Foreign workers face a lack of safe conditions, abuse and exploitation: Ethnic and mainstream media coverage

2021/01/11 Leave a comment

Useful summary of ethnic media coverage and contrast with mainstream media:

Temporary foreign workers and undocumented migrants have been one of the most affected groups during the pandemic, as covered by ethnic media from May to December. “The fact that in 2020, people are dying on farms in Ontario in one of the richest and most socially and technologically advanced countries in the world, Canada, is truly cause for reflection,” an Italian outlet wrote in early July, after multiple reports of COVID-19 outbreaks at farms employing seasonal workers from Latin America and the Caribbean, and deaths of three Mexican workers.

Outlets carried stories by migrants who said they were forced to start working right after arrival (without the 14-day quarantine) or had to quarantine in rooms that had no food or inadequate space to allow for physical distancing. The Migrant Workers Alliance for Change was cited as saying that it had received complaints from more than 1,000 people that their working and living conditions were crowded, they were unable to maintain the two-metre distance and lacked personal protection supplies.

One of the prominent cases was that of a Mexican farm worker, Gabriel Flores, who won compensation from his employer, Scotlynn Farms, in front of the Ontario Labour Relations Board. Flores sued Scotlynn Farms after he had been fired for speaking to the media about insufficient protection at the facility, where almost 200 workers had gotten infected with COVID-19.

Live-in care workers were shown to be highly vulnerable as well. A lot of media attention was devoted to a report titled “Behind Closed Doors: Exposing Migrant Care Worker Exploitation During COVID-19,” based on a survey of 201 migrant care workers and released in late October. The report showed that nearly half of the respondents were forced to work longer hours without being paid overtime. Two out of three workers said they weren’t allowed to leave the house, send money back home or even go to the doctor for fearing of breaking family quarantine bubbles.

What clearly transpired in ethnic media coverage was the fact that temporary foreign workers are the backbone of Canada’s food supply and many other essential sectors, but they are not getting basic rights protection.

In fact, as one Filipino outlet observed, Canada has depended on “cheap immigrant labour” from “Chinese railway workers to the Japanese fishermen, to South Asian farmers and loggers, to the Filipino overseas workers.”

Domestic work, health care and hospitality are all sectors that “capitalize on cheap female labour from the Global South,” wrote another, reporting a story of a Filipino woman who was separated from her son for five years as she was working in Kelowna, B.C., as a housekeeper at a hotel and as sanitation staff at a hospital. The pandemic has cost her and her husband their jobs at the hotel, and she still owes a substantial sum to an immigration agency.

“Guardian angels” of Quebec get pathway to permanent residency

Substantial coverage was given to the precarious status of many asylum seekers working or volunteering at long-term senior care homes and in other health-care settings in Quebec, including the price they have paid with their health.

These workers, whom Quebec Premier François Legault called “guardian angels,” are largely Haitians who came to Canada irregularly from the U.S. According to Montreal’s Haitian community advocate Ruth Pierre-Paul, cited in Caribbean media, hundreds of them have sought out jobs in long-term care homes as a quick way to enter the workforce.

After weeks of advocacy, media attention and petitions to the federal government, in August, Immigration Minister Marco Mendicino announced a pathway to permanent residency for asylum claimants working in health care during the pandemic. Several media outlets praised the move, but many also stressed that the program is closed to asylum seekers doing other essential jobs. This has left many people disappointed and triggered further protests.

International students treated like “cash cows”

International students have faced a lot of uncertainty, anxiety and financial pressure in the pandemic months, and ethnic media have covered these struggles closely. As reported, the main dilemma faced by students before the start of the new academic year was whether to attempt entering Canada at the risk of being turned back at the border (which happened to many) or stay in their home countries and study online.

Until October 20, only individuals with study permits issued before March 18 were able to travel to Canada, and solely for a “non-discretionary or non-optional purpose.” Other students were subject to a travel ban.

For students from China and India, who account for the bulk of international students in Canada, attending university online in their home countries has meant having to study at odd hours and cope with internet issues. As reported, students also missed exposure to local culture, which they thought might later affect their chances on the job market. Some consolation came with a July announcement that time spent studying online abroad would be counted toward a post-graduation work permit.

There has been no relief in terms of cost, however. Universities not only refused to give rebates to those studying online; some have even raised tuition fees for foreign students, prompting comments in ethnic media that international students were treated like “cash cows” by “shameless Canadian universities.”

International students already in Canada also struggled. According to Chinese outlets, many Chinese students decided to stay in the country despite classes going online, mostly because the flights were very expensive and hard to come by. They also did not want to risk being stranded back home. But with high costs of living, few summer job opportunities, almost no help from the federal government, and no social activities, students were reported to be feeling helpless, frustrated, anxious and homesick. 

Punjabi broadcast media noted that many students were under pressure to find work to support themselves and send money back to their families. Concerns were also expressed over “suicidal incidents among international students.”

Non-permanent residents in mainstream media coverage

Similar to the coverage offered in ethnic media, coverage by Toronto Star broadly reflected two major perspectives—conveying government policy and programs and also offering human interest stories reflecting the lived experiences of the newcomers, migrant workers, refugees and international students. 

