Language barrier: Why some of Canada’s diverse filmmakers are shut out of funding

2018/03/12 Leave a comment

Interesting policy question: does multiculturalism and diversity mean that films should be funded that are in neither official language, funded only if subtitled or not at all. Hard to see the logic of not funding films that are subtitled:

A small film called Ava — the story of a teenage Iranian girl facing pressures from family and society — is the biggest movie at this year’s Canadian Screen Awards. It has eight nominations and one special win already: it was announced in late January that Ava had won the Best First Feature Award, sponsored by Telefilm Canada.

Telefilm is the country’s main film funding agency, helping Canadian filmmakers get their movies made. Last fiscal year, Telefilm allocated more than $100 million to the production and promotion of Canadian films.

But Ava was not eligible for Telefilm funding.

That’s because writer-director Sadaf Foroughi is a Canadian citizen but decided to make Ava in Farsi, her native language, and film it in Iran.

The co-production with Iran and Qatar qualified as a Canadian film under the federal government’s rules, since key creative roles are filled by Canadians. But Telefilm only finances films made in English, French or Indigenous languages.

As a result, Foroughi had to rely on smaller grants from arts councils, which meant making her film on a shoestring budget, and sometimes not having enough money left over to feed herself.

“I had lots of difficulties,” she told CBC News. “Sometimes I ate less to keep all the money, because I knew that I didn’t have any other funds.”

Films in Mandarin, Korean also shut out

Foroughi is not the only diverse Canadian filmmaker facing this language barrier.

Last year, Old Stone by director Johnny Ma won the same Best First Feature award sponsored by Telefilm. It was nominated for five Canadian Screen Awards, but it also wasn’t eligible for Telefilm funding because it was made in Mandarin.

Albert Shin was born in Canada of South Korean descent, and decided to make his debut feature film, In Her Place, in Korean. His film played the Toronto International Film Festival, and garnered seven Canadian Screen Award nominations in 2015.

Even though it also qualifies as a Canadian film, it too was ineligible for funding from Telefilm because of language, a situation Shin calls “frustrating.”

He feels a film can be “uniquely Canadian” due to the artistic sensibility of its writer and director, even when it is set outside of Canada and filmed in a language other than English, French or an Indigenous language.

A ‘very difficult choice’

The executive director of Telefilm Canada says the agency receives four to five times more requests from filmmakers than it can afford to fund.

“It’s a very difficult choice to make,” said Carolle Brabant, who is stepping down this month after eight years in the job, adding, “We would love to, if only we had more money to do so.”

Brabant said there has been some discussion around changing the eligibility requirements, but “we’re not ready yet.”

Chair of the Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television Martin Katz pointed out that Indigenous language films used to be ineligible, as well. That rule was changed a few years ago.

“If we look at a film like Ava, which is such a beautiful film in Farsi, and it’s really about issues that young women all over the world are facing at the same time, I think we look at that and step back and ask ourselves the question ‘Why are our rules like that? Why are our rules not different?'”

Deepa Mehta’s Water was able to get Telefilm funding because she also shot a version in English — which was never released. (Mongrel Media)

Given that Canada participates in international co-productions all over the world, Katz thinks there should be a way to make those films “part of the Telefilm family.”

One veteran Canadian filmmaker did find a way. Deepa Mehta got around the language rules when she made her Oscar-nominated 2005 film Water in Hindi: she shot an English version at the same time just to qualify for Telefilm funding, even though it was never released.

Films ‘uniquely Canadian’

For those filmmakers caught in the funding gap due to their choice of language, change can’t come soon enough.

“We can make films that take place in different countries but they’re uniquely Canadian because we’re a country that embraces other cultures and other creeds and religions,” Shin said.

“We can be in the forefront of that — we have the population to do it, we have the stories to do it. This is a unique thing that Canada can bring to the world cinema stage.”

For now, Shin has to keep those ideas on hold. He’s writing his next feature film in English so it will be eligible for Telefilm funding.

Foroughi, however, is already planning her next movie in Farsi.

“[Telefilm] has to believe in us,” she said. “I think we have talent even if the film’s language is in Chinese or Korean or Arabic or Persian, but we are Canadian.”

Source: Language barrier: Why some of Canada’s diverse filmmakers are shut out of funding

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The covenant and the courts: Inside a Christian university’s law school crusade

2018/03/12 Leave a comment

Interesting good long read about Trinity Western, including the policies of its covenant and the realities of student life:

…After so many years of debate, members of the tight-knit Trinity Western community are used to hearing arguments that bear little relationship to their daily lives.

“Academic staff are required to teach students that the Bible is the ultimate, final, and authoritative guide by which ethical decisions are to be made,” Elaine Craig, a Dalhousie University law professor who is widely cited among those opposed to accreditation, wrote in a 2013 paper.

“This compulsory ideological conformity effectively excludes students on the basis of their sexual orientation or marital status,” the United Church of Canada argued in its factum to the Supreme Court. “It is also demeaning and degrading of these individuals, explicitly characterizing them as immoral outcasts, who are worthy of being shunned, or excluded by being pitied.”

“The Covenant is a binding contract. It governs conduct both on and off campus,” intervenors Start Proud and Outlaws intoned in their factum.

