Douglas Todd: ‘If I say I don’t see skin colour, am I racist?’ asks B.C. government agency

2021/03/13 Leave a comment

Personally, I find the debates over nomenclature less interesting than the substantive issues of discrimination and inequality. That being said, a reasonable billboard campaign, just as the Toronto one “where are you from” was:

Would you ask Doris Day that question?”

That’s how famed jazz singer Billie Holiday responds during a 1957 interview to a journalist who asks, “What it’s like to be a coloured woman?” The scene is in the new movie, The United States vs. Billie Holiday.

The acclaimed singer’s answer reflected the anti-racism approach of that era, which had civil rights leaders urging Americans to see beyond the skin colour of Blacks and other minorities — to treat them equally, like everyone else.

Source: Douglas Todd: ‘If I say I don’t see skin colour, am I racist?’ asks B.C. government agency

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Switzerland’s Mid-Pandemic Burqa Ban Doesn’t Protect Liberal Values or Security. It Marginalizes Muslim Women.

2021/03/13 Leave a comment

Of note:

Switzerland, hard-hit by the coronavirus pandemic, has been in a partial shutdown since January. Face masks are mandatory everywhere from public transportation to the country’s idyllic ski slopes. But that reality didn’t stop a slim majority of Swiss voters from approving a ban on full-face coverings in public spaces in a March 7 referendum.

The new ban wasn’t motivated by anti-mask sentiment. In fact, it won’t apply to facial coverings worn for health reasons—now or after the pandemic. Rather, the measure was aimed at a minuscule minority of Muslim women who wear the burqa or niqab. And while similar initiatives in France, Belgium, Bulgaria, the Netherlands, Denmark, and Austria have always been controversial, the deeply ironic timing of Switzerland’s burqa ban proves once and for all that efforts to ban face coverings were never really about supposed security concerns surrounding face concealment in public spaces. At their core, burqa bans have always been an attempt to marginalize Muslim women—and they have succeeded in bringing anti-Muslim sentiment into the mainstream.

Switzerland’s referendum was the product of a people’s initiative launched by the Egerkinger Komitee, an advocacy group that includes members of the right-wing, national conservative Swiss People’s Party (SVP) and aimsto organize against “the claims to power of political Islam in Switzerland.” Arguing that “free people show their face” and “the burqa and niqab are not normal clothes,” the group in 2017 collected the required 100,000 petition signatures to put the issue to a referendum. On March 7, 51.2 percent of Swiss voters approved it.

The deeply ironic timing of Switzerland’s burqa ban proves it was never about supposed security concerns.

Clamping down on the visibility of Muslims in Switzerland is nothing new. Swiss Muslims have been under scrutiny since 2004, when Switzerland held a pair of referendums on measures that would have eased access to citizenship for second- and third-generation immigrants. The SVP’s strong mobilization against the initiatives transformed them instead into cultural referendums on whether Muslims are part of the Swiss national community, a notion the majority of Swiss voters rejected. Then, in 2009, the Egerkinger Komitee proposed an initiative that sought to ban minarets on the grounds that they are a symbol of political Islam. It was approved by 57.5 percent of Swiss voters despite the opposition of domestic Muslim organizations and church leaders from other religious groups.

In December 2014, the SVP first sought to prohibit full-face coverings via a parliamentary initiative to amend the Federal Constitution, arguing that burqas are a threat to national security. But the Swiss Council of States rejected it in March 2017 on the grounds that the small number of burqa-clad women in Switzerland meant public order was not disturbed. There was also concern that a ban would have a negative impact on tourism from Gulf countries.

Though the SVP and Egerkinger Komitee have been active for decades, Switzerland’s burqa referendum can’t be explained without the broader regional context: namely, Europe’s crisis of identity in a globalized, multicultural world. Switzerland is only the latest country to express and assuage this cultural insecurity by managing the visibility of Muslims and Islam, which are perceived as a political, ideological, and national security threat to European values and civilization.

Muslims have been part of Europe’s fabric for centuries, but they continue to be misunderstood and misrepresented in media and politics, where Islam is often framed as an inherently violent religion and Muslims are portrayed as incapable of integrating into European societies. While there is certainly some cultural anxiety—the natural result of rapidly changing demographics on the continent—most of the sensationalism is constructed, encouraged, and egged on by political parties that have a vested interest in creating a supposed “Muslim problem.” The purveyors of these ideas seek to convince the broad populace that Islam is a religion inherently at odds with Western values and that Muslims must be tamed and domesticated. Right now, they are winning.

In Switzerland, demonizing Islam, Muslims, and immigrants as hostile to human rights and freedom—of expression, religion, and sexual orientation—has long been a pillar of the SVP’s electoral strategy, as well as that of other populist national conservative parties such as the Federal Democratic Union of Switzerland and the Ticino League. Because this fixation has contributed to countless electoral victories for the SVP—transforming it into one of the most powerful parties in the country—others have adopted its strategy.

In left-wing circles, too, there is now a narrative claiming that Islam violates democratic standards and practices. Many Swiss leftists believe that Muslims are particularly susceptible to the use of violence or terrorism, and that they seek to create a society based on religion as a pillar of the social, cultural, and political order. In Geneva, the far-left is split between advocates of a hard-line interpretations of secularism—like the Swiss Party of Labor and its coalition partners—and those supportive of an open and inclusive model that recognizes multiculturalism, like the Solidarity party.

The nascent Swiss debate about secularism mirrors that of its more established French neighbor. In France, the promotion of laïcité—the French brand of secularism—has become a rallying cry for the political and intellectual elite who wish to erase Muslim visibility and enforce assimilation under the guise of legal neutrality.

Once a liberal tool that protected religious freedom and freedom of conscience, laïcité has been weaponized to target the public expressions of Islam that are deemed incompatible with French values, however vaguely defined. In recent years, both the right and the gauche laïcarde (the secularist left) have expressed support for a more restrictive and narrow understanding of laïcité that effectively makes religious Muslims—especially women—disappear from public spaces.

Keeping “political Islam” ill-defined is a boon for Islamophobes.

