USA: African Immigrant Health Groups Battle A Transatlantic Tide Of Vaccine Disinformation

2021/04/07 Leave a comment

Of note:

Switching between Swahili and English, Dr. Frank Minja asked the African immigrants on the Zoom call if they had any questions about the COVID-19 vaccine.

Minja, who is originally from Tanzania, was asked how to get the vaccine, how it works, whether it’s safe.

Then one person asked him about a video promoting the conspiracy theory that the vaccine is part of a plot to reduce the Black race.

“That’s the realm of nonsense and misinformation,” he said.

Minja’s Q & A was hosted by the organization, African Family Holistic Health Organization (AFHHO), in Portland, Oregon. It’s one of a number of grassrootsorganizations across the country that are helping Africans in the U.S. get vaccinated.

In the United States, skepticism about the vaccine can be found in all segments of the population, including African Americans. However, efforts to address hesitancy among Black people often overlook African immigrants, who get much of their information from their countries of origin.

Minja has been paying close attention to threads of COVID-19 disinformation coming from Africa.

“We’ve seen the whole gamut of misinformation that basically started with the fact that Africans and people of African ancestry are not susceptible to COVID,” he said in an interview following the Zoom session.

Minja said many African immigrants do not rely on American media as trusted sources of information. Some do not speak English well enough yet. Others are used to getting information from friends and family back home through social media platforms, such as WhatsApp.

Chioma Nnaji, a health worker and community organizer for African immigrants and the wider Black community in Massachusetts, said it’s important to take into account that “certain communities live and operate in two spaces.”

“This is usually applicable to immigrants and refugees where they still have connections to their home countries while they are resettling in a new country,” she added.

A lot of what they hear from back home is helpful, she said. For example, traditional herbal remedies are popular. Minja said those can be useful for treating symptoms of non-severe forms of COVID-19.

However, there’s also quite a bit of misleading information about the vaccine that is spread through these channels, Minja said.

“And a lot of it is really about just planting the seeds of distrust,” he said.

For African immigrants, the distrust is partly rooted in the memory of being exploited by western countries, said Dr. Ifeanyi Nsofor. He’s a global health expert from Nigeria, who has also been battling vaccine misinformation on the continent.

“It’s almost like anything that you say is coming from the white man, people look at it with lots of suspicion, based on that experience of colonialism,” he said.

And that experience did not end with independence. Over the years, global health advocates have accused multinational pharmaceutical firms of using African countries as living laboratories for clinical trials of experimental drugs. In 1996, 11 children died and dozens were left disabled in Nigeria after being given an experimental anti-meningitis drug created by Pfizer — the developer of one of the COVID vaccines.

A year later, the U.S. government was accused sponsoring studies that gave pregnant women in developing countries a placebo during tests of the effectiveness of an antiviral drug for HIV.

 

And in April 2020, two French doctors sparked outrage when they suggested that a potential treatment for COVID-19 should be tested in Africa. The director of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, condemned the suggestion as a “hangover from a colonial mentality.”

“All this fear comes from a history,” said Haika Mushi, a health worker at AFHHO. She is also originally from Tanzania and moved to the U.S. 12 years ago. She has been helping organize the group’s Zoom calls since the pandemic began.

When the vaccine became available, AFHHO started helping people sign up for appointments. At first, it brought in a white doctor to answer questions, and people were still skeptical. She says the group had more success when it brought in Minja and a doctor from Zimbabwe. They also have translators speaking French, Swahili and Tigrinya.

“It makes sense to hear from our own,” she said.

Another type of disinformation that is being spread, according to Nnaji, is that immigration status affects a person’s ability to get the vaccine. She says that is why community-based organizations who can help people sign up for vaccinations, such as AFHHO, are so important.

AFHHO hopes that its sessions will also help curb disinformation in the countries of origin, too.

“We feel like if the people here are well enough educated about the vaccine, they will be able to educate our families back home — our friends, neighbors back home,” Mushi said.

Source: African Immigrant Health Groups Battle A Transatlantic Tide Of Vaccine Disinformation

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Mélanie Joly: révolutionner la fonction publique pour freiner l’érosion du français

2021/04/07 Leave a comment

Will be interesting to see the details and how this understandable push will be balanced with efforts to increase representation at senior levels of Indigenous peoples and visible minorities:

Aux prises avec une fonction publique qui ne respecte « pas toujours » la Loi sur les langues officielles et un réseau diplomatique anglicisé, la ministre Mélanie Joly dit avoir donné un « coup de barre » et montré une« volonté politique claire » pour freiner l’érosion du français dans la machine fédérale, au pays et dans le monde. Passées plutôt inaperçues lors du dépôt de son « document de réforme » sur le français, des propositions spécifiques au secteur public pourraient, si elles se réalisent, créer une petite révolution au sein du gouvernement.

« Les gens savent très bien qu’il y a une culture qui fait en sorte que, normalement, quand une personne parle anglais autour de la table et qui ne parle pas français, tout le monde s’ajuste », dit la ministre Mélanie Joly pour illustrer des problèmes bien ancrés dans la culture de l’administration publique. En entretien téléphonique avec Le Devoir, celle qui a hérité du portefeuille des langues officielles fin 2019 dit vouloir envoyer un message aux fonctionnaires : cette culture doit changer.

Lors du dépôt, en février, de son « document de réforme », que la ministre appelle parfois son « livre blanc », le gros de l’attention médiatique a été consacré au fait que le gouvernement libéral exprime son désir d’utiliser désormais la Loi sur les langues officielles pour protéger le français aussi auQuébec, et non seulement comme langue minoritaire dans le reste du pays. Cela, pour atteindre une « égalité réelle » entre le français et l’anglais d’un océan à l’autre.

Or, de nombreux passages du document de 30 pages laissent entrevoir un changement assez radical dans la manière dont les deux langues sont appelées à être mises sur un pied d’égalité au sein des bureaux du gouvernement fédéral, dont presque la moitié des employés francophones des régions bilingues disent qu’ils se sentent mal à l’aise de s’exprimer en français. De grandes sections sont aussi consacrées à l’importance du rôle du français dans la conduite de la diplomatie canadienne dans le monde, après qu’une enquête du Devoir eut révélée que la haute direction d’Affaires mondiale Canada est constituée essentiellement d’anglophones faisant accéder d’autres anglophones aux postes les plus importants.

