ICYMI: Labour anti-Semitism inquiry academic on being caught in a storm

2016/07/27 Leave a comment

Interesting and thoughtful reflection:

What is it like for academics to try and bring scholarly analysis to issues that are at the centre of fierce public debate?

On 29 April, Jeremy Corbyn appointed Shami Chakrabarti to chair an inquiry into “anti-Semitism and other forms of racism including Islamophobia, within the [Labour] party”, after a series of incidents involving Ken Livingstone, Naz Shah and others.

It soon attracted comment from both “sides”. There were those who believe that the Labour Party is riddled with anti-Semitism and feared that the inquiry would be a whitewash. Others suggested that the issue was just a storm in a teacup, an attempt to curb legitimate criticism of the state of Israel or part of a coordinated campaign against Mr Corbyn’s leadership.

One of those caught in the crossfire was David Feldman, vice-chair of the inquiry, and director of the Pears Institute for the Study of Antisemitism at Birkbeck, University of London.

“My role in the Chakrabarti inquiry was announced at a time of great controversy and concern around the allegations of anti-Semitism in the Labour Party,” he told Times Higher Education.

“The sort of complexities and nuance that academics can bring to an argument are not always listened to – people are not at their most receptive. I didn’t recognise some of the views that were attributed to me.”

Most of the attacks, Professor Feldman went on, came from “the Jewish communal leadership, figures and institutions who strongly identify with Israel”. He was taken to task for distancing himself from what he calls the “subjective” definition of racism, that “if a group or an individual regards something as racist, then it is”.

Some also called attention to the fact that he had signed a declaration by Independent Jewish Voices, a group which has raised concerns about “the proliferation in recent weeks of sweeping allegations of pervasive anti-Semitism within the Labour Party”, although he responded that the particular declaration he signed was “very uncontroversial: in favour of human rights, international law, Israelis and Palestinians living in peace and security; against racism and especially anti-Semitism”.

“When one is misrepresented in the public sphere,” reflected Professor Feldman, “that is unpleasant and not something that academics are used to in their day-to-day job. And being in that situation is still something I am coming to terms with.”

The launch of the report on 30 June was overshadowed by controversy over Mr Corbyn’s comments that “our Jewish friends are no more responsible for the actions of Israel or the Netanyahu government than our Muslim friends are for the self-styled Islamic states or organisations” and by the verbal abuse of the Jewish Labour MP, Ruth Smeeth, who left the room in tears.

Professor Feldman takes comfort in the fact that the report itself “has been very well received across a broad spectrum of opinion…It is striking that groups and institutions [such as the Board of Deputies of British Jews and the Jewish Labour Movement] who did express concern are among those who have welcomed the report as a step forward.”

It has led him to “reflect on how the histories of racism and anti-Semitism have shifted in recent decades, and that is something that will feed into my research and academic publications”.

Source: Labour anti-Semitism inquiry academic on being caught in a storm | THE News

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On Islam, the GOP has lost its mind and forfeited its soul – The Washington Post

2016/07/27 2 Comments

Good commentary:

As a Christian who served in the Bush and Obama administrations, I watched in dismay….

It was not long ago that George W. Bush won the Muslim vote in 2000. Throughout his presidency Bush went out of his way to express respect for Islam and to tamp down the swell of anti-Muslim sentiment after the September 11 attacks.

But the election of Barack Hussein Obama — a black man with an Arabic name and a natural rapport with Muslims — unleashed that swell of Islamophobia on the right. Even though Obama has used many of the same lines as Bush — for instance, “We are not at war with Islam” and “Islam is a religion of peace” — too many Republicans have ignored the calls for respect.

Enter Trump, stage (far) right. From registering American Muslims to banning foreign Muslims, rejecting refugees, reviving waterboarding, and implying Obama is an ISIS sympathizer, Trump’s campaign been littered with anti-Muslim pronouncements and policy proposals. And the crowds at his rallies have cheered each new inane, hateful idea. Trump has turned prejudice into an applause line.

