Le Devoir Éditorial | Une foi en la laïcité

2024/07/29 Leave a comment

Of note:

Dans les années 1960, Dieu en a mangé toute une au Québec. Les hippies et leur révolution contre-culturelle basée sur une réinvention du concept de la Sainte Trinité autour des figures du sexe, de la drogue et du rock’n’roll ne furent pas les seuls responsables de ces bouleversements annoncés par la prophétie de Refus global.

Dans le tome V d’Histoire populaire du Québec, l’historien Jacques Lacoursière décrit avec acuité le contraste entre l’omniprésence de l’Église et son inexorable déclin. L’Église qui « semble partout est en fait nulle part », écrit-il en citant le professeur de l’Université de Montréal et membre du clergé Jacques Grand’Maison.

Le concile Vatican II ne ralentira pas la sécularisation du Québec. Pendant que les curés débattaient encore en 1970 afin de permettre la messe dominicale le samedi soir — ô révolution ! —, la société laïque attaquait par les voies législative et judiciaire l’édifice croulant du contrôle social par soutanes interposées.

Au diable les prescriptions sur le divorce, sur l’union libre, sur la contraception ou sur l’avortement ! Elles voleront toutes en éclats au cours des deux décennies suivantes. Le recul nous permet de constater que les premières lueurs de la laïcité furent indissociables des combats féministes pour se libérer d’un carcan social qui régentait la vie des femmes, de l’habillement jusqu’à la procréation.

Bien sûr, des intellectuels catholiques participèrent aux premières initiatives visant à rattacher Dieu à la modernité, sans parvenir à freiner un mouvement qui fera passer le religieux de la sphère publique à la vie privée. La transformation fut plus longue et moins radicale qu’il ne le semble à première vue. En effet, il faudra quand même attendre jusqu’en 2005 pour achever le projet de déconfessionnalisation des écoles et jusqu’en 2008 pour voir la création du cours Éthique et culture religieuse.

Dans Genèse de la société québécoise, paru en 1993, le sociologue Fernand Dumont constate, dans un bilan du siècle, l’érosion définitive de l’Église comme « organisme politique et instance de régulation des moeurs ». C’est l’un des plus merveilleux accomplissements de la marche permanente vers la laïcité. Ce n’est pas tant un legs de la Révolution tranquille qu’un long parcours d’affranchissement face aux dogmes et aux gardiens de la parole sacrée, qui ne cesseront jamais d’aspirer à la « revanche de Dieu », pour paraphraser le sublime essai de Gilles Kepel.

Pour en revenir à Dumont, celui-ci soulignait aussi dans son essai « le flottement de la culture collective » qui accompagne la laïcité. Dans une nation en constante recherche de ses repères, c’est sans doute la raison pour laquelle l’attachement nostalgique au catholicisme et à ses rituels (baptême, mariage) a persisté bien au-delà de la Révolution tranquille. Il en est de même pour l’adhésion à une « catho-laïcité », qui s’est plu à casser du sucre sur le dos des femmes voilées tout en se portant à la défense de la symbolique du crucifix à l’Assemblée nationale. Dieu merci, ce dernier a été remisé lors de la dernière offensive législative du gouvernement Legault.

Aujourd’hui, les Québécois se déclarent parmi les moins croyants et les moins pratiquants de tout le Canada, mais la ferveur religieuse suit également une tendance baissière dans les autres provinces. La ligne de fracture s’observe plutôt entre l’appui à la Loi sur la laïcité de l’État au Québec et sa diabolisation ailleurs au Canada.

Dans La laïcité du Québec au miroir de sa religiosité, les codirecteurs de l’ouvrage collectif, Jean-François Laniel et Jean-Philippe Perreault, soulignent les défis de penser le fait religieux au Québec alors qu’il semble en voie de glisser vers le statut de « corps étranger ou anachronique, en marge de la culture et de la société ». « La laïcité, dans sa volonté de neutraliser la religion, n’est pas neutre », formulent-ils.