The French debate about laïcité and Islamic dress reached a fever pitch in the summer of 2016, when several cities across France banned the wearing of burkinis. The bans, which have since been overturned by the Council of State, were introduced as an ostensible effort to curb “political Islam.” At the time, former President Nicolas Sarkozy denounced the full-coverage bathing suits as a “provocation” in support of radical Islam. Likewise, in Switzerland, the new burqa ban was won through allusions to the specter of “political Islam.” Across Europe, the term has proved an effective electoral weapon

The problem is that “political Islam” is a vague notion that can mean virtually anything when alluded to under the mantra of fighting terrorism. For some, wearing a visible Muslim religious garment, eating halal food, or simply having conservative social beliefs is considered a step too far. As a result, authorities can interpret a mandate against “political Islam” very broadly, which can lead to the curtailment of civil liberties. France’s controversial new bill “strengthening republican principles,” which aims to fight “separatism,” is a case in point.

Keeping “political Islam” ill-defined is also a boon for Islamophobes. The SVP’s initiatives have succeeded largely because the party has been able to convince broad swaths of the public that Muslims who choose to make their presence visible simply by practicing their religion—whether by constructing a minaret or wearing a burqa—are attempting to “Islamize” the Swiss public. Then come referendums aimed at erasing any sign of a Muslim presence in Switzerland, with the implication that Muslims must remain invisible to fit into Swiss society. But these bans create an inevitable paradox: Targeting Muslims makes them even more visible, only contributing to an increase of racism and Islamophobia. The process is cyclical.

While Muslims are targeted as a collective, veiled Muslim women bear the brunt of Islamophobic outrage—framed as being victims of patriarchal norms or blindly following religious dictates. But far from liberating, burqa and burkini bans often only serve to exclude Muslim women from public life. Authorities, politicians, pundits, and certain groups of feminists claim to want to “free” Muslim women without including them in that process. And if these women do speak up, there is a systematic distrust of the true freedom of their choice, and therefore of their moral autonomy.

In all of this, it is important to remember that the number of Muslim women who conceal their faces remains vanishingly small in Europe. In 2009, the French newspaper Le Figaro estimated that only 2,000 women in France—out of a total French population of 65 million—wore a face veil for religious or philosophical reasons. In Switzerland, population 8.5 million, that number is estimated between 21 and 37. These are fractions so small they barely register on a calculator.

If the statistical insignificance of Europe’s burqa-clad population seems surprising, that’s because anti-Muslim parties across the political spectrum have successfully inflated the Muslim population in order to provoke fear in voters. In a 2017 survey conducted by Tamedia, a Swiss media company, respondents estimated—on average—that Muslims make up 17.2 percent of the Swiss population. In reality, that number lies at 5.1 percent, according to the Swiss Federal Statistical Office.

Besides burqa bans, it’s hard to think of another instance where the public would support a government initiative that targets so few people. But it makes sense in a climate where political success depends on fear—convincing voters that the “traditional culture” of Europe (whatever that may be) is in decline.

What Europe must recognize is that the hypersecuritization of Islam will only lead to deeper-entrenched segregation, thereby jeopardizing the liberal values it claims to stand for. Switzerland’s burqa ban is proof that the continent has yet to view its Muslim citizens as fully capable of autonomy and self-determination and able to formulate their own political will. If Europe really wants to save itself from cultural decline, recognizing Muslims as full citizens is where it should start.

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How to Reach the Unvaccinated: To counter online misinformation, it helps to knock on doors.

2021/03/12 Leave a comment

Of note, likely similar in Canada:

What does it take to get credible information about the coronavirus vaccine, and the vaccines themselves, to more people?

My colleague Sheera Frenkel spoke to experts and followed a community group as it went door to door in an ethnically diverse neighborhood in Northern California to understand the reasons behind the low vaccination rates for Black and Hispanic Americanscompared with non-Hispanic white people.

What Sheera found, as she detailed in an article on Wednesday, was how online vaccine myths reinforce people’s fears and the ways that personal outreach and easier access to doses can make a big difference.

Shira: What surprised you from your reporting?

Sheera: One question I was trying to answer was whether the incorrect narratives floating around online about the vaccines — that they change people’s DNA or are a means of government control — were reaching Black and Hispanic communities and other people of color in the real world. I heard false information like that firsthand. It was eye opening.

The other surprise was how effective it was for someone to stand on a person’s doorstep and talk about their own experience getting a coronavirus vaccine and answer questions. The outreach group talked to each household for half an hour or longer sometimes. That may make more of a difference than any online health campaign ever could.

But it’s laborious to go door to door. Can reliable information ever travel as far and fast as misinformation?

Internet platforms amplify misinformation, and countering it isn’t simple. It takes more than a celebrity posting a vaccine selfie on Instagram.

Are we overstating the impact of vaccine hesitancy? The pediatrician Rhea Boyd recently wrote in our Opinion section that the primary barrier to Covid-19 vaccinations among Black Americans is a lack of access, not wariness about getting the shot.

It’s both.

Two things struck me from my reporting. First, false vaccine information is persuasive because it builds on something that people know to be true: The medical community has mistreatedpeople of color, and the bias continues. And second, vaccine hesitancy is different in each community.

That makes reaching Black Americans different than reaching new immigrants who are reading articles in Vietnamese or Chinese that make them concerned about vaccine safety. It’s an opportunity for community leaders to address what’s keeping people who trust them from getting vaccinated.YOUR CORONAVIRUS TRACKER: We’ll send you the latest data for places you care about each day.Sign Up

You’ve written about Russian propaganda in Latin America that fanned concerns about European and American coronavirus vaccines. Is that also reaching people in the United States?

Yes. Two Russian state-backed media networks, Sputnik and Russia Today, have among the most popular Spanish-language Facebook pages in the world. Their news reaches Spanish speakers in the United States.

I heard people ask in my reporting, Why should they get an American vaccine when the Russian one is better? (Those articles tend to cite real statistics but in misleading contexts.) I asked one man I met, George Rodriguez, where he had read that, and we figured out that it was from one of those Russian news sites.

What has been effective at increasing the coronavirus vaccination rates among Black and Latino Americans?

It seems effective to hold walk-in vaccination clinics. People can show up, ask questions they have and get a shot.

What about Republicans? Surveysshow that they are among the wariest Americans about coronavirus vaccines.