The Republican party, in its treatment of Muslims, has lost its mind: An overwhelming amount of research shows that Muslim faith typically has very little to do with the underlying motivations for terrorism. The 2016 Republican platform champions national security, but alienating and antagonizing devout Muslims — those best situated to discredit extremist narratives — runs directly counter to America’s security interests.
And in its treatment of Muslims, the GOP has lost its soul: The Islamophobia at the Cleveland convention was a betrayal of the “Judeo-Christian heritage” touted in the GOP Platform. At the heart of Judaism and Christianity — and Islam — is the command to love God and love neighbor. For Christians, Jesus’ parable of the Good Samaritan makes it abundantly clear that our neighbors include those who are ethnically and religiously different.

In contemporary America, Muslims are the new Samaritans.

One need only look to the Bible — which Trump claims as his favorite book — to know how our forefathers would tell us to treat the Samaritans among us. And it wasn’t what we saw in Cleveland.

Source: On Islam, the GOP has lost its mind and forfeited its soul – The Washington Post

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Many Mounties oppose opening ranks to permanent residents, easing entrance requirements, spokesmen say

2016/07/26 Leave a comment

The change from making Canadian citizenship a requirement to a preference brings the RCMP in line with the overall public service, although this change is unlikely to make much of a difference to recruitment.

Military, RCMP, CSIS.001As noted in earlier posts and in the above chart, the RCMP diversity numbers are poor:

The Mounted Police Professional Association of Canada (MPPAC) said Sunday management has caved in to political correctness and the “knee jerk” changes amount to lowering standards.

“Essentially we face operational security issues as well as serious repercussions in service delivery if we hire people to meet political vs. operational criteria,” the association said in a statement through spokesman Rob Creasser.

On the issue of allowing permanent residents to apply to become Mounties, the association asked, “As a Canadian icon, shouldn’t the national police be Canadian?”

Internal records obtained by the National Post through access-to-information legislation show when the force announced the changes in May, officials anticipated questions over whether hiring non-citizens could affect the RCMP’s image and “what the RCMP represents.”

The RCMP’s proposed response says fewer young people are interested in policing careers and the force is struggling to attract “not only applicants, but also diverse applicants.”

Allowing permanent residents to apply would improve diversity and help the force deliver “culturally sensitive policing.”

The documents note the force’s senior executive committee has set recruitment targets of 30 per cent women, 20 per cent visible minorities and 10 per cent aboriginal.

Still, “RCMP recruiting standards remain very high and we continue to seek to attract the most qualified applicants from all backgrounds,” according to the documents.

The RCMP has a proud tradition as a national symbol of Canada, and that will continue

“The RCMP has a proud tradition as a national symbol of Canada, and that will continue. This change will also directly contribute to the RCMP’s commitment to ensure a workforce that is representative of Canada.”

Despite the new measures, the RCMP will still give priority to applicants who are Canadians citizens.

Permanent residents must have lived in Canada for at least 10 years, but if hired, they will be not be pressured to become citizens as that is a “personal choice.”

The force is also exempting more people from having to take the entrance exam, a test designed to gauge aptitude for police work.

University graduates have been exempt since June 2015. Now, they are being joined by people with two-year college diplomas.

In a further streamlining of initial screening, applicants need not prove they are physically fit. All physical testing now takes place during the 26-week program at the RCMP’s cadet training academy.

These changes were adopted in response to complaints the application process was “too long, inflexible and outdated,” the RCMP says.

Sgt. Brian Sauvé, co-chairman of the National Police Federation (NPF), another association representing some Mounties, said Sunday while the federation does not have a problem with opening applications to permanent residents — this will help the force represent Canada’s “blend of great people”  — it has serious concerns with the other changes.

All applicants should undergo aptitude and fitness evaluations before joining the training academy, he said. Without them, the force runs the risk of more people getting injured during training, as well as higher attrition rates later as recruits realize policing is not for them.

Source: Many Mounties oppose opening ranks to permanent residents, easing entrance requirements, spokesmen say

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Swastika flags at Vancouver home spark cultural dialogue

2016/07/26 Leave a comment

Certainly succeeding in provoking a dialogue, and one that appears to be carried out respectfully. It is also an example of one of most, if not the most, egregious case of cultural appropriation:

Sital Dhillon was driving through her neighbourhood in South Vancouver when she noticed a house with two prominent yellow flags adorned with swastikas flying at the front gate.

“When I saw the symbol, I stopped and took a second look and it started to provide questions in my mind,” said Dhillon. “I didn’t want to draw conclusions.”

Dhillon quickly noticed the flags weren’t the only thing decorating the front of the house — there were several posters, banners, and other religious symbols, hinting that there may be something more to the use of the swastikas.

