Racism in Canada (split from A Deeply Fractured US)

[Good2Golf]

I'll say how convenient in your quest to make a point. Additionally, I'll ask why you and your crse mates didn't address it? Remember, we're told everyone is a leader, and it behoves us all to address matters like this. If you aren't speaking up, you're part of the problem.

Where did you see EITS say he didn’t address the racist comments?

So you judgementally launch into accusing him of being part of the problem, without asking him?  :not-again:

 

[Remius]

I'll say how convenient in your quest to make a point. Additionally, I'll ask why you and your crse mates didn't address it? Remember, we're told everyone is a leader, and it behoves us all to address matters like this. If you aren't speaking up, you're part of the problem.

Jack, I'm trying to avoid the dogpile here.  But do you tell minorities that are victims of racist behaviour the same thing.  Are they part of the problem if they don't speak up?

Without knowing the context of EITS's interaction is it fair to label him the problem?

 

[Brad Sallows]

>So it says that unionized police forces tend to have higher incidents of killings of minorities?

Roughly.  The common sense interpretation goes something like this: unions protect their memberships; at the margins more abuses occur and go unpunished which emboldens people inclined to be abusive and/or abusive of particular minorities; at the margins of abuses, wrongful deaths occur.

 

[Remius]

>So it says that unionized police forces tend to have higher incidents of killings of minorities?

Roughly.  The common sense interpretation goes something like this: unions protect their memberships; at the margins more abuses occur and go unpunished which emboldens people inclined to be abusive and/or abusive of particular minorities; at the margins of abuses, wrongful deaths occur.

Interesting study.  I’ll be interested in seeing the results and how it could be applied to more troubled police forces. 

 

[jacksparrow]

Next question....am I actually a Canadian?

Jacksparrow. Are you actually in the Military?

 

[Kilted]

Next question....am I actually a Canadian?

Or does he work for the CBC?

 

[Remius]

Next question....am I actually a Canadian?

Ok, Jack, I’m actually trying to have a conversation with you but you are coming off as spoiling for a fight.

Take a breath.  Listen to what is actually being said and try not to make it personal or take it personally.

Asking if you are military is a legit question if your profile does not show any military experience.  Given your comments I believe you are but for some they just want confirmation.

 

[mariomike]

The common sense interpretation goes something like this: unions protect their memberships; at the margins more abuses occur and go unpunished which emboldens people inclined to be abusive and/or abusive of particular minorities; at the margins of abuses, wrongful deaths occur.

I don't know about the police, but the department I belonged to was frequently sued for wrongful death. Highest payout for a single individual I am aware of was $10 million. Wasn't racist. But, it had a bit of a sexual orientation angle.

The crew received a slap on the wrist, along with some back to school. Then back on the street.

I joined the union when I was 18. It seemed to me the city would tolerate almost anything. Unless you became a public disgrace. That was the unforgivable sin.

 

[Quirky]

These protests, during a pandemic no less, will sure fix racism for good now. I’m glad they are twittering to their facebooks and hashtagging their instagrams. Nothing will be gained from this except more Covid cases and sunburns. Remember the last BLM protests and how things changed? Yeah, exactly. People who are racist will continue to be racist regardless what Toronto’s (and elsewhere) Karens march against. Free money from the government, unemployment and protests, we are living in a Liberal SJWs wet dream.

 

[Brad Sallows]

>Nothing will be gained

I am optimistic.  There was much less overt prejudice in my small corner of the Res F puddle when I left than there was when I joined.

What will not be gained is the improvement activists demand, within the time they allow.

 

[mariomike]

>Nothing will be gained

I am optimistic.  There was much less overt prejudice in my small corner of the Res F puddle when I left than there was when I joined.

I observed the same thing.

Also, in my full-time career.

It was 100% white male when I joined. There were minimum height requirements too, which were later found to be discriminatory. Very few over the age of 25 were hired. You had to be from Toronto for your application even to be considered.

All that changed over the course of my employment. So, I too an optimistic.

 

[Colin Parkinson]

Great post Colin thanks.

Pointing out that racism isn't just something white people do isn't a very popular thing.

Your post reminded me of some conversations I had with people about names. I know an amazing PSP member who shortened her female name to a male name because people treated her better through email correspondence (at her previous job) when they thought they were dealing with a male. An RCMP friend who's a visible minority told me before he went RCMP he owned a business and changed his name to a "white sounding name". I never asked why and assumed it was to not draw prejudice from caucasians but now I wonder.

