“To say ‘I don’t see colour’ is to say we don’t see the racism people face. What matters is people’s own experience of being racialized. Believing that ignoring skin colour will solve all of our problems fails to consider the very real experiences of racism that occur in daily life. As a result, this attitude helps to maintain inequities and systemic racism.”

When Postmedia asked if the commission would then reply Yes to the question, “If I say I don’t see skin colour, am I racist?” spokeswoman Elaine O’Connor responded, “We did not set an ultimate answer to the question or prescribe a ‘correct’ answer. The purpose of this campaign was to prompt internal assessments.”

The spokeswoman also emphasized the “am I racist?” campaign was not inspired by Horgan getting called out.

“It’s important to share that our campaign was conceived and created in the summer of 2020. The questions in our campaign were decided upon and finalized well before the premier’s statement,” O’Connor said.

Asked how the commission defines its use of the academic term “racialized,” O’Connor initially declined, saying the commission “isn’t in a position to dictate or define a fixed meaning at this time.”

Six days later, O’Connor emailed that “‘racialization’ is an evolving discursive process and term. The term ‘racialized’ has a number of different interpretations, since it is a fairly new addition to modern conversation and there is not full agreement.”

Continuing, she said, “Racialization of all groups is not equally applied in practice. The racialization of white people tends to be invisible because whiteness is the generally accepted ‘norm’ in our culture. The term ‘racialized’ is generally used in reference to BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, people of colour) people.”