But the symbol, so associated with Nazi terrors, still touched a nerve.

“The Western world does not have a very good perception of the swastika,” she said, “It’s evil. It’s hate.”

Religious symbol

Homeowner Ravinder Gaba doesn’t see anything wrong with his use of the swastika.

Ravinder Gaba put two swastika flags in front of his house to honour a spiritual guru who is staying at his house. He says the swastika is a symbol meaning peace, love, and purity in Hinduism and other religions.

“This symbol, if you go to India, in every temple that symbol is there,” he said.

Gaba, who is Hindu, is playing host to a spiritual leader — a man believed by his followers to be an immortal living saint, Brahmrishi Shri Gurudev. The flags are flying outside his home for a few days to celebrate the occasion.

Gaba points out that the swastika goes back thousands of years, long before Adolf Hitler and the Nazis began using it.

“It’s nothing with Hitler. We don’t follow Hitler. We don’t follow even extremist people right now, okay? We are a religion against that,” he said. “Believe me I don’t know that’s his symbol. That’s a Hitler’s symbol? I don’t know.”

Swastika

Ravinder Gaba’s home was recently built and includes a large custom mantle decorated with Sanskrit swastikas. (Rafferty Baker/CBC)

Gaba’s newly built home even has an elaborate stone mantel in the living room with stylized swastikas decorating the corners.

‘A lot of pain’

Carey Brown, a rabbi at Temple Sholom Synagogue in Vancouver, reacts strongly to the flags, even with the knowledge that they aren’t a Nazi reference.

“It is very jarring to see it,” she said. “Whether it’s graffiti on a bus stop or a flag flying in someone’s lawn, even if they’re placed there for two different reasons, just seeing it … is very jarring.”

“Certainly as a Jew, it’s a symbol that has a lot of emotional painful resonance for me. We have many members of our synagogue who themselves are survivors of the holocaust, or have parents or grandparents that survived,” said Brown. “It’s a lot of pain and a little bit of fear as well.”

Brown has travelled throughout India, and is fully aware of the ancient use of the swastika in religions like Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism.

“While it’s a little bit strange to see swastikas all around you, I know that in its context it means something very peaceful,” she said.

But for Brown, that context is removed once the swastika is flown in Canada.

“Symbols have meaning, and the meaning of this symbol — in the Western world certainly — is one that is the absolute opposite of peace, and to see it flying in Vancouver it is difficult to see and it represents something that’s very hateful to me.”

Cross-cultural dialogue

Gaba says his religion teaches love and peace, and that’s all he means to promote with his swastika flags.

He hopes that anyone who has misgivings about the flags will knock on his door and engage in a conversation about the issue.

“They should come to us and ask us first. We are always open. Anybody can come and ask us a question,” he said. “We are loving people.”

But for Brown, knocking on the door of a house that has swastikas outside doesn’t seem like a likely proposition.

“I think many people would want to not knock on the door, because they would be nervous about who they might encounter inside,” she said, adding that she would welcome a cross-cultural conversation about what the symbol means to different people.

Source: Swastika flags at Vancouver home spark cultural dialogue – British Columbia – CBC News

Suresh Kurl provides some historical context:

Historically, Swastika goes back to approximately 12,000 years, when it was discovered carved on an ivory figurine in Mezine (Ukraine).

In Buddhism, svastika is also considered a symbol of good fortune, prosperity, abundance and eternity. It is found carved on statues on the soles of Lord Buddha’s feet and on his heart.
In Jainism, Svastika symbolises the four states of existence: Heavenly beings (devas), Human beings, Hellish being and Tiryancha, as flora or fauna,  representing the perpetual nature of the universe in the material world, where a creature is destined to one of those states based on their karma. Amazingly, Native Americans also use this symbol for the sun.

Recently, Mr. Ravinder Gaba of South Vancouver put two swastika flags in front of his residence to honour his spiritual guru.  As a practicing Hindu he must have learned that the swastika is an old Vedic symbol denoting peace, love and purity.

If I may add, this Hindu-Auspicious symbol spelled as, Sv-asti-ka in Sanskrit also means well being, fortune, luck, success, prosperity and victory — a far cry from its Nazi association. The symbol represents the Hindu Lord Vishnu (the preserver of this planet) and god Surya (Sun).