The paper quite extensively explored how immigrants and newcomers to Canada have been affected by COVID-19 pandemic from the economic, social and health and well-being angles. Dozens of articles addressed the issue of temporary farm workers, highlighting their precarious situation as well as legal battles. Solid coverage was also devoted to refugees and asylum seekers and the processes related to their status, brought to readers’ attention via a number of human-interest stories.

The issues facing international students, whether stranded in Canada or overseas, also received attention. Among others, the Star carried discussion regarding tuition fees and opportunities for foreign students to change their status.

Among the Postmedia Network titles, the Windsor Star appeared to carry the most coverage relating to migrants and the pandemic — perhaps unsurprisingly, given that more than half of the local COVID-19- cases during the pandemic’s first wave were among the thousands of migrant workers employed in the agri-food sector in Southwestern Ontario’s Essex County. 

Another significant aspect of the coverage was the call on the government to create a new permanent residency program for migrant workers, including undocumented workers, in sectors facing labour shortages. Advocates were asking the government to allow migrant farm workers to apply for a 12-month open work permit that would maintain or regularize their status while their application for permanent residency was in process.

Insight from MIREMS media monitoring

“Ethnic media has been instrumental in reporting on and clarifying government policy, processes and programs. It has also documented the unique challenges different migrant constituencies face and has been part of successful lobbying efforts for concrete solutions,” summed up Silke Reichrath, Editor-in-Chief at MIREMS.

Of particular concern were temporary foreign workers, international students, asylum seekers, and undocumented workers.

In terms of immigration policy, a lot of coverage was devoted to the impact of COVID on immigration levels, border closures and travel restrictions, visa extensions for temporary residents stranded in Canada, work permit regulations, farm worker rights and COVID safety protocols, COVID-related accommodations for international students, modifications to the Express Entry draws, and the “guardian angel” program for front-line care providers. Ethnic media frequently aired interviews with immigration lawyers and consultants as well as with lawmakers.

Another concern reflected in the ethnic media has been around family reunification. The processing of spousal sponsorship cases has stalled, and ethnic media has reported repeatedly on protests organized to ask the government to resume processing sponsorships.

Methodology: This ethnic media analysis is based on a selection of 350 summaries of articles and broadcast segments in radio, TV, print and web sources between May and December, 2020. These summaries were selected from about 6,000 items on these issues found in 450 active ethnic media sources in Canada monitored by MIREMS.

Source: https://newcanadianmedia.ca/ethnic-media-highlight-exploitation-of-temporary-migrant-workers-troubles-of-international-students-during-pandemic/#ethnic-media

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Islamic scholars, activists call for ban on British film about prophet’s daughter

2021/01/11 Leave a comment

Parallel between this call and the similar call re Mel Gibson’s 2004 file The Passion of Christ. I remember similar controversies over Martin Scorcese’s 1988, The Last Temptation of Christ, and the appropriateness of the portrayal. The different element is the fear of increased Sunni Shia tensions:

Paksitani authorities banned Jan. 5 the release of the controversial British film “The Lady of Heaven.” They urged social media platforms to remove the trailer of the film.

The Pakistani ban has raised controversy in Egypt about this film. Similar to the Pakistani reaction, a number of social media activists, Al-Azhar scholars and sheikhs of the Salafist currents called for banning the screening of the film. They urged the issuance of fatwas prohibiting its viewing and sent official demands to the United Kingdom to stop showing it worldwide.

The film sparked controversy due to its portrayal of the character of Fatima al-Zahra, the daughter of the Prophet Muhammad and wife of Ali bin Abi Talib, the fourth and last of the rightly guided caliphs following the death of the prophet. On Jan. 2, several Egyptian and international newspapers reported that the film features the voice of the Prophet Muhammad as one of the storytellers of the film’s events.

Commenting on one of the news reports criticizing the film, Facebook user Ahmad Allam wrote, “They do not respect our faith or our sanctities, and when we get angry [and defend] our religion and our Messenger, they say we are terrorists.” Omar Hindawi wrote, “This film should be immediately banned,” while Mona Mahmoud wondered about Al-Azhar’s position on “this humiliation?”

Al-Azhar, Sunni Islam’s highest religious authority, issued a press statement Dec. 27 through its adviser Mohammed Mehanna, confirming the steadfastness of Al-Azhar’s position regarding the prohibition of the embodiment of the Prophet Muhammad, all prophets and the family members of the prophet (wives, daughters and sons). The statement asserted that the release of this film consecrates the continued disrespect by the West and some Shiite extremists for the sanctities and beliefs of others. 

Al-Azhar, however, did not announce any measures to try to ban the screening of the film, as demanded by social media activists.

Inquiring about the possibilities of banning the film in Egypt or launching any media campaigns to prevent it from showing in Egypt or abroad, Al-Monitor talked to a source in the Al-Azhar Sheikhdom. “Al-Azhar is not an authority that can ban or permit a film,” the source said on condition of anonymity. “It simply expresses the Sharia opinion regarding the prohibition of embodying the prophet and his family members. Al-Azhar leaders are not concerned with efforts to ban the film abroad and has nothing to do with the delay in its release.”

The film, directed by Elli King and written by Sheikh Yasser Al-Habib, was to be released in theaters Dec. 30, before it was postponed until 2021. No new date was scheduled for its release and the reasons for its postponement have not been disclosed. But some newspapers reckoned the delay came in light of the sharp criticism the film generated or because of the coronavirus pandemic.