There have been concerns among some Republicans that people will be forced to get vaccinated, but that isn’t happening. 

It’s clear that among Republicans and other groups with vaccine hesitancy, once we know more people who are getting vaccinated, we’re more willing to do it, too.

How do you see this moving forward?

In just the last few weeks, I’ve gotten more optimistic about closing the vaccination gap. There have been huge strides in reaching people, getting those walk-in vaccination clinics open or taking vaccines to people, and addressing people’s concerns.

Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/10/technology/vaccine-misinformation-access.html

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More racially diverse areas reported much higher numbers of COVID-19 deaths: StatsCan

2021/03/12 Leave a comment

Confirmation of what we have seen in other studies with respect to minorities being more affected given many are employed in healthcare and other front line occupations:

The most racially diverse neighbourhoods in Canada reported COVID-19 mortality rates more than twice as high as those reported by districts that are overwhelmingly white, according to new data released Wednesday by Statistics Canada.

The report, titled Year in Review, lays bare the uneven effects of this pandemic on Canadians of different racial backgrounds.

The data affirms what some Canadians have reported anecdotally for months: Black people in particular have been far more likely to succumb to the virus than members of other groups.

Source: More racially diverse areas reported much higher numbers of COVID-19 deaths: StatsCan

StatCan report: https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/11-631-x/11-631-x2021001-eng.htm

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Stephens: California’s Ethnic Studies Follies: A proposed curriculum magnifies differences, encourages tribal loyalties and advances ideological group think.

2021/03/11 Leave a comment

Some exaggeration regarding divisiveness but valid points regarding over-reach and the risks in not using ethnic studies to look at both the commonalities and differences:

The first time California’s Department of Education published a draft of an ethnic studies “model curriculum” for high school students, in 2019, it managed the neat trick of omitting anti-Semitism while committing it.

More than a million Jews live in California. They are also among the state’s leading victims of hate crimes.

Yet in a lengthy draft otherwise rich with references to various forms of bigotry, there was no mention of bigotry toward Jews. There was, however, an endorsement of the Boycott, Divest and Sanction movement, which essentially calls for the elimination of the Jewish state. There was also an approving mention of a Palestinian singer rapping that Israelis “use the press so they can manufacture” — the old refrain that lying Jews control the media.

The draft outraged many Jews. And they were joined by Armenian, Assyrian, Hellenic, Hindu and Korean civic groups in a statementurging the California Department of Education to “completely redraft the curriculum.” In its original form, they said, the document was “replete with mischaracterizations and omissions of major California ethnoreligious groups.”

Last September, Gov. Gavin Newsom vetoed a bill that would mandate ethnic studies as a graduation requirement in California’s high schools, pending further review of the model curriculum. While some maintained that a critical ethnic studies curriculum was a mistake, and not just for Jews, others took the view that, when it came to those revisions, it was better to be at the table than on it. Progressive Jews helped redraft a curriculum that included two sample lessons on the Jewish-American experience, along with testimonials about Jewishness from the likes of Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Dianne Feinstein.

A victory? One can still quarrel with the curriculum’s tendentiously racialized view of the American-Jewish experience. But at least the anti-Semitic and anti-Zionist dog whistles have been taken out and the history of anti-Semitism has been put in.

Yet as the Board of Education is set to vote on the new curriculum this month, it is likelier than before to enthrone ethnic studies, an older relative to critical race theory, into the largest public school system in the United States. This is a big deal in America’s ongoing culture wars. And it’s a bad deal for California’s students, at least for those whose school districts decide to make the curriculum their own.

What is “ethnic studies”? Contrary to first impressions, it is not multiculturalism. It is not a way of exploring, much less celebrating, America’s pluralistic society. It is an assault on it. “A multiculturalist framework that views our people through a colonialist lens is what literally led to the need for ethnic studies,” Sharif Zakout of the Arab Resource and Organizing Center told a state Education Department panel last year.

Ethnic studies is less an academic discipline than it is the recruiting arm of a radical ideological movement masquerading as mainstream pedagogy. From the opening pages of the model curriculum, students are expected not just to “challenge racist, bigoted, discriminatory, imperialist/colonial beliefs,” but to “critique empire-building in history” and “connect ourselves to past and contemporary social movements that struggle for social justice.”

That would be fine if it appeared in the pages of, say, The Nation. It would be fine, too, if students were exposed to critical race theory the way they might be exposed to Marxist philosophy or some other ideology — as a subject to be examined, not a lens through which to do the examining. The former is education. The latter is indoctrination. The ethnic studies curriculum conceals the difference.

It also does so in a uniquely lopsided way. “Ethnic studies is for all students,” the curriculum announces. Actually, not so much. Irish-Americans have faced a long history of discrimination in the U.S. and are famously proud of their heritage. But the word “Irish” hardly appears anywhere in the model curriculum, and nowhere in its sample lessons. Russians, Italians, Poles and others rate only the briefest mentions.

Perhaps this is because all of them, like most Jews, have a new identity, known in the jargon of ethnic studies as “conditional whiteness,” which simultaneously erases their past and racializes their present. Leave aside the ignorance this fosters regarding the long history of differences, struggles and achievements by various European ethnic groups in America. It’s also the mirror image of longstanding prejudices regarding “Asians” or “Hispanics” as ethnically undifferentiated masses of mainly identical people.

When the main thing left-wing progressives see about America is its allegedly oppressive systems of ethnicity or color, they aren’t seeing America at all. Nor should they be surprised when right-wing reactionaries adopt a perverse version of their views. To treat “whiteness” — conditional or otherwise — not as an accident of pigmentation but as an ethnicity unto itself is what the David Dukes of the world have always wanted.

It shouldn’t be like this. Public education is supposed to create a sense of common citizenship while cultivating the habits of independent thinking. This is a curriculum that magnifies differences, encourages tribal loyalties and advances ideological groupthink.

Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/09/opinion/californias-ethnic-studies.html

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Immigrant Minorities in Canada at Higher Risk for PTSD

2021/03/10 Leave a comment

Of note:

Immigrant minority groups had higher rates of PTSD than both Canada-born minorities and white immigrants. Socioeconomic status, health, and nutrition also played a role according to a study published in Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology.