But as anyone who has signed a code of conduct or even scanned a list of institutional policies knows, rules are rarely followed to the letter, and recriminations are anything but guaranteed. It is just so at Trinity. Last year the campus newspaper, Mars’ Hill, conducted a survey of covenant compliance. While unscientific, the results were nevertheless revealing: 28 per cent of respondents said they had used marijuana or other non-medical drugs; 55 per cent admitted to drinking to excess; 32 per cent admitted to sex outside marriage; four per cent admitted to having an abortion.

There are also LGBTQ students at Trinity, as media have reported. Yet the suggestion they might feel welcome despite the covenant “defies logic,” Craig argued in another paper in 2014. “Not only are prospective students required … not to engage in same-sex sexual intimacy under any circumstances, but they are also required to police each other for any breaches of this promise.” (The covenant says it “may at times” be necessary for students “to hold one another accountable,” as most honour codes do.)

Lawyers are naturally going to argue from written policies. But such sweeping statements are simply irreconcilable with the observable reality on campus. And that gets up a lot of noses in the Trinity Western community, including those who would very much like the university to change.

Trinity was first founded as a two-year college on a dairy farm. Today there are all manner of degree options, including education and nursing.(Ben Nelms for National Post)

There is no shortage of such people: In a recent open letter to the community bearing 287 signatures, an LGBTQ-affirming group of Trinity students, faculty and staff, alumni and parents called OneTWU argued “that homophobia and transphobia are affronts to our Creator God,” and that “reconciliation and healing is needed to bridge the gap between the Christian church and the LGBTQ+ community at large.”

Two hundred and eighty-seven signatures is a fair haul in such a small community. And the letter’s language reflects conflicted attitudes about the prospective law school: some strongly believe in Trinity’s right to hold its religious views, even while teaching law, but are also weary of the endless battle and the toll it takes on students.

Bryan Sandberg, who graduated in 2014 and has spoken before about his mostly positive experiences as a gay student at Trinity, says that most in the community are “not rampaging bigots” — “they’re just people” — but the community covenant “explicitly creates this space where homophobia is allowed to exist, where LGBTQ people are viewed as lesser.”

In a word, he says, it is “uncomfortable.”

“These are people who are growing up in churches, who are born into Christian families, and there’s nothing they can do about that. Their faith becomes an extremely important part of who they are,” Cam Thiessen, a graduate student in biblical studies who signed the OneTWU letter as an “ally,” says of Trinity students. Coming to grips with their sexuality in such an environment can obviously be terribly difficult.

“This could have been an opportunity for Trinity to begin making steps toward a more ecumenical approach to this issue — recognizing that there are Christians who are affirming of LGBTQ people and there are entire denominations that are very affirming,” including some evangelical groups, he argues.

“Instead it’s a ton of money and a ton of time going towards fighting for the right to exercise some sort of authority over this group of people” — time and money that Thiessen wishes could go toward “hiring more faculty, or bringing in more guest speakers, or bringing in better resources for people in the LGBTQ community to understand what their place is in this type of religious society.”

In the meantime, however, many students say Trinity is a far more welcoming, tolerant and diverse campus than outsiders realize. Many, including LGTBQ community members and their allies, believe a place they love and where they have felt loved has been unfairly caricatured….

Source: The covenant and the courts: Inside a Christian university’s law school crusade

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Douglas Todd: Why Sikhs are so powerful in Canadian politics

2018/03/12 Leave a comment

Another interesting piece by Todd. Their political impact is greatly helped by their concentration in a number of ridings in the Lower Mainland and the 905. All parties tend to run Canadian Sikh candidates in these ridings:

The Sikh connection had been working well for Justin Trudeau, as it did for Jean Chretien. Punjabi Canadians, most of whom are Sikh, gave Trudeau a big leg up in nabbing the leadership of the federal Liberal party, which soon led him to the commanding heights of the prime minister’s office.

But Punjabi/Sikh support has come back to haunt Trudeau’s popularity. It ignited controversy in his January visit to India, where he appeared linked to backers tied to Sikh militants, some wanting to carve out a theocratic homeland in India called Khalistan.

How did it get to this? Why do Canadian Sikhs punch so much above their weight? How, to the envy of other minority groups, are they so adept at turning grassroots activism into serious political clout?

After all, the country only has 500,000 Sikhs, accounting for a little more than one per cent of all Canadians.

But more than 12 per cent of federal Liberal cabinet ministers are Sikhs, including Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan. There are 14 Liberal Sikh MPs, says Kwantlen Polytechnic University political scientist Shinder Purewal. Liberals hold all nine federal ridings in which Punjabi Sikhs predominate, says Purewal, plus 11 more in which the South Asian population is significant.

Sikhs also profoundly shape the New Democratic Party. They played a huge role in the elevation of Jagmeet Singh to leadership of the federal NDP.

This is not to mention their over-sized clout in provincial politics in Ontario and also in B.C., where Sikhs were early supporters of former NDP premier Ujjal Dosanjh and recent Liberal premier Christy Clark. Purewal counts six current B.C. MLAs who are Sikh (five NDP and one Liberal).

Most of the time Sikhs’ impressive ability to shape Canadian politics stays below the public’s radar. But it came to an embarrassing head for Trudeau in India – in part because of the shady figure of Jaspal Atwal, a one-time Sikh terrorist convicted decades ago of shooting an Indian politician who was visiting Vancouver Island.