A source from the Ministry of Culture told Al-Monitor on condition of anonymity that the Authority for Censorship of Artistic Works affiliated with the ministry is the authority competent to ban or allow the screening of a film when its distributors apply for a request for its release in Egypt. The source explained that the authority cannot decide to ban a film before watching it, adding that the opinion of Al-Azhar and religious institutions on the embodiment of the prophet will be taken into account in addition to the opinions of scholars, if the film falsely depicts or distorts established historical facts.

The Authority for Censorship of Artistic Works had banned the screening of “The Passion of the Christ” in 2004, and “Noah” and “The Exodus; Gods and Kings” in 2014, because they portray the characters of the prophets.

Several Egyptian newspapers, notably Soutalomma and Al-Wafd, accused in press reports Dec. 31 the film and its producers of Shiism and bias toward false stories about Zahra’s death. They said that the teaser of the film shows she was subjected to torture and physical assault causing her to have an abortion and to die at the hands of the Rightly Guided Caliphs who preceded Ali, namely Abu Bakr al-Siddiq, Omar bin Al-Khattab and Othman bin Affan.

But renowned film critic and writer of Arab cinema Tarek el-Shinnawy believes banning the film will create unnecessary momentum and buzz that may encourage Egyptians to watch it out of curiosity. “Sooner or later everyone will be able to watch it when it becomes available on the internet. It is better to allow its screening while holding, in tandem, historical and religious discussions to unveil its fallacies if it truly tells a historically questionable story.” 

The film’s events take place in two different times separated by nearly 1,400 years. It tells the story of an Iraqi child who lost his parents and was displaced by an armed Islamic State attack. The boy then moves to live with his grandmother, who tells him the story of Zahra, the first victim of terrorism in history from the Shiite perspective. The film then recounts the story of Zahra. 

Mohsen Qandil, a professor of Islamic history at Cairo University shares Shinnawi’s opinion. “Any serious discussion about the film would reveal the weakness of the Shiite narrative that contradicts the friendly relationship that Imam Ali had with the Rightly Guided Caliphs who preceded him, even after Zahra’s death. Imam Ali agreed to marry his daughter, Umm Kulthum, to Omar bin Al-Khattab and recommended him [bin Al-Khattab] as his successor.”

He added, “How can bin Khattab be one of Zahra’s killers, while he was on good terms with Imam Ali, her husband, after her death.”

Despite the film being accused of Shiism and promoting false or weak historical narratives, Iranian websites Ijtihad and Al-Alam reported that four Shiite religious authorities — Ayatollah Lotfollah Safi Golpaygan, Ayatollah Makarem Shirazi, Ayatollah Hossein Noori-Hamedani and Ayatollah Jaafar Subhani — labeled as haram any support or promotion for the film. The fatwas banned viewing it since it deepens the disagreement in the Islamic nation between Sunnis and Shiites. The Shiite authorities argued that fanning the flames of the inter-Muslim dispute is in the interest of those they described as the “enemies of Islam.”

Mohamed Abdel Halim, an Egyptian journalist specializing in religious affairs at the London-based news website Daqaeq, told Al-Monitor that showing the film at this time while Lebanon, Syria and Iraq are witnessing divisions between Sunnis and Shiites will exacerbate existing differences.

“In case this film is shown, Al-Azhar will be forced to refute the Shiite historical allegations. Al-Azhar has always tried to ignore these allegations so as not to worsen the division between Sunnis and Shiites,” Abdel Halim said. “This will abort the sheikhdom’s attempts for decades to achieve rapprochement and focus on what unites Sunnis and Shiites instead of focusing on points of contention, including the historical allegations about Zahra.”

Read more: https://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2021/01/egypt-al-azhar-ban-movie-prophet-daugher-sunni-shiite.html#ixzz6j8s7ef7l

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Most new Order of Canada appointees are white men, despite diversity-boosting efforts

2021/01/11 Leave a comment

For the full analysis, see my deck below:

Most of the new appointees to the Order of Canada in 2020 were white men, despite some progress made in boosting the diversity of the elite group.

Of the 175 people picked for the prestigious civilian honour last year, just over one third were women. About 7.4 per cent were members of visible minorities — up two per cent from the previous year –  and 5.1 per cent were Indigenous, according to analysis by immigration and diversity researcher and former government official Andrew Griffith.

Velma Morgan, chair of Operation Black Vote Canada, called those figures “extremely problematic.”

“We talk about diversity as our strength as Canadians. We advertise that to the world,” she said. “Yet this is not demonstrated when we’re trying to recognize those people who have made contributions to Canada.”

Morgan said institutions can’t expect to command broad public respect when they fail to represent the population.

“Black communities have been here for hundreds of years. So when we don’t see ourselves represented in one of the highest honours of the country, it says something — that we’re not being recognized for things that we have done and continue to be doing,” she said.

Morgan said stepping up outreach to underrepresented groups and enhancing public awareness about the program could help to address the longstanding imbalance. The makeup of the panel that reviews nominations should also better reflect the population, she said.

The Toronto Star reported last month that The BlackNorth Initiative — which pushes corporations to improve the diversity of their boardrooms and executive suites — has written a letter to Gov. Gen. Julie Payette complaining about the low number of Black Order of Canada recipients and has suggested the names of individuals who could be worthy of the honour.