The researchers used data from the Canadian Longitudinal Study on Aging (CLSA), which includes Canadians age 45-85. A random selection of participants were invited to participate. More than 30,000 adults participated. Researchers assessed PTSD, ethnicity, immigration status, demographic information, health status, and nutrition information.

PTSD prevalence among minority immigrants (7.5%) was more than double that of white immigrants (3.6%, p < 0.001), and about 50% higher than Canada-born whites (5.6%, p = 0.008). Prevalence did not differ significantly between immigrant and Canada-born minority members (4.9%, p = 0.19). Researchers attribute this to the small sample size of the latter.

Looking at demographic and socioeconomic variables, adults age 45-55, those who earned less than C$100,000 per year, and those who were widowed, divorced, or separated had higher odds of PTSD. Participants who reported at least 2 health conditions, who had chronic pain, who smoked, and who had a low waist-to-height ratio had higher odds of PTSD.

Adults who consumed fiber-rich foods less than 3 times a day had lower rates of PTSD than adults who consumed only 1 source of fiber. Adults who ate a lot of pastries and chocolate also had higher rates of PTSD than their non-sweets-eating counterparts.

The study was limited by a sample size restricted to those aged 55 and over and cross-sectional data. Information about traumatic experiences which may have caused PTSD was not available.

“This investigation provides important insights for policy and program development to mitigate PTSD among mid-age and older adults, particularly for marginalized groups such as visible minority immigrants,” the researchers concluded. “Future investigations that use estimate models such as these as well as longitudinal analyses may better inform mental health practice and policies to both prevent and treat PTSD.”

Reference

Davison KM, Hyland CE, West ML, et al. Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in mid-age and older adults differs by immigrant status and ethnicity, nutrition, and other determinants of health in the Canadian Longitudinal Study on Aging (CLSA). Soc Psychiatry Psychiatr Epidemiol. Published online February 3, 2021. doi:10.1007/s00127-020-02003-7

Source: Immigrant Minorities in Canada at Higher Risk for PTSD

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Ryerson School of Journalism leaders step down amid calls to address racism

2021/03/10 Leave a comment

The “woke brigade” at work. Lasting change takes time:

The heads of a prestigious journalism program at a Toronto university have stepped down amid calls for sweeping changes at the school to address systemic racism and discrimination.

Janice Neil, the chair of the Ryerson School of Journalism, and Lisa Taylor, associate chair and the school’s undergraduate program director, resigned on Sunday.

Both noted in their resignation letters that they had worked to address issues of systemic racism and discrimination at the school during their years as leaders.

On Monday morning, Ryerson journalism students issued a public letter accusing the school of failing to represent and support Black, Indigenous, people of colour and LGBTQ students in the program.

The letter said the school has contributed to an unsafe learning environment rife with discrimination that has left students traumatized.

In an email to The Canadian Press on Monday evening, Neil said that under her leadership, the school had increased diversity of the teaching faculty, introduced new courses about reporting on race, Indigenous issues and the LGBTQ community, and offered mental health supports for students.

But Neil also acknowledged that many students think change has not come fast enough or is broad enough to make an impact,.

“One of the things I’ve learned as a leader is to recognize when It’s time for a major reset and that time is now,” she wrote. “To get to the next level will require different leadership.”

In her resignation letter, Lisa Taylor explained her reason for stepping down.

“Some students don’t believe that I’m in their corner, which means they may not turn to me if they’re in need, and having an undergraduate program director who is a trusted resource for only some students is truly inequitable,” she wrote.

A spokeswoman for Ryerson said the school “continues to acknowledge the work that needs to be done to address systemic racism” and will continue to take concrete steps to address the students’ concerns.

Source: Ryerson School of Journalism leaders step down amid calls to address racism

Filed under Multiculturalism, Racism Tagged with

Are We Ready for a Novel Narrated by a Terrorist? – The Daily Beast

2021/03/10 Leave a comment

Similar but different to The Reluctant Fundamentalist:

Would you read a book in which the protagonist is a radicalized terrorist?

This is the premise of Khalil, a novel by Algerian-born, France-based author Yasmina Khadra. When it was first published in France in 2018, there was a certain reticence towards the book. “Frankly, what interest is there in finding yourself in the mind of one of the perpetrators of the attacks of November 13, 2015 in Paris?” a cultural critic in French newspaper Libération bluntly queried. “Khadra’s new novel provokes an impulse to retreat: don’t want to read it, don’t want to check it out.”

And yet, the reviewer concluded just as firmly: “Such prejudices show that the author was right to write his book.”

The desire to dismiss rather than deconstruct dangerous figures is, in a way, its own danger. Their unfathomable and unconscionable actions shape our anarchic society; avoidance doesn’t eradicate their presence or power. Nor does an engagement with their narrative validate what they do. Confronting our malaise around these figures helps identify how the past has metastasized into the present moment.

Khadra wrote the first part of the novel less than a month after the November 2015 attacks in Paris; he then took more than a year to resume the narrative. He was already well acquainted with the phenomenon of extremism: “I fought fundamentalist terrorism for eight years. In Algeria, the horror was daily,” Khadra recounted, via email, of his military role during the Algerian civil war. (Yasmina Khadra is a pen name he began using in 1990 to avoid military censorship; his given name is Mohammed Moulessehoul.) “I thought I had seen it all, that I was immune to the atrocity, yet each attack that occurs anywhere on earth brings me back to the barbarism that almost took over my country.”

Khalil is narrated by a 23-year-old first-generation Belgian from a Moroccan family. The reader first encounters him in a car full of men driving from Belgium to Paris, intending to blow up the Stade de France while a soccer match is in progress. Khalil—accompanied by Driss, his childhood friend and also-radicalized compatriot—is dispatched to set off a bomb on the RER, the train connecting central Paris to the banlieue. It is Khalil’s first time setting foot in the French capital.

“Khalil is not the ‘hero.’ He is the main character,” the author said. “It’s not the same thing. The use of the first person is a pedagogical choice. I wanted the terrorist to confide fully in the reader, without an intermediary. The immediate proximity makes it more explicit. It is a total immersion in the absurd world of murderous ideologies.”