As a Federal regulator, I had a fair bit of power as to how reviews would go. We had a new female officer join our team and I was mentoring her. She was given a file which I supported her on. At the meeting with the Proponent and their reps, who were all male and not Caucasian, they kept trying to direct all the questions to me. Finally I stated : "She is the lead on this file and you will direct all your questions to her and treat her the same way you treat me. I am here to support her if required and not to run the file" They struggled to make eye contact with her, so I made excuses to leave the room so they have no choice but to deal with her. I had zero sympathy for their stupidity as she was bright, experienced and worth her salt. Just prior to my retirement I was working on multi-billion project reviews where the majority of people in the room where females and the company project lead was female and they were all real smart and professional.

Some of the worst sexism though I have seen in a meeting is between First Nations. I have had to interrupt blabbing male elders so the FN women in the room had a chance to speak and normally I found they were more concise and better thought out then the men who were to wrapped up in their ego. 

 

[OldSolduer]

As a Federal regulator, I had a fair bit of power as to how reviews would go. We had a new female officer join our team and I was mentoring her. She was given a file which I supported her on. At the meeting with the Proponent and their reps, who were all male and not Caucasian, they kept trying to direct all the questions to me. Finally I stated : "She is the lead on this file and you will direct all your questions to her and treat her the same way you treat me. I am here to support her if required and not to run the file" They struggled to make eye contact with her, so I made excuses to leave the room so they have no choice but to deal with her. I had zero sympathy for their stupidity as she was bright, experienced and worth her salt. Just prior to my retirement I was working on multi-billion project reviews where the majority of people in the room where females and the company project lead was female and they were all real smart and professional.

Some of the worst sexism though I have seen in a meeting is between First Nations. I have had to interrupt blabbing male elders so the FN women in the room had a chance to speak and normally I found they were more concise and better thought out then the men who were to wrapped up in their ego.

Make no mistake, mysoginy (hope I spelled that right) is alive and well within every demographic. Its another dragon that needs slaying.

 

[Xylric]

My sister-in-law is Kenyan, and she has been quite vocal about letting the family know when she's had negative interactions. I will tell you, nothing will spark me to violence faster than seeing someone making a racist remark about my cute little 2 year old niece. The interesting thing is that most of the remarks I've been informed about aren't about the fact that sister-in-law and niece are black, but that it's a "shame" my brother married her. That infuriates me more than anyone can possibly know, because what most people don't know is that my grandfather's eldest sister was disowned by the family for marrying, of all possiblities, an Englishman. They love each other in as deep and abiding a fashion as my grandparents, and that's the only thing that matters.

It was interesting watching my brother introduce my sister-in-law to my grandparents when they first started dating, because my grandparents being who they were immediately treated her as part of the family. Their only concern was the education difference at the time - she was working on a Master's degree, and thus the question was whether or not my brother would be seeking to obtain one of his own (he is).

But the real core of this story is that my great-grandmother was sufficient of a racist that it was figured the best way to sort out my grandfather's "behavioural issues" (which ultimately proved to be the result of the fact that he, like me, was somewhere on the extreme high end of the autism spectrum) was to re-enroll him in a different school after he was essentially expelled unfairly for something that was never fully disclosed. Specifically, a school in which my grandfather was the only white student for the rest of his elementary career (about six years. This also means that he attended the same school as Dwayne Johnson's uncles). While this resulted in my grandfather having to physically defend himself on a daily basis for a period of at least three weeks, it also backfired tremendously, and ensured that my grandfather would never allow racist sentiment a place in his soul. And a half-dozen lifelong friendships.

This of course, also meant that he knocked the teeth out of a teacher in high school for making racist remarks about the girl he was taking to a dance, which again resulted in his expulsion and having to continue his education in New Brunswick. As this led to his being scouted for the hockey team at Acadia and a trip to a hockey tournament in Toronto, whereupon he mistakenly took the luggage of a girl visiting Canada from Michigan on a school trip, I have to admit that my grandfather's rather violent refusal to accept a racist way of thinking is directly responsible for my existence.

I obviously don't deny that racism and prejudice exists, but the simple fact of the matter is - you have to give people the choice to give it up themselves, you can't force it upon them.

 

[Colin Parkinson]

The solution to racism is no great secret, treat everyone the way you wish to be treated when you first meet them, let their actions and personality shape your opinion of them. Smile at people, say hello, hold doors open for them, ask questions about their heritage, learn some history. Don't feel bad for actions taken long in the past, they are not your fault or responsibility. You can acknowledge them without guilt. Racism will suffocate in a world of thousands of small gestures amongst ordinary people, openness to each other and respect to each other.