The Order of Canada program relies on nominations from individuals or organizations, which are reviewed by an independent advisory council. That council makes appointment recommendations to the governor general, who accepts them according to convention.

Modernizing honours programs a ‘priority’

Rob McKinnon, a spokesperson for Rideau Hall, said modernizing all honours programs is one of Payette’s “key priorities.”

He said her office has taken steps to increase diversity, such as data collection on gender identity, disabilities and Indigenous and visible minority status through a self-identification questionnaire. The office also has launched communications strategies and social media campaigns meant to increase the number of people being nominated for civilian honours, he said.

“The best way to augment the representation of a merit-based public program like the Order of Canada is to increase the participation of Canadians [in] it, thereby generating a larger volume of diversified nominations,” McKinnon said in an email.

“In that spirit, Governor General Julie Payette has taken steps and asked her team to look at ways of increasing the public profile of all its honours programs and to make the nomination process as user-friendly as possible and easily accessible to all. Such improvements will lead to the recognition of individuals with more diverse backgrounds.”

McKinnon acknowledged that while progress is being made, it’s slow. He noted that while nominations of women to the Order of Canada have remained steady — about 200 per year since 2000, from a pool of 500 to 800 nominations each year — women nominated to the order now see a success rate of about 72 per cent, compared to 58 per cent for men.

Recognizing contributions to building Canada

Diversity consultant Chi Nguyen said the Order of Canada program has clung to a tradition of installing “upper crust” people selected by an elite group – and that must change.

“Often you’re tapping the people who look like you, who run in the same circles as you,” she said.

“So I think those numbers are increasing and they look better than they have in the past … but it still doesn’t recognize the other ways in which lots of newcomers, Indigenous folks are contributing to building our country.”

Griffith, who has tracked Order of Canada appointments since 2013, said while the trend line appears to be moving in the right direction, there is still much progress to be made.

“You want to make sure that the awards — to an extent, not a perfect extent — have that representation of the population,” he said. “Because it highlights that everybody can make a contribution. It highlights that all different aspects of Canadian society are getting some recognition.”

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Paradkar: Why calls to label white supremacists terrorists could backfire on their targets instead

2021/01/11 Leave a comment

Interesting discussion. Prefer white supremacists as more specific:

Any incident of mass violence throws up certain inevitable tensions in newsrooms. What to label the perpetrator? 

Until not so long ago, the news media uncritically ran with the labels that came from politicians who deferred to security agencies who in turn had a vested interest in the social narrative around the incident. This was why certain events were given certain designations and in short order began to be exclusively associated with certain identities.

Terrorist: Muslim, foreigners. Think al-Qaida or Islamic State types, but any visible Muslim could be perceived as being sympathetic to them.

Homegrown terrorist: Muslims, citizens of the West. (How were they radicalized despite growing up amid all this innocence?)

Gangs: Consisting of Black thugs, involved with drugs, guns.

Cartels: Latin Americans, narcotics.

White supremacists: Yahoos, poor, uneducated. And, during the reign of Donald Trump: Trumpists.

Notice the sleight of hand in that turn to elitism? How smoothly those terms take identity out of the picture and offer excuses instead.

It is no wonder then that people on the receiving end of unfair labels rebelled. Was that van driver a white terrorist? Was the mass shooting an act of white terrorism?

It’s an argument that has been renewed with vigour in the wake of white supremacists storming the U.S. Capitol building Wednesday in defiance of an election that kicked out their leader, and led to the question: are white supremacists terrorists?

On Thursday, U.S. president-elect Joe Biden called them “domestic terrorists” and said tackling domestic terrorism would now be a priority. Across the northern border, NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh launched a petition asking the prime minister to ban and designate the Proud Boys as a terrorist organization. “(Wednesday) was an act of domestic terrorism,” Singh tweeted. “The Proud Boys helped execute it. Their founder is Canadian. They operate in Canada, right now. And, I am calling for them to be designated as a terrorist organization, immediately.”

On the surface this appears like fairness in motion. It might explain why the petition got so much support that the website crashed.

White supremacists terrorize people, but consider the terrorist label through another lens. Whom will it actually penalize?

Harsha Walia is executive director of the British Columbia Civil Liberties Association. Voicing what she called “an unpopular opinion” on Twitter, she said: “Let me be clear that calling for the expansion (of terrorism designation) to white supremacists won’t work.” 

Walia, who has long been a community organizer supporting migrant communities and Indigenous land defenders, called laws around terrorism designation “fundamentally regressive,” and said, “I know anti-terror legal infrastructure is rotten by design.” 

That infrastructure includes tighter border controls in the name of national security. Traditionally, that has led to racial profiling at the borders, targeted at non-white people, especially those perceived as Muslims. Treating them as suspicious outsiders then leads to increased surveillance, which requires funding, which means increasing police budgets. 

The alienation legitimizes societal debates around criminalizing aspects of these “outsiders’” cultures, with policies such as banning articles of clothing (looking at you, Quebec) and legal tools such as security certificates to detain and deport foreigners and permanent residents the country deems a security threat. In a violation of the basic principles of justice, the government can deem someone suspicious based on secret evidence that even the accused cannot access. Detainees in Canada have been stuck in legal limbo for years.

As we saw from the blatant police inaction against political rioters Wednesday, our security apparatus is simply not equipped to racially profile the “yahoos.” Not when those yahoos included off-duty police officers and members of the military who flashed their badges and ID cards in an attempt to gain entry. Canadian Armed Forces and police forces already count among their members those with active ties to neo-Nazi and far-right groups. 