When his explosive vest does not go off, Khalil flees the chaos that ensues. He is not relieved to be alive—he is furious he didn’t get to carry out his radicalized apotheosis. Unsure of what to do next, he slinks back to Brussels, avoiding people he knows in Molenbeek, the disenfranchised neighborhood he grew up in and which qualifies as a “mass of misfortune and submission.” He skulks around kebab shops, in public parks, imposing himself at his older sister’s apartment, lying his way into a childhood friend’s place, while he frantically seeks an explanation about his failed equipment.

The shock of the attacks in Paris reverberates back to Belgium and changes security measures immediately: bags searched, identity papers checked, ethnic profiling at an all-time high. Yet Khalil is less worried about the authorities than that the members of the Fraternal Solidarity might think he chickened out.

When it turns out his Paris-based cousin died in the attack on Le Bataclan—the concert venue targeted the same night as the Stade de France, an unthinkable massacre—it shakes not one iota of empathy loose. Khalil espouses nihilistically: “When you’ve chosen to sacrifice yourself for a cause, everything that has to do with life loses its importance.” He shrugs: “Whether you die for your convictions or because you were in the wrong place at the wrong time changes nothing… Such are the whims of destiny.”

Khalil encounters people from his past—his older sister, his twin sister, his childhood friend—yet one of the most telling moments in the novel is a conversation Khalil passively overhears between a group of young North Africans, heatedly discussing the Paris attacks and the effects seeping into Brussels. (Their dialogue is, unfortunately, awkwardly translated… the word choices are distractingly out of step with the slang actual young people would use.) They parse the omnipresent cops, the heightened suspicions, the collective feeling of hchouma, or shame, but also the resistance to feeling this, given that there is no link between Muslims and those twisting the religion into fanatical perversions. One man finds it only natural for ethnicities to be singled out; another retorts that extremist ideology should have no bearing on peaceful Muslims, let alone non-practicing ones. Someone pipes up that the violence is a natural progression of cultural exclusion: that Belgians—born and raised—with immigrant roots are unceasingly treated like unwelcome outsiders.

Khalil falls back in with members of the Fraternal Solidarity and is given a new mission. He is enthusiastic to deliver it, until a brush with grief rattles his convictions. Khadra concludes Khalil with—for this incredulous reader—an inauthentic attempt at redemption. Ultimately, where the author succeeds most is in addressing the statelessness many first generations feel, in which neither conformity nor diversity is rewarded. The systemic contempt of these communities erodes any possibility of hope, and this is a form of violence too.

Filed under Multiculturalism, Radicalization Tagged with , ,

More than 520 plaintiffs now part of Black public servants’ $900-million class-action lawsuit against government, as feds enlist Bay Street law firm

2021/03/09 Leave a comment

The disaggregated data that we have for the past three years (employment equity reports including hiring and promotion data, public service employee survey) along with PSC analysis of staffing process stages on employment equity results is not supportive of the proposed suit.

The large number of claimants, on the other hand, provides large-scale anecdotal evidence. (For my overall analysis, see Public Service Disaggregated Data for Visible Minorities and Indigenous peoples, Citizenship status):

More than 520 current and former Black federal public servants are now part of a $900-million class-action lawsuit that is alleging decades-long government discrimination, lack of advancement opportunities, and harassment. Three months ago, there were 12 representative plaintiffs.

After three months of waiting to hear from Ottawa, the suit’s leading lawyer says the government has decided to enlist a Bay Street law firm to fight the action despite the fact that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau (Papineau, Que.) has publicly admitted that racism and discrimination exists across public-sector institutions.

Courtney Betty, the lawyer leading the class action, has called his experience over the last three months and the steady influx of new plaintiffs “an incredible journey and nothing that I had expected.”

“I think that every day, we’re having new plaintiffs register and new individuals calling in asking how they can become class members,” said Mr. Betty, a former Crown attorney at the Department of Justice.

The class action started receiving a “flood” of call from elderly individuals who have retired from government departments and agencies, something which Mr. Betty called a “game-changer.”

“When we started getting people that were 74, 78 years old, it was like an atomic explosion, because it really brought to the forefront so many things that we had not been aware of,” said Mr. Betty. “It’s like unearthing this tremendous pool of pain and trauma.”

Filed on Dec. 2, 2020, the class proceeding includes plaintiffs from a wide range of government departments and agencies, including the Canada Revenue Agency, Employment and Social Development Canada, Corrections Canada, the Department of National Defence, and the RCMP.

Many of the experiences of members delineated in the class action centre on their lack of promotions within the federal public service after many years on the job, with the suit alleging that the Employment Equity Act has “failed in its goals and mandate to Black employees,” as it “fails to break down the category of visible minorities and thus ignores the unique, invisible and systemic racism faced by Black employees relative to other disadvantaged groups that are covered by the categories established by the Act.”

The class proceeding has now been filed, is before the court, and the government has been served, according to Mr. Betty.

“We wanted the government to have 90 days to come to the table, accept our offer, to meet with Black employee representatives, to meet with the union representatives, and figure out if there is a way of taking this to mediation and arbitration,” said Mr. Betty. “It just seemed like the natural thing to do.”

At the eleventh hour, the government informed the legal team that it had retained a Bay Street law firm, sending a signal they were intending to fight the litigation, said Mr. Betty.

“We’re now getting geared up on the premise that the government is prepared to have these individuals relive their horror, and tell their stories,” said Mr. Betty. “It’s a game changer for us in terms of how we approach it, and so we’re definitely now in a a position where we’re going to aggressively put forward our case.”

Mr. Betty said he’s “the guy who has spent my entire life waving the Canadian flag, I’m the guy who loves this country more than most Canadians do.”

“And now I’m in a situation where I recognize the government has been committing behaviour, that in many ways, [with] the pain and suffering that these individuals are feeling, is a form of atrocity that’s been committed against them,” said Mr. Betty. “And I know that’s a strong word.”

In a Dec. 4, 2020 press release, the Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC), Canada’s largest federal public service union, indicated its support for the legal action, with union president Chris Aylward telling The Hill Times that “Canada’s public service presents itself as a ‘merit-based, representative and non-partisan organization that serves all Canadians.’”

“While laudable as a principle, many Canadians, particularly Black Canadians, have experienced a different reality. The government must do what is necessary to right these wrongs and ensure that these injustices do not continue,” wrote Mr. Aylward.