C’est une autre façon d’envisager la Loi sur la laïcité. Celle-ci avait son utilité pour parachever l’oeuvre du rapport Bouchard-Taylor sur la crise des accommodements raisonnables, même si elle embrasse trop large en incluant le personnel enseignant. Avouons-le franchement, cette loi a autant à voir avec la marche vers la sécularisation que l’affirmation identitaire d’un groupe majoritaire entretenant une relation historique d’amour-haine avec le catholicisme. Un groupe qui projette désormais cette relation sur d’autres confessions qui n’avancent pas au même pas dans leur rapport évolutif au fait religieux.

Par l’un de ces paradoxes dont le Québec ne détient pas le monopole parmi les sociétés modernes, nous avons tué Dieu, mais nous ne sommes pas venus à bout de l’irrépressible besoin de croire, comme en atteste la montée en force de la spiritualité à base de tarots, de sorcellerie, de chakras ou de roches magiques. Nous aurions tort de penser que nous pourrons légiférer les croyances jusqu’à leur extinction, surtout pas dans une ère numérique où s’effacent les distinctions entre le public et le privé.

Source: Éditorial | Une foi en la laïcité

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Not Everything is about Anti-Semitism: Bella Hadid and Adidas Shoes

2024/07/27 Leave a comment

Of note:

Nostalgia is lamenting over the job you never got, missing the girl you never dated, and holding memories for the trip you never took – or at least never completed. In marketing, it usually leads to inferior products that are sold for skyrocketing prices. I am probably the last candidate to purchase the retro sneakers that Adidas have recently issued for the upcoming Olympics in Parism which are an exact replica of the shoes they have issued in 1972 for the Olympic games in Munich. In am not a sprinter, but even if I were one  – I would have probably preferred modern shoes that come with airbag cushions which boost the performance and add to the comfort at a cheaper price (the nostalgic pair is sold for over 100 Euro!).

However, the story is not about me, not about running shoes consumption, and not even about nostalgia – but about the ongoing attempt to mark even the most indirect criticism of Israel as anti-Semitism. According to the very loud Israeli propaganda, the retro Adidas shoes are a disgrace not because they are outdated or too expensive, but since they brutally manifest anti-Semitism. Why? Because they are promoted by Bella Hadid. Let’s examine the proposed connection: The shoes were first introduced for the 1972 Olympic Games, where 11 Israeli athletes were murdered by a Palestinian terrorist organization, Black September. This organization no longer exists for over 40 years. Most of its commanders were killed by Israel. The remaining, like Amin al-Hindi, surprisingly or not, became collaborators during the golden age of the Oslo Accords.

What does it say about our perception of terrorists? Let’s leave it for another article and go back to the anti-Semitic shoes legend. None of the Israeli athletes who were murdered in the 1972 Olympics wore these shoes. None of them was a sprinter. Nothing connects Adidas to the massacre. As for Bella Hadid – while the famous model is the daughter of an even more famous objectionable real estate mogul and reality TV star Mohammed Hadid, who is a 1948 Palestinian refugee, has always maintained (just like her dad) a critical tone toward Israel – nothing in the family’s history relates to Black September or to any other terror organization. In fact, a cold blooded analysis would determine that the Hadids are in fact victims of Israel because they lost their house in Safed, lost their citizenship, and lost their chances to live in the country where the family has been residing for centuries. No matter how much you slice it and dice it – at the age of two weeks, baby Mohammed Hadid when expelled in 1948 was not a terrorist. It is true that he and his daughter never praise Israel, but do you really expect them to sing hymns to the country that expelled them and confiscated their property?

It is easy to find models with a better fit to Adidas retro running shoes. The world is full of athletes and former athletes who model, but anti-Semitism is the last ground to disqualify Bella Hadid.

Amir Hetsroni was a faculty member at Ariel University in the West Bank. He is emigrating from Israel in order to miss the next war, earn higher wages, enjoy cooler summers, and obtain a living package that is cost-effective. He has three passports and does not feel particularly worried about anti-Semitism.