Exigence du français

Selon la vision de la ministre Joly, le gouvernement doit abolir le double standard des exigences linguistiques entre, d’une part, les francophones desquels on exige une excellente maîtrise de l’anglais écrit pour accéder à des postes de gestion et, d’autre part, les anglophones pour qui un français simplement fonctionnel peut très bien faire l’affaire. Pour ce faire, les exigences linguistiques sont appelées à être rehaussées, et plus de formation doit être offerte pour mettre à niveau les fonctionnaires. « Il faut aussi une bonne maîtrise du français écrit [en plus de la bonne maîtrise de l’anglais]. C’est ça, l’idée. C’est ça, le réel bilinguisme », explique Mélanie Joly.

Encore faut-il assurer un suivi auprès des différentes branches administratives du gouvernement fédéral. « Le problème qu’on avait, c’est que c’était une loi [sur les langues officielles] qui n’était pas toujours respectée », dit la ministre. Puisqu’ils sont isolés chacun dans leur coin, les ministères ont pris la mauvaise habitude de ne pas prendre toujours au sérieux leurs obligations en matière de langues officielles, a-t-elle constaté, rapports administratifs à l’appui. « C’est comme si, chaque fois, il fallait que j’appelle mes collègues pour savoir s’ils avaient fait le suivi, ou [comme si] l’équipe et moi voyions dans leurs propositions qu’il y avait des choses quine fonctionnaient pas au niveau des langues officielles », se rappelle-t-elle.

Dans sa nouvelle version, promise d’ici la fin de l’année 2021, la Loi sur les langues officielles devrait bénéficier non seulement d’un commissaire qui aura plus de pouvoirs pour faire appliquer ses recommandations, mais aussi d’une « unité » au sein du Conseil du Trésor qui aura pour mission de faire respecter la loi auprès de tous les employés.

« Il faut être capable de trouver une façon pour que, lorsqu’on est francophone, on puisse exercer notre travail en français au sein de notre fonction publique », fait valoir Mélanie Joly. Se basant sur les grands progrès réalisés au cours des 50 dernières années pour rendre l’État fédéral bilingue, alors qu’il peinait autrefois à donner des services en français, la ministre Joly croit que son document de travail donne un « coup de barre » à l’administration, lui indiquant les orientations du prochain chantier visant à l’égalité au sein des employés.

« Maintenant, on sait que le système n’est pas parfait, et on peut bâtir à partir de nos acquis pour nous assurer qu’il n’y a pas d’érosion du français au sein de notre fonction publique, alors que ce sont de nouvelles générations de fonctionnaires qui rejoignent les rangs des ministères et qu’elles ont eu accès à des cours d’immersion en français [au Canada anglais]. »

Dans le reste du monde

Le 18 mars dernier, les quatre sous-ministres d’Affaires mondiales Canada ont conjointement signé une lettre, envoyée à tous les employés, qui réaffirme que « le bilinguisme fait partie intégrante du Canada » et que l’organisation « a le rôle unique de représenter les intérêts et les valeurs du pays sur la scène internationale dans les deux langues officielles ».

« Nous incitons tous les employés à utiliser davantage le français et nous demandons à tous les gestionnaires de donner l’exemple dans leurs propres communications », peut-on lire dans le courriel obtenu par Le Devoir. Il ne s’agit pas d’un hasard. La conduite de la diplomatie en français est explicitée à de nombreuses reprises dans le document de réforme que la ministre Joly a présenté en février. « Ça a des impacts et c’est normal que notre fonction publique réagisse. Elle voit venir [les changements] et elle s’adapte parce qu’on a dit qu’on allait déposer un projet de loi », indique la ministre.

Tout en faisant le constat d’« une migration vers l’anglais pour tout le monde, pour tous les peuples », Mélanie Joly souhaite essentiellement tirer profit du caractère bilingue du Canada dans les relations avec les autres pays, ainsi que contribuer davantage aux instances internationales qui en font la promotion, comme l’Organisation internationale de la Francophonie (OIF).

« On est dans un monde où, essentiellement, on a tout avantage à développer des accords de libre-échange, des ententes culturelles, à créer des ponts entre les nations. Si on ne le fait pas, d’autres vont le faire. Donc, pourquoi ne pas utiliser nos racines, ce qui nous unit comme francophonie ? »

Mélanie Joly précise que les nombreux éléments abordés dans son document de réforme ne se retrouveront pas nécessairement tous dans la nouvelle Loi sur les langues officielles promise par le gouvernement Trudeau, qu’ils pourraient prendre d’autres formes. Par exemple, le souhait de donner un coup de pouce à la vie en français dans la capitale, Ottawa, sera plutôt traduit par des aides financières. Il est également toujours trop tôt pour savoir si le droit de travailler en français dans les entreprises privées de compétence fédérale au Québec sera inclus au projet de loi ou s’il fera partie d’une éventuelle réforme du Code canadien du travail. Un groupe d’experts mandaté pour se pencher sur la question doit remettre ses conclusions le 8 mai.

Source: Mélanie Joly: révolutionner la fonction publique pour freiner l’érosion du français

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Akyol: It Is Time To Revive The Islamic Enlightenment

2021/04/07 1 Comment

Akyol’s commentary always relevant and interesting:

ISIS, Al Qaeda, Boko Haram… Beheadings, terrorist attacks, massacres in the name of Islam… Do these grim episodes show that there is something wrong in the Muslim world today?

In the West, there are two popular answers to this question, which are diametrically opposite: The first is that these terrorists reveal “the true face of Islam,” which is a hopelessly violent and intolerant religion. The second answer is that, quite the contrary, these terrorists “have nothing to do with Islam,” which is only a religion of peace, while all troubles are created by socio‐​economic problems or foreign interventions.