Neither Trudeau nor any Liberal can explain how Atwal was invited to high-level Trudeau functions in India. The Atwal affair, which sparked outraged headlines across India, has many people in India worried that Trudeau and other Liberal MPs are too closely tied to Sikh separatists, some of whom appear to glorify the man who masterminded the bombing of an Air India flight in 1985, which killed 329 innocents.

And such incendiary connections are not confined to Trudeau’s Liberals, since similar suspicions have been levelled at the NDP’s Jagmeet Singh, whom India refuses to give a visa, in part because he has a history as a lawyer of defending militants fighting for a separate Sikh homeland and because he lobbied for a 1984 pogrom against Sikhs in India to be labelled a “genocide” by the government of Ontario.

Here’s a short primer on how Sikh politics often works in Canada.

The grassroots process typically begins with board elections at hundreds of Canadian gurdwaras; especially in Vancouver suburbs such as Surrey, in neighbourhoods of Calgary and in Toronto suburbs such as Mississauga and especially Brampton (where Singh is centred).

The competition to run a gurdwara, which acts like a community centre even for non-religious Punjabis, often pits so-called moderate Sikhs against fundamentalists, a minority of whom want to create a separate Sikh homeland. The faction that ends up controlling a gurdwara, Purewal says, “gains the upper hand.”

The 10 to 20 individuals (almost always men) who run the gurdwara not only gain access to pools of money (typically religious donations made in cash), Purewal says, they’re also able to influence a circle of 40 to 50 extended families. The group that operates a gurdwara, Purewal says, can effectively obtain funds and temple volunteers on behalf of their partisan favourite. They often man a table in the temple on behalf of their politician, “particularly on weekends when devotees come by the hundreds.”

Another little-understood factor that enhances the effectiveness of many Sikh leaders is their traditional caste, says Purewal. “The dominant caste among Punjabi Canadians is Jatt, which is a landowning warrior caste,” he says. The high status of a Jatt leader “makes it easier for certain politicians of Sikh faith to mobilize their relatives, extended families and friends.”

The NDP’s Singh, despite playing down his family’s upper-caste origins, has proved adept at gurdwara politics, particularly at winning the “backing of Sikh temples with (Khalistan) secessionist tendencies,” Purewal says. “As they say, ‘money is the mother’s milk of political campaigns,’ and temples have a lot of it, in cash.” Before winning the leadership of the NDP, Singh signed up an astonishing 10,000 party members in B.C. alone.

Barj Dhahan, a noted Punjabi philanthropist, also has first-hand experience of how temple politics works among Canadians Sikhs, since he competed in 2014 for the federal Liberal candidacy in the riding of Vancouver South.

“Punjabi Sikh voters are very much into their politics,” Dhahan confirms. At one level, Dhahan admires the grassroots activism. At another level he’s concerned many can be manipulated by it.

Sikh-Canadians’ political power is greatest at the local party level, Dhahan says — at determining who is nominated to represent ridings, and in gathering bulk members to vote for a candidate to become a provincial or national leader of a party.

Despite Dhahan’s high profile and good standing in the party, Dhahan says the federal Liberals in 2015 pressured him not to run for a seat in the riding of Vancouver South, which has a large Punjabi Canadian population. Instead, Dhahan said Liberal officials manoeuvred for the only declared candidate to be Sajjan, whom Trudeau appointed minister of defence.

Punjabi Canadians, Dhahan said, “mostly punch above their weight at nomination battles and for political party leadership. They can attract new members very effectively. This is where they put their energy. This is where they can do mass recruitments. And this is where they can deliver.”

Looking into the future of Sikh-Canadian politics, however, Dhahan suggested it is Sikhs above age 55 who are most “driven by personalities.” They’re the most inclined to vote for a political candidate based on little more than the recommendation of a strong Sikh leader, mostly because of family, ethnic, caste or religious loyalties.

The younger generation of Sikhs are more willing, Dhahan said, to quiz candidates on their actual principles. Like most Canadians, Dhahan says, younger Punjabi Sikhs “are more likely to ask, ‘What do you stand for?’ They’re less likely to join a political party because their father tells them to do so.”

Source: Douglas Todd: Why Sikhs are so powerful in Canadian politics

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Anti-racism campaign in B.C. school district draws backlash from parents

2018/03/10 Leave a comment

Prompted a needed if uncomfortable conversation regarding one’s respective advantages or disadvantages:

An anti-racism program in a rural B.C. school district has caused an uproar among some parents.

In January, administration for School District 74 — which includes Cache Creek, Ashcroft and nearby smaller communities — plastered anti-racism posters in the halls and classrooms of the elementary and high schools in the area. The posters feature administration members reflecting on racism, in their own words.

Fair enough, say critical parents. But one poster featuring the superintendent of schools, Teresa Downs, is being seen as a step too far.

“I have unfairly benefited from the colour of my skin. White privilege is not acceptable,” reads the poster.

Downs, who has worked in education for 16 years and as superintendent for seven, says the administration was inspired by a billboard campaign in Saskatoon and felt compelled to do something similar in a school district with 60 per cent Indigenous children.

“We’re doing things to improve the sense of belonging and cultural safety for students of Indigenous ancestry,” said Downs. “So conversations on racism, privilege and prejudice are important for us to have.”

