White Racism is the issue, Mr Harper
auldbob...@aol.com
lately about Canada's various "international treaties" and
"international obligations" with regard to our country's ongoing
military role in Afganistan. However, if Stephen Harper was really
serious about honouring "international treaties" and "international
obligations", he may want to start
with making a public commitment to properly implement the terms and
obligations of
some other very important "international treaties", such as the
"International Convention
on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination" (ICEAFRD) and
the "Declaration
of Race and Racial Prejudice" (DRRP). Implementing these two
"international treaties" first and foremost would send a very strong
and very positive message that Stephen Harper and his new Conservative
Party of Canada are very serious and determined to fight the scourage
of white racism in Canada.
While previous Liberal governments have not gone as far as they should
have in having Canada properly implement the aforemention
"international treaties", they have gone a
great deal of work to combat white racism in Canada. Stephen Harper and
his new Reform Party/Canadian Alliance Party/Canadian Conservative
Reform Alliance Party/ Conservative Party of Canada on the other had
are yet to prove they are serious about fighting white racism in
Canada, and their own rather scorid and utterly disgraceful recent
histories of racism, sexism, homophobia, bigotry, misogyny, and
discrimination; make the need for them to prove they are serious about
fighting white racism all the more needed and urgent.
This past March 21 was commemorated as the International Day for the
Elimination of
Racial Discrimination because of a massacre in the town of Sharpeville,
in the Republic of
South Africa. Until as recently as 1994, South Africa was a country
ruled by brutal white supremacists. Organized racism was state policy.
The people labored under a government that was widely regarded as
fascist, and of the same type as Nazi Germany. Certainly Canadian and
American racist and fascist publications have been consistent in their
support of South African white supremacy and the policy of apartheid -
or racial separation - on which South African fascism was constructed.
Of all the racist laws that people of colour were forced to obey under
apartheid, the pass law was among the most degrading. Every non-white
was forced to carry a written pass. Failure to produce the pass when
requested by any white police officer, civil servant, or employer meant
fines or imprisonment. The pass contained information on where the
bearer lived, who his or her local chief was, and a variety of detailed
information including whether the pass carrier had paid the annual poll
tax, which was a tax that only Africans were forced to pay. The African
people of color recognized that the pass system was a form of organized
racist oppression designed to eliminate their free movement within
their own country.
And they were determined to resist it.
After decades of struggle, white supremacy and its policy of apartheid
were finally overthrown in the 1990s, by a united three-way alliance of
the African National Congress, the South African Communist Party, and
the Congress of South African Trade Unions. Nelson Mandela, the leader
of the African National Congress, and Joe Slovo, the leader of the
Communist Party of South Africa, were close colleagues and together
fashioned the combined strategy of political struggle and armed
struggle that eventually won the day.
The Canadian state is not a fascist state, and organized racism is not
state policy. On the other hand, the Canadian government has for
decades engaged in activities which border closely on fascism and has
tolerated, and continues to tolerate, overt white racism.
That Canada is rarely condemned on these grounds is testimony to the
ability of the
Canadian state to consistently portray itself as fair, moderate, and
benign, in the face of
any amount of contrary evidence.
>From Vancouver to Halifax, people of color experience police harassment
and brutality, including murder. In some communities, police officers
have worked with organized racist groups, such as the Ku Klux Klan, and
have been members of such groups. Government policy before the Second
World War, refused the entrance into Canada of Jews fleeing from Nazi
Germany; many of them were subsequently murdered in Nazi gas chambers.
But after the war, the government allowed hundreds of Nazi SS officers,
war criminals, and fascist collaborators to immigrate. The INCO mining
company, in Sudbury, Ontario, brought former Nazis into the country and
employed them for the specific purpose of physically attacking the
union leaders and destroying the union. And in a move reminiscent of
every fascist state, the Canadian government, through a network of
secret police and spy agencies, harassed, blacklisted, and kept files
on at least one million Canadians, between 1940 and 1970, simply
because they ! held socialist political beliefs or were active in union
organizing. We do not know how many progressive Canadians are
systematically spied on by their government today.
But of even greater concern to the anti-racist and anti-fascist
movement, is the rapid growth of organized white racism in Canada in
the 1990s and early 2000s. Many groups that promote white supremacy,
hatred of Jews, and denial of the Holocaust have been active for
decades, but have shown increased growth in this period.