Even if our security agencies were equipped to do so, even if they were fine impartial defenders of public security who could identify domestic terrorists by sight, putting the shoe on the other foot is not the solution. We can’t claim to seek a world of dignified equality and actively seek to expand oppressive policies that will surely boomerang.

The “global war on terror and its ongoing aftermath must be dismantled, not bolstered,” Walia said.

Calling white supremacists terrorists and inviting stronger anti-terrorism measures will also likely criminalize legitimate protesters by turning them even more easily into peace disturbers and security threats.

“On the contrary, if we call them white supremacists, naming their movement as what it is, it demands a solution specific to that problem,” tweeted Lea Kayali, a digital communications manager at the American Civil Liberties Union. “Truth-telling. Reparations. Facing our history as a nation founded on white supremacy and dismantling it bit by bit.”

Source: https://www.thestar.com/opinion/star-columnists/2021/01/08/why-calls-to-label-white-supremacists-terrorists-could-backfire-on-their-targets-instead.html

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2020 brought ugly truths about inequity to the forefront — like how Ontario’s Medical Association still upholds structural racism

2021/01/09 Leave a comment

A bit of a meandering critique, ranging from the well-demonstrated disparities in health to the narrower focus on OMA fee structure for non-insured services. While one can argue the inequity aspects (like in so many areas, not convinced that this is necessarily structural racism:

2020 was an awakening in the ongoing struggle against inequity.

Race-based health inequities highlighted the persistence of structural racism in health care. The importance of diverse representation in medicine became glaringly obvious, and the need to address a status quo of inequality became more urgent. The Ontario Medical Association, a membership organization that ‘represents the political, clinical and economic interests’ of Ontario’s physicians’, from family doctors to specialists, is a powerful organization and a major government partner in administering health care. 

In response to the 2020 awakening, the OMA released a year end communication stating it is committed to enhancing “equity, diversity and inclusion across all facets of the organization” and to promoting those concepts “including their importance at the societal level.”

But this statement is contradicted by their own actions and policies of the last several years. 

Reconciliation, for example, is one of the most pressing matters of our time. Yet, in 2018, the OMA took a major step backward, as the Governing Council summarily defeated a motion submitted by the Ontario Medical Students Association requesting that OMA General Council Meetings open with an acknowledgment and reflection on relationships with Indigenous peoples in Canada. A shift in physician culture towards acknowledgment of Indigenous peoples rights is a fundamental step toward healing. Without this physicians will continue to operate in perpetual structures of racism and exclusion, and health care gaps will not close. 

The 2020 pandemic also revealed the intimate links between race, income and health. Research shows that 87 per cent of Indigenous adults in Toronto live below the Low Income Cut Off. Black, Indigenous and other People of Colour (BIPOC) people made up more than 83 per cent of first wave COVID infectionsin Toronto, and they continue to be over seven times more likely to contract COVID than White Torontonians. BIPOC communities are also more likely to live in multi-generational, inadequate or crowded housing. Overcrowded and unsafe factories, employment in health services or personal support or delivery jobs that ensure those with privilege can stay home, account for much of the high prevalence of COVID in these neighbourhoods.

The OMA continues to perpetuate rules and policies which disproportionately impact racialized communities. 

The OMA publishes the Physician’s Guide to Uninsured Services: a document that details fees that physicians can directly charge patients. Examples include transferring medical records, providing telephone advice, or phoning in prescriptions. 

This 52-page OMA compendium is a remarkably detailed catalogue on how to bill for every conceivable service at a rate equivalent to 2.31 times the value of the 2014 OHIP fee schedule or $411 per hour. The OMA allots exactly 10 lines to the issue of patients’ ability to pay for uninsured services.

Doctors have no training in assessing the ability of patients to pay. The vast majority of doctors have had no experience with living on incomes below the low income-cut off or poverty line. Those who have experienced such poverty left that status long ago. Yet these same doctors are supposed to judge a patient’s ability to pay — patients whose annual incomes are in many cases a twenty-fifth or less of the physician before whom they sit. Patients are compelled to plead poverty in a humiliating interaction with their physician.

Who are these patients who must engage in such unequal bargaining with their physicians? Again, they are disproportionately BIPOC, including immigrants and refugees, who are massively overrepresented in the lower income classes. The OMA’s billing guide is a classic example of structural racism precisely because its effects are felt most by BIPOC communities.

Human rights vernacular is empty talk if the result is entrenched bias and its consequent harm. The OMA creates the culture within which Ontario’s physicians operate. It must tackle head on its own discriminatory practices.

Philip B. Berger is an Associate Professor in the Temerty Faculty of Medicine at the University of TorontoSuzanne Shoush is a Black and Indigenous mother, physician and Indigenous Health Faculty Lead for the University of Toronto Department of Family and Community Medicine. Semir Bulle is the outgoing co-president of the Black Medical Students Association at the University of Toronto and co-founder of Doctors for Defunding Police. Follow him at @SemirBulle.

Source: https://www.thestar.com/opinion/contributors/2021/01/07/2020-brought-ugly-truths-about-inequity-to-the-forefront-like-how-ontarios-medical-association-still-upholds-structural-racism.html

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Andy Beckett: Brexit may spell the end of the tabloid version of Englishness. Can Labour redefine it?