Downs says the school board understands that discussions about race and privilege can make some people uncomfortable, “but we truly believe that education and dialogue is what is really needed.”

Gil Anderson, a 37-year-old father of three, says life in the Gold Trail district has been “pretty harmonious” since he moved there from Nanaimo in 1997.

But the posters have caused unrest. Anderson says there was no notice given to parents about the posters, and he considers the wording of Downs’s is problematic.

“I teach my kids equality. I teach them tolerance. They know they’re no better being white than anybody is being a different colour,” said Anderson, who works the evening shift operating equipment for a local company. “(The poster) singles out people of a certain colour.”

Anderson isn’t the only parent to raise the issue both online and with the school board. While Downs says only four parents have voiced their concerns, the furor online has been more widespread.

A letter written by another parent to the school board obtained by Postmedia is critical of the administration’s “race-driven” policies and questions the children’s ability to grasp complicated social concepts like privilege.

“Children have innocent souls,” it reads. “I feel you have no moral ground to try to brainwash my children into thinking how you want them to.”

Downs says that concerned parents are free to speak to school administration privately, but Anderson and others believe there should be a public forum to discuss the controversial topic.

In Canadian academia, white privilege is typically defined as “the unquestioned and unearned set of advantages, entitlements, benefits and choices bestowed upon people solely because they are white. Generally white people who experience such privilege do so without being conscious of it.”

Source: Anti-racism campaign in B.C. school district draws backlash from parents

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HASSAN: Enough with the feminists who stay silent on Islam

2018/03/10 Leave a comment

Some valid points (e.g., on polygamy, FGM), less so with respect to the hijab:

The usual gusto accompanied International Women’s Day on March 8, with enlightened people of both sexes commending the strides we have made. Women debated our roles in this day and age, and how our lot can be further improved.

Needless to say, even after decades of public conversations on women’s rights, their plight in undeveloped nations has not changed much. In fact, in this politically correct era there are some nominal Western feminists who say too little about the suffering of third world women.

As always, developed countries have fared better. The biggest news is the #MeToo movement, which has prompted public conversations on sexual harassment faced by women in various settings, but especially the workplace. Actions bring reactions, however; while the movement has raised awareness on these issues, some employers may now fear to hire women because they anticipate sexual allegations.

There were already issues specific to Canadian women, such as workplace discrimination and lack of comparable wages — an issue our prime minister addressed at Davos. Accounting for missing and murdered aboriginal women is an enduring problem, as are violence and abuse in these communities.

Radical ideologies also turn many Muslim women into victims, even in Canada. This is most offensive to me, as a Muslim woman. Feminist groups, who usually expound a leftist worldview, have often defended discriminatory practices in the name of a “new feminism.”

An opinion piece by Nakita Valerio on the CBC website states that “New feminism is based on the understanding that there is nothing inherently liberating about one expression over another. Rather, the liberation is in a woman’s choice and part of modern gender equality rests on the acceptance of diverse womanhood on her own terms, regardless of one’s background.”

Really? So, by extension, there is nothing inherently constraining in any expression of womanhood. Therefore, a woman who is self-assured, economically independent and capable of making career choices is no more liberated than one who lives her entire life according to the whims of her husband? A woman who “chooses” to let her husband take a second wife because her religion permits it, and then suffers all the consequences of a polygamous union, is as liberated as one who rejects such an arrangement as repugnant?

Let’s extend this argument. Submission to the requirements of one brand of Islam has convinced some women to support the heinous practice of female genital mutilation. Their understanding of religion has brainwashed them into considering this beneficial. Such a procedure subjects them or their daughters to pain and poor health. Are they more liberated because they have defined their femininity in these terms?

Clothing matters less than mutilation. The niqab and hijab may be “mere” pieces of cloth, but the expectation that women will wear them remains an important issue. The requirement is rooted in patriarchy, and it is hard to accept that any woman who “chooses” to wear these garments has somehow defined her womanhood in a liberated way.

The new feminists have regressed if they do not call out such practices with the fervour of #MeToo. Their silence endorses a way of thinking which keeps countless women in permanent submission.

Next International Women’s Day it would be encouraging if the women’s movement redefined some of its goals as universal rather than relative. Culture can never be an excuse.

via HASSAN: Enough with the feminists who stay silent on Islam | Toronto Sun

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Is It So Hard to Denounce Louis Farrakhan’s Anti-Semitism?

2018/03/09 Leave a comment

Good question:

Two weeks ago, during a Saviours’ Day event to commemorate the life of Nation of Islam founder Master Fard Muhammad, Louis Farrakhan had some things to say about Jews. The “powerful Jews,” he told the audience inside Wintrust Arena in Chicago, “are my enemy.” The Jews are also “responsible for all of this filth and degenerate behavior that Hollywood is putting out turning men into women and women into men” — that is, for the existence of transgender people, which Farrakhan apparently views as a pressing moral concern. He issued a warning to a subset of the Jewish community — “Farrakhan has pulled the cover off the eyes of the Satanic Jew and I’m here to say your time is up, your world is through. You good Jews better separate because the satanic ones will take you to hell with them because that’s where they are headed.”