These white supremacists and advocate genocidal activity against Jews,
people of colour, homosexuals, socialists, and Communists. Both oppose
any non-white immigration. Both oppose women's reproductive rights.
Both are armed and dangerous. Both are actively recruiting. Both are
growing in influence and in raw numbers. Both are operating with
virtual impunity in every province of the country.
Canada's laws against racism and fascism are among the weakest in the
western world.
And even though sections 318, 319, and 320 of the criminal code forbid
the advocacy or promotion of genocide; the willful promotion of hatred
on the basis of colour, race, religion,
or ethnic origin; or the sale or distribution of hate propaganda, these
laws are almost never enforced. There have been literally no more than
a handful of convictions.
Even more seriously, although it has signed several international
declarations anconventions, Canada has done almost nothing to live up
to its obligations. Nevertheless, by signing international conventions,
the Canadian government is duty bound to carry out the intentions of
the documents; after all, what else is the point in signing them?
The International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial
Discrimination, which Canada (ICEAFRD) signed in 1965, obliges all
signatories to "declare illegal and prohibit organizations, and also
organized and all other propaganda activities, which promote and incite
racial discrimination, and shall recognize participation in such
organizations or activities as an offence punishable by law."
Furthermore, The Declaration of Race and
Racial Prejudice (DRRP), which Canada signed in 1978, obliges signing
governments to
take appropriate steps specifically "to prevent, prohibit, and
eradicate racism," and "racist propaganda."
Under these international agreements the Canadian government has both a
legal and an ethical duty to eliminate racist organizations and racist
propaganda. Yet Aryan Nations, Heritage Front, the Ku Klux Klan, and
dozens of other racist and fascist groups are openly active and
recruiting across the country. Furthermore, Ernst Zundel's
organization, based in Toronto, Ontario; the Canadian League of Rights,
based in High River, Alberta; the Council on Public Affairs, based in
Salmon Arm, British Columbia; and dozens of other organizations sell
substantial quantities of viciously racist and anti-Jewish literature
secure in the knowledge that there will almost certainly be no legal
consequences.
Partly because of the relative inactivity of the government, an
anti-racist and anti-fascist movement has been developing in Canada,
especially over the last ten years. The anti-racist and anti-fascist
movement believes that organized racist groups easily breed within
Canada because the fundamental power structure of Canadian society is
based on white supremacy.
While it is certainly true that white people are sometimes the victims
of racism or racism occurs between different people of colour, these
incidents fail in comparision to the number of people of colour who are
victimized by institutionalized white racism; it's not hard to see
where the real problem lays. Racism against white people and racism
between different people of colour should always be condemned and
denounced.
In order to combat organized white racism, the anti-racist movement
monitors and tracks the activities of racist groups, gathers and
analyzes information, writes documents and reports, publicly exposes
racist groups, sponsors anti-racist events, engages in anti-racist
education, leads anti-racist training workshops, organizes community
groups across the country, lobbies the government, protests and
demonstrates against racist meetings, attempts to shut down racist
meetings, and presses for prosecutions against the distributors of
racist propaganda, and for the arrest and conviction of racist and
fascist leaders. If it is true that the anti-racist movement has had
some recent successes, it is important to realize that the work becomes
more difficult each year. Organized racist and fascist groups are
expanding exponentially. In Canada and the USA combined there are over
800 armed, paramilitary militia groups, where only five years ago there
were no more than half a dozen. Enrollment in the largest neo-Nazi
group, National Alliance, is up 30 times what is was ten years ago.
Aryan Nations is active in 24 states of the United States today,
compared to 6 states in 1993; and is active in all provinces in Canada
except Newfoundland and, probably, Prince Edward Island. In Canada,
Aryan Nations and other Nazi and Identity organizations have begun to
adopt a pattern of underground activity making the possibility of
widespread armed violence increasingly likely.
Now what can Stephen Harper do to fight the scourage and danger of
white racism in Canada?. Furthermore, what role if any at all, does
Stephen Harper himself have in the continuation and perpetuation of
white racism in Canada?. Is Stephen Harper himself
a white racist?. I personally DO NOT believe this is the case. However,
there are some
rather disturbing facts to consider.