Rabbi Carey Brown of Vancouver said, “Certainly as a Jew, it’s a symbol that has a lot of emotional painful resonance for me. We have many members of our synagogue who themselves are survivors of the holocaust, or have parents or grandparents that survived,” said Brown. “It’s a lot of pain and a little bit of fear as well.”

No human with a conscience can dispute this tragedy. I am a Hindu. I was not even born, when Adolf Hitler adopted the symbol, redefined it, corrupted it and rained his terror over Jewish people under his Nazi brand of Swastika flags.

I sincerely apologise on behalf of Mr. Gaba for flying those flags with Swastika. Though his behaviour would seem insensitive I would like to believe it was not intentional.

As we live in a multi-cultural and Inter-faith country, I believe it will be advisable to first run such symbols and objects through the litmus test before putting them out for a public display : “How it will affect the general public before we display them?  No worship or celebration can be fruitful if it ends up hurting our fellow human beings. We know it.

That said the Inter-faith Associations also have an obligation to review such sensitive issues and come up with harmonious solutions.

SWASTIKA: Cultural Sensitivity Should Take Precedence When We Display Controversial Symbols And Objects

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Le coût de la diète religieuse bondit dans les prisons

2016/07/26 Leave a comment

Part of the cost of living in a diverse society and respecting different faiths:

Le coût des repas religieux servis dans les prisons québécoises a bondi au cours de la dernière année, en particulier en ce qui concerne les mets préparés pour les détenus de confession juive. Un repas casher en prison coûte maintenant deux fois plus cher qu’un repas non religieux, a appris La Presse. Portrait de la diète carcérale, un régime de 12,6 millions par année.

Chaque repas casher servi en centre de détention a coûté 6,98 $ pendant l’année financière 2015-2016, contre 5,25 $ un an plus tôt, selon des données du ministère de la Sécurité publique (MSP) rendues publiques par la Loi sur l’accès à l’information. Selon le Ministère, ce bond de 33 % en un an est la conséquence de la résiliation du précédent contrat pour l’achat de repas cashers congelés.

« Durant la période sans contrat, les établissements de détention ont dû s’approvisionner auprès de fournisseurs locaux, à coûts plus élevés. »

– Louise Quintin, porte-parole du ministère de la Sécurité publique

Un nouveau contrat de deux ans pour l’approvisionnement de repas cashers congelésa d’ailleurs été conclu en décembre dernier pour 223 582 $. Une seule des deux soumissions déposées a été jugée admissible. En vertu du contrat, le fournisseur doit préparer jusqu’à 35 058 repas et les livrer dans quatre centres de détention de la région métropolitaine. Plus de 20 000 repas cashers sont destinés à l’Établissement de détention de Montréal (Bordeaux). Les autres sont partagés entre les prisons de Laval, de Saint-Jérôme et de Rivière-des-Prairies.

 Les 11 759 plats cashers servis en 2015-2016 – en hausse de 15 % par rapport à l’année précédente – représentent à peine 0,17 % des quelque 7 millions de repas servis chaque année dans les prisons provinciales. En incluant les coûts de la main-d’oeuvre, la préparation de chaque repas non religieux a coûté 3,27 $ en 2015-2016, une hausse de 6 % en un an, soit trois fois plus que l’inflation. La facture a donc bondi de 516 000 $ pour la diète standard, même si 34 000 repas de moins ont été servis.

Le coût unitaire d’un repas halal a augmenté de 14 % en un an, passant de 3,61 $ à 4,10 $, en raison de la cherté de la viande halal, selon le Ministère. Ainsi, les 91 988 plats préparés en 2015-2016 pour les détenus de confession musulmane ont coûté 124 646 $, en hausse de 10 %. Ces repas sont généralement préparés à partir de viande hachée halal achetée en « très petite quantité » pour remplacer le boeuf d’un hamburger, par exemple.

« Il est important de souligner que le nombre de repas halal a diminué [de 7 %] […]. De plus, notons que les repas cashers et halal servis dans les établissements de détention représentent moins de 2 % de l’ensemble des repas servis en détention », soutient Louise Quintin. En fait, la diète religieuse représente 1,47 % de tous les repas servis en prison provinciale.