Source: Not Everything is about Anti-Semitism: Bella Hadid and Adidas Shoes

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Deborah Lyons: Courageous leadership is needed to combat antisemitism in Canada

2024/07/27 Leave a comment

Reasonable recommendations, highlighting the benefits of appointing a former public servant compared to a former activist as is the case with the representative on combatting Islamophobia:

…Lean into a proactive rather than reactive approach:

Leaders often wait for antisemitic incidents to take place before responding. To shift from a reactive to a proactive approach, leaders can establish a relationship underpinned by trust with Jewish individuals in their organizations. This could be a network, an adviser position, or a recurring meeting with a group representing the Jewish community. Combatting antisemitism works best when it is continuous, and not only when a problem arises. Nurturing relationships built in trust with Jewish individuals, actively listening to them and proactively engaging on issues is helpful in preventing antisemitism.

Encourage interfaith and inter-community dialogue:

I have seen a lot of pain in the eyes of Jewish Canadians, particularly after October 7. Much of this pain has come from the loss of friends and allies, and the silence and lack of support they’ve received from other Canadians, including from other faith communities. Community and faith leaders should understand that empathy and understanding for one group should not preclude empathy and understanding for others. Faith and community groups should extend their hands in support, as the Jewish community has so often done for others in past crises. Leaders should remember that we can be pro-Israeli and pro-Palestinian at the same time. Leaders should encourage interfaith and inter-community dialogue, by creating spaces for these difficult but important conversations to happen. If done with mutual respect, compassion, and rooted in our shared values as Canadians, these spaces can help bring us back together rather than continuing the divisive dialogue and binary thinking that is destroying our civility.

Advocate for Jewish Canadians through allyship:

As a non-Jewish person, what I have learned most clearly is that antisemitism cannot be solved by the Jewish community alone. Jews did not create antisemitism and as with any other marginalized group, it is not on them to fight it alone. Being an ally means being present, an active listener, and a support system. Most importantly, it means believing Jewish Canadians when they speak. And taking action. A simple way for leaders to demonstrate their allyship is to ask Jewish neighbours, friends or individuals in their organizations: “What does support look like for you” and “How can I help?”

Discover modern day manifestations of antisemitism:

To address antisemitism, we must first define and understand it. In 2019, the Government of Canada formally adopted the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) Working Definition of antisemitism as part of Canada’s Anti-Racism Strategy. The IHRA Definition is the product of a 16-year-long democratic, iterative process, and as of the date of publication, has been adopted by 42 other countries and multiple international organizations. It is a tool for recognizing antisemitic expression, behaviour, intention and impact. The IHRA working definition — particularly through its 11 examples — serves as a helpful tool for leaders to understand the many forms of antisemitism and how to meaningfully address them.

Much work remains to be done. If this vacuum from faith, political and business leaders continues it may become too difficult to find our way back. It is our role as Canadians to stand now with our Canadian Jewish family across our country. It is what our Jewish family deserves. It is what Canada needs, now.

Deborah Lyons is Canada’s Special Envoy on Preserving Holocaust Remembrance and Combatting Antisemitism. She previously served as Ambassador of Canada to Israel, Ambassador of Canada to Afghanistan, and the UN Secretary-General’s Special Representative for Afghanistan and Head of the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan.

Source: Deborah Lyons: Courageous leadership is needed to combat antisemitism in Canada

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France’s ban on athletes in hijabs makes a mockery of the Olympic charter

2024/07/27 Leave a comment

Of note (I am generally cynical about the IOC stated values, ethics and behaviour, but not the athletes):

The International Olympic Committee touts the 2024 Olympic Games as the first to nearly achieve gender parity. While six countries have no female athletes who qualified, gone are the days when the IOC repeatedly acquiesced to Saudi Arabia’s insistence on excluding women from its Olympic team. In advance of the 2012 Olympic Games, Saudi Arabia relented to prolonged international pressure and included female athletes for the first time. Since then, the country’s female participation rate has tripled, from roughly 10 per cent in 2012, to 30 per cent this year, including its first-ever female swimmer, 17-year-old Mashael Al-Ayed.

Heading into the Paris Olympics, IOC President Thomas Bach has effusively declared the Games as “the youngest, most inclusive, most urban and most sustainable.” But he didn’t mention the situation some athletes from France are facing.

