parties running an African Nova Scotian candidate, it’s a guarantee that there will be an African Nova Scotian representing the area,” Beals said in a recent interview. He added that the area comes with specific cultural issues, including education and business development, of which the candidates have an intimate understanding. “Who best to address them than someone in the community, from the community?” he said.

As for the Acadian ridings, Marie-Claude Rioux, the executive director of the Acadian Federation of Nova Scotia, said in an interview that the change “gives Acadians a better chance to elect someone that will know their needs,” such as French-language health services.

But while the community was glad to see the three Acadian ridings restored, Rioux said the federation plans on fighting for more representation, namely a riding for Cheticamp, an Acadian community in Cape Breton.

Moving toward effective representation, Graham said, is about “having someone that you feel may look like you in the legislature, or is a reflection of your lived experience in the legislature.”

And with the newly reinstated ridings, Angela Simmonds said she now has an opportunity to engage with the constituents of the riding at a more personal level.

“I think when you see someone who looks like you there is an appreciation for one’s lived experiences,” she said.

Source: Return of ‘protected ridings’ sees N.S. riding with full slate of Black candidates

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Australia Census 2021 seeks to understand what it means to be Australian, but ignores the complexities of ancestry

2021/08/10 Leave a comment

Of note. Canadian parallel with 2016 census that no longer included Jewish under ethnic ancestry given not in top 50 (see Technical report on changes in response related to the census ethnic origin question: Focus on Jewish origins, 2016 Census integrated with 2011 National Household Survey):

According to tradition, in 16th century BC, Cecrops, the mythical first king of Athens, conducted a census of his subjects. Each Athenian was compelled to provide a single stone and when these were counted, it was determined that the city contained 20,000 inhabitants.

The 2021 Australian Census is much more complicated in that it asks questions about income, qualifications, education, hours worked, hours assisting those with a disability, hours expended looking after children and significantly, considering the purported multicultural nature of Australian society, questions as to ancestry and language.

It is these latter two questions that give rise to concern. Firstly, there appears to be no question as to ethnic and/or cultural identity on the Census. There is an apparent lack of understanding by those conducting or commissioning the Census that ethnic identity is an issue separate, though ancillary to that of ancestry. For instance, one can be of diverse ancestry and yet identify ethnically in a different manner altogether, according to religious, cultural, linguistic or political factors.

Even if one accepts this lack of appreciation as to the importance of ethnic identity in understanding the Australian population, and its incorrect conflation with ancestry, the ancestry question on the Census provides cause for grave disquiet. In scrolling down the various ancestries listed, ranging from the Anglo-Celtic, to Chinese, Italian and beyond, I was interested to note this time, the omission of Greek. While it is not expedient for a government to list every ancestral group on a census form, it would be interesting to know the reason for the omission of the Greeks, being one of the oldest, historically and numerically significant communities in this country. It may well be that demographic change has seen our numbers (as counted by a census which usually is conducted during a month when significant members of our community are traditionally holidaying in the motherland en masse) diminish. To diminish our prominence and importance is quite another matter altogether, a cursory tale about the use and misuse of statistics in interpreting our multifaceted nature.

There is something deeply disquieting about being compelled to participate in a Census in a multicultural country that involves scrolling down the prescribed list of ancestries and then having to choose a box labelled “Other.” Reinforcing to people of diverse ancestry that they are “Other,” tacitly conveys to them the message that they are considered to be not truly an organic part of this nation’s society, regardless of their citizenship status or place of birth. It would be infinitely more respectful then, if in future censuses, either all known ancestral groups were listed, or better still, that participants, rather than choose from government sanctioned ancestries, are permitted to merely record their ancestral affiliations themselves, instead of being officially termed outsiders and thus by implication, subversive.

Conversely, in permitting the free expression of ancestry under the option “Other,” the government is allowing for a Pandora’s Box of affiliations to emerge. With a debate raging in certain sections of our community with regards to expressing our ancestry as “Hellenic” rather than “Greek,” which is considered by some to be a western imposed term, a course of action that is not recommended given that it will mystify the statisticians of the Australian Bureau of Statistics, who presumably do not have training in cultural anthropology and hinder a true depiction of our numbers, the option “Other,” is also giving rise to a debate about the constituent parts of what it means to be Greek. Some people I have spoken to feel passionately about their Arvanite, Pontian or Vlach ancestry and wonder whether they should record this aspect of their “Greekness” in the census. How are we to interpret the ancestry of someone who claims that they are Cypriot? Do we not need to understand whether they interpret this as being part of the Turkish, Greek, Maronite or Armenian cultural world? Do we consider this as evidence of an emerging identity that contains all, or none of these components? This is precisely the reason why culture and ancestry must be addressed separately in the Census, and why not doing so is problematic, to say the least.