As a Muslim myself who has been struggling with issues of freedom, human rights, and tolerance in the contemporary world of Islam, I believe both answers are wrong.

The first answer is wrong—and awfully unfair—because terrorists acting in the name of Islam are extremely marginal among the world’s 1.6 billion Muslims, most of which are peaceful people with normal lives. So, those terrorists are “extremists” indeed.

However, the second answer is also wrong, because the terrorists in question have something to do with Islam: they are referring to certain verdicts in Islamic jurisprudence—the interpretation of the Sharia—only by taking them to new heights.

Look at how ISIS justifies massacring Shiites: by declaring them “apostates.” In return, mainstream Islamic authorities condemn ISIS, by typically saying, “No, you can’t declare fellow Muslims apostates.” But most of these authorities don’t say that no apostate should ever be targeted—because they still believe in the authoritativeness of a dubious narration from the Prophet Muhammad: “Whomever leaves his religion, kill him.”

Or look at how Al Qaeda justifies killing “blasphemers”—people such as Charlie Hebdo cartoonists. They rely on medieval Islamic jurists who defined sabb al‐​rasul, or “insulting the prophet,” as a capital crime. In return, mainstream Islamic authorities oppose Al Qaeda, typically by saying, “No you can’t punish blasphemy on a vigilante basis, especially in a non‐​Muslim county.” That is helpful, but most of these mainstream authorities still see blasphemy as a capital crime. Hence they do not oppose the harsh blasphemy laws in Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Iran, and many other Muslim‐​majority countries.

Here is the underlying problem that modern‐​day Muslims need to frankly face: Islam, as a religion, found political power right at its birth. Therefore, most early Muslims did not see anything wrong with using coercive power to advance their faith—just as their contemporaries, such as the Byzantines or the Sassanids, were also doing. This coercive power included military conquests; a political order based on the supremacy of Muslims over non‐​Muslims; the enforcement of piety; and the violent suppression of blasphemy, apostasy, and heresy.

None of these were shocking in the pre‐​modern world, when Islam in fact often seemed to be a more lenient religion than Christianity, whose own marriage with power was reflected in the horrors of the Crusades or the tortures of the Inquisition. No wonder, in that pre‐​modern world, many Jews fled from Christendom to the Muslim Ottoman Empire to find safety and freedom.

Yet the world has changed dramatically in the past few centuries, with the rise of liberal democracies and universal human rights. Christianity—and Judaism—adopted to these modern values, by revising some of their illiberal doctrines. But Islamic jurisprudence, and the mindset beneath, has not changed much.

Therefore, mainstream Islam indeed needs that much‐​discussed transformation: a major reform. The right analogy in Western history is not the Protestant Reformation, though, which has been often referenced, but only inappropriately.

The right analogy is the Enlightenment, in particular the kind of Enlightenment advocated by John Locke, who offered a new interpretation of Christianity—not a rejection of it—to save it from its own centuries‐​old marriage with coercive power.

In fact, this has been realized since the 19th century—in the late Ottoman Empire, Arab World, and India—by self‐​declared “Islamic liberals.” Their efforts led to liberal constitutions, feminist reforms, and religious reinterpretations. Recently, British historian Christopher de Bellaigue has summarized these significant efforts as the “Islamic Enlightenment.”

Yet this very drive provoked “Islam’s counter‐​Enlightenment,” spearheaded by a wide range of Salafis, Islamists, and rigid conservatives. (The terrorists mentioned above represent their most extreme fringe.)

My new book, Reopening Muslim Minds: A Return to Reason, Freedom, and Tolerance, is meant to be an intervention into this big crisis of Islam. It aims to revive and advance the Islamic Enlightenment, by presenting a comprehensive argument for it—and, perhaps more importantly, by dismantling the theological roadblock that obstructs it.

The main challenge is simple, but also a big one: Can Islam give up coercive power? Can it be a religion that proposes its truth claims, but does not imposethem?

Many Muslims, who are happy to live in free societies or aspire for them, already say “yes.”

Yet there are others who emphatically say “no.”

Their zealotry threatens the future of liberty. It also threatens the future Muslim societies, and, in fact, the future of the Islamic faith—my faith—as well.

Hence I wrote this book to show why they are wrong, and why there is a better way to understand Islam.

A way where faith is reconciled with reason, expressed in freedom, and crowned with tolerance.

Source: It Is Time To Revive The Islamic Enlightenment

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Canada must formally apologize for its historic role in the enslavement of Africans in this country and acknowledge the contributions of Black Canadians

2021/04/06 Leave a comment

From one of the more prominent plaintiffs in the proposed class action lawsuit against the Canadian government for past and current discrimination.

Question the need for a separate category under the Employment Equity Act for Black Canadians, given that the disaggregated data already includes Black Canadians, and government employment equity reports are now including that data.

And, as I have written elsewhere, disaggregated government employment and public service survey data highlights the similarities and differences between the different visible minority groups (https://multiculturalmeanderings.wordpress.com/wp-admin/post.php?post=48735&action=edit), with some groups being comparable to Black Canadians, others doing better.

Hopefully, the federally regulated sectors will start to collect comparable disaggregated data, as agree this would be helpful. But it should be collected for all visible minority groups, not just Black Canadians:

American civil rights activist James Baldwin once asked, “how much time do you want for your ‘progress.’ ” Canadian Black politicians, leaders, professors, civil rights activists, and associations have for years called upon Canada to formally apologize for its role in the enslavement of Africans in this country. This long-awaited apology would bring about acknowledgment, recognition, and much-needed healing of the effects of slavery still reflected in the treatment and the experiences of Black Canadians. Canada’s long overdue apology for the treatment of the No. 2 Construction Battalion and recognition of Emancipation Day are not enough.

For too long, Black Canadians have been fighting anti-Black racism symptoms by calling for changes in the criminal justice system, employment, housing, and education sectors. We have also been calling for changes in the same organizations that are meant to bring about equality, specifically amendments to the Employment Equity Act (EEA) to establish a category for Black Canadians, as well as to the Canadian Human Rights Commission (CHRC), which is more often than not dismissive of anti-Black racism. As of March 2021, more than 600 former and current Black public service employees are suing the federal government over the unjust practice of Black employee exclusion due to systemic discrimination dating back from the 1970s. More than 12,000 Canadians have signed a petition calling on Justin Trudeau and the Government of Canada to end systemic discrimination and Black employee exclusion within the federal public service.