According to a joint response from the Department of Justice and the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat, the proposed class-action brought on behalf of Black employees in the Public Service of Canada was issued by the Federal Court on Dec. 2, 2020. The statement of claim was received by Canada and the proposed class-action is not certified.

“As part of the class-action process, the parties may proceed to schedule a motion for the court to determine whether to certify the action,” according to the statement. “No motion has yet been scheduled. “

Counsel for the Attorney General of Canada was in communication with counsel for the proposed class and advised Mr. Betty that outside counsel would be appointed, according to the statement.

“Counsel from Fasken Martineau DuMoulin LLP reached out to plaintiffs’ counsel in February to indicate that they will be representing the government’s interests in the two class proceedings and to discuss next steps,” according to the statement. “No schedule has been set for the government to set out its position on the lawsuit.”

According to the government, counsel for Canada has not received a request from counsel for the proposed class to enter into mediation with respect to this class action.

“Any future request would be given consideration,” according to the government. “As this complex proposed class action is in its early stages, it is otherwise premature to comment on the litigation at this point.”

The joint statement added that “systemic racism and discrimination is a painful lived reality for Black Canadians, racialized Canadians and Indigenous people,” that the government has taken steps to address anti-Black racism, systemic discrimination and injustice across the country, and that $12-million over three years has been committed towards a dedicated Centre on Diversity and Inclusion in the Federal Public Service.

“In September, the Speech from the Throne announced an action plan to increase representation and leadership development within the public service,” according to the statement. “Early in its mandate, the government also reflected its commitment in mandate letters, in the establishment of an Anti-Racism Strategy and Secretariat, in the appointment of a Minister of Diversity and Inclusion and Youth, and in the creation of the Office for Public Service Accessibility.”

“As this matter is currently before the courts, the Treasury Board Secretariat cannot comment on this suit at this time.”

NDP MP Matthew Green (Hamilton Centre, Ont.) told The Hill Times that he believes the government has retained a law firm in an attempt to “use the infinite resources of the government to ensure Black workers in the public sector never have a fair day in court.”

“They’re going to lawyer up, they’re going to drag it out, and they’re going to try to bleed the class action support dry,” said Mr. Green last week.

Mr. Green said he believes this government does an actuarial risk assessment “both politically and financially.”

“I think on one side, you have a scenario in which they know they’re wrong, that many in the processes they claim to put in place around equity, diversity and inclusion under the guise of [Gender Based Analysis Plus], the language that the government uses, actually does not have the outcomes in which they purport to have.”

“We’ve now had decades of anti-Black racism, which will be in the most contemporary terms, validated in these toxic workplace cultures that have essentially left out a sub-segment of their workers in ways that they can point to as being quantifiable,” said Mr. Green.

Any worker, more especially marginalized workers, deserve to have basic workplace fairness, said Mr. Green.

“You could imagine working somewhere for 20 or 30 years and only ever being promoted one or two pay grades above your entry level while seeing your co-workers go on to become senior management and fully pensioned,” said Mr. Green. “The opportunity cost lost for these Black workers is immense, so on one hand you have a government that knows that and recognizes the burden of their financial obligation, while simultaneously doing the risk analysis politically on whether or not stifling these workers is going to result in votes lost for their future political gains.”

Mr. Green said that when this government felt it most politically expedient to take up the cause of the Black Lives Matter movement, it politicized it for their own partisan gain and for the branding exercise of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau (Papineau, Que.) to take a knee in that moment, alluding to the June 5 “No Peace Until Justice” march on Parliament Hill to protest racism, police brutality, and systemic discrimination in Canada and around the world.

“[To] not stand for the thousands of Black workers who are past and present impacted by anti-Black racism within the public sector says everything you need to know about this government,” said Mr. Green. “They’re all about identity politics, without any commitment to justice, and that is a very cynical way to treat people.”

“I won’t mince words—it’s performative, and when push comes to shove, Justin Trudeau and this Liberal government are nowhere to be found in tackling things that are well within their power,” said Mr. Green.

“We’re not asking them to solve racism in Canada, we’re telling them they have a responsibility to Black workers within the public service that they are ignoring and in fact, in this case, continuing to uphold in perpetuity, that they are upholding anti-Blackness by not mediating with this group in good faith,” said Mr. Green.

‘37 years stuck at one level’

Caroline Layne, one of hundreds of plaintiffs now part of the class-action lawsuit, said she started as a temporary employee as a telecommunications clerk with the RCMP in 1982, and spent 37 years with the RCMP before retiring in 2009. Ms. Layne said she spent 37 years stuck at one level and was never promoted.

“People say to me, ‘You worked with the government, you must have a good pension,’” said Ms. Layne in an interview with The Hill Times.

“But I don’t, because I was never able to move up the ladder,” said Ms. Layne. “The thing is, for an honest day’s work, you should get an honest day’s pay.”

Outlining some of her experiences during her many years with the RCMP, including acts of both indirect and overt racism from co-workers, members of the public and sometimes from superiors, Ms. Layne said there was never anyone to turn to or to relate her story.

“Everybody turned a deaf ear,” said Ms. Layne.

“People would come to the front desk and almost want to throw me out, and I would just have to take it on the chin,” said Ms. Layne. “I had to take it and just smile.”

When a police officer takes on a post, they should take it on “because of who they are, because they are there for society, and there to help each individual, Black, brown or white,” said Ms. Layne. “When I went to the RCMP, I took an oath as a public servant.”

Another plaintiff in the class action, Carol Sip, spent 26 years in the federal public service, starting in the Department of National Defence in 1974 before retiring in 2000.

“There was not much room for promotion, so I decided to apply elsewhere,” said Ms. Sip at the beginning of an emotional interview with The Hill Times.

Looking for a permanent position, Ms. Sip applied to the now defunct Canada Customs and Revenue Agency (known today as the Canada Border Services Agency), as well as to Gateway postal services, alluding to the Canada Post facility in Mississauga.

“I chose Customs, thinking I’ll have a better chance of promotion there,” said Ms. Sip. “But I was wrong.”

The former federal public servant, who would end up spending the vast majority of her career with the agency, said she joined the class-action lawsuit because the lack of opportunities for promotion throughout her career affected her mental health and well-being, and found herself looking for part-time work to subsidize her income, ending up working very difficult hours.