Scrolling down the Census

While I was scrolling down the Census form, seeking to record my Greek ancestry, I noted mentally, the entries for English, Scottish and Irish (but not Welsh), the main ancestries for the dominant group within Australian society. I also noted the term Aboriginal and found this too, disturbing, in that the dominant group appears to be attempting to pigeonhole and compartmentalise a vast and intricately diverse number of cultural and ethnic groups under one blanket term that does nothing to highlight their own uniqueness and if anything, serves to obfuscate their existence. Whether intentional or not, this is a form of racism that should not have any place in any sector of modern Australia, let alone its governing institutions.

To my utmost perplexity, below the entry for Torres Strait Islander, I discovered the term “Australian.” Given the previous entries for “Aboriginals” and “Torres Strait Islanders” what are we to understand from this term? Is it suggesting that our native peoples are not

“Australian?” Considering that all of us except for our native peoples draw their ancestry from outside the Australian continent, the inexplicable inclusion of this contentious term merely serves to highlight the dispossession of our native peoples and the appropriation of their sovereignty and affiliation to the land. Further, it again subtly reminds those who do not share the same ancestry as the members of the dominant group, that they are not “Australian.” The dysphoria and sense of alienation created by such a clumsy rendering of terms again reinforces the need for cultural identity to be distinguished from ancestry on future Census forms and raises questions about the manner in which our governments view our communities.

As was the case in the 2016 Census, in its current iteration, the Australian Bureau of Statistics has made no provision in the question regarding which languages other than English the population speaks, for the possibility that some Australian citizens are multilingual and use a number of languages on a daily basis. Instead, participants may only choose to list one language other than English. This obscures and restricts the gleaning of a true picture of the linguistic heterogeneity of this country. For example, on any given day, my children will be speaking to each other and to me, in Greek. As they move from the kitchen down the hallway towards my wife, they call to her in Assyrian. My wife, on the phone to her mother, will be speaking to her in Arabic, so that the children will not understand a conversation relating to their grandfather’s declining health. Through the telephone, my wife will hear my father-in-law address my mother-in-law in Kurdish, so that in turn, my wife won’t understand what he is saying. Back on the other side of the house, I will be speaking to a client in Mandarin Chinese. Linguistic polyphonies of this nature form part and parcel of the polyglot reality of Multiculturalism and the reason as to why there is an official attempt not to capture this statistically is at best, incomprehensible. Furthermore, there is no follow up question as to the level of one’s proficiency in the language claimed to be spoken or indeed, as to which language is the primary language in use. These are both important aspects in interpreting the linguistic demography in this country. For example, while someone may be fluent in English, which language do they use more often and when? How proficient is someone in the language they claim to speak, especially if this is the language of an important political or trading partner? Questions of these nature, vital for the creation of coherent language policy, are completely ignored, suggesting that despite the rhetoric, officials see themselves as presiding over a benign, monolingual monoculture.

Ultimately, the Census says just as much about those who fashion it, as those who participate in it. It is difficult not to conclude that the carefully calibrated narrowness of the questions referring to culture, ancestry and linguistic identity, seem calculated to reinforce a narrative imposed and perpetuated by the ruling echelons of the dominant class. As such, we can be justified in harbouring a lack of confidence in the 2021 Census’ ability to provide us with an accurate depiction of the intricate complexities of our social make up and in being concerned as to the use made of any such flawed statistics, by legislators.

Source: Census Censure: Census 2021 seeks to understand what it means to be Australian, but ignores the complexities of ancestry

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Australia’s state parliaments lagging on racial and cultural diversity, report finds

2021/08/07 Leave a comment

Of note:

Australia’s state parliaments are lagging behind in racial and cultural diversity compared with the populations they represent, according to a new analysis.