Les centres de détention ont l’obligation d’offrir un repas halal ou casher à un détenu qui en fait la demande écrite. L’administration doit alors valider « l’appartenance à la communauté religieuse du demandeur ainsi que la sincérité de sa croyance », explique Mme Quintin. Un détenu peut démontrer sa croyance religieuse par un document pertinent, par sa connaissance de sa religion ou par sa participation à des activités spirituelles.

Source: Le coût de la diète religieuse bondit dans les prisons | Louis-Samuel Perron | Actualités

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Comedians say the push for political correctness is no laughing matter

2016/07/25 Leave a comment

Reasonable commentary by Evan Carter on the limits of comedy:

Finding the balance between comedy that pushes the envelope and a routine that doesn’t offend anyone has been a precarious task for decades.

But many comedians today say that social media has put them under an unprecedented amount of scrutiny. Whereas a comedian’s ill-advised or offensive joke would once elicit boos or, at worst, a few cancelled gigs, it now ends up on social media, where it’s seen by millions.

Evan Carter, a Toronto comic who’s been performing stand-up since the early 1980s, agrees comics today have it harder than when he started in the business.

“There’s something that they don’t like and they’ve picked out two minutes of a one-hour show completely out of context, and the next thing you know — boom! — it’s on Twitter, it’s on Instagram, it’s on Facebook, and before you get off stage, you’re hated.”

Still, Carter, who teaches a course in stand-up comedy at Second City, doesn’t think political correctness is the enemy of comedy: “I think what’s the enemy of comedy is lazy comics.”

He says that even very risky material can be accepted by the audience if it’s intelligently written and delivered; he brings up Louis C.K. as an example of a popular comic who handles tough topics like spousal abuse or racism cleverly in his routines.

“Craft the joke, build a joke, so that the audience goes, ‘Yeah, I probably shouldn’t be laughing at this but I see your point and I’m willing to learn from it,'” is the advice he gives his students. “But if it’s somebody that’s just coming up and punching you in the face while you’re standing there with a line, with a word that’s just there to shock you? Well, that really doesn’t take much craft at all.”

Source: Comedians say the push for political correctness is no laughing matter – Arts & Entertainment – CBC News

Another balanced piece is by Steve Patterson:

My personal comedy mantra is to make fun of the “haves” not the “have-nots.” When there is someone in the public eye whose arrogance, attitude and ineptitude should be taken down a peg or two (or perhaps have the ladder kicked out from underneath them completely) I am all for it. But it should be done with witty wordsmithing, precise skill and, where possible, in a way that makes the target of the joke laugh along.

Mike Ward is a skilled comedian. He is a worthy wordsmith (in both French and English, which is no small feat). But he picked his target poorly in this case and now he is being told to pay the price. It happens that he is one of the few Canadian comedians who can afford the fine and will certainly profit more from this notoriety in the media. And Mr. Gabriel and his family can count a small “win” after being publicly shamed through no fault of their own (those heaving backlash against his family for initiating this complaint are, in my opinion, tiny-brained troglodytes).

So where does this leave Canadian comedians? I would say, keep working hard to make your jokes the best they can be. Choose your targets wisely. And I would have thought this would go without saying, but leave vulnerable people such as, say, children with facial deformities, out of your comedic repertoire. Unless they personally requested you to focus your sights on them. Then, make sure they’re laughing louder than anyone else at the joke.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to get back to writing jokes that will offend Donald Trump and any of his supporters, while hoping that he doesn’t sue me.

If a joke is offensive, is it punishable?

 

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The West’s Crisis of Leadership [focus on France] – The New York Times

2016/07/25 Leave a comment

Sylvie Kauffmann on the weakness of political leadership in France, contrasted with the resilience of its population:

Today, France and the United States are probably the West’s two main targets of Islamist terrorism. In France, our government warns that we must “learn to live with terrorism.” Yet just when they need to be stronger, our societies seem fragile, tense, stirred by powerful winds of revolt against their elites and an economic order that has increased inequalities. Can they withstand the shock?

Defying the odds through the last 18 difficult months — three bloody waves of terrorist attacks and sporadic terrorist incidents, strikes, violent protests against a reform of labor laws, high unemployment and floods — the French have proved surprisingly resilient. The annual survey of the National Consultative Human Rights Commission, carried out in January, even showed tolerance on the rise “despite the posture of some public figures.” While the 2008 economic crisis reduced tolerance, the 2015 attacks produced the opposite effect, “leading to soul-searching and civic mobilization” against extremists, the commission said.