Black Canadians lack capital power and political representation; thus, our calls for change are dismissed and our demands shoved for another day, promises of change are never realized. The Canadian government itself practices discrimination against Black Canadians and is thus unwilling to force change. In addition to the above mentioned lawsuit by Black government of Canada employees, Canada has officially apologized to several indigenous peoples, apologized over the Chinese head tax, and for sending Japanese-Canadians to internment camps during the Second World War. The government has also rightly apologized for its discrimination, criminalization, and the injustices endured by the Canadian LGBTQ community members. Yet, Black Canadians are still awaiting such turning points and are disheartened to repeatedly ask a prime minister who himself repeatedly wore a Black face and contributed to our dehumanization. So, long as the Canadian government discriminates, it cannot in good faith and with the same breath implement equal rights and progress.

In a 2019 survey, the Canada Race Relations Foundation found that Black Canadians and Indigenous peoples are the most likely groups to report racial discrimination experiences, and they are also the groups widely understood by others to experience such treatment.

The government is aware of the pervasive nature of anti-Black racism in Canada. In 2017, the federal government invited the United Nations Human Rights Council working group of experts on people of African descent to examine the legal, institutional and policy framework and measures taken to prevent racial discrimination and related intolerance faced by Black Canadians. While acknowledging Canada’s commitment to diversity and inclusion, the UN expressed deep concern about Black Canadians’ human rights situation.

It noted that Black Canadians faced disproportionately high unemployment rates and forced to take low-paying jobs with little security and poor prospects when working. The UN cited the multiple and intersectional forms of racism at play against Black Canadian women who make 37 per cent less than white men, and 15 per cent are less than white women, with over one in four living below the Canadian poverty line. The UN working group recommendations included that Canada recognizes Black Canadians as a distinct group who continue to make profound economic, political, cultural and spiritual contributions to Canada. Additionally, it proposed a mandatory nationwide policy on collecting data disaggregated by race and other identities to determine if and when racial disparities exist for Black Canadians. Furthermore, it remarked that the category of “visible minority” obscures the degrees of disparities in Black Canadians’ treatment and specific human rights concerns.

In January 2018, Canada officially recognized the UN International Decade for People of African Descent, stipulating that the international community acknowledges that people of African descent represent a distinct group whose human rights must be promoted and protected. It also calls for adoption or strengthening of comprehensive anti-discrimination legislation and ensuring its effective implementation.

Amid COVID-19, Statistics Canada indicated that the pandemic had hard-hit Canada’s Black population (approximately one million people aged 15 to 69). Data revealed that in the three months ending in January 2021, the unemployment rate among Black Canadians (13.1 per cent) was about 70 per cent higher than that among non-visible minority Canadians (7.7 per cent). Additionally, almost one-third of employed Black women (31.7 per cent) worked in health care and social assistance in January 2021, bearing the brunt of response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Groundbreaking research by the Edmonton-based African Canadian Civic Engagement Council and Innovative Research Group unveiled how COVID-19 is disproportionately impacting the health and finances of Black Canadians. It showed that Black communities are experiencing layoffs, reduced work hours, and reduced household incomes at higher rates. Fifty-six percent of Black respondents said their job, or the job of someone they knew, had been affected, compared with the national average of 46 per cent.

The government’s ongoing initiatives and resources to address systemic racism and anti-Black racism in Canadian institutions and the privately regulated sectors are welcomed. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Bardish Chagger, minister of diversity and inclusion and youth, acknowledge that racism is one of the root causes of social and economic gaps for Indigenous peoples. The more recent 2021 Privy Council call to action to deputy ministers, heads of separate agencies, and heads of federal agencies to reflect deeply on the unjust treatment of Black people and other racialized groups and Indigenous peoples is helpful. It is encouraging that the Privy Council statements distinctly recognized and named Black Canadians in its call to eradicate systemic racism and appropriately used the words racialized communities rather than visible minorities and Indigenous Canadians, rather than aboriginal peoples. This is in stark contrast to the outdated federal legalization meant to eradicate systemic racism and take positive measures towards employment equity in the federal government and federally regulated private sectors, namely the EEA. The Federal Black Employee Caucus (FBEC), established in 2018 to support efforts to address issues faced by Black federal public servants, is also a positive development in the governments’ efforts towards engaging Black employees and learning about their first-hand experiences with systemic racism as it relates to barriers to career to advancements.

The Employment Equity Act requires that federal jurisdiction employers take proactive measures to measure progress on the programs it puts in place. The Public Service Commission (PSC) collects and analyzes hiring, promotion, selection process, survey response and other data for these designated groups. In its January of 2021 audit report on employment equity representation in recruitment, the Commission found that the representation rate of visible minority groups declined at the organizational screening and assessment stages. Of the visible minority sub-groups examined in the audit, Black candidates experienced a more significant drop in representation than other visible minority groups, both at the organizational screening stage and at the assessment stage. Additionally, according to the Federal Black Employee Caucus (FBEC), Black people encounter more significant challenges and obstacles than their mainstream counterparts in their efforts to be recruited and promoted in the federal public service.  The FBEC further state that Black federal employees report above-average levels of harassment and discrimination and are over-represented in the lower ranks. They note ongoing marginalization and underemployment affect the health of some Black employees and force others to leave the public service and that current and former diversity initiatives aren’t solving the problem. The FBEC called on the government to collect disaggregated data on the experiences of the Black public servant and noted that the currently visible minority category masks the representation, recruitment and advancement challenges of Black people. The collection and analysis of disaggregated data have also been made by Liberal MP Greg Fergus, the Canadian caucus of Black Parliamentarians’ chair.

Where is the political will for real change?