While approximately 21% of Australians have non-European ancestry, according to a 2018 report from the Australian Human Rights Commission, only 10% of Victorian state MPs and 9% of NSW MPs have non-European ancestry, not including Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander ancestry.

This is far lower than comparable state or sub-national parliaments in the UK or Canada, according to Osmond Chiu, a research fellow at the Per Capita thinktank.

In Canada, 23% of MPs in the Ontario parliament – the country’s most populous province – are of a visible minority, and 18.3% in the British Columbia parliament. This is compared with 29.3% of Ontario’s general population having non-European ancestry, and 30.3% in British Columbia.

Grassroots members in NSW Labor have argued that the party must increase the diversity among its MPs or lose electoral ground. A cross-factional group propose inserting a clause into the party’s platform at the upcoming NSW state conference, recognising the under-representation.

The motion argues that a lack of representation is an electoral issue for Labor as the Coalition has made significant ground campaigning in more diverse communities, especially in western Sydney.

Chiu told Guardian Australia that previously-safe Labor seats in Sydney had been won by Liberal MPs in recent years as part of a concerted strategy from the Coalition.

“There is a belt of multicultural marginal seats in Sydney that will determine government at a state and federal level,” he said. “They were once Labor-held seats but were lost to the Liberals who spent more than a decade focusing on culturally diverse voters in these seats.

“As Australia becomes more diverse, other seats will be at risk if Labor does not take the growing cultural diversity of the electorate seriously when the Liberals clearly do.”

Chiu said that under-representation was also an issue for the Liberal, National and other parties, not just Labor.

“However, there’s been an assumption that Labor does better because of its historic support for multiculturalism,” he said. “The reality is in some ways the Liberals are ahead of Labor. For example, there currently are two state and territory Liberal leaders, Gladys Berejiklian and Elizabeth Lee, with non-European ancestry versus none for Labor.”

In the United Kingdom, the London Assembly is 32% BAME (Black, Asian and minority ethnic) compared with 40.6% of London. Scotland and Wales’s populations are far less diverse than Australia, but their parliaments are comparatively more diverse than Australia’s parliaments, according to the Per Capita research.

In Scotland, 4.5% of MSPs are BAME compared with 5% of the population. In Wales, 5% of MSs are BAME compared with 5.6% of the population.

The change to be tabled at the NSW Labor conference states that the party “recognises the ongoing under-representation of culturally and linguistically diverse people in senior leadership positions across business, politics, government and higher education”.

It adds that NSW Labor should be “committed to improving the representation of culturally and linguistically diverse people across all organisations and institutions, including within the party”.

Nearly 50 party units across NSW have endorsed the change to the party platform, with more than 300 party members signing a petition, according to Chiu.

Source: Australia’s state parliaments lagging on racial and cultural diversity, report finds

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Ottawa declines overhaul of hate crime offences

2021/08/07 Leave a comment

Agree with B’nai Brith that enforcement is the bigger issue, along with the discomfort or reluctance of some to report incidents to the police:

Ottawa says existing Criminal Code offences are adequate to confront a recent surge in hate-fuelled incidents, but the federal government has recommitted to passing a law aimed at improving hate crime prosecutions.

After recent online summits on antisemitism and Islamophobia, the Department of Justice said this week that it wants to ensure hatred is better defined but otherwise has no plans to overhaul the way hate crimes are dealt with in the courts. Suspects are most often charged for a core crime and then prosecutors may argue hate motivation at the end of a trial to secure a heavier sentence.

The National Council of Canadian Muslims (NCCM) released a list of 35 federal recommendations including a call for Ottawa to introduce new provisions in the code to single out hate-motivated assault, murder, threats, and mischief that would include specific new penalties for each infraction. The existing code only singles out three hate propaganda offences and mischief relating to religious or cultural sites.

Nadia Hasan, chief operating officer of the NCCM, said doing this would create a much stronger deterrent for potential criminals as hate crimes have risen in recent years.

“I’m not saying by any means that this alone would eradicate hate crimes for Canada, but it would send a strong message” that hate crimes deserve their own penalties, said Dr. Hasan. Her group also wants the code changed to offer restorative justice measures.