You see, Olympians from across the world are welcome in Paris. Except French athletes who are Jewish, Sikh or Muslim and choose to wear religious apparel as part of their faith. These women and men are banned from the French Olympic team, in accordance with the French interpretation of laïcité (secularism). While Olympic athletes from other countries are permitted to wear religious apparel in Paris, French athletes cannot because of the religious “neutrality” of the state, which dictates that civil servants are forbidden from all religious expression. According to the French government, Olympic athletes are technically civil servants.

Not surprisingly, this ban disproportionately affects Muslim women. This was made clear last September when France’s Sports Minister Amélie Oudéa-Castéra announced that French Olympic athletes “will not wear the head scarf,” thus ensuring “the prohibition of any type of proselytizing and the absolute neutrality of the public service.”

Compare the French position to the Olympic Charter, which states: “the practice of sport is a human right. Every individual must have access to the practice of sport, without discrimination of any kind in respect of internationally recognized human rights within the remit of the Olympic Movement.”

And here we are: France has unequivocally banned its Muslim female hijabi athletes, while hosting the Olympic Games under the auspices of the IOC, whose very charter bars such discrimination.

The IOC’s response to the French position – “freedom of religion is interpreted in many different ways by different states” – is like the waters of the Seine: murky at best. By justifying discrimination, the IOC has rendered basic human rights meaningless. No Mr. Bach, you shouldn’t be boasting about how inclusive the games are. With its “move along, there’s nothing to see here” attitude, the IOC has shamefully abandoned French Muslim hijabi athletes who aspire toward the Olympics. It has made a mockery of its own charter.

Let’s not forget the role of France’s sports organizations, whose intransigence against hijabs has expanded over the years. As Anna Błuś, Amnesty International’s Researcher on Gender Justice in Europe writes: “Even at amateur levels and in regional competitions, several sports federations have banned sports hijabs. So, after training for years, excelling in their sport, coaching young girls and considering sports as a professional career, young Muslim women athletes are told to remove their hijabs or give up on their dreams.” A Muslim cannot play organized soccer, basketball or volleyball anywhere in France – even at a recreational level – if she wears a hijab. This, even though FIFA, FIBA and FIVB have authorized sports hijabs. No other European country has such draconian bans.

The ban extends to the opening ceremony. Sprinter Sounkamba Sylla was initially barred owing to her hijab, but worked out a deal with the French Olympic Committee to wear a cap instead of a head scarf as a compromise.

Les Hijabeuses, a group of soccer players, has challenged the French ban before the European Court of Human Rights. In June, they organized an “alternate Olympics,” which was more inclusive than the IOC’s version. Co-founder Founé Diawara captured its essence: “Our fight is not political or religious but centred on our human right to participate in sports.”

As Ms. Błuś states, “the Olympics should be for all women, including Muslim women.” This should be obvious in 2024, but it’s not. In the past, such challenges have sparked women to mobilize in solidarity with their sisters. In 2012, we raised our voices demanding the IOC sanction Saudi Arabia for excluding women on its Olympic team.

Today, only two countries immediately come to mind where I cannot play amateur sports, nor swim in my burkini: France and Afghanistan. France is not Afghanistan. But it is a G7 nation that is a signatory to international human rights treaties. It purports to be a champion of women’s rights. We must raise our voices again to demand the inclusion of all women in sports.

Sheema Khan is the author of Of Hockey and Hijab: Reflections of a Canadian Muslim Woman.

Source: France’s ban on athletes in hijabs makes a mockery of the Olympic charter

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Australia: A major multiculturalism review has recommended bold reforms. How far is the government prepared to go?

2024/07/26 Leave a comment

Jakabowicz on the review:

A year ago, the government instigated an independent review of the national multicultural framework.

As more than half of Australia’s population is either born overseas or has one parent who was, this policy is important. It underpins how multiculturalism works in almost every part of life. It aims to ensure equity and inclusion for people from minority groups, and attempts to whittle away at structural racism.