In a missed opportunity, in November of 2020, the government passed amendments to the Employment Equity Regulations under the EEA and introduced new pay transparency requirements that came into effect on Jan. 1, 2020. Had there been a prioritization of anti-Black systemic racism and its painful impact on the Canadian Black populations, indeed, the government could have enacted the above recommendations.

As former senator Donald Oliver outlined, the legislation can be amended in two weeks, should the government so wills. As such, the minister of labour is encouraged to consider the Canadian Black population as a separate and distinct group within the EEA and take immediate steps to collect disaggregated data along racial and intersectional identities to understand African Canadians’ experiences in the labour market and associated human rights concerns. Future amendments to the Act should also include a robust accountability model akin to the Canadian Official Languages Act. Under OLA the duty of each federal institution to take positive measures is enforceable. This means that the public and the commissioner of official languages may seek court remedies if they feel that the duty under Part VII of the act has not been met.

Profound demands for justice have been enlisted following the tragic murder of George Floyd, which sparks international demands for justice, and equality including in Canada. This will continue until measurable progress is achieved and history shall keep recording. With COVID-19’s devastating impact on Black Canadians, their families, children, and communities, the time to act and take measurable action is now.

Huda Mukbil is a national security expert and a former senior intelligence officer with Canadian Intelligence Service (CSIS).

Source: https://hilltimes.us10.list-manage.com/track/click?u=a90bfb63c26a30f02131a677b&id=64bcc7c44b&e=685e94e554

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UK Home Office: new deportation law may discriminate against ethnic minorities

2021/04/06 1 Comment

Of note:

The Home Office has admitted that a new immigration rule to criminalise and deport migrant rough sleepers may discriminate against ethnic minorities, including Asian women who have survived domestic violence.

An internal document outlines the department’s analysis of how the new power – which prompted widespread outrage when it came into force four months ago – would also indirectly affect at-risk groups, including people with disabilities.

The eight-page equality impact assessment, obtained by Liberty Investigates, accepts the potential of the rule to indirectly discriminate on the grounds of race, since some factors leading to homelessness disproportionately affect people from particular ethnicities. “The main reason Asian women give for being homeless is because of domestic violence,” the assessment states.

Source: Home Office: new deportation law may discriminate against ethnic minorities

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UK: Ten previous inquiries expose the real problem with the Race Commission’s findings

2021/04/05 Leave a comment

As all too often happens with inquiries:

Amid Black Lives Matter protests following the death of George Floyd, Boris Johnson promised a Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities. Announced in a Telegraph column(where else?) about Winston Churchill (who else?), it was clear even then that this was a weak response to a widespread problem.

The Commission’s remit was vague (with its sights on “inequality across the UK, not just that affecting the BAME community”), and those eventually charged with it had previously expressed reservations about the existence of institutional racism.

Yet the main problem was that previous inquiries, many set up by past governments using official data, had already exposed the racial disparities in the areas under the Commission’s remit: education, work, policing and health.

The information is already out there, but the recommendations from those reports have not been taken up. Last June, when the Commission was announced, I counted 375 recommendations to the government in ten different inquiries – from the 1999 Macpherson Report following the racist murder of Stephen Lawrence, to 2020’s Lessons Learned review into the Windrush scandal – which are yet to be implemented.

As my colleague Ailbhe Rea points out, the latest Commission’s findings were carefully briefed ahead of publication to achieve headlines suggesting institutional racism is “no longer” a problem in Britain.

The pre-publication stories focused on celebrations of Britain as a “beacon” of successful multiculturalism to Europe and the rest of the world, scepticism of the use of “institutional racism”, and success stories among certain ethnic minority pupils in educational attainment.

While there are clearly nuggets for the “war on woke” brigade to get their teeth into – the description of slavery as “not only being about profit and suffering” springs to mind – there are also recommendations that echo findings of aforementioned reviews.

For example, the 2017 Lammy Review into discrimination in the criminal justice systemanalysed disproportionate use of stop and search on black people, citing Northamptonshire Police Force’s enhanced scrutiny of the practice as a favourable case study. The Race Commission recommends greater scrutiny of the practice through body-worn video footage, with officers who have their cameras off providing a written reason to the individual who was stopped as well as their supervising officer (and “misconduct procedures” for serious instances of misuse).

Many of the Race Commission’s recommendations contradict its own headlines and implicitly accept the existence of systemic racism: the application of the Equality Act to potentially discriminatory “algorithmic decision-making” is just one example.

There are also proposals that run against the “war on woke” narrative. For example, the development of a pilot to divert offences of low-level Class B drug possession – which disproportionately affect ethnic minority young people – into public health solutions.

Yet the evidence-heavy, action-light history of reviews into British racism suggests these may be patchily enacted or left to exist only on paper – forever buried beneath headline-hungry right-wing virtue signalling.

Anoosh Chakelian is the New Statesman’s Britain editor.

Source: Ten previous inquiries expose the real problem with the Race Commission’s findings

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New curriculum deepens old political divide in Alberta

2021/04/05 Leave a comment

Brings back memories of working on Discover Canada, the citizenship study guide introduced by former immigration and citizenship minister Kenney (my book, https://wordpress.com/page/multiculturalmeanderings.com/2507, has a chapter covering that):

When Alberta’s NDP government was still in power, the United Conservative Party campaigned on the idea that its political rival was trying to smuggle politics into Alberta classrooms. Once in office, UCP Education Minister Adriana LaGrange said her own government’s plans for a sweeping curriculum revamp would be about getting away from any “ideological bent.”

But when everyone got the first official look at the UCP’s draft kindergarten-to-Grade 6 curriculum this week, it became clear that the governing party’s political stamp is on its own strategy. In social studies, in particular, it’s a prescriptive, details-heavy document with a take on history that’s not an easy sell to many parents, or the people who teach the stuff.

The document asks Grade 3 students – kids aged 8 or 9 – to explain items many grownups struggle with, including the clauses of Magna Carta, the First Nations’ claim to land beyond the settled area of New France and “why Alberta is a leading resource-producing region.”