Under normal circumstances, sadly, none of this would come as a surprise. As the Anti-Defamation League and plenty of other organizations have amply documented, Farrakhan has been a hardened anti-Semite — not to mention a committed enemy of LGBT rights — for a long time, and the broader Nation of Islam movement has a longstanding problem with anti-Semitism (as the ADL noted, Farrakhan was not the only speaker to make wildly offensive remarks about Jews that day). This is a man who has described Adolf Hitler as a “very great man.”

What made this address different was one of the attendees: Tamika D. Mallory, co-president of the successful Women’s March organization that has served as an important part of the anti-Trump resistance movement ever since it was formed. During the portion of his speech not dedicated to recycling ages-old anti-Semitic conspiracy theories, Farrakhan explicitly praised both the March and Mallory herself. Mallory posted an Instagram video of herself at the event, and previously had posted a photo of herself with Farrakhan describing him as the “GOAT,” or “greatest of all time.”

Once Mallory’s attendance at the event was revealed, she was repeatedly asked to denounce Farrakhan’s rhetoric, and she declined to do so. When she addressed the controversy, she did so vaguely. In one tweet, she did denounce anti-Semitism and transphobia without explicitly mentioning Farrakhan; in another, she made the dispute out to be some sort of thorny moral dilemma entailing “nuance & complexities.”

The Women’s March followed a similar tack: not really addressing the controversy head-on at all. Yesterday, a full nine days after the controversy broke out, it finally posted a statement:

The phrasing is strikingly milquetoast: “Minister Farrakhan’s statements about Jewish, queer, and trans people are not aligned with the Women’s March Unity Principles, which were created by women of color leaders and are grounded in Kingian Nonviolence.” Also striking is the group’s explanation for why it took a week and a half for it to issue a statement: “Our external silence has been because we are holding these conversations and are trying to intentionally break the cycles that pit our communities against each other. We have work to do, as individuals, as an organization, as a movement, and as a nation.”

Who is being pitted against whom here? The only question is whether or not viciously anti-Semitic claims — claims that have historically led to the murders of millions of Jews — should be swiftly denounced. And there is no version of “social justice,” whatever one’s conception of that might be, where the answer isn’t obvious. There is nothing to discuss here.

But more than one member of the Women’s March has described Farrakhan’s rank anti-Semitism in exactly these terms: not as a decades-long pattern of bigotry to be denounced, but as a political maneuver (presumably from the right) that requires a deft, careful response. In January, for example, Women’s March co-chair Carmen Perez told Refinery29: “In regards to Minister Farrakhan, I think that is a distraction.” She continued: “People need to understand the significant contributions that these individuals have made to Black and Brown people… There are no perfect leaders. We follow the legacy of Dr. King, which is Kingian non-violence. We say we have to attack the forces of evil, not the people doing evil. We never attack people.” The view that this is a “distraction” slots neatly into Mallory’s desire not to “redraw the lines of division”:

To be fair, there are definitely situations in which nuance is required to evaluated complicated, flawed figures, particularly when it comes to the leaders of bygone eras where different social mores reigned. But in this case, the subject at hand is a man who, in 2018, continues to spout murderous propaganda against a group that was, in his lifetime, almost entirely removed, via gas and bullet and starvation, from the European continent. If you’re a Jew, it’s absolutely baffling and infuriating for anyone to meet this sort of rhetoric with “Look, it’s complicated,” or “But what if our political enemies use this divide against us?”

More broadly, it’s simply difficult to think of any other situation in the left-of-center universe where the response to hate speech would be anything like this, where the act of responding aggressively to that hate speech would be seen as a “distraction” or a political trap to be avoided. The Women’s March, throughout this whole controversy, just hasn’t come across as taking anti-Semitism very seriously.

via Is It So Hard to Denounce Louis Farrakhan’s Anti-Semitism?

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Women Of Color Are Severely Underrepresented In Newsrooms, Study Says

2018/03/09 Leave a comment

Long overdue for a comparable study in Canada:

People of color make nearly 40 percent of the U.S. population, and women make up more than half. But you couldn’t guess that by looking at American journalists, according to a new report by the Women’s Media Center.

Women of color represent just 7.95 percent of U.S. print newsroom staff, 6.2 percent of local radio staff and 12.6 percent of local TV news staff, according to this year’s Status of Women in the U.S. Media study, the organization’s annual audit of diverse media voices.

“Women are just 32 percent of newsrooms, but the percentage of women of color is even more dire,” Cristal Williams Chancellor, director of communications at the Women’s Media Center, told NPR. “We wanted this year’s report to take a closer look at that segment.”

The report analyzed news organizations’ responses to “professional association queries” and included dozens of interviews with female journalists of color who shared their obstacles and triumphs.

Along with American newsrooms’ low representations of female journalists of color, the report also found that compared with in previous years, newspapers’ count of minority female employees stagnated or fell and radio hired fewer minority women.

Williams Chancellor said these findings weren’t shocking, given the enormous challenges that women of color continue to face in American newsrooms. Especially troublesome, she said, are the media’s methods of recruiting, hiring and promotion. “Part of the challenges come from the plagues that have been part of society for decades, such as racism and sexism, and the old boy’s network,” she told NPR.

Amanda Terkel, Washington bureau chief at the Huffington Post, discussed the nuances of landing a prestigious job in journalism. “So much of hiring in journalism is poaching from other news outlets, which is often a great way to get talent. But when you do that, you’re often dipping from the same pool of people rather than bringing in new voices,” she said in the report.