“Now, instead of the government taking responsibility, protecting me, and addressing the matter, they hire a Bay Street law firm to inflict more pain and suffering,” said Ms. Sip. “The victims always suffer.”

Ms. Sip said she initially didn’t want to come forward with her story.

“But then I think about the younger generation and if this would make a difference,” said Ms. Sip.

Erica Ifill, a policy analyst at Innovation, Science, and Economic Development Canada (ISED) who has been with the department since Feb. 2019 and is currently on sick leave, recently penned a piece for The Hill Times in her regular column called “An open letter to federal Black employees,” where she outlined her experience being “harassed, bullied and surveilled for most of my time at the department” where she was “denied development opportunities and promotions.”

Ms. Ifill also wrote that when she tried to seek redress through the internal processes, “again I was refused any meaningful action.”

When asked if she believed the emergence of this lawsuit and the continued growth of the number of plaintiffs involved will send a strong message to the federal public service in a follow-up interview with The Hill Times last week, Ms. Ifill was not optimistic.

“[The public service] exists on a plane that is divorced from reality,” said Ms. Ifill. “Their ability to assess risk is very skewed—they get to where they are by badly assessing risk.”

“I don’t have any faith in them, I think they’re going to have to be forced to do the right thing,” said Ms. Ifill, who is also a member of the Federal Black Employee Caucus.

Although not yet a part of the class-action suit, Ms. Ifill said she’s considering it and that she’s currently in talks with representatives.

Riyadh Nazerally, a spokesperson with ISED, said “the public service has long made diversity and inclusion in its workforce a core value, and there has been steady progress over the past decade, but many gaps remain,” in an emailed statement to The Hill Times. “In particular, the lack of diversity in leadership roles across the public service has been persistent and must be addressed.”

“At ISED, we have started a dialogue and we are listening. We are learning from lived experience through ongoing employee consultation and safe space discussions,” added Mr. Nazerally, who also pointed to the creation of a Diversity and Inclusion Taskforce focused on identifying and implementing specific diversity and inclusion measures.

“We are actively consulting with employees on a plan to identify meaningful actions in order to build a more diversified workforce. One of our objectives is to remove biases and systemic barriers. We are committed to addressing and dismantling structural and systemic racism and discrimination, while also ensuring that our workplace is free of harassment.”

“For privacy reasons, we cannot comment or discuss specific employee matters,” wrote Mr. Nazerally.

‘Persistent threat to our national security’

Huda Mukbil, a former senior intelligence officer with the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) and a national security expert, is not a plaintiff in the Black class-action lawsuit, but she told The Hill Times that she is helping the team and hoping to become more involved in the future.

“The reason I feel passionate about this, is because I feel that it is a persistent threat to our national security,” said Ms. Mukbil, who began her career at CSIS in 2001 and was the first Arab woman and one of very few black women at the agency.

“I was well received for a very long time, about three years, and then what can I say—I encountered systemic issues,” said Ms. Mukbil, who went on to outline discrimination she would face throughout her career.

“The biggest problem is that it’s left up to individuals to fight the discrimination and the harassment and the microaggressions and the lack of career progression—the whole thing is left up to an individual,” said Ms. Mukbil. “There’s a risk obviously—you’re looking at one individual trying to take on a system.”

What’s coming out as a function of this lawsuit is “really the tip of the iceberg,” said Ms. Mukbil.

“There is so much going on, there’s so much damage that’s happening to so many people’s lives, and what we’re seeing now is just horrible,” said Ms. Mukbil.

‘This lawsuit will force the public service to look deeply inside its structure’

Although former senator Don Oliver was unavailable for an interview last week, he has spent decades fighting against systemic racism within the public service, and told The Hill Times in December 2020 that he was supportive of the lawsuit and the effect it would have on structures within the bureaucracy.

“The lawsuit will force the public service to look deeply inside its structure and systems to find ways to eradicate white privilege in performance evaluations and all other known forms of systemic black racism,” wrote the retired Senator in a message to The Hill Times shortly after the lawsuit was first launched. “It must start with some profound personal soul searching that will require all white managers to learn to accept some uncomfortable truths.”

And as the establishment of any new government department is ultimately directed by the PMO, according to the former Senator, the clerk of the Privy Council and all deputy ministers in the public service would have to fall in line.

In a piece that ran in The Globe and Mail on March 1 following Black History Month, Sen. Oliver wrote that deputy ministers in government “can speed up the internal cleansing and make meaningful change” by, among other practices, ensuring that no barriers exist to prevent Black employees from advancing, implementing or expanding unconscious bias and anti-racism education, sharing best—and unsuccessful—practices, working with members of the Black community, and creating the conditions for success.

“The defining test of systemic racism in Canada is when I no longer have to somehow prove that I, as a Black Canadian, am worthy to participate in and enjoy all the fruits, benefits and perks of daily living that have been bestowed on the white majority by virtue of their privilege,” wrote the former Senator, who served in the Red Chamber from 1990 to 2003.

When asked for comment, the Prime Minister’s Office referred The Hill Times back to the Treasury Board.

Source: More than 520 plaintiffs now part of Black public servants’ $900-million class-action lawsuit against government, as feds enlist Bay Street law firm

Filed under Multiculturalism, Racism Tagged with , , , , , ,

York school board releases its strategy to combat anti-Black racism and end a culture of low expectations and ‘throwaway kids’

2021/03/09 Leave a comment

Will be interesting to assess the impact on student outcomes in a number of years and what measures were particularly effective:

It’s the stories. It’s the stories that sit within, and heave out come time to seek justice, that make a difference. 

Stories that have been discounted for centuries, but have become unignorable since decades of data — statistical, academic and visual — have rapidly piled up. Today only the most wilfully ignorant would deny the existence of deeply rooted anti-Black racism — itself a term coined by Ryerson social work professor Akua Benjamin.

It’s those stories, the experiences of Black families in the school system, that sit at the root of a report by the York Region District School Board (YRDSB) being released Monday.

The two-part Dismantling Anti-Black Racism Strategy is a five-year strategic plan built in collaboration with staff, parents, trustees, community organization and students. In all, about 800 people contributed to the creation of the strategy, which the YRDSB calls the first of its kind by a Canadian school board.