Dr. Hassan said creating a new class of hate crimes would also help victims get better service from front line investigators, some of whom are unfamiliar with Canada’s laws around hate-motivated attacks. The NCCM helped more than 70 hate crimes victims across the country seek justice last year and some of those victims have told her group that police in some jurisdictions routinely discouraged them from filing a hate-related complaint by telling them “it’s not worth it.”

“It happens often enough where we have to fight back and make sure the police are listening and really advocate for the victim,” said Dr. Hasan.

But Ian McLeod, a spokesman for the Department of Justice, said in an e-mailed statement that Canadians are well served by a justice system that prosecutes the existing hate crime offences and then, with other hate-related crimes, has penalties amplified when motivation is factored in at sentencing. However, he said Ottawa is committed to updating the Criminal Code throughBill C-36 to define hate speech as “content that expresses detestation or vilification of a person or group,” including over the Internet, where these comments are common.

Bill C-36, which targeted public hate speech by individuals, did not pass into law after being introduced by the Liberal government at the end of the parliamentary session. If an election is called this summer, as is widely expected, the legislation will no longer move forward.

Mr. McLeod’s statement said Ottawa is also tackling online hate through a proposal to create a new regime to police hateful content on social media sites.

In June, MPs unanimously voted to call the emergency Islamophobia conference following the murder of three generations of a London, Ont., Muslim family by a driver now facing terrorism charges, with the government also announcing the summit on antisemitism.

Statistics Canada also recently released its annual report on crime data showing 2020 brought a 10 per cent overall decrease in cases reported by police across the country, but departments reported a record 2,669 hate crimes cases – a 37 per cent spike from the year prior. Police and criminologists acknowledge hate crimes in general go vastly unreported.

Michael Mostyn, chief executive officer of B’nai Brith Canada, said his organization would rather see the current laws enforced “more diligently” before any new amendments are legislated.

“One of the serious frustrations from a group like B’nai Brith, which is dealing with the victims of hate crimes on a daily basis, is that we don’t see so many of these prosecutions across the country,” he said.

Mohammed Hashim, executive director of the Canadian Race Relations Foundation, a Crown corporation, said many different solutions are needed as Canada’s entire criminal justice system is ill-suited to address the scourge of hate crimes.

“It starts from underreporting; to not having confidence in the police dealing with hate crimes adequately; to the number of charges that are laid, or the lack thereof; and the level of seriousness that both attorney generals and prosecutors treat hate-motivated crimes,” he said.

Source: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/politics/article-ottawa-declines-overhaul-of-hate-crime-offences/

Filed under Hate crimes, Multiculturalism Tagged with , , , , ,

Government multiculturalism-related definitions

2021/08/07 Leave a comment

As part of its instructions to departments in providing their input to the annual multiculturalism report, Canadian Heritage provided the following instructions to departments, with pages 6-10 providing relevant definitions to assist them.

Not a bad list but interesting that reasonable accommodation is not one of the terms highlighted:

multiculturalism-annual-report-definitions-a-2021-00117-ibDownload

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One year after Trudeau took a knee, is his government living up to its anti-racism promises?

2021/08/06 Leave a comment

Useful review, showing a reasonable yes. The effectiveness, of course, will require some time to assess:

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau took a knee at a Black Lives Matter rally on Parliament Hill over a year ago, after the murder of George Floyd sparked worldwide protests. Some welcomed the action as a commitment to fight anti-Black racism, while others dismissed it as a hollow gesture.

Shortly after that rally, the MPs and senators who make up the Parliamentary Black Caucus issued a letter listing more than 40 calls to action to confront racism. They called on the Trudeau government to go beyond mere “words and symbolic gestures” to tackle the “crisis” Black Canadians face.

“We urge all governments to act immediately. This is not a time for further discussion,” said the letter.

Source: One year after Trudeau took a knee, is his government living up to its anti-racism promises?

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Europe’s Hijab Test: War of the Headscarves and Death of Multiculturalism

2021/08/05 Leave a comment

Of note:

In mid-July, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) ruled that private employers in the EU can ban employees from wearing religious symbols, including headscarves, in order to present an image of “political, philosophical, and religious neutrality” in the workplace. The verdict reaffirmed a 2017 CJEU ruling and highlights longstanding tensions over multiculturalism in Europe. In particular, it raises the question of whether there is a place for visibly Muslim women in European public life.