There was never a chance that a large-scale blueprint that outlines the lessons that will mould young minds would be anything but political. Education is a fraught issue everywhere, but it’s especially so in the polarized landscape that is Alberta politics. Here, there’s no consensus on where the oil and gas-focused economy needs to go, and where it feels like the NDP and UCP are locked in a perpetual, election-like battle.

The government says the draft K-6 curriculum brings a renewed focus to literacy, numeracy, citizenship and practical skills. Everyone seems to agree that the addition of financial skills, computer coding and sexual consent are good things.

The government is asking for feedback from the public but intends to test the curriculum in some classrooms this fall, and all students are expected to be learning it in the 2022-23 school year. The quick turnaround for reimagining the curriculum is in step with the government’s focus on fulfilling campaign commitments, even in the midst of a pandemic.

Alberta has long had a strong, well-regarded public-education system with high student test scores in reading, math and science, compared with global peers. Ms. LaGrange, however, also notes that some parts of the curriculum are decades old, and raw scores are either flat or seeing a decline.

“This is actually very ambitious – to change all of the curriculum at one time,” said Ms. LaGrange in an interview this week with The Globe and Mail.

But already, the Métis Nation of Alberta has called for a redo. Edmonton Public Schools – which counts more than 100,000 students of all grades on its rolls – said Thursday that it will not participate in a pilot run of the draft elementary curriculum this fall. The decision is based on worries about bringing in a new program during the pandemic. But there’s also high public concern as to whether the curriculum is age-appropriate, whether it properly addresses the issues of residential schools and reconciliation, and whether an “us-versus-them mentality” is embedded in the document.

Elk Island Public Schools is also out, and Edmonton Catholic Schools has saidit “will not be committing to piloting the curriculum.”

All subjects are under intense scrutiny but social studies appears to be the major sticking point. Some parents and critics say the curriculum is far too dense for young students, mishandles issues of race and leaves out LGBTQ issues, is too American- and European-centric, or is focused on the three major Abrahamic religions.

There are seemingly gratuitous partisan jabs, like in Grade 6, where the curriculum notes that “the United States Congress, controlled by the Democratic party, ruled in the Fugitive Slave Act that escaped slaves must be returned to their owners.”

NDP critic Sarah Hoffman’s blunt assessment is “this is a mess of a curriculum.”

But the UCP is responding, in part, to broader concerns about the education system – which Ms. LaGrange notes helped her party win the 2019 election. A key part of this is what she has described as the political biases of some individual teachers.

Last year, Ms. LaGrange referred to an excerpt from an exam that she said was from a Grade 10 class in Calgary. She argued that it was an attack on the province’s responsible energy sector. A multiple-choice question asked students to identify “one of the valid arguments against oil sands development” being the destruction of tracts of forest.

“My main concern has always been to ensure that our curriculum is taught without bias,” the Education Minister said the interview. “And the fact that the new draft curriculum is really based on factual content – that will really leave little room for bias in our classrooms.”

But the other side of this argument is that the ability of teachers to adapt to circumstances is diminished. “The new curriculum turns education into a checklist and rote memorization,” said Alberta Party Leader Jacquie Fenske.

And a second, related theme for the UCP is that current teaching now is so focused on the many errors of history, and injustices, that it fails to note the accomplishments of modern civilization, in Alberta and elsewhere. Premier Jason Kenney says it’s possible to face up to historical racism, for instance, “while also teaching how we have increasingly managed to overcome those things, and how we’ve created this incredibly diverse, pluralistic society.”

This part of the revamp is very on-brand for the UCP. Part of it, however, feels incongruous in a week when Mr. Kenney talked about “hitting our stride in diversification.”

An overly political remaking of Alberta’s now-strong school system is galvanizing parent groups who are against the changes. A big fight over the base curriculum for the youngest kids is not only bad for the province, it could make potential newcomers – and even the companies and investors Mr. Kenney’s government has spent two years trying to entice – less enthusiastic about coming to the province.

Politics will be part of any new curriculum. But Mr. Kenney’s UCP is, as often, in danger of letting politics take over.

Source: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-new-curriculum-deepens-old-political-divide-in-alberta/

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CDC: COVID-19 Was 3rd Leading Cause Of Death In 2020, People Of Color Hit Hardest

2021/04/02 Leave a comment

More confirmation of COVID-19 racial disparities:

COVID-19 was the third-underlying cause of death in 2020 after heart disease and cancer, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirmed on Wednesday.

A pair of reports published in the CDC’s Morbidity and Mortality WeeklyReport sheds new light on the approximately 375,000 U.S. deaths attributed to COVID-19 last year, and highlights the pandemic’s disproportionate impact on communities of color — a point CDC Director Rochelle Walensky emphasized at a White House COVID-19 Response Team briefing on Wednesday.

She said deaths related to COVID-19 were higher among American Indian and Alaskan Native persons, Hispanics, Blacks and Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander persons than whites. She added that “among nearly all of these ethnic and racial minority groups, the COVID-19 related deaths were more than double the death rate of non-Hispanic white persons.”

“The data should serve again as a catalyst for each of us [to] continue to do our part to drive down cases and reduce the spread of COVID-19, and get people vaccinated as soon as possible,” she said.

The reports examine data from U.S. death certificates and the National Vital Statistics System to draw conclusions about the accuracy of the country’s mortality surveillance and shifts in mortality trends.

One found that the age-adjusted death rate rose by 15.9% in 2020, its first increase in three years.

Overall death rates were highest among Black and American Indian/Alaska Native people, and higher for elderly people than younger people, according to the report. Age-adjusted death rates were higher among males than females.

COVID-19 was reported as either the underlying cause of death or a contributing cause of death for some 11.3% of U.S. fatalities, and replaced suicide as one of the top 10 leading causes of death.

Similarly, COVID-19 death rates were highest among individuals ages 85 and older, with the age-adjusted death rate higher among males than females. The COVID-19 death rate was highest among Hispanic and American Indian/ Alaska Native people.

Researchers emphasized that these death estimates are provisional, as the final annual mortality data for a given year are typically released 11 months after the year ends. Still, they said early estimates can give researchers and policymakers an early indication of changing trends and other “actionable information.”

