I have been censored by The Tyee

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          • I participated in a respectful discussion with another reader of The Tyee today on an opinion piece by Rose Wu  entitled Vancouver's 'Race Estate' Market has Hurt Many of Us  My final contribution was a long response to a question from my discussion partner.  I hit the 'post' button and moved on.  A while later I checked back and could see my response, but could also see that it was under review by the Tyee staff and would not be posted for all to see until it received their approval.

          I found that curious as I have not been abusive or rude.  So I then posted a short comment to my discussion partner to let him know that my comment was under review.  The Tyee deleted that one labeling it as spam.

        Curious behavior on the part of The Tyee.

        
        

        
        
      • I have posted below the comment The Tyee has been 'reviewing' for a few hours now.

      
      
    • • • • • • Hold on, this is waiting to be approved by The Tyee.

                Keep in mind I am not a social scientist or psychiatrist so my 'claims' are based on my observations in life and in my work - I teach high school.

                As I have matured over the years I realized that my perceptions have a huge role in creating my experience. As you grow older you see the rudeness or carelessness of others as a symptom of their lack of awareness and compassion rather than evidence of true evil intent. The kind of 'casual racism' we may have in Canada fits here I think - again I haven't researched this, it is a world view I have built over the years.

                Let me provide an example. A couple of years ago I had a boy in one of my classes who was a person of colour. One Monday morning he was telling me about his weekend and got very animated about a confrontation he had had with a clerk at Home Depot. This boy was in the store and looking at tools. A clerk came by and said to him: "Just want you to know there are security cameras here." The clear implication being the clerk suspected this boy may shoplift. The boy got angry and demanded the clerk get the store manager which he did. The boy accused the clerk of profiling him because of his race and told the manager that they shouldn't be racist. I don't remember what the manager's response was but my student seemed to have been mollified. I praised the boy saying it was important to stand up for yourself. I told him he did the right thing. However I wondered if there was another element to the confrontation that my student missed.

                Later that day I spoke to one of my colleagues who is a person of colour and recounted the boy's story to him. Right away my colleague said that the clerk was probably profiling the boy because he was a 14 year old boy - not because he was a person of colour. We will never now for sure, but I suspect my colleague was right. So the upshot here is the boy had an unpleasant experience that he and many others would describe as 'casual racism', when a more accurate description may be something much less serious.

                Historically, Canada has been very racist. Modern Canada however has a good claim as being a place that upholds human rights through its legal system. The big exception being the Indian Act and the struggles of First Nations society - but we are working on that.

                Racism is a very corrosive thing. Accusations of racism, if they are false, are corrosive as well.

                Racism exists. Where it does we have to deal with it. But if there are other explanations for bad behaviour we should consider them.

                 

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