Now the review report has been released. This comes against a backdrop of growing antisemitism and Islamophobia in Australia, as well as the fallout from the failed Voice to Parliament referendum and the vicious racism many communities experienced during the COVID crisis.

The report includes 29 recommendations for improving Australia’s multicultural society. The government has committed $100 million over the next four years to implement the recommendations, though it is still working through the details and timeline. Here’s what it found.

Some of the recommendations are symbolic and have appeared in every multicultural review over the past 50 years. But other recommendations are far more concrete.

Firstly, it suggests there be a federal Multicultural Commission (a proposal the Greens have had on the parliamentary agenda without Labor support for some years). This body would be empowered to provide leadership on multicultural issues, hold opponents of human rights to account, and promote close collaboration between stakeholders at all levels.

Secondly, the panel proposes breaking up the Department of Home Affairs. This would be an attempt to reverse the surveillance and punishment approach that many believe the department to have towards migrants, refugees and some ethnic groups.

Instead, it suggests a new-look, nation-building, Cabinet-level Department of Multicultural Affairs, Immigration and Citizenship.

And from a policy perspective, the report recommends:

  • better ways to protect people’s languages
  • a citizenship process that is less about learning cricket scores and more about appreciating diversity and the importance of mutual respect
  • diversifying our media sector so it more effectively reflects and involves our minority communities
  • and ensuring the arts and sports sectors are spaces for intercultural collaboration and cooperation.

Overall, the report shows how marginal multicultural affairs have become in government – these ideas would go a long way toward refocusing the government’s attention where it is needed.

Why was this review needed?

The review was tasked with assessing how effective Australia’s institutions, laws and policy settings are at supporting a multicultural nation, particularly one that’s changing rapidly. This included looking at the challenges of refugee and immigrant settlement and integration, as well as the impact of world events on Australia’s multicultural society.

There’s also an economic element. The review looked at how we can ensure the wide-ranging talents of Australia’s residents are fully harnessed for personal and broader societal benefit.

These questions point to the need to bring together political, economic, cultural and social priorities in our government programs and policies. They also recognise the deeper challenges of racism, social marginalisation and isolation, which are often compounded by other factors, such as age, gender, class, health and disability.

These are not new questions. What is new is the recommendation for a strategy to engage in a sustained and interconnected way with the causes and consequences of our current failures. It is very unusual for a government to ask a review to do this.

The findings also bring together the perspectives and insights that many advocates in this space have long championed, but which have been swept aside and neglected for over two decades.

Importantly, the report stresses that a national commitment to multiculturalism demands bipartisanship.

I made an argument for a research strategy element in the review in 2023, and was later commissioned to develop a paper on research and data for a multicultural Australia.

The panel has now recommended that a national multicultural research agenda be developed by the new Multicultural Commission, taking account of my recommendations.

What will the government do?

There is still a long row to hoe – none of the recommendations have been publicly accepted (nor dismissed) by the government, and as yet no specific resources have been committed (despite the $100 million commitment overall). Significant action, however, is likely over the coming months and in future budgets.

While it is unlikely Home Affairs will be broken up immediately, some major moves to upgrade the capacity of the public service to deliver on the government’s commitments are likely. The courage of the government to advance these priorities in the election will depend in part on public reactions to the report and its implementation, as well as the stance of the Opposition.

Will the panel’s extensive work improve cohesion, enable better community relations, and unleash the social and economic benefits of a more collaborative society? The first test will be in how a proposed Multicultural Commission would be structured, led and resourced. We may not have long to wait.

Source: A major multiculturalism review has recommended bold reforms. How far is the government prepared to go?

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Austin Harper: The Emerging Bipartisan Wokeness

2024/07/25 Leave a comment

Of interest:

…Underlying left-wing wokeness, even at its most performative and excessive, is a series of partial truths about American society: Even if die-hard progressives are wrong and anti-Black racism does not explain every problem in this country, it does explain quite a few of them. And 2020’s summer of reckoning did draw much-needed attention to entrenched and structurally reinforced racial inequalities in the United States, despite the movement quickly getting derailed by “elite capture”—the tendency of radical social movements to get co-opted by corporate and other rarefied interests.