“These data can guide public health policies and interventions aimed at reducing numbers of deaths that are directly or indirectly associated with the COVID-19 pandemic and among persons most affected, including those who are older, male, or from disproportionately affected racial/ethnic minority groups,” they added.

The other study examined 378,048 death certificates from 2020 that listed COVID-19 as a cause of death. Researchers said their findings “support the accuracy of COVID-19 mortality surveillance” using official death certificates, noting the importance of high-quality documentation and countering concerns about deaths being improperly attributed to the pandemic.

Among the death certificates reviewed, just 5.5% listed COVID-19 and no other conditions. Among those that included at least one other condition, 97% had either a co-occurring diagnosis of a “plausible chain-of-event” condition such as pneumonia or respiratory failure, a “significant contributing” condition such as hypertension or diabetes, or both.

“Continued messaging and training for professionals who complete death certificates remains important as the pandemic progresses,” researchers said. “Accurate mortality surveillance is critical for understanding the impact of variants of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, and of COVID-19 vaccination and for guiding public health action.”

Officials at the Wednesday briefing continued to call on Americans to practice mitigation measures and do their part to keep themselves and others safe, noting that COVID-19 cases continue to rise even as the country’s vaccine rollout accelerates.

The 7-day average of new cases is just under 62,000 cases per day, Walensky said, marking a nearly 12% increase from the previous 7-day period. Hospitalizations are also up at about 4,900 admissions per day, she added, with the 7-day average of deaths remaining slightly above 900 per day.

Dr. Celine Gounder, an infectious disease specialist at New York University who served as a COVID-19 adviser on the Biden transition team, told NPR’s Morning Edition on Wednesday that she remains concerned about the rate of new infections, even as the country has made considerable progress with its vaccination rollout.

She compared vaccines to a raincoat and an umbrella, noting they provide protection during a rainstorm but not in a hurricane

“And we’re really still in a COVID hurricane,” Gounder said. “Transmission rates are extremely high. And so even if you’ve been vaccinated, you really do need to continue to be careful, avoid crowds and wear masks in public.”

Source: CDC: COVID-19 Was 3rd Leading Cause Of Death In 2020, People Of Color Hit Hardest

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British Government’s ‘Gaslighting’ Report on Racism Says Slavery Had Some Upsides

2021/04/02 Leave a comment

Not a great headline if a government wants to demonstrate awareness and sensitivity to racism. More denial of systemic barriers and bias, including how the report was released:

Last summer, after George Floyd’s killing sparked mass anti-racism demonstrations around the globe, British Prime Minister Boris Johnsonasked a dedicated team to investigate and report back on racism in the U.K.. On Wednesday, they came back with their findings—that institutional racism no longer exists, and that the slave trade had some upsides.

The report, published by the British government’s Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities, has been branded as “gaslighting” and “an insult” by anti-racism activists. While the study went as far as admitting that Britain is not yet a “post-racial country,” it lauds the country’s race relations as “a model for other white-majority countries.”

“Put simply, we no longer see a Britain where the system is deliberately rigged against ethnic minorities,” it says. “The impediments and disparities do exist, they are varied, and ironically very few of them are directly to do with racism. Too often ‘racism’ is the catch-all explanation, and can be simply implicitly accepted rather than explicitly examined.”

The report went on to say that other factors—such as geography, socio-economic background, culture, family influence, and religion—had “more significant impact on life chances than the existence of racism.”

Appearing on BBC Radio 4’s Today show on Wednesday, the chairman of the commission, Dr Tony Sewell, explained his questionable findings further, saying: “No-one denies and no-one is saying racism doesn’t exist… We found anecdotal evidence of this. However, evidence of actual institutional racism? No, that wasn’t there, we didn’t find that.”

Perhaps the low point of the report is when it appears to find some benefits of the African slave trade—an atrocity in which Britain very much led the way. The government report chirpily states: “There is a new story about the Caribbean experience which speaks to the slave period not only being about profit and suffering but how culturally African people transformed themselves into a re-modelled African/Britain.”

The report also criticized anti-racism campaigners, dismissing Black Lives Matter and related demonstrations as the “idealism” of “well-intentioned young people” that risks “alienating the decent centre ground” of British politics. The commission condemned what it described as an “increasingly strident form of anti-racism thinking that seeks to explain all minority disadvantage through the prism of white discrimination.”

The report has, predictably, received an extremely bad reaction from anti-racism advocates. Rehana Azam, the national secretary of the GMB trade union, said: “Only this government could produce a report on race in the 21st century that actually gaslights Black, Asian, Minority and Ethnic people and communities. This feels like a deeply cynical report that not only ignores Black and ethnic minority workers’ worries, but is part of an election strategy to divide working class people and voters.”

David Lammy, a lawmaker for the opposition Labour Party and shadow Justice Secretary, described the report as “an insult to anybody and everybody across this country who experiences institutional racism.” He added: “Boris Johnson has just slammed the door in their faces by telling them that they’re idealists, they are wasting their time. He has let an entire generation of young white and Black British people down.”

Prof Kehinde Andrews, a professor of Black Studies at Birmingham City University, said: “It’s complete nonsense. It goes in the face of all the actual existing evidence. This is not a genuine effort to understand racism in Britain. This is a PR move to pretend the problem doesn’t exist.”

To make matters worse, HuffPost reported that selected journalists were not briefed about the report in advance—including Britain’s only race correspondent, The Independent’s Nadine White. White was sent an emailshowing that the commission asked for briefings on their report on racial disparities be sent to a “tight list of journos” only.

Institutional racism in Britain has been under the spotlight in recent weeks after Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s allegation that the royal family expressed concerns about how dark their baby’s skin would be. Harry said racism in the British media was a “large part” of why he left the country, adding: “Unfortunately, if the source of information is inherently corrupt or racist or biased, then that filters out to the rest of society.”

Source: British Government’s ‘Gaslighting’ Report on Racism Says Slavery Had Some Upsides

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Nicholas: La honte [history of France’s suppression of minority languages and related issues]

2021/04/02 Leave a comment

Refreshing reminder of history and its impact:

On prend rarement le temps, au Québec, de rappeler qu’il n’y a pas si longtemps que tous les Français parlent français.

