Stephen Harper should attend the latest upcoming event hosted by the "Chillin’ In Your Brown Skin Collective"
fraeauldb...@gmail.com
to attend a major South Asian
festival to listen to the concerns of this very important demographic
group. South Asians are the fastest
growing ethnic groups in Canada and increasingly decide the outcome of
many swing ridings in the
Greater Toronto, Greater Vancouver, and Greater Montreal areas. With
official Statistics Canada
projections showing that Toronto, Montreal, and Vancouver will all
have solid non-White majorities
by the year 2010; Ontario, Quebec, and British Columbia will have
solid non-White majorities no
later than the 2040's, and Canada as a whole will have a solid non-
White majority no later than
the early 2050's; then Stephen Harper's Conservatives can not afford
to ignore the interests and
concerns of this vital demographic group which will increasingly yield
political, economic, media,
academic, business, and legal power in the years and decades ahead.
South Asians constitute the largest share of Canada's total visible
minority population and have one of the highest fertility rates and
immigration levels of all ethno-cultural groups in Canada. South
Asians also overwhelmingly tend to vote Liberal. If Stephen Harper
were to attempt to make the Conservative Party of Canada more relevant
to women, visible minorities, aboriginals, city dwellers, and
residents of Ontario
and Quebec; then he could very well win a majority at the next federal
election. However, in order to do
so, he will need to adopt a firm Red Tory, socially progressive, and
environmentally responsible
set of policies and totally break with the racist, sexist, bigoted,
homophobic, anti-immigrant, anti-bilingual,
anti-multicultural, anti-abortion rights, anti-gay rights, anti-hate
crimes laws, anti-tax, anti-social programs,
anti-Kyoto accord, pro-Israel, pro-American, Alberta-centric, redneck,
White Anglo Chauvinist roots of
his Reform Party/Canadian Alliance predecessors. In short, Stephen
Harper will need more Tory MPs
like Joe Clark and Jean Charest and less American Republican-style MPs
like Stockwell Day and
Rob Anders.
Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper and his new Conservative Party
of Canada are completely
and utterly out of touch with 21st Canadian life, and fail miserably
in reflecting Canada's rich multiracial, multiethnic, multicultural,
multireligious, multinational, and multilingual mosaic. Canada's
population is a tapestry of different races, genders, ethnicites,
cultures, nationalities, religions, and spoken languages; yet Canadian
Prime Minister Stephen Harper's new cabinet looks like it is better
suited to reflect the population
of rural Alberta rather than that of cosmopolitan Canada!!!.
Despite the fact that the racial breakdown of the Canadian population
is 80% white, 17% visible minority,
and 3% aboriginal. Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper has decided
in his infinite wisdom to only appoint only 1 visible minority to his
new cabinet out of a total of 27, and no aboriginals at all. Canadian
Prime Minister Stephen Harper's new cabinet is thus 3% visible
minority and 97% white!!!. Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper
could have easily appointed many more visible minorities to his new
cabinet to achieve a racial balance more reflective of the Canadian
population at large, as there were plenty of visible minority
Conservative MPs elected to the house of commons last month for him to
chose from if he was so inclined toward racial equality. Canadian
Prime Minister Stephen Harper could have chosen to appoint
intelligent, educated, experienced visible minority Conservative MPs
such as Neena Grewal, Deepak Obhrai, Rahim Jaffer, and Inky Mark to
bolster the number of visible minorities in his new cabinet.
Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper could also have easily
appointed an aboriginal Canadian to his
new cabinet by appointing such an individual to the Senate, as he has
already done in the case of the
unelected Michael Fortier. In opposition and during the campaign
Harper had also criticized unelected, appointed cabinet ministers and
the Canadian Senate as it was an unelected body. However, seemingly
going against his own criticisms he appointed Michael Fortier, a
senior Conservative party operative from Montreal, to his cabinet,
giving him the high-profile cabinet position of Public Works!!!. The
move was
quickly criticized by observers including the then interim Leader of
the Opposition Bill Graham, as the department spends billions of
dollars a year and the minister responsible for the portfolio will not
be
subject to questioning in the House of Commons. Perhaps ironically,
the department was also at the
centre of the sponsorship scandal which the Conservatives capitalized
on during the 2006 election
campaign; and, they claimed, exemplified an example of a lack of
accountability in Parliament!!!.
Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper's cabinet choices have largely
been influenced by the
Conservative Party of Canada's rank and file membership, which is
basically dominated racists, sexists, bigots, homophobes, misogynists,
patriarchs, rednecks, and religious fundamentalists. The rank and file
membership of the Conservative Party of Canada would love to turn the
social clock back 50 or 60
years to a time when women, visible minorities, aboriginals,
immigrants, people with disabilities, and homosexuals has little or no
civil rights in society; and whereby politics, business, academia,
law
enforcement, and the military were controlled by and for the exclusive
benefit of white males.