As someone who became a professor in August 2020, at the incandescent height of progressive wokeness, I have watched higher education around the country become ever more outwardly progressive. But the social-justice rhetoric that now suffuses academia has done absolutely nothing to stop the relentless pace of gigification. More and more academics every year are employed as contingent laborers rather than as tenure-track professors. In fact, a good case can be made that wokeness greases the skids for this trend by allowing universities to appear like benevolent actors, hiring greater numbers of women and people of color, even as they pull the rug out from under labor by placing those new hires in adjunct roles.

It’s easy to argue that we should have known better, that the progressive ideas championed by CEOs and elite-university presidents were probably not that progressive after all, but the reckoning of 2020 happened for a reason. The Great Awokening was so galvanizing for so many precisely because it always had one foot in reality. The same can be said of conservative wokeness.

The right’s renewed focus on anti-white racism, its opportunistic seizing of the anti-Semitism debate, and the broader anti-DEI craze it has stirred up are also appealing to the masses precisely because they have some truth in them. For example, although it is not true that white men are unemployable in academia, the subject of a recent high-profile social-media culture-war battle, it is obviously the case that efforts to diversify the faculty at many universities mean that white candidates are viewed less favorably. The rise of racially themed cluster-hire initiatives—which allow universities to gerrymander diverse candidate pools by writing job ads for minority-majority subfields such as “decolonial theory”—are a way for academic institutions to skirt antidiscrimination laws. Likewise, although the right’s attempt to portray university students as hardened pro-Hamas, bike-lock-wielding terrorists is plainly ludicrous, it is just as plain that anti-Semitism within the progressive movement is real, however fringe these elements may be. If the ways the right characterizes these issues are often disingenuous and overexaggerated, they are not wholly fabricated either.

But as with left-wing wokeness, conservative wokeness preys on people moved by these legitimate issues to sell them on a hyperbolized politics. Woke conservatism leverages reasonable concerns about a range of issues—the plight of working-class white men, anti-Semitism, misandry, and the like—only to foment a hysteria that distracts from the fact that its principal champions are also the causes of many of the problems it allegedly seeks to solve. The primary threat to the job prospects of many working-class white men in America is not “reverse racism,” affirmative action, or pesky minorities, but accumulated decades of deindustrialization, market fundamentalism, and anti-union efforts that sent blue-collar jobs overseas and gutted the ones that remained. As for the loud warnings about left-wing anti-Semitism, the sociologist Musa Al-Gharbi has demonstrated that “liberals are consistently the least antisemitic ideological group in the US, and white liberals—the Americans most likely to embrace ‘woke’ ideology—are the least antisemitic people in the country by far.”

Wokeness is now the air we all breathe, a noxious miasma of bad faith, hysteria, and shameless opportunism that is animated by not ultimate principles but ultimate convenience. It has not peaked, and it is not peaking. Wokeness has become the status quo, a bipartisan lingua franca, the ruling style of American politics.

Tyler Austin Harper is an assistant professor of environmental studies at Bates College and a contributing writer at The Atlantic.

Source: THE EMERGING BIPARTISAN WOKENESS

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Geoff Russ: A future Conservative government must fight the culture war, not stand idly by 

2024/07/25 Leave a comment

Of note and likely reflects some of the thinking among conservatives given some of the excesses of the current government and elsewhere. Would prefer the term “correction” or “rebalancing” to “war:”

…There is much to be undone from the past ten largely unpleasant years. Canada Day fireworks celebrations are no longer hosted by the federally-funded Port of Vancouver, for example. The new lyrics that made “O Canada” gender-neutral are grammatically inaccurate, horrific to listen to and another example of this Liberal government’s love of making headlines without any worthy substance. If restoring the older lyrics is off the table, replacing the lazy “In all of us command” with a lyric befitting the style of the anthem, like “In all thy souls command,” would be a welcome correction.