2021/01/09 Leave a comment

Interesting commentary:

For too long, one version of Englishness has dominated British politics. Proud, white, both confident and defensive, often xenophobic, always anti-Europe, this Englishness has changed as little as the tabloid front pages that have bellowed it out for decades. Brexit is one of its greatest victories. The continuing Conservative ascendancy is another.

Even formidable politicians of other parties have struggled to popularise a different national identity. Gordon Brown got lost in well-meaning but unconvincing generalities about the British national character: in 2007, he praised our “tolerance”, “decency”, and love of “fair play” and “liberty”.

Tony Blair tried to adopt the language of conservative patriotism for Labour’s own purposes. One of his election broadcasts in 1997 intercut promises of a national revival with footage of a waking bulldog. Labour won the election, but the idea that national pride could only be expressed through such dated Churchillian symbols was left unchallenged.

Source: Brexit may spell the end of the tabloid version of Englishness. Can Labour redefine it?

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Germany Moves Toward Requiring Women On Large Companies’ Executive Boards

2021/01/09 Leave a comment

Of note to Canadian regulators, broadening to visible minorities and Indigenous peoples:

Germany has taken a step toward requiring what has not happened voluntarily: putting women on the management boards of the country’s largest companies.

On Wednesday, Germany’s cabinet approved a draft law that would require stock exchange-listed companies with executive boards of more than three members to have at least one woman and one man on those boards.

The rule would affect about 70 companies – of which some 30 currently have no women at all on their management boards, the Justice Ministry said. These companies generally have more than 2,000 employees.

The draft law will now go to the Bundestag, Germany’s parliament, for a vote.

The legislation also contains a provision intended to improve the effectiveness of a 2015 law that requires leading companies’ supervisory boards — which are generally chosen by shareholders and don’t have executive powers — to have at least 30% of their positions occupied by women.

The new law would extend the 30% requirement to companies in which the federal government is the majority shareholder. That includes Deutsche Bahn, the German railway company. In addition, executive boards – responsible for managing the company – that have more than two members will be required to have at least one woman. These measures would affect about 90 companies.

Federal Minister for Family Affairs, Senior Citizens, Women and Youth Franziska Giffeycalled the law a “milestone” that would ensure there will no longer be women-free boardrooms in these large companies. The law would make Germany better prepared for the future, she said, and more able to capitalize on its potential.

“We have seen for years, not many changes are made voluntarily, and progress is very slow,” Giffey said in a statement.

An October 2020 report by the AllBright Foundation, which advocates for boardroom diversity, found that Germany lags the U.S., France, the U.K., Poland and Sweden in the proportion of women on executive boards at leading companies.

The study found that in the U.S., women comprise 28.6% of the executive boards of the 30 largest publicly traded companies. In Germany, that figure is just 12.8%. And only four of Germany’s largest 30 listed companies had more than one woman on their executive boards.

Janina Kugel, a former Siemens executive who is now an equality advocate, told Deutsche Welle the new quota would be an important signal.

“The perception of Germany is that, because we’ve had a female chancellor for the last 15 years, Germany is very progressive in that matter, but actually it is not,” she said.

The U.S. has also begun to confront the issue of gender disparity in boardrooms.

In 2018, California became the first U.S. state to require companies based there to have women on their boards of directors.

And the U.S. stock exchange Nasdaq announced diversity requirements last month. Under the rule submitted to the Securities and Exchange Commission, Nasdaq would require companies traded on its exchange to appoint at least one woman and at least one member of an ethnic or racial minority or LGBTQ+ person to their boards of directors.

Source: Germany Moves Toward Requiring Women On Large Companies’ Executive Boards

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I went on Punjabi radio to share COVID information with my community. I learned that multicultural media has been kept in the dark

2021/01/08 Leave a comment

Ethnic media is often unappreciated at times like these:

“I would encourage listeners to not take medicine as there are lot of side effects.” These are the types of uninformed messages I heard being blasted on a Punjabi radio show as I awaited my turn to speak about COVID-19 precautions.

As a General Surgery Resident at the University of Toronto, I decided to personally reach out to this media outlet to promote awareness around COVID-19 in Punjabi. I had recognized the importance of dissemination of cultural and language specific information while working with my patients, and colleague physicians from different specialties including Public Health, and Infectious Disease.

I was also inspired to connect with Punjabi radio and TV shows after seeing the way my family and friends relied on information from these sources. As part of my social media campaign, Humans in Brampton, I also spoke to a few truck, and taxi drivers who sometimes go on long cross border trips and they informed me that their sole knowledge about COVID-19 is from Punjabi, Hindi, and Urdu radio shows.

Moreover, I came across multiple tweets from community advocates urging physicians and public health officials to speak to the community directly. These tweets were in response to conversations in national media about the rise of COVID-19 cases in specific communities such as North East Calgary in Alberta, and Peel region in Ontario. What emerged from these discussions was the role of socioeconomic status, language barriers, health care and workplace inequities that exacerbated the pandemic burden in such communities.

Speaking to some of the Punjabi Radio and TV media outlets, I was surprised to learn how underutilized these platforms have been throughout the pandemic. One of the spokesmen for such a media platform informed me, “We have hardly been approached by physicians, public health or government bodies to run COVID-19 specific messaging on a regular basis. We would be more than thrilled to have them on our shows,” they said.