We know that 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 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.
For all these reasons, we need to build the anti-racist movement and
build an anti-fascist culture in Canada. Today, we need to recognize
the continuity of anti-racist work from
South Africa to Canada. The March 21 massacre in Sharpeville was not
the beginning of the international struggle against organized racism,
and it surely was not the end of that struggle. But if today we want to
honor the memory of the men and women who died in Sharpeville, we can
do that best by actively carrying on their struggle, and by making it
our own. We best honor history by making history.
White Canadians and particularly men like myself, who would do
antiracist work must acquire such attunement through moral education,
through tutelage. Only rarely, because of our socialization, itself a
product and reinforcement of White privilege, do we possess the ear we
need, and then only by overcoming not only our lack of it, but our
native, hostile clumsiness to it. Most of us have to earn it, through
careful and attentive listening, chiefly to people of color, to women,
to those for whom such an attunement is a skill of survival, imbibed
with mother's milk. To gain the attunement we need, White men must
destroy old attachments and form new ones. Only by our genuine love for
the oppressed other may we dissolve our native attachments (to our
privilege, to our arrogation, to our power) and form new attachments of
justice and care and concern.
My voice gets heard in large part because I am a white male holds a
professional job with status. In most settings, I speak with the
assumption that people not only will listen, but will take me
seriously. I speak with the assumption that my motives will not be
challenged; I can rely on the perception of me as a neutral authority,
someone whose observations can be trusted.
Every time I open my mouth, I draw on, and in some ways reinforce, my
own white privilege, which is in large part tied to race.
Right now, I want to use my own white privilege to acknowledge the many
non-white people who took the time to tell me about the enduring
realities of racism in Canada. And, I want to talk to the white people
who I think misread my recent postings and misunderstand what's at
stake.
So, we should not permit this posting or any others on this very
important topic meaningless lip service to the struggles of the past.
We should instead use this day to rededicate ourselves to the on going
fight against racism. Stephen Harper should consider fighting evils
such as white racism here in Canada, before he send our young men and
women into harms away to slay monsters in distant lands.
DetectorTHX23:59:01
> But of even greater concern to the anti-racist and anti-fascist
> movement, is the rapid growth of organized white racism in Canada in
> the 1990s and early 2000s. Many groups that promote white supremacy,
> hatred of Jews, and denial of the Holocaust have been active for
> decades, but have shown increased growth in this period.
The more you try to stamp out free speech as you increase mass immigration
from the third world, the more you contribute to these groups growth, as
Germany has discovered.
You can't legislate away racism you tin pot Nazi!
Most Canadians are opposed to third world immigration and the multicultural
hellhole you weak mewling guilt trippers are creating and your attempt to
label most Canadians as supremacists overplays your hand, as usual. Fuck
off bob.
You know what your million poor African immigrants would turn Canada into?
AIDS and violent crime central.
Check this out for some "racist" facts about another wonderful multicultural
experiment:
http://southafricaiscrap.blogspot.com/
>
> These white supremacists and advocate genocidal activity against Jews,
> people of colour, homosexuals, socialists, and Communists. Both oppose
> any non-white immigration. Both oppose women's reproductive rights.
> Both are armed and dangerous. Both are actively recruiting. Both are
> growing in influence and in raw numbers. Both are operating with
> virtual impunity in every province of the country.
>
> Canada's laws against racism and fascism are among the weakest in the
> western world.
No Bob the fascism is here already you fucking moron, and you advocate more
of it!
tyreen...@hotmail.com
You are living proof that anti-racism activities are nothing more than
anti-white activities.
In other words, just ANOTHER way for the stupid,retarded,guilt-filled
whites and the evil,hate-filled Viz-Min "other" to attack,weaken,and
eventually destroy white-western civilization.
FOAD you pathetic,grovelling 'tard!
All the best
Tyreen Blaque
pcourterelle
pc
Jimmy
race, culture etc. But if someone wants to be racist then let them be
so as long as they don't get violent which of course would be a crime.
Our government just keeps pushing us towards totalitarianism if we are
not already there. Once free speech is stifled...
We do have a bill of rights which guarantees free speech but there is a
caveat which goes something like...free speech except in the interest
of fundamental justice. That can be taken to be anything.