I have spent the last several months interviewing Muslim women, many of them citizens and residents of European countries, about their portrayal in the media and perception of belonging in their countries. While many reported similar experiences of ostracism or harassment, the European women, particularly those who choose to wear the hijab (head covering), told me time and again: “I feel like I don’t exist.” The hijab is more than a religious symbol to those who wear it. Muslim women cover their hair out of tradition, to maintain a connection to their cultural heritage, or for reasons of modesty. Several young European women I spoke to explained that they wear the hijab despite protests from their immigrant families, who do not want them to face undue scrutiny or discrimination at work.

But their choice carries a high personal cost. The rampant European misperception of the hijab as a symbol of a supposedly misogynistic Islamic culture has made women who wear one feel like faceless, nameless “victims” who must be saved, instead of empowered individuals making a personal decision. “It’s frustrating, because [the media] always brings out [sic] the male members of the family,” one of them, Sama, said in a message she sent me from Italy. “It’s like, ‘did your father force you to make this choice that I actually made?’” Likewise, Lama, a French-Algerian woman now living outside France, laments the phenomenon of “white men in the media debating whether we should have the hijab.” The problem, she says, is that “it’s never about the objective garment, it’s about what the garment symbolizes [to them].”

The CJEU’s recent ruling resurfaces tensions between the right to freedom of religion and Europeans’ increasing discomfort regarding the visible face of Islam in the region. Article 9 of the European Convention on Human Rights sets a high bar for limiting the manifestation of freedom of religion. But the CJEU’s 2017 and 2021 rulings appear to attach greater weight to the concept of overall “neutrality” and, in the case of its recent decision, the effect on others – an issue that already weighs heavily on many Muslim women’s minds. Several women I spoke to described going through a draining mental exercise before leaving their homes – what I call the “friendly enough” test. “Muslim women look in the mirror in the morning and think, ‘do I look friendly? Do I look approachable?’” Maha, a journalist, explained. And it is not only men whose judgment these women worry about. Khadija, a young French-Algerian woman, confessed that she once stopped to put on red lipstick before going to an interview for a babysitting job. “I told them I wore the hijab ahead of time. I don’t know why I did that, preparing them for me,” she said. “I took out my lipstick and put it on so that [the mother] can see I am French, [that] I am not a terrorist.”

These psychological strains underscore the agonizing choice forced upon European Muslim women today between their faith and identity on one hand, and their nationality on the other. Whereas most European girls can dream of pursuing the career of their choice, Muslim girls in Europe face a demoralizing caveat: “but you cannot wear the hijab.” In a post-#MeToo world where young women are increasingly taught to be empowered, Europe’s Muslim women are being held back by legislation and told that their very appearance is problematic. Khadija went on to tell me that the experience of removing her hijab for a job when she was 19 left her feeling denigrated and ashamed. “It made me feel like I am nothing,” she said. “I am not the same as everyone else. I am a little bit lower.” She went on to ask, rhetorically, “What gives you the right to do that?”

Despite Europe’s stated values of emancipation, freedom, and self-sufficiency, the dearth of female Muslim voices in the European public debate over the hijab leaves many young women with little hope that the conversation will change. In a stark display of hypocrisy, some of the European politicians who decry Islam for being repressive and anti-feminist champion laws that threaten to strip away Muslim women’s agency. “Muslim women exist and have things to say when the subject concerns them,” Soumaya, 15, told me. “We are not objects, we think, we feel, we have free will, we are strong and intelligent and, above all, capable.” But, she said, “the media does not want to recognize that. It’s a pity.”

Rather than asking whether Islam is liberal enough to belong in Europe, the more relevant question today appears to be whether Europe is liberal enough to accept its female Muslim citizens – regardless of their attire – in public life. The debate will no doubt continue in Europe’s courtrooms. In the meantime, the lives and livelihoods of the region’s female Muslim population hang in the balance. As one young woman said to me resignedly, “I have to wait for a woman who doesn’t wear the hijab or a man to fight for me, because right now I don’t exist. I am no one.”

‘Europe’s Hijab Test’ – Commentary by Jasmine M. El-Gamal – Project Syndicate.

Source: Europe’s Hijab Test: War of the Headscarves and Death of Multiculturalism

Filed under Islamophobia, Multiculturalism Tagged with , ,

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