Why Canada’s politicians fixate on the ethnic vote – The Globe and Mail

2015/08/17 Leave a comment

From the piece Michael Adams and I did in today’s Globe on the importance of the ethnic vote and Canada’s uniqueness in that all parties compete for it:

In the 2011 federal election, voters sent 42 foreign-born citizens to represent them as MPs in Ottawa. That’s about 13 per cent of the then-308-member House of Commons. That proportion falls short of parity with our foreign-born population (20 per cent of us are foreign-born), but it comes quite close to matching the proportion of us who are foreign-born and Canadian citizens: 16 per cent.

Remarkably, the immigrants who were elected to Canada’s Parliament in 2011 had not only become citizens, gotten themselves nominated and then won election – but they represented all five main political parties: 18 Conservatives (of 166 elected), 18 New Democrats (of 103), four Liberals (of 34), and one each in the Bloc Québécois (of four) and the Green Party (of one). The Green Party is 100-per-cent foreign-born: Elizabeth May is from Hartford, Conn. The Bloc is dedicated to dismantling the country but managed to be inclusive of the foreign-born. Only in Canada.

Another “only in Canada” fact is that our most right-wing party, the Conservatives, attracts a substantial contingent of candidates born abroad. In most countries, right-wing parties are anti-immigrant and would be unlikely to either attract or accept foreign-born candidates. Stephen Harper may loathe much of the progressive agenda the Liberals and NDP have embraced over the past half-century, but he sure loves multiculturalism.

The high proportion of foreign-born MPs suggests a willingness to elect people not born in Canada – but are Canada’s immigrant MPs all from countries like Britain and France, of which the dominant ethnocultural and religious groups mirror Canada’s? No. Canada’s foreign-born MPs came from everywhere: 15 from Europe, 11 from Asia, 11 from the Americas and five from Africa.

Canada’s history of large immigrant inflows combined with a high naturalization rate (citizenship acquisition) has made it an electoral imperative to court – not dismiss – the “ethnic vote.”

Why Canada’s politicians fixate on the ethnic vote – The Globe and Mail.

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Apple’s Diversity Numbers Reveal Plenty of Progress To Be Made | TIME

2015/08/15 Leave a comment

More on diversity in hi-tech:

According to head of human resources Denise Young Smith, more than 11,000 women have been hired worldwide in the last year, a 65% increase from the year before (for some more perspective, the company employs over 110,000 people worldwide). In United States, 2,200 black employees and 2,700 Hispanic employees were hired in the same time frame, representing increases of 50% and 66%, respectively. And in the first six months of this year, nearly 50% of Apple’s U.S. hires were women, black, Hispanic or Native American.

“We feel good about what’s been accomplished in the last 12 months,” Young Smith said in a phone interview with Fortune. “Clearly this is a start, but we know that with the investments that we’re making and the work we’re doing we’ll show much more progress over time.”

CEO Tim Cook also offered a message on the company’s website Thursday afternoon, saying that Apple realizes there is a lot more work to be done. According to Cook’s statement: “Some people will read this page and see our progress. Others will recognize how much farther we have to go. We see both.”

Like many other large Silicon Valley players, Apple’s gender and racial breakdown is still far from reflecting our society. Under increasing pressure, these companies have pledged to not only disclose the demographic breakdown of their employee base, but to put money into programs that aim to increase the pipeline of women and minorities in tech and to make changes to their hiring practices. Last year, Cook said he is as committed to “being as innovative in advancing diversity as we are in developing products.” He has also said that the definition of diversity should go beyond race and gender and include age and sexual orientation, among other characteristics. (Last year CEO Cook became the first openly gay leader of a Fortune 500 company.)

… The efforts are leading to very slow progress, though it is progress nonetheless: Apple’s 2015 breakdown shows that the company’s employee base is still 69% male and 54% white; in 2014 it was 70% male and 55% white. But while one percentage point doesn’t sound impressive, it does reflect thousands of new, more diverse employees, and—as Young Smith admitted—it is just a start.