Similarly, the Pew Research Center’s 2016 Global Attitudes Survey found that France (the European Union country with the biggest Muslim and Jewish populations) was the European nation second only to Spain in valuing diversity. The monthlong Euro soccer competition, hosted by France just before the Nice attack, also inspired intense fervor from the French public for its very diverse national team; it was supported throughout by enthusiastic singing of “The Marseillaise,” even after it lost the final game.

Some statistics from the Ministry of Interior, though, show a different picture: The number of racist criminal acts went up 22.4 percent in 2015. The reason for this contradiction, the Human Rights Commission’s experts suggest, is that while individuals who carry out such acts are becoming more radicalized, the society at large is more aware of the dangers of polarization. This attitude shows in an increasing number of civic initiatives, and in the results of the regional election last December: After the far-right National Front did very well in the first round, voters rallied against it and prevented it from winning a single region in the second round.

Whether such healthy reactions will prevail after the Nice massacre — and any future one — is an open question. With a big immigrant population from North Africa and a very strong National Front locally, Nice itself is particularly vulnerable.

The sad reality is that people of good will are not helped by a significantly mediocre political establishment. There could be national unity at the bottom — if only there were at the top.

This was illustrated again immediately after the Bastille Day attack. While citizens of all backgrounds and colors joined to pay their respects to the victims on the Promenade des Anglais, while the florists of Nice united to cover the bloodied avenue with flowers, while the nation was in shock, our politicians bickered over whether the government could have prevented this new atrocity. With the 2017 presidential election flashing big on his radar screen, Mr. Hollande’s rival and predecessor, Nicolas Sarkozy, did not even wait for the end of three days of national mourning before mounting a ferocious attack on what he saw as the government’s passivity.

The political debate in France has not quite reached the abyss of the campaign for the June 23 referendum on Brexit in Britain yet, nor of Donald J. Trump’s surreal pronouncements, but it is going in that direction. Le Monde’s longtime cartoonist Plantu feels that politicians, media and social networks have stolen his job: “They are now more caricatural than my own caricatures,” he said. In an interview with the Journal du Dimanche on Sunday, Prime Minister Manuel Valls openly worried about a trend that he describes as “the Trumpization of minds.” This, he said, “cannot be our response to the Islamic State.”

When citizens behave more wisely than the men and women who compete to represent them, the time has come to take a hard look at the state of our political systems and its impact on our societies further down the road — particularly when modern democracies are under threat from outside forces that have declared war on them.

Source: The West’s Crisis of Leadership – The New York Times

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Allan Richarz: A more diverse bench isn’t the answer

2016/07/23 Leave a comment

Nice to see that my analysis (Diversity among federal and provincial judges – Policy Options) is provoking some discussion and debate.

But I think for most advocates of greater diversity on the bench and public and private institutions more generally, the fundamental purpose is to encourage a greater diversity of life experiences and views to inform and improve decision-making.

We all have our implicit biases and assumptions. Judges are no exception, even if their training and decision-making (“slow thinking” to use Kahneman’s phrase) are designed to help them be more mindful of these biases.

It is not simply assuming that female, visible minority and indigenous judges will necessarily make different decisions than male, non-visible minority or non-indigenous judges, but that their different backgrounds may provide a different perspective to interpreting the law.

Moreover, the legitimacy of public institutions requires a reasonable correlation between the population and their representation in these institutions.

How would Richarz feel if the numbers were reversed with only 2.1 percent of federal judges being white?

 

So while I fully agree with Richarz that improved judicial diversity is not a panacea for over-representation in prison or other similar issues, this does not undermine the overall case for diversity:

A recent report by Policy Options magazine reveals that indigenous and minority representation on Canada’s judiciary registers in the low single digits. This has led to the predictable hue and cry over a “judiciary of whiteness” from assorted legal analysts cum race-baiters. The real problem, however, is not with a lack of minority representation on the bench, but with the patronizing and divisive assumption that having more minority judges will serve as a sort of panacea for certain racial groups’ over-representation in prison. The clamour for more minority appointments to the bench is simply a smokescreen for pushing broader political ends that will ultimately do nothing for the communities it purports to help.

