The not so Great Racism in Canada Thread

[WarrenC12]

Originally Posted by someone123

Ehh. I don't really believe in the "personal cred" thing. If I must answer to be listened to, I have experienced multiple people making fun of my ethnic background. Not sure how bad it has to be to qualify.

The worst "on the job" incident I experienced (years ago, not in Vancouver) was when a coworker told me "my kind" was disgusting and people like me didn't deserve to live. Perhaps you have been through such things, perhaps not.

When I talk about e.g. the distinction between verbal abuse and violent crime I do have some personal experience. I have friends who've been physically assaulted for being minorities; I don't consider that to be in the same range of harm as graffiti or crackheads yelling stuff.

So we have a racism problem, or these things are acceptable in limited quantities? I don't get it.

This started when I posted a link saying hate crimes were dramatically higher this year, and you disagreed based on "investigation rigor". As if the VPD, for some reason, are trying to inflate these particular crime stats.

[LakeLocker]

Originally Posted by MolsonExport

Not nearly as much as your property dealings. Quebec, New Hampshire, Florida, now Vancouver. Am I missing some?

On a site dedicated to real estate?

Next you're gonna tell me Acajack obsesses over being french too much.

Thing is you're not even trying to make your education relevant to the conservation, your trying to avoid conversations or delegitimatize the arguments of others with some argument from authority.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by WarrenC12

So we have a racism problem, or these things are acceptable in limited quantities? I don't get it.

This started when I posted a link saying hate crimes were dramatically higher this year, and you disagreed based on "investigation rigor". As if the VPD, for some reason, are trying to inflate these particular crime stats.

"We have a problem" is a weird way to frame it. We have always had a crime problem for all of human history and we will have one for the foreseeable future. Obviously the ideal number of racially-motivated crimes is 0 and none of them are acceptable. Unfortunately in life we all need to assume non-zero risks (even more true for disadvantaged folks), and we need to balance priorities. Driving the number of racially-motivated crimes to 0 might not be possible or the social trade-off might not be worth it (e.g. spend tons of money and build a police state). So for the purposes of determining the burning issues of Vancouver it matters if we're looking at 30 incidents of graffiti a year or 500 stabbings.

Unfortunately hate crime rates can easily be inflated, by being unclear about the type of crime and through inconsistent reporting practices. It is very easy to manufacture an increase in hate crimes. It is a genuine problem if you honestly want to assess the risk that you will be the victim of a crime or whether things are getting better or worse. A crime index that includes graffiti + killings + bad mouthing each as a single incident is worthless.

Homicides, broken down by various demographics, are the gold standard. They give us a pretty good baseline to compare against. In Canada, the homicide rate has gone down considerably since the early 90's peak.

[LakeLocker]

Originally Posted by WarrenC12

That's not my go to. When have I accused you of racism?

I'm saying we have a racism problem in Canada, and it seems difficult to get people to agree. Funny those are the same people that have never experienced racism themselves.

I'm autistic more than half my friends are autistic.

If I had a dollar for ever time someone treated me like I was more mentally unstable than I actually am, dumber than I actually am, on drugs, unaware of my surroundings etc.

And this isn't unique to me virtually all of my friends have experienced an absurd level of bullying.

Just the simple avoidance factor of non autistics is enough to be pissed off about.

But guess what, there's no point in bringing this shit up. It just creates a victim complex for no good reason. People are insecure they act defensively. You can't be hostile to people because they don't have the privilege of feeling secure in their life.

This discrimination shit is absolutely pointless to bring up unless there is a specific circumstance where change can actually be had.

99 percent of the time it just creates barriers and unnecessary negativity.

EDIT: If you are actually something approaching victim-hood you got bigger problems than what other people think.

Information you can do something with is useful information you cannot is crap.

So unless you think its progressive for people to plan around racism that may or may not exist it is absolutely nonsense. You'll get far better mileage by focusing on your presentation(if pleasing assholes is your concern/you're not autistic.

Regardless I'll never get why people on this site are so obsessed with getting into peoples personal lives to as part of an argument.

Present or arguments, and stop trying to make things more personal than they need to be.

[LakeLocker]

Originally Posted by someone123

"We have a problem" is a weird way to frame it. We have always had a crime problem for all of human history and we will have one for the foreseeable future. Obviously the ideal number of racially-motivated crimes is 0 and none of them are acceptable. Unfortunately in life we all need to assume non-zero risks (even more true for disadvantaged folks), and we need to balance priorities. Driving the number of racially-motivated crimes to 0 might not be possible or the social trade-off might not be worth it (e.g. spend tons of money and build a police state). So for the purposes of determining the burning issues of Vancouver it matters if we're looking at 30 incidents of graffiti a year or 500 stabbings.

Unfortunately hate crime rates can easily be inflated, by being unclear about the type of crime and through inconsistent reporting practices. It is very easy to manufacture an increase in hate crimes. It is a genuine problem if you honestly want to assess the risk that you will be the victim of a crime or whether things are getting better or worse. A crime index that includes graffiti + killings + bad mouthing each as a single incident is worthless.