Apple’s Diversity Numbers Reveal Plenty of Progress To Be Made | TIME.

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More women, minorities running in GTA in federal election

2015/08/14 Leave a comment

Election_2015Encouraging but will see how many elected (47 percent of the GTA are visible minorities):

Many GTA voters can look forward to voting for either a woman or a person from a diverse background during this year’s federal election.

While the nomination process is ongoing — the deadline for candidates isn’t until Sept. 28 — there has already been a concerted effort by the federal parties to court women and minorities to run in Toronto-area ridings.

When it comes to women, the NDP leads the way with 21 of its 50 nominated candidates being women. The Liberals trail closely behind, while about one-in-four Conservative and Green Party candidates are female.

 

Incumbent NDP MP Peggy Nash, who is running again in Parkdale-High Park, said it’s positive to see so many women in the race.

“I think that a strong slate of women, really offers Canadians a full choice and broad representations so that they’re full range of views are getting heard,” Nash said.

While the number of female candidates in the GTA and the rest of Ontario is going up, the co-founder of Equal Voice — an organization that encourages women to run — says there’s still work to be done, especially given the fact that just 25 per cent of the 41st Parliament was female.

“That doesn’t nearly approximate the percentage of women in the population. And it does suggest that our democracy is not fair,” said Donna Dasko.

The number of minority candidates also appears to be on the rise, with the Liberals leading the way.

 

Ratna Omidvar, of Ryerson University’s Global Diversity Exchange, said growth in this area is inevitable given Toronto’s diversity, particularly in the suburbs.

“Think of Brampton, think of Scarborough, it is then inevitable that all parties will be running candidates from these communities,” Omidvar said.

More women, minorities running in GTA in federal election – Toronto – CBC News.

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ISIS Enshrines a Theology of Rape – The New York Times

2015/08/14 Leave a comment

Sick:

The systematic rape of women and girls from the Yazidi religious minority has become deeply enmeshed in the organization and the radical theology of the Islamic State in the year since the group announced it was reviving slavery as an institution. Interviews with 21 women and girls who recently escaped the Islamic State, as well as an examination of the group’s official communications, illuminate how the practice has been enshrined in the group’s core tenets.

The trade in Yazidi women and girls has created a persistent infrastructure, with a network of warehouses where the victims are held, viewing rooms where they are inspected and marketed, and a dedicated fleet of buses used to transport them.

A total of 5,270 Yazidis were abducted last year, and at least 3,144 are still being held, according to community leaders. To handle them, the Islamic State has developed a detailed bureaucracy of sex slavery, including sales contracts notarized by the ISIS-run Islamic courts. And the practice has become an established recruiting tool to lure men from deeply conservative Muslim societies, where casual sex is taboo and dating is forbidden.

A growing body of internal policy memos and theological discussions has established guidelines for slavery, including a lengthy how-to manual issued by the Islamic State Research and Fatwa Department just last month. Repeatedly, the ISIS leadership has emphasized a narrow and selective reading of the Quran and other religious rulings to not only justify violence, but also to elevate and celebrate each sexual assault as spiritually beneficial, even virtuous.

“Every time that he came to rape me, he would pray,” said F, a 15-year-old girl who was captured on the shoulder of Mount Sinjar one year ago and was sold to an Iraqi fighter in his 20s. Like some others interviewed by The New York Times, she wanted to be identified only by her first initial because of the shame associated with rape.

“He kept telling me this is ibadah,” she said, using a term from Islamic scripture meaning worship.

“He said that raping me is his prayer to God. I said to him, ‘What you’re doing to me is wrong, and it will not bring you closer to God.’ And he said, ‘No, it’s allowed. It’s halal,’” said the teenager, who escaped in April with the help of smugglers after being enslaved for nearly nine months.

ISIS Enshrines a Theology of Rape – The New York Times.