While many boards have equity plans and activities on anti-Black racism,“the power of this (strategy) is making sure there’s some coherence to those activities,” said Tana Turner, an adjunct professor in the faculty of education at York University, who authored it. It builds on the board’s existing equity plans and spells out priorities, action items and an accountability framework.

That last point is urgent. It is also where community skepticism resides. It’s easy for leaders to sign on to anti-racist ideas. The racist barriers are usually erected when it comes to carrying them out. No surprise, then, that everyone who was involved in the creation of this report cited bold leadership as the No. 1 step to accountability. 

“The leadership has to be truly on board, understand what’s at stake and has to lead by example,” said Claudette Rutherford, a parent and teacher at the board. “Are you championing for racial justice when nobody is looking?” 

Two years ago, Rutherford put out an email to parents of Black children, saying, “If you’re worried about your kids in this system, let’s talk.” It was an emotional meeting. They had their own stories, they heard others’.

A desire to take the discussions beyond venting led to her co-founding Parents of Black Children (PoBC) with Charline Grant and Kearie Daniel, both known firebrands. They found strong, talented teachers — Black and non-Black — who said they were too afraid to put their names as board members, that they worried about the repercussions for their careers. 

“I understand it, no judgment,” Rutherford said. But it made the co-founders wonder: “Who is going to put themselves on the line for our children? Nobody but the mothers, right? It sits deep within me.” 

Turner said this lack of safety for anti-racist teachers is true across school boards. In her decades of doing equity and census audits in Ontario school boards and public sector organizations, she found, “In a lot of these boards, it’s safer to be racist than to be anti-racist. You can lose your job for sticking up for Black children.”

In school, teachers are the most important contributors to student achievement. But what to do if they themselves are biased or racially illiterate? When studies show they are more likely to read Black faces as angry even when they’re not, Black boys’ misbehaviours as more hostile than those of white boys, Black girls as less innocent and more adult-like than their white peers? 

Parents echoed what has been said in other boards. “Teachers look through Black students,” is one quote in the report. They said their children were seen as “throwaway kids” not worthy of being taught. 

When one of Rutherford’s children had applied for an academic course, she received an email from staff at the new school (who had never met him) saying they were worried he couldn’t manage. “I had to get his white principal to write a note on my behalf.”

Consultants heard Black children were called the N-word as early as in Grade 1, or slaves by classmates because their teachers had singularly focused on slavery during Black History Month while ignoring contributions of Black Canadians. 

Equally troublesome was that teachers and principals often treated these situations as interpersonal conflicts, holding both children culpable if the Black child responded verbally or physically. 

This is why one of the action plans is for the board to increase the racial literacy of all staff and students, create a protocol to help them identify racist and other inappropriate acts, and guide them with steps that students, parents and staff can take to have them addressed. “We need to equip teachers and make a difference in those classrooms,” Turner said. 

The Parents of Black Children group is separately collecting these experiences from staff, which Rutherford says will be analyzed by a volunteer researcher. 

At the board, a major part of the accountability process is bringing community eyes on the process, with plans to give the steering committee regular updates on how the strategy is being implemented. Strategies are to be adjusted based on their feedback and response to data being collected.

“What was excellent about this whole process is you had various Black community members and organizations working together, speaking about the problems and wanting to be part of the solution, to be part of the change,” said Elizabeth Turner, York school board trustee and one of the 22 working-group members who helped develop the strategy.

“This framework is designed to hold the YRDSB accountable not only for implementing the actions … but also for creating better outcomes for Black students,” the report says.

These include better academic outcomes and greater well-being of Black students in learning environments that not only protect them from the trauma of anti-Black racism but also affirm their identities. 

“The issue of Black underachievement is the most pervasive and unacknowledged in the education system,” said Cecil Roach, a superintendent of equity at the board. “You can’t have 50 years of Black kids not graduating at the same level as everyone else.”

The trouble is how to convince the naysayers? Naysayers are often not people who say anti-Black racism doesn’t exist. They’re ones who look at the disparities of student outcomes and blame Black students and their families for it. Up to a point, this can be blamed on racial illiteracy. Beyond that it’s about racist attitudes towards Black people. 

“If you don’t understand the system, you’re blaming the marginalized people for their marginalization,” Turner said. “These teachers haven’t been taught. They don’t know.”

Roach, too, insists on optimism on that score. “Teachers want to do well by kids as long as we give the proper intervention.”

Not that he has a choice. Other than hoping interventions move people to see the light, what hope of change can anyone have? 

Consultations with the York school community showed that even cheerful events can deepen Black students’ isolation. On Crazy Hair Day, for instance, “It’s white kids putting their hair in braids, using baubles Black kids put in their hair … and you’re calling them crazy?” Turner said. Or the only Black kid in class gets left out on Twin Day.

In addition there is the well-known fact of criminalization of children, the so-called school-to-prison pipeline. “For many students, school discipline can lead to their first contact with the criminal justice system,” the report reads. Kids who drop out are eight times more likely to be incarcerated than a youth who has graduated from high school. 

Rutherford remembers once receiving sensitive information about a Black family going through a transition after the father lost his job. Another educator heard the same story and called in Children’s Aid. Why?

Rutherford sees other supports that could have been put in place. Maybe the school could have called the father and offered to get housing. “What is it about Black families that makes you want to penalize rather than support?” she asked. 

If he had to choose just one outcome, Roach would want to see Black graduation rates shoot up. “I want to see Black kids at age 16 have 16 credits.” But that’s not a goal that can operate in isolation, he said. 

“We already know what to do. The question is do we want to do it? It’s one thing to accept the disparity is there. It’s another thing to care about it.”

It’s a given that supporting the most marginalized students supports all students. 

“Ultimately we want an education where our kids flourish,” Rutherford said. “We want our children to feel nurtured and welcome and deserving of safe educational spaces. We don’t want more than what other parents want. Our children deserve that.”

Source: https://www.thestar.com/opinion/star-columnists/2021/03/08/york-school-board-releases-its-strategy-to-combat-anti-black-racism-and-end-a-culture-of-low-expectations-and-throwaway-kids.html

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