The Women’s Media Center recommends that media organizations conduct an audit of their employees, decision-makers and candidates for promotion and that they “staff with intention.” The organization also recommended that outlets diversify their news sources.

NPR’s Soraya Sarhaddi Nelson was featured in the report and recalled the difficulties she faced as a woman of color during the beginning of her 30-year career as an international reporter. ” ‘We want to hire this woman with this foreign-sounding name? How will that work?’ ” she remembers hearing. “Even sources seemed hesitant to call me back, at times. Could they pronounce my name? ‘Are you Asian, Middle Eastern? What exactly?’ ”

NPR’s 377-person news staff is 75.1 percent white, 8.8 percent black, 7.7 percent Asian, 6.1 percent Latino, 2.1 percent multiracial and 0.3 percent American Indian, according to the company’s latest report on the racial, ethnic and gender diversity of its newsroom. NPR Ombudsman Elizabeth Jensen called the numbers a “disappointing showing.” The newsroom is 56.2 percent female — the highest number in five years.

Last year’s Status of Women in the U.S. Media noted that “white men were 71 percent of NPR’s regular commentators in 2015. By comparison, in 2003, the rate was 60 percent.” NPR uses the term commentator for its opinion contributors.

The Women’s Media Center hopes that reporting on stagnating hires of female journalists of color will serve as a “wake-up call” to the media and its consumers. Featuring “diverse voices means that we have a more credible media, and a more democratic society,” said Williams Chancellor. “We need a media that’s more representative and inclusive, and looks like America.”

Source: Women Of Color Are Severely Underrepresented In Newsrooms, Study Says

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Maxime Bernier rejects Liberal MP’s apology over ‘check your privilege’ Twitter row

2018/03/08 Leave a comment

Lost opportunity for dialogue.

Bernier, the son of a former MP, who represents Beauce, a rural riding with only 1.1 percent visible minorities and overwhelmingly francophone, and Caesar-Chavannes, who represents Whitby, an urban riding with 25.3 percent visible minorities, would each benefit from sharing their life experiences and perspectives, and being more careful with tweets that shut down rather than engage conversations:

Conservative MP Maxime Bernier is rejecting an olive branch from Liberal counterpart Celina Caesar-Chavannes after the pair exchanged barbs on Twitter over issues of race and identity politics.

Bernier, Caesar-Chavannes and Liberal Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen were going at each other over funding in the budget that Hussen described as historic for racialized Canadians.

The budget included money for a national anti-racism plan, mental health supports for at-risk black youth and funding to collect better data on race, gender and inclusion in Canada.

Bernier says targeting specific Canadians by race is divisive and contrary to the idea of being “colour-blind,” prompting Hussen and Caesar-Chavannes — both visible minorities — to accuse him of ignoring the fact that minorities are treated differently.

In a tweet today, Caesar-Chavannes apologized to Bernier for telling him to “check your privilege and be quiet,” suggesting they meet in person so they can try to resolve their differences on an important issue.

Bernier replied by saying he isn’t interested in a meeting because the two share no common ground, and says Conservatives should support treating everyone individually without any labels at all.

Source: Maxime Bernier rejects Liberal MP’s apology over ‘check your privilege’ Twitter row

Predictably, Anthony Furey of SunMedia picks up on this without understanding or acknowledging that systemic discrimination exists, it is not only about individuals:

Bernier, a former Conservative leadership candidate and well-known free-market advocate, was initially responding to comments posted by Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen, who himself celebrated the budget as “a historic budget for racialized Canadians.” Hussen went on to applaud budget additions that included $19 million for black youth and mental health and $31.8 million for racialized newcomer women.

“I thought the ultimate goal of fighting discrimination was to create a colour-blind society where everyone is treated the same,” wrote Bernier. “Not to set some Canadians as being ‘racialized.’ What’s the purpose of this awful jargon? To create more division for the Liberals to exploit?”

It was these remarks that set Caesar-Chavannes off and veered the exchange into toxic territory. She called on Bernier to “do some research, or a Google search, as to why stating colour blindness as a defence actually contributes to racism. Please check your privilege and be quiet.”

She then linked to a column on race issues from The Guardian, a U.K. publication routinely mocked by critics for it’s divisive far-left editorials.

Bernier didn’t take kindly to being told to pipe down, responding on Twitter to say: “You are aware we live in a democracy with free speech as one of its building blocks, right?”

Clearly feeling the heat online, Caesar-Chavannes offered something of an apology, posting early Tuesday morning: “I am not too big to admit when I am wrong. Limiting discussion on this issue by telling you to be quiet was not cool. If you are willing, let’s chat when back in Ottawa. We are miles apart on this important issue and it is possible to come a little closer.”

Some apology. It seems she’s apologizing for telling him to shut it but not for hurling the privilege accusation, then sanctimoniously implying that she’d be willing to educate him out of his ignorant ways “if you are willing.”

It’s unclear which alleged privilege she was specifically referring to, but Bernier is a Caucasian male.

Caesar-Chavannes generated headlines in December when she complained that working in the House of Commons was like “death by a thousand cuts” due to the constant racist “microaggressions” she routinely faces as a black woman. One example she cited is how a woman in the washroom jokingly told her not to steal her purse, a comment Caesar-Chavannes took to be racially motivated.