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We have better tools than the law to defy hate-mongers: Butt

2015/08/13 Leave a comment

David Butt, a Toronto-based criminal lawyer, argues for more public discourse as a means to curb hate speech, rather than lengthy judicial processes, provoked by the visit of misogynist Daryush Valizadeh who essentially advocates legalizing rape among other unacceptable views:

Third, there is often truth to the cliché that the best antidote to hate speech is more speech that denounces the hate not through the force of state intervention, but through the force of enlightened reason. Defying the hate-monger with the very tools he uses, exposing his offensive, propagandistic assumptions and deceptions, can be a powerful antidote to hate speech. Social media, wisely deployed, can enhance our collective power to burst the bubble of hate-mongers. Boycotts can catch fire with devastating speed, the hate-monger’s enablers can be dissuaded from enabling, and the messages can be transformed into teachable moments on the virtues of the counterarguments.

The catch is that countering bad speech with good has traction only if people care enough to actually respond. A passive, disengaged populace is fertilizer to the hate-monger’s mushrooms. Speaking out against hate is a social responsibility associated with a truly vibrant freedom of expression that is all too often overlooked. It is hard work to rise up and speak against things that are just plain wrong, and too many of us are content to leave that hard work to someone else.

There are at least three reasons why it is not a good idea to prosecute malevolent gadflies like Roosh V. But there is every reason for all of us to take on his hateful propaganda with the tools we all have at our disposal: our discerning intellects and our expressive capacities. We maintain and deserve a vibrant freedom of expression to the extent that we exercise it.

We have better tools than the law to defy hate-mongers – The Globe and Mail.

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Extremist travellers aren’t about to go away: Leuprecht

2015/08/13 Leave a comment

Christian Leuprecht’s contrarian view in support of  the proposed travel ban to countries where ISIS or other terror organizations are active:

Given the ease of communication and travel in the 21st century, the phenomenon of ideologically inspired travellers looking to join violent extremist causes is not about to go away. In fact, the ubiquity of social, economic and political conditions, especially throughout the Middle East, that fuel ideological extremism will likely mean extremist travellers will become even more prevalent.

Over the past decade, the United Nations Security Council has passed several resolutions, binding on all member countries – including Canada – to stem the flow of Foreign Terrorist Fighters, including Resolution 2178 in 2014. Political stripes notwithstanding, the next federal government is bound to find itself under continued pressure to innovate measures to counter and prevent terrorist-related activity. In this light, Canadians stand to benefit from a more informed debate on issues of national security. No better time, then, to raise legislative proposals than during an election campaign and afford Canadians the opportunity to cast their lot on the issue at the urn.

Extremist travellers aren’t about to go away – The Globe and Mail.

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A Current Snapshot of Canadian Multiculturalism – Review of my book

2015/08/12 Leave a comment

From the first review of Multiculturalism in Canada: Evidence and Anecdote, by Don Curry, Executive Director, North Bay & District Multicultural Centre, in New Canadian Media:

Griffith has the credentials for writing a comprehensive book of this nature. The author of Policy Arrogance or Innocent Bias: Resetting Citizenship and Multiculturalism, he is the former director general for citizenship and multiculturalism at Citizenship and Immigration Canada.

As someone leading an organization that is active in integration issues, I encourage anyone involved in citizenship, multiculturalism, immigration and integration issues to read this book to keep current with the latest available information, and perhaps alter some perceptions.

The only complaint I have about the depth of research is that it left out my corner of Canada – northern Ontario – and lumped it in with southern Ontario.

But I know why: it’s because, as Griffith notes, the National Household Survey of 2011 left a lot of gaps when it attempted to drill down to smaller census areas. He strengthens the argument for the return of the long-form census.

The evidence Griffith uses in the book is irrefutable, combining the best currently available data from Statistics Canada, employment equity, Citizenship and Immigration Canada operational statistics, and more to draw his conclusions.

As Griffith says, “My hope is that the evidence highlighted in this book will contribute to creating a more informed discourse as Canada – by most measures a remarkably successful, diverse and multicultural society – prepares for its 150th anniversary.”

Multiculturalism in Canada is an e-book modestly priced to reach a wide audience – and it deserves one.