In another live Punjabi TV discussion that was being broadcasted throughout North America, I received a question from a New York resident who had tested positive for COVID-19 regarding precautions, and this solidified my belief that these highly impactful public platforms have not been utilized during the pandemic to disseminate life-saving information even across the continent.

I was also shocked to learn that more homeopathy and alternative care providers used these language specific platforms to deliver health related information than government bodies, and physicians. The lack of information and even worse, misinformation, can be dangerous for the community members as they are essentially in the dark about how to protect themselves from COVID-19.

Based on 2016 Statistics Canada data, Peel region in Ontario for instance had the lowest percentage (60.92 per cent) of population speaking in English at home. 4 per cent of the Peel population had no knowledge of English or French. Language, on top of other inequitable factors is another barrier many of these communities face when it comes to inaccessibility to health care and information.

With these numbers in mind, one needs to contextualize the fact that the COVID-19 numbers continue to be alarmingly high in these communities despite strict lockdown measures. It’s clear from these numbers that our response has been inadequate in providing messaging to all Ontarians — which must include some of whom don’t speak English. This is on top of workplace and health care inequities that continue to impact these marginalized communities.

As we head into the second wave, and develop an inclusive vaccination strategy, it’s still not too late to incorporate language-specific radio and television shows as an important tool in our armamentarium to deliver critical health related information to the most vulnerable communities.

The time is ticking to get pandemic-related health information out to these high-risk communities. Giving these communities time through the way they consume news, can serve as much needed platforms and community ambassadors in our fight against COVID-19 and allowing everyone to have the most up to date knowledge.

Dr. Amanpreet (Preet) Brar is a General Surgery Resident in the Department of Surgery, UofT. Follow her at @iPreetBrar.

Source: I went on Punjabi radio to share COVID information with my community. I learned that multicultural media has been kept in the dark

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Paradkar: The tens of thousands of white people who rioted at the U.S. Capitol were reclaiming white supremacy

2021/01/08 Leave a comment

Pretty evident from watching the mob yesterday, and the double standard of relative police inaction compared to the BLM Washington protest:

Let it be remembered that it was white people who were allowed to breach the U.S. Capitol during a joint session of Congress, white people who broke the building’s glass windows and rummaged senators’ desks, white people who laid violent siege to the seat of American democracy, white people whose attacks led to Vice-President Mike Pence being evacuated and white people’s violence that put the senate and house chambers on lockdown.

Tens of thousands of white people. Armed white people. Confederate flag-waving, QAnon poster-bearing white people. 

Mostly maskless rioters on a day when the U.S. hit 21 million cases of COVID-19..

They weren’t just white people engaging in democratic protest. “An insurrection,” president-elect Joe Biden called it. 

Whom are we kidding? What we witnessed today was an assertion of white power, a Trump-pumped MAGA crowd staking claim to power without care for facts or truth. 

Depraved racists recreating the death of George Floyd as crudely as you can imagine on the steps of a D.C. church that unfurled a Black Lives Matter banner. 

We witnessed the U.S. brought to the point of anarchy by white people whose beliefs are so mired in falsehood that even an advocacy group funded by a Koch brother — one of the villainous billionaires who funded climate change denial — disagreed with their attempts to delegitimize the election. 

This was a reclaiming of white supremacy because white people are the only group that can spin a fake grievance into violent chaos and not face bodily harm.

Imagine if they were a crowd of Black people. 

A crowd of visibly Muslim people.

Indigenous peoples. Peacefully occupying their own territories.

We don’t need to imagine any of it, really. 

We’ve witnessed that reality many times over. Racist chants, batons, violent arrests, water cannon, tear gas, bullets. A hail of bullets that mainstream narratives would find ways to justify. They were damaging private property! They burned a police station! Why can’t they be more civil?

Those protesters would be agitating for basic human rights. Right to their land. Right to not be murdered by police. Right to a clean planet. Wednesday’s rioters were fighting not for the right to live on equal terms but on unequal ones that would ensure they retained supremacy. 

This violent insurrection has been in the works for weeks. Law enforcement may or may not have been prepared for reasons known only to them. Some did their job. Others participated. Cops were recorded taking selfies with the white throngs. Cops were seen gently opening the barricades to allow the crowd to stream onto the Capitol grounds.

Where’s the need to burn down police stations when you’re all as one?

This is not a double standard. This is the standard. 

When mostly Black athletes knelt respectfully during the national anthem to protest the unequal treatment of Black people, Trump called them “sons of bitches,” saying they “disrespected the flag.”

What a lot of hot air and baloney. An image of a white intruder Wednesday sitting inside the office of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, with his boots up on her desk, made the rounds on social media. Trump hailed people like him and the rioters as “great patriots.”

When the rioters chanted “Whose capitol? Our capitol?” they were staking a claim to a fundamental truth in America: that the direction of violence has always flowed from white to Black and all the shades in between. 

White supremacy has been the continuous thread weaving through the history of democracy in the U.S. (and Canada) from its founding to the present. It’s ever present and its proponents — whether overt or sheathed in politeness — know it is theirs to evoke. 

And still there is that tone of surprise among media commentators. “This is not America” “This is not how we function” “This is how election results are disputed in a banana republic.” That last statement from former president George W. Bush, the man who butchered Iraq in the name of democracy.