For Bernier’s part, he wasn’t too charmed by her non-apology.

“Thank you for recognizing my right to air an opinion. I don’t think we can find much common ground beyond that however. You and Min Hussen implied I’m a racist because I want to live in a society where everyone is treated equally and not defined by race.”

He went on to say it’s important to address injustices but not in a way that divides people along racial lines.

That’s what you get when you throw a low blow at someone, as Caesar-Chavannes did. It’s difficult to come together after such a wall has been tossed up. It needlessly divides.

 

Source: FUREY: Toxic ‘privilege’ debate rears its head on Parliament Hill

 

Filed under Multiculturalism Tagged with , ,

Christie Blatchford: Depiction of nude on a prayer mat too provocative for Ontario art school

2018/03/08 Leave a comment

Over reaction by the students and administration:

The “safe space” people have struck again at another Ontario university campus.

Monday night, an untitled, anonymous piece of art hanging in a student show at the Ontario College of Art and Design University in downtown Toronto was quietly removed.

It was a green Islamic prayer mat with the black outline of a nude woman on it.

In its place is a notice, apparently from the curators and jurors of the show, saying that absent knowing “the intent of the work that was previously hanging in this space,” they had decided to “remove it temporarily … until a statement from the artist can accompany it.”

The notice referred to “the concerns of a number of OCAD University student groups” and offered a one-two apology if either the original inclusion of the piece or its removal “has caused anyone harm.”

The formal complaint came from the Muslim Student Association at the school, which over the weekend issued a statement with several demands — the immediate removal of the piece, an investigation into how it was approved and “whether this was done out of ignorance or not” and an official apology from the university “that this piece was approved for display.”

The controversial piece.

“As a Muslim community,” the statement said, “we feel greatly offended, concerned and disappointed.

“This has already provoked Muslims and has caused very upsetting reactions, and several students’ responses and behaviour towards this is extremely alarming and is starting to make some students feel unsafe at OCAD.

“This is serious and we do not take it lightly.”

In a private, members-only Facebook group for OCAD students, the piece was immediately a lightning rod for controversy after the show, titled Festival of the Body, opened last Friday.

It sparked a spirited debate, sharp rebukes (and much apparent after-the-fact deletion of controversial posts) from the group moderators, one of whom snapped at one point, “This group was doing fine until these recently violent posts by some of you.”

Members of the group say dozens upon dozens of comments were arbitrarily deleted if they weren’t supportive of the decision to remove the piece.

Of those that remain, only one could be remotely described as violent, and it comes from a supporter of removing the prayer mat artwork.

He is a student who works part-time as a cab driver and who asked, “why does someone need to disrespect a whole religion and the way of life of billions of people?” He said the “intent” of the artist didn’t matter.

“… The intent does not change the blatant disrespect to our Islamic faith and the objects, places and symbols we hold dear to our heart.

“Picking up customers in my taxi that swear I hate them and want to kill them simply because I am Muslim or having my mother or my sisters followed and abused for wearing the hijab makes me live a certain anxious and protective lifestyle.”

In a phone interview Tuesday, OCAD professor Natalie Majaba Waldburger, a co-curator of the show, appeared to try to distance the university from the short notice that now sits in place of the art.

She said the artist, whom she identified as a Muslim woman and “we understood she was speaking from within her own cultural practices and experiences,” originally had her name by the piece, but then removed it over the weekend.

Several other pieces — the show includes at least one full-frontal nude, of a male — had no artist statement.

“We didn’t feel we could put up the work without any information,” Waldburger told the National Post.

She said the artist wants to provide an artist’s statement — such statements can range from the direct to the hopelessly oblique — and that “we’ve been working with her the last couple of days. We’ve been in discussion.” Waldburger said she hopes it can be re-installed.

Some sort of authorship, whether the artist’s name or statement, is required, she said. “So for her, no name and no statement means the work has to come down.”

Waldburger said she’s aware of the controversy raging around the work, but “that doesn’t mean we’re shutting the dialogue down. The university supports the right to artistic expression.”

Christine Crosbie, OCAD’s media and communications manager, said the school is aware that freedom of speech issues are controversial on campus at the moment.

“We respect the Muslim Student Association has their opinions, and this is an important dialogue around this piece. It’s a matter of looking at both sides.”

Interestingly, one of the mandatory art history courses at the school covers an infamous piece of art called Immersion (Piss Christ).

A 1987 photograph by American photographer Andres Serrano, Piss Christ is a photo of a plastic crucifix submerged in a tank of Serrano’s own urine.

Just about every time it has been exhibited over the past three decades, Christians have denounced, vandalized or threatened the photograph or photographer.

After the Charlie Hebdo attacks in Paris three years ago, sparked by the satirical magazine republishing the Danish cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad, the Associated Press removed an image of Piss Christ from its editorial archives.

Serrano wrote at that time, “We’ve seen the same impulse for self-censorship in the West before … Given the seriousness of the violence, such self-censorship is understandable; it’s also a step backward at a time when we need to reassert the importance of free expression by artists, activists, journalists and editors alike.”

Amin, as they say in Arabic.

