December 15, 2003
From 1964 to 1969 I lived in Mississippi as a student, social activist and civil rights worker. This was a time when being a civil rights worker was a risky avocation and to this day I have scars on my body to prove it. I engaged in voter registration throughout rural Kemper and Neshoba Counties, I worked in a Head Start Program and was a Councillor for Neighborhood Youth Corp. The point of this exposition is to dispel any notion that what I am writing about below is somehow racist.
Having said this, I find that people seem to be ready to use the term "racism" at the drop of a hat. Anyone making a critical comment about any minority is branded a racist. The Toronto Police Department is the latest case in point. I have no feeling one way or another about installing video cameras in police cars, but to install them for the express purpose of stopping perceived acts of racism among the rank and file is an insult to the entire department.
It is curious that several years ago the Toronto Police Services Board commissioned a study to break down crime statistics by race. When the report was tabled, the chief inspector who presented the report almost lost his job because of the politically incorrect results. The report showed that there was a disproportionate percentage of crimes committed by certain minorities. Naturally the report was supressed and the police force was instructed to no longer document crime statistics by race.
Now, go ahead and accuse me of being a racist, but the fact remains that there is a crime problem among some of Toronto’s racial minorities that is disproportionate to their percentage of the population. Current social(ist) thought is that somehow society is to blame for the crime wave among minorities, rather than the individuals committing the crimes. The theory being that because we are a fundamentally racist nation, the perpretrators of these crimes have no recourse but to turn to a life of crime. As if being a racial minority automatically entitled one to a different set of laws than those applying to the population at large.
I beg to differ. I believe that hard work brings about great rewards, no matter what one’s race, sex, sexual orientation, or religious beliefs. What’s more, I believe that Canada is so not racist that accusing Canadians of racism has become a viable industry by those who see the rest of us a easy marks whose guilt will make us roll over.
Rather than searching out "root causes" (that’s leftists jargon for excusing unconscionable acts), we should be holding people to account for their actions, no matter what their race. There is no excuse for the high incidence of gun crimes in our cities and we must allow the police to do their job, regardless of what race the perpretrators represent.
It’s also important that we hold criminals to account for their crimes. It shouldn’t matter what their race is, what they experienced as children, or if they were poor or deprived. The only thing that should matter is that a crime was committed. There is a reason why traditional representations of justice show her wearing a blindfold. Legal justice, being blind, is meant to apply equally to everyone.
If we want to see a real example of racism, we need look no further than the liberal apologists for minority crimes. Imagine, being so contemptuous of minorities, that they are prepared to give them a pass when they commit a crime because they can’t help themselves. As if their race somehow rendered them powerless and prevented them from benefitting from participating in our society.
What’s more, I find the term "reverse racism" to be offensive in that it implies that only whites are racists, and that discrimination against a white person by a racial minority is somehow not possible. In fact, I recently had a conversation with a friend of East Indian descent who postulated that only whites could be racist.
In my opinion, racism is racism, no matter who engages in it. Canadians aren’t prepared to countenance a two-tiered health care system. They certainly shouldn’t entertain two-tier justice.