Fumbling Towards Equality

My first experience with racism occurred in elementary school. I was around 8 years-old at the time, and my mom had just dropped me off at the playground before classes started. On my way to the monkey bars, or tire swings, or whatever fit my fancy on that particular day, I heard this grating little voice heckling me from behind. As the voice got closer, I started to get a good look at the chubby kid taunting me, “You’re a n*****!” Honestly, I didn’t really know how to react to this little jerk’s comments. What I should have done, was walk right up to that mini bigot and kick him in the nuts, but alas, hindsight’s only 20/20. I knew he was calling me a really bad name, but I categorized it in the same way a child does for shit, fuck, bitch, etc. So as far as I can recall, the school day carried on like this little occurrence never happened.

That night, I somehow let the whole story slip to my mom. It probably started off like, “Mom, what’s a n*****?” And boy, was she ever PISSED—as in downright LIVID! If I’ve learned one thing in my 26 years on this planet is to watch out when a Filipino mom is angry! Seriously, they are downright scary! Needless to say, we marched right into the principal’s office the very next morning and my mom unleashed the beast. She did such a great job that not only did the little guy get that dreaded phone call home, but I scored an official apology out of the deal. Not a surprise considering I had the world heavyweight mom on my side of the ring.

But I wasn’t going to get off that easily. When I got home from school that day, my mom and I had a little sit-down. And that’s when she basically educated me on how cruel that “N-word” really was—how Black people were once treated like slaves and how that one word symbolized their years of oppression. She obviously gave me the simplified version at the time, minus the lynchings and the rapes and the KKK, but I still got it. But I somehow knew that after learning this dark truth, I would never be the same.

So now, as a Filipina Canadian in her late twenties, that certainly wouldn’t be the last time I’d have to deflect a racial slur. I’ve been called “chink” and “paki” since then, but to me, neither has carried the same weight as the “N-word.” And while I’m obviously not Black, and therefore, truly cannot understand the very magnitude of that word, I am deeply saddened when I think how damaging that experience would be for an 8 year-old Black child. Just to be minding your own business while playing in the playground and then BOOM—some dumb little kid, who probably doesn’t even know what that word means, drops the “N-bomb.” Then what? That dumb little kid gets reprimanded by the school, his/her parents get involved, end of story, right? Unfortunately, the world is a lot more complicated than that.

The bottom line is that hate does not exist in a vacuum. This is pretty obvious. I don’t believe that people are inherently evil and thus become the Hitlers, or Pol Pots, or top Klansmen from birth. It isn’t biology that spreads racism and intolerance, ideologies pursued in ignorance do. And whose minds are the most impressionable of such beliefs? Well our children, of course. We all know that kids are like sponges.

And the problem is obviously not just black or white either. There are Asians who hate Black people, Arabs who hate Asians, White people who hate Aboriginals, and Aboriginals who hate Whites. So what is the reasoning behind such racism? "All Black men are dangerous.” “All Arabs are terrorists.” “All Aboriginals are lazy drunks.” “All White people are racists.” Really sound logic, eh?

But that’s the kind of intolerance that’s easy to see. What about systemic discrimination--the kind of intolerance that often flies below the radar of the PC police? Well, it’s just as insidious. It’s the overrepresentation of Aboriginals in Canadian penitentiaries, while African Americans and Hispanics pack the prisons down South. And it's the disturbing way more than 40 sex trade workers (most of whom being Aboriginal women) went missing from Vancouver's downtown Eastside over the last thirty years--without so much of an RCMP investigation--until only 6 years ago. Like I said, systemic intolerance is insidious.

And while I haven't even touched on the implications regarding religion and borders, this post is already slipping into a state of doom and gloom. So instead, let's see how the glass looks when its half full.

A few years ago I had the pleasure of knowing an amazing youth group, known as Youth Against Racism (YAR), through the Intercultural Association of Victoria. Each of the youth fell between the ages of 12 and 18, and seemed to represent quite the multicultural mosaic which covered the map from China to Haiti to Russia.

YAR's big project during that year was to create their very own documentary. When I say create, these adolescents wrote the script, directed each scene, and starred in the short film aptly entitled, Sifting Through the Layers. And if you haven't already guessed, the film explored the realities of racism as seen through their own experiences.