Making “O Canada” sound nice again or once again funding fireworks celebrations on July 1st that are worthy of the country’s birthday would be great first steps, but we need much more than that. The Conservatives need a year-round, muscular cultural policy that is active, aggressive, and interventionist. This could start with a bold appointment of a Canadian heritage minister who is actually viewed as a senior member of the cabinet.

There will be major pushback from the usual suspects at university faculty lounges and in the opinion pages of newspapers like the Toronto Star, but the Conservatives and their supporters must stand their ground. This is not the 1980s anymore, when wokeness hadn’t yet reared its ugly head. Conservative attitudes toward the role of government and crafting national culture need to change.

If someone constantly strove to focus only on their past mistakes and embarrassments, they would lead a very miserable life, possibly even going insane. That is exactly what Canada has been inflicting on itself for nearly a decade, with the federal government’s full backing.

There are certainly more effective and creative ways to fight the culture war than those suggested here, but fighting back against post-nationalism or the “woke” vandalism of Canada is a task that only a Conservative government can undertake.

Given the current atmosphere of progressive politics, there should be no expectation that the Liberals or NDP will abandon post-nationalism. If the Conservatives will not fight the culture war with a will to win, they may as well just embrace post-nationalism themselves.

Source: Geoff Russ: A future Conservative government must fight the culture war, not stand idly by

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Groups representing minorities say they’re alarmed by foreign interference legislation

2024/07/25 Leave a comment

Of note. Telling that NCCM adds “Ukrainian dissidents, Uyghur activists” to groups possibly affected when their real concern is with respect to “Palestinian citizens,” arguably more likely to be accused of being subject to foreign interference as we see in some coverage of the anti-Israel/pro-Palestine demonstrations.

Expect “intimidation” will end up being defined through case law, but certainly we have seen examples:

Groups representing minority communities are warning that a recently introduced law giving Canada’s intelligence agency and the federal government new powers to counter foreign interference is open to abuse.

Bill C-70 received royal assent on June 20.

The law introduces new criminal provisions against “deceptive or surreptitious acts” done “for the benefit of or in association with, a foreign entity,” to prejudice Canadian interests or with the “intent to influence … the exercise of a democratic right in Canada.”

It also allows for broader sharing of sensitive information among national security agencies, and establishes a foreign influence transparency registry.

C-70 amends the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act (IRPA) to allow the Immigration Minister to ask the courts for the detention and removal of a permanent resident or other non-Canadian citizen if their actions are deemed injurious to “international relations.”

IRPA previously provided the minister with that same authority, but only in cases where someone was inadmissible to Canada on grounds of security, human or international rights violations, or criminality.

That section is alarming the National Council of Canadian Muslims and the World Sikh Organization of Canada.

Nusaiba Al-Azem, director of legal affairs at the NCCM, told CBC News the organization is troubled by “the vagueness of the international relations piece.”

The WSO’s legal counsel, Balpreet Singh, agreed.

“International relations is the reason that four decades of Indian interference targeting Sikhs in Canada has gone completely unknown in the mainstream,” he said.

“Canada has on many occasions ignored Indian operations targeting Sikhs in order to preserve trade relations and trade talks with India. That’s really been at the expense of the Sikh community.”

In a petition that is still online, the NCCM warned that the “international relations” provision could lead to the expulsion of “Ukrainian dissidents, Uyghur activists, or Palestinian citizens.”

C-70 also amends the Security of Information Act, which deals with crimes against national security. The previous version of the law gave authorities such as the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) the ability to charge individuals who use “threat, accusation, menace or violence” in association with a “foreign entity or terrorist group” to harm Canadian interests, with penalties ranging up to life imprisonment.

The new law adds “intimidation” to the list of potential misdeeds. The NCCM and WSO said the law doesn’t define “intimidation” — a lapse the WSO says “raises concerns about potential misuse against activists.”

“That could have real concerns for, for example, civil liberties groups who are often levied with charges that their protest behaviours may amount to intimidation,” said Al-Azem.

CBC News reached out to the offices of Immigration Minister Marc Miller and Public Safety Minister Dominic LeBlanc with questions.

Leblanc’s office replied by saying C-70 was developed “after extensive consultations” and “it respects Canadian fundamental rights and freedoms, including those protected by the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.”