 

[lenaitch]

For example, a UVic study (not yet complete) has very recently gained some publicity: "Forthcoming research out of the University of Victoria's economics department finds that the introduction of collective bargaining produces somewhat higher compensation for police officers. It does not correlate with a reduction in total crime%u2014but it does eventually correlate with higher numbers of killings by police, especially of minorities."

I read the article and can't decide if it is anti-police or anti-union (I suppose if I knew more about the organization I'd know).  Their link to UVic is a twitter account form something called Cliometrics which according the Merriam-Webster is "the application of methods developed in other fields (such as economics, statistics, and data processing) to the study of history".  It apparently got its start back in the 1950s when it argued slavery was economically a good thing.  Police collective bargaining has been in place in Canada for years, so it should be no surprise that salaries have gone up.  So has minimum wage and the wages of sanitation workers.  Trying to argue that higher income results in increased violence against the public seems to attempt to relate correlation and causation.  By that argument, paying them minimum wage would result is law enforcement nirvana.

Police and public sectors labour laws in the US are quite different than up here and I can't really comment on their power and influence down there.  It should come as no surprise to anyone that a member's union stepped in to defend them, be it police or bus drivers. That's what they do; represent the interests of their membership.  In Ontario and probably the rest of Canada, the union could be brought before the labour board for failing to fulfill its legal responsibility that the members pay dues for.  Having said that, I do have a problem when they champion the cause as opposed to simply representing the member.  In my employment life, I was a lower-level executive of a police association (union) for a time and saw too many instances of the Board defending egregious behavior rather than simply providing legal advice and support.  I found out that telling a member that 'I'm here to help and represent your interests but ya gotta know you screwed up big time and should take your lumps' is not apparently acceptable.

 

[CBH99]

Agreed Colin.

I've never understood why racism is even a thing.  We don't judge other people by the pigment in their hair.  Yet some folks judge others for the pigment in their skin?

Having darker pigment in your hair isn't something anybody notices, but darker pigment of the skin makes someone less human than others?


Absurd.  I don't even understand how this ever became a 'thing' other than sheer collective ignorance, which somehow didn't die off as humans evolved.  ???

 

[mariomike]

Police collective bargaining has been in place in Canada for years, so it should be no surprise that salaries have gone up.  So has minimum wage and the wages of sanitation workers. 

Maybe instead of some people saying, "I don't have it, so they shouldn't either." They could ask, "They have it – why don't I?"

It's not a race to the bottom.

 

[Xylric]

The solution to racism is no great secret, treat everyone the way you wish to be treated when you first meet them, let their actions and personality shape your opinion of them. Smile at people, say hello, hold doors open for them, ask questions about their heritage, learn some history. Don't feel bad for actions taken long in the past, they are not your fault or responsibility. You can acknowledge them without guilt. Racism will suffocate in a world of thousands of small gestures amongst ordinary people, openness to each other and respect to each other.

Quite. That's why my response to the "Black Lives Matter" statement is simply "Your Life Matters." It makes it far more personal, and takes it out of the abstract. How many black kids grow up with some level of an intrinsic fear of white people, and vice versa? How many of them develop anger simply out of the simple reality of it is present in their lives?

Anger I understand, same with fear, but cold and deliberate malice? I'm a human being, not a cat. I utterly refuse to play with unquenchable fire.

And yet by the refusal to hate, one can all too easily become hated, because one cannot be understood by those who live their lives with it as their companion.

A couple of years ago, a friend of mine was going through a dark period and was actively contemplating suicide. I made sure to contact the proper authorities at their university, with a very simple reason. I would rather see the friend alive and cursing my name until the day they died than to do nothing and leave them unaware how much of an impact they had on my life. As they said at the time, if I ever did something like that again, they would completely terminate our association. I still consider that an acceptable bargain.

If I am to be hated, let it be for decisions made and actions taken, rather than things which are mere description.

 

[Eye In The Sky]

I'll say how convenient in your quest to make a point. Additionally, I'll ask why you and your crse mates didn't address it? Remember, we're told everyone is a leader, and it behoves us all to address matters like this. If you aren't speaking up, you're part of the problem.

So, you're saying I am making it up, it is not possible that happened.  :facepalm: 

It happened, in Wainwright, in 2003.  Or are you saying that is not possible, because he was FN and we were 'white males'?

Who said it wasn't addressed? WTF does that have to do with my point, which you're apparently trying hard to avoid/deny?