There are a number of troubling assumptions underlying the contention that greater minority representation on the bench will result in more positive outcomes for minority defendants. The first seems to take as a given that, say, an African-Canadian judge will cut a black defendant slack based not on the law, nor on the facts of the case, nor on the judge’s legal experience, but on nothing more than a sense of racial solidarity. This would be unacceptable in any other contexts. A male judge acquitting a male defendant of sexual assault based on a wink-wink, nudge-nudge “you know how it is” would raise immeasurable howls of protest.

Such an approach also unfairly reduces minority judges to just that, a minority judge. Becoming a judge is no easy task. Never mind the long hours at law school, passing the bar exams, spending a decade or more as a practising lawyer and earning the recommendation of one’s peers; all that is thrown out the window when one is simply reduced to “the Asian judge” or “the black female judge.” Perhaps for activist lawyers who have built careers on sowing racial divisions such labels do not matter, but for minority lawyers simply wanting to work and be treated no differently from their white colleagues, being reduced to a mere token is undoubtedly patronizing and unfair.

Adding to this is the unfair denigration of the thousands of judges serving  across Canada. While it is certainly fair to note that the judiciary is somewhat “male, pale and stale,” it is quite another to conclude based on that that the judiciary is riddled with closet racists, homophobes and misogynists as a result.

None of this matters, of course, to activists who would simply reduce the legal profession and judiciary to its constituent elements of race and sex. Their end game, however, is not about greater equality or fairness or whatever other trendy legal cause célèbre arises; it is about their own power, self-aggrandizement and profit. The squeaky wheel gets the grease, but also the TV face time and lucrative government contracts.

Judges are not the victims in this instance. For better or for worse, they have largely insulated themselves from the slings and arrows of the rabble-rousers and society generally. Who suffers most is the communities activists purport to help. Underlying causes of criminal overrepresentation in black and indigenous communities are overlooked in favour of sexier, more profitable Band-Aid solutions.

It is an unfortunate trend among progressive organizations in which political opportunism trumps all. In the United States, the leading cause of death among African-Americans aged 15-34 is homicide, according to the Centre for Disease Control. Among all African-American homicide victims, 90 per cent are killed by other blacks. Last weekend, 11 people in Chicago — all black — were shot and killed, yet Black Lives Matters was elsewhere, disrupting yuppie food festivals and clambering for airtime on CNN. This is a crisis, and people are dying. The solutions will be complex and never complete, but surely a more diverse bench isn’t the first place the hard work should start.

Ultimately, if activists want to help their communities, they must focus less on cheap agitation and political stunts, and more on actually supporting those in need. There is no doubt room to improve our judicial system, but tokenizing those serving in it is not the way to do it. Promoting and sponsoring education, work training opportunities and self-respect, rather than treating communities as hapless minorities in need of a Svengali-like saviour, are key. Perhaps it means less screen time on the TV talk shops, but activists’ political opportunism must take a back seat to actually serving their communities.

Source: Allan Richarz: A more diverse bench isn’t the answer

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ICYMI: Jihad and the French Exception: Farhad Khosrowkhovar – The New York Times

2016/07/23 Leave a comment

Good, thought-provoking explanation of some of the reasons for France’s “exceptionalism” and the arguable failure of its integration model:

France’s distinctiveness arises in part from the ideological strength of the idea the nation has had of itself since the French Revolution, including an assertive form of republicanism and an open distrust of all religions, beginning, historically, with Catholicism. This model has been knocked around over the years, first by decolonization, then by decades of economic hardship, the growing stigmatization of cultural differences, the fervent individualism of new generations and globalization, which has narrowed the state’s room for maneuver.

Above all, France hasn’t been able to solve the problem of economic and social exclusion. Its system, which is too protective of those people who have jobs and not open enough to those who don’t, breeds angst all around. Young people in the banlieues, marginalized and with few prospects, feel like victims. They become prime targets for jihadist propaganda, often after a stint in prison for petty crimes.

Neither Germany nor Britain faces the banlieues phenomenon, at least not on such a scale. The German town of Dinslaken, which is partly ghettoized, has become a hotbed of Islamist radicalization. The same goes for Dewsbury, in West Yorkshire, and the Molenbeek district of Brussels. But France seems to alienate many more of its citizens and residents, well beyond those who actually join the Islamic State.