Though the legislation itself has already passed, the NCCM said it hopes it can be tweaked through the regulations.

The WSO said it will closely watch how C-70 is implemented. The legislation is required to undergo parliamentary review every five years.

“If we see reasons for concern, then we will certainly be raising those along the line, and certainly at the review,” Singh said.

Source: Groups representing minorities say they’re alarmed by foreign interference legislation

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Multicultural Framework Review – Australian Government Response​

2024/07/25 Leave a comment

Suspect that any Canadian review will result in comparable insights (with obvious inclusion of French language):

The Panel travelled across Australia to consult more than 1430 individuals and 750 organisations, including community and faith groups, First Nations bodies, local government, business representatives, and service and sports clubs.

Among many insights arising from consultations and submissions, the Panel found:

  • Australians are living in a new era of uncertainty, in which beliefs and concepts they once counted on for stability were being put into question.
  • While government has a crucial role in establishing laws and policy to prevent discrimination, promote equal opportunities and provide access to strong public services, all people who call Australia home share responsibility for building and sustaining our multicultural society.
  • Education and English language learning are vital tools for defining and communicating a shared Australian identity, and promoting understanding and connection between Australia’s communities.
  • Effective and sustainable language services are essential to providing access and equity to key services, particularly in high-risk health and legal settings.
  • Regional, rural and even remote communities are increasingly culturally diverse and an important part of the multicultural story.
  • Many factors shape the diverse lives of Australians, including cultural background, gender, sexuality and socio-economic disadvantage, along with barriers to social and economic inclusion. The Government must consider intersecting forms of discrimination when making policy.
  • Young people, who will inherit and define Australia’s multicultural future, must be at the heart of policy-making considerations, and were a key focus of the Review.

Dr Dellal, Chair of the Review, has observed that simply being a culturally diverse society is not the same as being a successful multicultural society. Effective government policies and the engagement of all Australians are also essential. The Review creates a foundation on which to develop and communicate such policies. 

Foundations for future generations: the Government response

The Panel made 29 recommendations, noting the particular importance of data, research and evaluation to underpin future work. The recommendations emerge from three core principles of the Review:

  • Connection – setting the foundations of a multicultural Australia through leadership, planning, and accountability between three tiers of government and communities.
  • Identity and belonging – creating a welcoming Australia through English language programs, citizenship policy, and participation in arts, culture, sports, and media. Experiences of discrimination and racism comprise the second of the top ten themes identified in submissions to the Review.
  • Inclusion – building cultural capability into public services, modernising grant programs, ensuring digital inclusion, ensuring a sustainable language services sector, and meeting the unique needs of young people and regional areas.

This is among the most substantial reviews of Australian multiculturalism ever conducted. Its comprehensive consultation processes and thoughtful deliberations create the opportunity to strengthen government and community efforts into the future.

The Government commits to the Framework’s principles and will be guided by them, as we build on our commitment to ensure Australia’s multicultural settings are fit-for-purpose to harness the talents of all Australians.

Multicultural Framework Review – Government Response​ (435KB PDF).

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Polgreen: If Kamala Harris Is a D.E.I. Candidate, So Is JD Vance

2024/07/23 Leave a comment

Good reminder of the importance of class in DEI, so often forgotten:

…Personally, I think powerful institutions should value this kind of diversity. Over the course of my career I have hired and promoted many people, and diversity in the broadest sense has always been important to me. I have found that the best leaders I have worked with are eager to build teams from as wide a range of geographic, religious, class, ideological and, yes, racial and ethnic backgrounds as possible.

Kamala Harris and JD Vance, despite their political differences, have a few things in common. They were raised by tough, charismatic matriarchs. They both pursued legal careers. They both sought and won high elected office. They both come from backgrounds that are underrepresented in the halls of power. And now they are both engaged in the core work of politics — translating their stories into power. We would do well to ask why only one of these two remarkable Americans stands accused of getting where she is based on D.E.I. The answer, I fear, is written on their faces.

Source: If Kamala Harris Is a D.E.I. Candidate, So Is JD Vance


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