A Current Snapshot of Canadian Multiculturalism – New Canadian Media.

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Damian Clairmont’s mother says Harper pushing ‘quick fix’ on terrorism

2015/08/12 Leave a comment

Captures it exactly (Michael den Tandt made similar arguments in Michael Den Tandt: Harper pandering with plan to make it illegal to travel to terror-stricken zones):

An Alberta woman whose 22-year-old son was killed while fighting with Islamic extremists in Syria says Stephen Harper is looking for a “quick fix” to deal with terrorism instead of addressing the root cause of radicalized youth.

The Conservative leader promised on Sunday that, if re-elected, his government would make it a crime for Canadians to travel to countries or regions where they could fight alongside groups identified by the federal government as terrorist organizations.

He said the government would establish “declared areas” — parts of the world where terrorist groups such as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, or ISIS, hold control and use their base to recruit and train followers.

“Anybody can pick up and travel and book a flight to anywhere, and if you really want to go badly enough, you can book your flight to Europe and then from there book yourself into somewhere else,” Chris Boudreau of Calgary said in an interview with The Canadian Press.

“It’s window dressing. It’s not realistic.”

Damian Clairmont’s mother says Harper pushing ‘quick fix’ on terrorism – Politics – CBC News.

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Some minorities more likely to see heart health deteriorate: study

2015/08/12 Leave a comment

Some_minorities_more_likely_to_see_heart_health_deteriorate__study_-_The_Globe_and_MailInteresting new study on how lifestyle in Canada affects different minority groups, as they integrate and adopt unhealthy Canadian food and lack of exercise habits:

The study looked at data from nearly 220,000 Canadians who took part in Statistics Canada’s Canadian Community Health Survey. The researchers focused on individuals belonging to Canada’s four major ethnic groups: white, South Asian, Chinese and black.

The results add to a growing body of evidence suggesting health problems affect ethnic groups at different rates. While genes certainly play a role, they do not tell the entire story, Chiu said.

“I like to think of it as genes load up the gun and environment pulls the trigger,” she said.

Her study helps explain why some ethnic groups appear to be more vulnerable to certain health conditions. Overall, the ethnic minority groups included in the study had household incomes that were as much as $30,000 lower than those of their white counterparts.

Those groups also reported that they ate fewer fruits and vegetables. At the same time, smoking rates among all of the groups studied fell, with the exception of black women and Chinese men.

“This is another wakeup call,” said Dr. Sonia Anand, professor of medicine and epidemiology at McMaster University in Hamilton and a spokeswoman for the Heart and Stroke Foundation. “We have to get going or we’re going to end up with an epidemic of obesity and type 2 diabetes in the next 20 years.”

Anand was not involved in this study, but much of her research focuses on the causes of heart disease in ethnic groups. She said the evidence is clear the differences exist, but there is no clear strategy on how to solve this complex problem.

The important question for researchers and policy makers, according to Chiu, is how to bridge the gap and reverse the trends.

One solution will be to tailor campaigns to ethnic groups, Chiu said. They need to know they are at risk and what changes they can make to reduce their vulnerability, such as quitting smoking or eating more fruits and vegetables.

And, as Anand noted, “we move less, we commute by car, we don’t live in walkable neighbourhoods.”

That means the necessary solutions are going to require a lot of time, co-ordination, funding and commitment, she said.

Some minorities more likely to see heart health deteriorate: study – The Globe and Mail.

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Multiculturalism in Canada: Evidence and Anecdote – Now Available in Print

2015/08/11 Leave a comment

For those interesting, my book is now available in print at a price of $39.00 directly from Lulu (direct link here) in addition to the pdf version at $3.99 (direct link here). The print version should become available through the usual on-line distributors in 6-8 weeks.

My personal preference is for the pdf version, given the charts are best in colour although I did optimize the print black-and-white charts as much as I could.

But doing the final review of the proof copy today, there is something oddly satisfying of holding it in one’s hand at last.

Filed under Citizenship, Multiculturalism Tagged with ,

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