Throughout history, many ordinary White Men all across Canada have
sought to fight against this unfair and quite often unearned
allocation of societal privileges and to improve the lives of their
fellow Canadians who as a result of being born as a woman, visible
minority, aboriginal or disabled were quite often denied equality of
opportunity in employment, education, and housing. Many White Men
including former Progressive Conservative Party of Canada leader and
Prime Minister Joe Clark fought hard to bring about anti-
discrimination measures and equality of opportunity for women, visible
minorities, aboriginals, and peoples with disabilities. Other examples
of this are former Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario leaders
and premiers John Robarts and Bill Davis, who did a great deal of
excellent work to bring about equality, fairness, and human rights in
areas such as employment, education, and housing to their Province of
Ontario. The vast majority of Canadian White Males do not agree with
Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper's institutionalized racism and
sexism; and wish to see greater equality of opportunity and a fair
share of representation in elected public life for historically
oppressed and discriminated against groups such as women (both white
and non-white alike), visible minorities, aboriginals, and peoples
with disabilities.
Unfortunately, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper does not appear
to be one of these men, if he
was he would have seized upon a golden opportunity to appoint a larger
number of women, visible minorities, and aboriginals to his new
cabinet to better reflect their percentage of the Canadian population
at large. Instead, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper's new
cabinet is 78% white male, which is a grossly
distorted overrepresentation of this particular demographic, as white
males make up more or less 40% of the total Canadian population.
Sadly, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper appears to be very
backward, outdated, old fashioned, and regressive indeed. Most
unbecoming for a 21st Century Canadian Prime Minister indeed.
Prime Minister Harper, it would appear as if your new cabinet needs to
consult a qualified diversity trainer rather urgently!!!.
FEATURE
TheStar.com | DesiLife | GTA groups talk taboos at Masala! Mehndi!
Masti!
GTA groups talk taboos at Masala! Mehndi! Masti!
Jul 10, 2008 04:30 AM
Be the first to comment on this article...
Justin Piercy
The largest South Asian festival in North America and the biggest
festival of its kind outside of Asia hits the Exhibition Place grounds
in Toronto July 25 through July 27. Renowned for such traditional
attractions as film, fashion, music and food, Masala! Mehndi! Masti!
is also developing a reputation as a venue for decidedly non-
traditional discussions.
Much of this is directly attributable to a group of non-profit
organizations that aims to demystify topics that are taboo in many
South Asian households. The group calls itself the Chillin’ In Your
Brown Skin Collective, and festival co-founder Jyoti Rana says it
plays a key role in achieving the festival’s goal of inspiring
meaningful discussions. The collective donates its time and creativity
to helping the South Asian community “settle in,” using workshops and
interactive performances to broach such edgy issues as homosexuality,
arranged marriage and single parenting.
Formed in 2001, the collective is made up of several organizations
that share the same goal of wiping out stigmas surrounding a variety
of taboo topics in the South Asian community, and includes the
Alliance for South Asian AIDS Prevention (ASAAP) which provides health
promotion and support for people living with or affected by HIV; the
Council of Agencies Serving South Asians (CASSA), a social justice
organization that does advocacy work focusing on youth engagement,
domestic violence and poverty; the South Asian Women’s Centre (SAWC),
run by and for South Asian women and their families to help increase
self-awareness and economic status; and the South Asian Legal Clinic
of Ontario (SALCO), which provides public education on social justice
issues.
“All of our organizations do different things but our target goals are
similar,” says ASAAP’s Aalia Jadavji.
Photo illustration by Richard Lautens “We do a lot of work on racism
and discrimination, sexual health, hyphenated identities, forced
marriage, immigration and other things that are really significant and
important to discuss in the South Asian community, and at the Masala!
Mehndi! Masti! Festival we bring that out using creative and
innovative means.”
Masala! Mehndi! Masti! is one of two major projects the collective
tackles each year. Jadavji says their role in the festival requires a
lot of preparation because they face stiff competition for the
attention of the more than 100,000 festival patrons.
“Shopping, music, food, Bollywood actors. . . . There is a lot of
great programming, but we want to provide a social justice lens.”
At past festivals, the collective has incorporated multimedia, music,
dancing and theatre to help ease the crowds into challenging subjects.
Jadavji cites last year’s interactive workshop on healthy
relationships and sexuality for women as an example. Teasingly titled
What Would Your Mother Say?, the workshop used film clips, dance and
audience interviews to draw the audience in and help them over the
shyness barrier.
“That really engaged people,” Jadavji says, and got them “really
talking about sexuality in the South Asian community.”
This year at Masala! Mehndi! Masti!, the collective will focus on
intergenerational conflict and the thorny issues that can arise when
families are torn between the rules, values and traditions of the land
they left behind and the society their children are growing up in.
“Their ideas and values and what they believe to be right can clash
with those of the younger generation,” says Ellen Curtis of CASSA.
“There are so many things that tie in with (intergenerational
conflict) — sexuality, forced marriages, negotiating relations with
parents, picking and choosing things we’ll do in the future — it was
an all-encompassing theme.”
Rana says the collective’s presence at the festival boosts the South
Asian community by giving an open forum to topics that would otherwise
be off limits. “Homosexuality or arranged marriages or any of these
other things — we bring them to the forefront,” she says.
The openness, acceptance and public nature of the discussions are
especially helpful for the elders in the audience. “They learn about
these topics and the types of problems people face and, should they go
back to their own homes and be affected by this, it will give them
perspective,” says Rana. “There is no closed-door perspective anymore.
Chillin’ In Your Brown Skin has done some really great work to make
these issues accessible to the public.”