Source: Christie Blatchford: Depiction of nude on a prayer mat too provocative for Ontario art school

Filed under Multiculturalism, Religion Tagged with , ,

What Oscar-winner Frances McDormand can teach corporate Canada | Jennifer Wells

2018/03/08 Leave a comment

Good linkage with the failure to strengthen diversity in corporations in C-25 Canada Business Corporations Act:

“I have two words for you: inclusion rider.”

If there was a single indelible moment at the 90th Academy Awards celebration Sunday, it was the fierce Frances McDormand wrapping up her winning best actor speech with a call to arms to A-list entertainers with the power to effect change.

There was a great deal of clapping and cheering and, according to Twitter, a great many people wondering: what’s an inclusion rider?

It’s worth viewing Stacy Smith’s TED talk for the answer. Smith is a social scientist who teaches in the communication and journalism school at the University of Southern California. In a clear and swift 15 minutes she takes her audience through a set list of really dispiriting data. In what she deems the “inclusion crisis in Hollywood,” Smith’s statistics include this fact: not quite a third of movie roles go to women. (To qualify for inclusion in the data set, the actor needs to speak but a single word through the entire script.) Surprised? No, of course not. But Smith extrapolates this data to conclude that much has not changed in a half century.

How about power? Auditing 800 films between 2007 and 2015, Smith and her researchers found only 4.1 per cent were directed by women. A total of three films were directed by black or African-American women. One lone film was directed by an Asian woman. The traits of leadership (commanding a crew, being a “visionary”) are seen to be male in nature, industry insiders confided. Hence the results, as Smith said in her talk, “pull male.” Left alone to its own devices, Hollywood does not change.

What does this remind us of?

That’s right, corporate Canada. As it happens, the Academy Awards came just days after the Senate voted down a proposed amendment to Bill C-25, that is, the Act to amend the Canada Business Corporations Act (and that of co-operatives and not-for-profits, too). That sounds like multiple acts and multiple amendments. The point to glean is this: in hauling the Act into the modern era a group of senators supported the view that publicly traded corporations be compelled to set internal targets to boost diversity, the very ethos of the governing Liberals. The Senate voted against the amendment, 37 to 30, in third reading last Wednesday.

Let’s think about this. Corporations would not be compelled to reach targets by a set date. Corporations would be free to establish for themselves time-lines for the increase of four under-represented groups: women, Indigenous peoples, persons with disabilities and visible minorities. This is a step beyond the “comply-or-explain” declarations of diversity policy. As Senator Paul Massicotte pointed out in tabling the amendment, even with the comply-or-explain rule introduced by the Ontario Securities Commission, the progress of women in leadership roles has been unsatisfactory, budging modestly in board representation, and even more modestly in senior management positions.

Phrased another way, asking nicely doesn’t work.

The result: just as Stacy Smith’s work shows that Hollywood does not reflect the real world, so too corporate Canada.

In supporting the amendment Senator Ratna Omidvar made the case clearly: “This amendment does not ask anyone to climb Mount Everest. It asks for targets, the targets are voluntary, the corporations can set these according to their own history, their own context, their own region and their own industry. This is common business practice.”

The non-partisan bill nevertheless placed Massicotte’s supporters in one corner, and bill sponsor Howard Wetston in the opposing corner. Wetston, readers may recall, is the past chair of the Ontario Securities Commission.

Citing in part Canada’s fragmented securities landscape (can’t we fix that already?), Wetston supported the comply-or-explain model as a “legitimate choice to address diversity at the board and executive level in Canada.” Government can do more within that model, Wetston said in addressing the chamber last week. “They can provide guidelines. They can get the director of corporations candidate to do more. There can be more outreach. Basically, these categories allow for a great deal of opportunity by the government to do more within this model if it so chooses.”

In an interview, Omidvar wonders if part of the failure lies in a lack of clarity. “The lesson I take out of this is that we must do much better at explaining our point of view and making it extremely clear to people that our amendment would not have forced corporations to have quotas,” she says. “Our amendment was simply moving them toward a mature approach to developing strategies. We were told these business corporations have so much work, they can’t do this. That’s not true. Any business corporation that comes under this act is big enough to have people and departments who are devoted to human resources, change management, long-term planning.”

The distinction between the two positions is clear: a soft tap on the shoulder (Omidvar’s description of C-25 as written) and a firm nudge. It goes without saying that the senator is disappointed by the outcome, especially given the aspirations — the brand — of the government of the day.

Stacy Smith had a few suggestions to redress the historic and intractable imbalance in Hollywood. “Just Add Five,” was one, in which scriptwriters would up the presence of roles for women, five at a time. That strategy, Smith concluded, could achieve gender parity in casting in three years. So, goal setting. But remember, a “role” is defined as a single spoken word.

More powerfully, A-list actors could insist on inclusion riders in their contracts, and start to dictate directly how to fix the diversity gap.

That’s what Frances McDormand was advocating.

In corporate environments, this could be a call to arms. Does any incoming A-list CEO have the nerve to insist upon a diversity rider? Now that would be progressive. Ground-breaking, even.

In the meantime, the amendment-sponsoring senators will be stuck monitoring what progress is made as a result of C-25. I’m not holding my breath.

via What Oscar-winner Frances McDormand can teach corporate Canada | Toronto Star

Filed under gender, Multiculturalism Tagged with , ,

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