And was it ever a success! These ambitious youth effectively tackled the complexities of racism and structural discrimination through a powerful commentary that came straight from their hearts. YAR explored the need for cultural visibility in media and pop culture, the distorted racialized messages sent by the beauty industry, and the undeniable power of education. In fact, Sifting Through the Layers has now become a DVD resource package in which teachers and youth workers can facilitate lessons around the subject. Ultimately, this really is a brilliant example of youth empowering other youth.

So as I bring this story to a close, I would like to go off with a bang with the help of Dr. Maya Angelou:

When we come to it

We, this people, on this wayward, floating body

Created on this earth, of this earth

Have the power to fashion for this earth

A climate where every man and every woman

Can live freely without sanctimonious piety

Without crippling fear

When we come to it

We must confess that we are the possible

We are the miraculous, the true wonder of this world

That is when, and only when

We come to it.

--from the last two stanzas of "A Brave and Startling Truth"

Hate's Twisted Logic

"For to be free is not merely to cast off one's chains, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others." -- Nelson Mandela



Today, I was cruising by one of my favourite blogs and became completely struck by their last post. It was a heated response to the blatantly racist sentiments expressed by a shameless hate monger on a South African blog. While I won't shed light on this individual's identity because I wouldn't want to intentionally link him to my site, I will try to logically critique his hateful rant without dropping too many F-bombs along the way. In the meantime, I will refer to this individual as X. (Please note that the following is a highly censored version of how I really feel about X's perspective)...

So the most disturbing of X's claims is: "Blacks deserved apartheid fair and square." If that isn't abhorrent enough, he even goes on to say, "In fact, blacks were treated way too softly; [South] African authorities made the fatal mistake of thinking of blacks as HUMANS, an item of faith which has been debunked by black African HISTORY (and ‘African-American’ behaviour in the civilised world). By ‘civilised world’ I mean WHITE-ruled states."

Not only is X's diatribe downright deplorable, it blatantly disregards both the historical and sociological implications of colonialism. First of all, to have the audacity to even suggest that Black Africans deserved apartheid is just as reasonable as saying that every individual who was ever lynched, raped, or murdered somehow deserved that fate. According to X's twisted reasoning, I would imagine that even slavery would also qualify as merely a deserved consequence of the grand plan. Having your villages pillaged, women raped, land stolen, cultures suppressed, languages lost, religions vilified, and not to mention being beaten, shackled, and shipped over to the New World as a "savage" would somehow all be justified in the name of civilizing Africa. Wow, X, you really provide one convincing argument.

If X had bothered to do any of his homework, he would realize that the colonial machine can only blame itself for the social, political, and economic fall-out facing Africa and other previously colonized nations. Perhaps X didn't realize that stripping entire societies of their traditional ways of life might somehow have devastating long-term effects on the system, or how the breakdown of colonial enterprises such as cash crop agriculture would also contribute to the continent's current instability. Not surprisingly, X didn't consider how colonial cartography, that conveniently ignored traditional religious and tribal territories, might play a part in Africa's civil conflicts. What about issues regarding the forced dislocation and diaspora of traditional African communities? Couldn't this trauma also be enough to have a negative ripple-effect for future generations? But according to X's worldview, such civilized powers are apparently infallible.

And clearly, X must have been sniffing glue when he blindly questioned the very humanity of both Black African and African American communities. Perhaps the following list will help sober him up enough to refrain from passing on such blatant garbage as truth--Nelson Mandela, Winnie Mandela, Martin Luther King Jr., Coretta Scott King, Alice Walker, Audre Lorde, Malcom X, Rosa Parks, C.L.R. James, Maya Angelou, Sojourner Truth, George Washington Carver, Phillis Wheatley, William Edward Burghardt DuBois, Toni Morrison, Spike Lee, James Brown, Duke Ellington, Akua Lezli Hope, Langston Hughes, Billie Holiday, Bob Marley, Jimi Hendrix, Qunicy Jones, Carol Mosely-Braun, Sidney Poitier, Sammy Davis Jr., Derek Walcott, Patricia Hill Collins, Harry Jerome, Portia White, Mary Ann Shadd... These individuals are all a mere tip of the iceberg when reflecting the enormous social, cultural, academic, artistic, athletic, scientific, technological and political contributions Black men and women have made around the world. This truth, X, is undeniable. Neither your hate nor your bigotry will ever take that away...