One reason is that France’s vision of citizenship, which strongly insists on adherence to a few exalted political values, has seriously eroded over time. By the 1980s, the republican ideal was floundering: It had promised equal opportunity, and that now seemed to be in short supply. The French Communist Party, which had long brought dignity to disadvantaged groups by proposing to fight injustice through class struggle, also greatly weakened during that period, partly because of the demise of the Soviet Union.

Postwar Germany, on the other hand, chose a far more modest and prudent vision: economic progress. Today, Germany has a rather muted foreign policy toward the Muslim world, and it displays no desire to unite all its citizens around universal principles. Britain isn’t trying to create a monocultural society either. It has opted for multiculturalism, which can abide hyphenated identities and communal behavior.

France, however, remains resolutely universalist and claims it still has both the desire and the power to enforce inclusion. Yet its assimilationist ambitions are increasingly at odds with everyday reality, and this growing gap is a source of pervasive distress.

And so the strength — the weight — of France’s national identity has become a problem. It only heightens the discontent of young people with foreign origins, especially North Africans or their descendants, all the more so because the Maghreb’s decolonization occurred in pain and humiliation: When France withdrew from Algeria, it left behind hundreds of thousands dead and created scars in the collective unconscious that remain to this day. British decolonization seems almost painless in comparison.

Certainly, Britons and Germans also express fears about immigration and Islam. Such concerns help explain Brexit. Acts of sexual harassment in Cologne around the new year, apparently committed by immigrants, sparked a heated debate in Germany (and beyond). But both Britain and Germany give non-local minorities ample leeway to publicly express and practice their religious and communal preferences.

France insists — in the name of republicanism — that religion should remain a strictly private affair. An ideological nation par excellence, it focuses on symbolic issues like wearing headscarves or holding collective prayers in public places. But restricting such practices causes wounds that go much deeper than the prohibitions themselves: It allows Islamists to exaggerate the implications and accuse France of Islamophobia. In fact, France is no more Islamophobic than its neighbors; it’s just more frontal in the way it handles Islam in the public sphere.

French-style integration has had some successes. Most notable among them is a high rate of mixed marriages. The French public school system, by helping uplift the lower classes and, therefore, many children of North African parents, has also been a tool of integration (although lately it has seemed less effective). Sometimes precisely because they have faced prejudice in the job market, which has long been stifled by unemployment, children of immigrants have found refuge in state institutions like the army and the police, which recruit through anonymous competitive exams.

Although France has managed to integrate many immigrants and their descendants, those it has left on the sidelines are more embittered than their British or German peers, and many feel insulted in their Muslim or Arab identity. Laïcité, France’s staunch version of secularism, is so inflexible it can appear to rob them of dignity. An additional factor is France’s muscular foreign policy, which seems to target mostly Muslim countries, such as Libya, Syria and Mali.

Source: Jihad and the French Exception – The New York Times

Filed under Integration, Multiculturalism, Radicalization Tagged with ,

Qandeel Baloch’s Murder Sheds Light On Global Honor Killings: NPR

2016/07/22 Leave a comment

Good overview article:

An estimated 5,000 honor killings are committed every year, mostly in Muslim, Hindu and Sikh communities, according to a 2000 report from the UNFPA — the most recent compilation of data. But the number could in fact be far higher. Barr says the killings are frequently not reported to authorities by the victims’ families.

While there may be more honor killings in the Middle East and Southeast Asia than in other parts of the world, there is no single ethnic, cultural or religious indicator of honor-based violence, reports the Honor Based Violence Awareness Network, a digital resource center that studies honor killings.

“It goes across cultural norms,” says Christa Stewart, sexual violence program manager at Equality Now, a women’s and girls’ rights organization. “It’s aimed at any woman who transgresses in a societal framework — who asserts her own desire to marry on her own volition, not have a marriage imposed upon her or chooses education.” In the case of Baloch, she says, her “transgression” was clear: posting social media posts that defied cultural norms.

Such acts of violence take place in the Western world, too. According to research commissioned by the U.S. Department of Justice in May 2015, an estimated 23 to 27 honor killings occur in the U.S. per year, 13 in the Netherlands and 10 to 12 in the U.K.

….And some researchers believe the label for these acts is part of the problem. “We shouldn’t use the term ‘honor killings’ at all,” she says. “It’s just an excuse for murder.”

Source: Qandeel Baloch’s Murder Sheds Light On Global Honor Killings : Goats and Soda : NPR

Filed under Multiculturalism Tagged with

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