C’est que l’Europe s’est développée au Moyen Âge comme un ensemble de royaumes aux frontières instables, et donc les monarques se mariaient entre eux, évoluant dans un univers culturel et linguistique à part de populations très diversifiées. Et la France ne fait pas exception. L’occitan, le catalan, le breton, le picard, l’alsacien, le basque ne sont que quelques-unes des langues autochtones de la France, parlées comme langues maternelles et souvent comme seules langues de bien des sujets de la France de l’Ancien Régime, dans l’indifférence quasi totale de la monarchie. Ce qui importait au pouvoir politique des rois qui ont administré notamment la Nouvelle-France, c’était surtout que le français soit normé et imposé comme langue de l’État et de l’administration pour supplanter le latin, et donc le pouvoir de l’Église.

C’est principalement avec la Révolution française qu’on s’est mis à s’intéresser à cette diversité linguistique, perçue alors comme un obstacle à la circulation des idées politiques républicaines et laïques. Et après la période de va-et-vient politique qu’a connue la France au XIXe siècle, la Troisième République instaure dans les années 1880 une série de lois sur l’instruction primaire obligatoire — en français — sur l’ensemble du territoire. On veut alors une république, unie et unitaire. Et avec l’industrialisation et la montée du capitalisme, la bourgeoisie dominante a avantage à créer une masse qui suit les mêmes normes, travaille de la même manière, consomme les mêmes produits et les mêmes journaux.

Dans les écoles de France, on déploie un ensemble de châtiments, souvent physiques, pour punir les enfants qui parlent leur langue maternelle. On leur enseigne finalement non seulement le français, mais aussi l’infériorité de leur culture et de leur milieu familial. En occitan, on parle de vergonha pour nommer l’effet des politiques républicaines sur la psyché populaire. La honte. C’est par la honte, et souvent par la violence envers les enfants, que le français est devenu la langue de la République. Le projet linguistique républicain est donc fondamentalement un projet disciplinaire. Il faut parler le français, le bon, le patriotique, le beau, l’exact, le supérieur, le vrai, le pur. Une liste de notions qui, faut-il le spécifier, n’ont d’assises dans aucune science du langage. Les dogmatiques les plus orthodoxes de la langue française n’ont souvent (nécessairement) aucune notion de sociolinguistique.

L’unitarisme républicain a bien sûr été amené dans les colonies françaises au même moment qu’il a été imposé en France même. On a aussi tenté, tant bien que mal, d’enseigner aux fils des potentats « indigènes » non seulement le français, mais aussi la fierté et le sentiment de supériorité qui viennent avec le rapprochement avec la norme, ainsi que la honte et le mépris de sa langue maternelle ou des variants locaux du français. Cette honte, elle laisse des traces, d’une génération à l’autre, tant en France que dans son (ex) empire.

Après des décennies de lavage de cerveau, une France transformée par cet idéal politique « redécouvre » le Québec, et sa langue qui a échappé à cette entreprise de réingénierie sociale républicaine. Et une partie des élites québécoises, à son contact, internalisent aussi cette honte et la transmettent à leur tour aux gens d’ici, au nom, paradoxalement, de la fierté nationale. Frustrés d’être l’objet des moqueries des Hexagonaux, on se moque à son tour des Saguenéens ou des gens d’Hochelaga. Des Parisiens disent aux élites montréalaises qu’elles sonnent comme le Moyen Âge, et elles, à leur tour, traitent les Acadiens, les Cajuns et les Franco-Manitobains comme des vestiges du passé.

Si l’on prend rarement le temps d’expliquer cette histoire de la langue française au Québec, c’est notamment que l’on se préoccupe, avec raison, de la place prépondérante de l’anglais en Amérique du Nord, et surtout de cet autre projet impérialiste qu’est le Régime britannique à l’origine du Canada moderne. On croit que nos insécurités linguistiques nous viennent de cette situation de minoritaires sur le continent. C’est vrai, en bonne partie. Mais il ne faut pas non plus oublier d’examiner cette francophonie, le projet politique qu’elle porte, ses effets insécurisants et sa logique disciplinaire génératrice de honte et de hiérarchie qui pèsent sur les francophones « hors norme » de tous les continents, Européens y compris.

Il faut réfléchir à la langue française en Amérique non seulement face à l’anglais, mais aussi face à elle-même, dans toute sa complexité. Qu’est-ce que cela veut dire de dénoncer les tentatives d’assimilation et de stigmatisation vécues par les enfants francophones des Amériques aux mains des Britanniques et des Américains, tout en ayant participé à des projets missionnaires visant à assimiler les enfants haïtiens, sénégalais ou innus et à stigmatiser leur langue maternelle ? Qu’est-ce que ça signifie de dénoncer le règlement 17 qui a longtemps compliqué l’enseignement du français en Ontario pendant que l’État québécois s’acharne à franciser les jeunes du Nunavik ? Qu’est-ce qui se produit quand des militants de gauche, qui militent pour l’équité et l’inclusion, s’en prennent à l’orthographe des internautes moins scolarisés qu’eux plutôt qu’à leurs idées ? Ou lorsqu’on « se donne un accent » pour faire sérieux à la télévision d’État ou à l’université ?

Dénonce-t-on les effets néfastes de l’impérialisme britannique parce qu’on est anti-impérialiste ou parce qu’on lui aurait préféré un impérialisme différent, où l’on aurait été plus dominant ? Est-on contre le mépris des Franco-Québécois ou contre le mépris tout court ? Se pencher sur ces questions, c’est s’interroger sur ce que l’on veut que notre francophonie signifie à la face du monde, et aussi sur la manière dont les francophones se traitent entre eux, et sur le rapport traversé de contradictions, d’émotions et souvent d’insécurité de chacun envers sa langue et son identité. À nous de voir, avec les francophones de partout dans le monde, ce que signifie parler français, de mettre en question ses normes et de s’approprier (enfin) sa langue

Source: La honte

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