The violence of white innocence continually excels itself — and exhausts the rest of us. 

Source: https://www.thestar.com/opinion/star-columnists/2021/01/06/the-tens-of-thousands-of-white-people-who-rioted-at-the-us-capitol-were-reclaiming-white-supremacy.html

 

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Australia: Protecting girls from genital mutilation

2021/01/08 Leave a comment

Of note on the limits to accommodation:

Outrage was provoked a few weeks ago by a new Islamic guide for parents fostering children. Reaction to an extremely controversial provision in the guide pointed up the fine balance that continually needs to be struck between religious diversity in a multicultural society and preservation of the norms and laws of a liberal secular democracy.

The Islamic Position on Foster Care, Adoption and Guardianship, published by the Australian National Imams Council (ANIC), contained a paragraph on circumcision for children — both boys and girls.

It stated that circumcision for boys is obligatory in Islam. However, it skirted around the highly contentious matter of circumcision for girls — better known as ‘female genital mutilation’ (FGM).

Critics, including the NSW Families Minister, pounced immediately on the statement, contained in the initial version of the guide, that there is ‘no obligation’ to perform circumcision on girls. And those critics had good cause to be angry. It may well be that FGM is not obligatory in Islam; that’s beside the point. FGM is actually illegal in Australia. Why did the ANIC fail to recognise this?

Soon enough, the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils (AFIC) added its voice, firing a broadside criticising the ANIC for appearing to equate FGM with circumcision, and stating in plain language that there was no place in Islam for ‘the horrors of FGM.’ A revised version of the foster guide was subsequently posted stating that, ‘It is impermissible and forbidden to circumcise girls in Islam.’

It was a welcome amendment — although it addressed only Islamic doctrine without mentioning the law. But the damage had been done.

Foster care in Australia is tightly governed by a set of strict legal requirements with which all providers, whether faith-based or not, must comply. Ensuring that the well-being of the child is protected means there can be no exemptions from the law.

All Australians with religious beliefs want the freedom to order their own lives, and the lives of their families and communities, according to the teachings of their faith tradition. Such teachings often deal with dietary rules, dress conventions, and rules governing attendance at worship. Sometimes they also express clear positions on moral issues, such as opposition to abortion or euthanasia.

As a result, faith-based views and teachings are often out of step with what we are told our wider, secular society demands. This, in turn, can provoke calls for contentious religious opinions to be banished from the public square when campaigners, activists, and even policy makers consider them to be out of step with contemporary secular opinion.

Advocates of multiculturalism profess to welcome the cultural and religious diversity that is one of its principal characteristics. And in Australia, one of the world’s most cohesive multicultural societies, people of all faiths and none are free to go about their lives openly and without hindrance.

This freedom is part of Australia’s so-called ‘secular settlement’.

Under this secular settlement, private religious practices such as dietary customs are tolerated, and faith-based organisations retain certain privileges, such as specific tax advantages, on condition that religious groups do not rock the social or political boat.

The settlement depends for its success on two key requirements being met. First, it requires that those who seek accommodation for their beliefs demonstrate a tolerant acceptance of all other members of society. And, second, it requires members of minority groups to exercise restraint to ensure that their private, faith-based practices do not offend against principles shared by the wider secular society.

Clearly, one of the distinctive characteristics of any religion is that it marks its followers in the practices of their daily lives, such as in their diets, as being somewhat set apart from other members of society. But while religion can be a sign of distinctiveness and apartness from wider society, it must never become a sign of alienation.

According to the 2016 census, Australians claiming an allegiance to Islam comprise 2.6 per cent of the population. Muslims, along with Hindus (1.9 per cent) and Buddhists (2.4 per cent), represent part of the significant demographic change that has taken place over the past 50 years in a country where 52 per cent still retain an allegiance to Christianity.

Our different religious communities advance widely diverging conceptions of the good life. And Australia’s success as a multicultural society depends on the fact that it is a secular state committed to remaining neutral in regard to those conceptions. If multiculturalism is to remain successful here, it also requires demonstrating respect for diverse points of view.

At the same time, the secular state has authority — and an obligation — to intervene in situations where certain practices, whether faith-based or not, threaten not just the well-being of the community, but the well-being of the individual. No exemption can be afforded minorities whose wish to avoid the obligation to obey the law threatens that well-being.

Australia has taken a strong stand on some practices often associated with Islam, such as the marriage of children and FGM, and has declared them illegal. The unacceptability of these practices is not simply a matter of culture or conflicting opinions; it is a matter of law. No faith-based exceptions to law can ever be granted where religious practice threatens to put children at risk.

The ANIC’s perceived failure to condemn FGM signalled not merely an indifference to prevailing Australian norms about the well-being and care of children. It also signalled an apparent unwillingness to ensure that the practice of Islam in Australia always complies unequivocally — and without exception — with the law of the land.

Australian Muslims, and members of other faith communities, must be free to live in ways distinguished by their faith-based customs and practices. But they also bear responsibility for ensuring those customs and practices never contravene the norms and laws of Australia.

Peter Kurti is Director of the Culture, Prosperity & Civil Society program at the Centre for Independent Studies, Adjunct Associate Professor of Law at the University of Notre Dame Australia, and author of Sacred & Profane: Faith and Belief in a Secular Society

Source: Protecting girls from genital mutilation

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