Homicides, broken down by various demographics, are the gold standard. They give us a pretty good baseline to compare against. In Canada, the homicide rate has gone down considerably since the early 90's peak.

I'd also add what crime isn't a product of hate?

These people want to jump over the hills for racism, and then turn a blind eye when people burn down stores, assault cops etc etc.


Internal hatred is a tiny proportion of an issue relative to actual violence.

You'd never engage in some pre crime nonsense trying to detect aggressive behaviors in people, yet people are perpetually witch hunting for supposed racists.

All you do is give these people power.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by LakeLocker

I'd also add what crime isn't a product of hate?

People care about targeting and I guess there is some sense that understanding motivations might lead to solutions. Like maybe police should go after white supremacist groups directly if they are a major force. Maybe there is such a thing as an anti-racist initiative that deters hate crimes; who knows?

It is so easily politicized though, particularly if minor crimes are included.

One irony is that I am skeptical of police crime numbers because they have an incentive to play with them. Cut police funding and the natural thing for police to do is to raise reported crime rates if possible. Part of the trend of growing police budgets is a narrative that police always have more work to do and cities are ever more threatened.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by MolsonExport

Not nearly as much as your property dealings. Quebec, New Hampshire, Florida, now Vancouver. Am I missing some?

SSP is a forum dedicated to buildings, though. It's kind of on topic...

BTW, I did not mean this at all in an offensive manner. You're one of my favorite participants on this forum

[theman23]

Any comments on the Wendy Mesley and Jessica Mulroney incidents?

Both seem like over reactions to me.

[hipster duck]

Originally Posted by rousseau

Neat, I had no idea you were of Chinese descent. Or have you mentioned it before? Seems like people on SSP "out themselves" now and then, but I tend to forget who's who and the identifiers get lost in the shuffle.

Yup, I was born in Canada, and lio is correct that I grew up in lily white Peterborough. In fact, I’ve received next to no racism in Peterborough - certainly not since I was in elementary school. My parents did, though. For the record, I don’t count innocent and well-meaning “where are you from?”-type questions from older people as instances of racism. This is almost nonexistent in Toronto or Vancouver nowadays, especially if you don’t have an accent, or if you’re a man in your thirties (my sister still gets it from old boomer men).

Then again again, one of the most untalked about elephants in the racist room in the US is the vicious bullying that blacks inflict upon East Asians in schools and elsewhere. It's a widespread phenomenon, but you rarely hear more than first and second-hand anecdotal accounts from the victims themselves because the media turns a blind eye to it (doesn't fit the narrative) and, of course, the very last thing a skinny Chinese or Korean kid is going to do is inform on the five hulking African-American classmates who regularly bash him around in the locker room.

Yes, and there’s a lot of racism in the Chinese community towards black people too. The rhetoric often takes very vicious undertones, like something out of Apartheid South Africa or the South in the 1950s, likening black people to a polluting presence. I’ve heard this in my own extended family.

Anti-black racism in visible minority immigrant groups is a serious problem. Hassan Minhaj from Netflix’s Patriot Act had an excellent YouTube monologue the other night calling the South Asian community out for their anti-black racism.

Whenever I hear stories about a landlord that won’t rent to black people, my first instinct is to see whether the landlord’s name is something foreign.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by hipster duck

Yes, and there’s a lot of racism in the Chinese community towards black people too. The rhetoric often takes very vicious undertones, like something out of Apartheid South Africa or the South in the 1950s, likening black people to a polluting presence. I’ve heard this in my own extended family.

I always found this puzzling. Was there ever that much historical interaction between Africans and Chinese? I've heard that some Asians are particular about skin lightness and consider it better to be fair-skinned than dark-skinned.

I had a friend whose parents were Eastern European, living in metro Halifax circa 2000. They explicitly forbade his sister from dating black guys and would say things like "roll up the car windows" if they saw a black person (which happened all the time; the area I lived in was probably 5-10% black), as if they were going to get carjacked by a schoolkid in this incredibly boring suburb. My friend found it very embarrassing and frustrating.

[casper]

Originally Posted by LakeLocker

I'd also add what crime isn't a product of hate?

These people want to jump over the hills for racism, and then turn a blind eye when people burn down stores, assault cops etc etc.


Internal hatred is a tiny proportion of an issue relative to actual violence.

You'd never engage in some pre crime nonsense trying to detect aggressive behaviors in people, yet people are perpetually witch hunting for supposed racists.

All you do is give these people power.

I would say a significant amount of crime is not driven by hate. Many criminals rationalize their crime by saying they are taking money away from corporations or insurance companies.

There are entire criminal ecosystems that support the drug trade, money laundering, etc.

[Architype]

Originally Posted by LakeLocker

I'd also add what crime isn't a product of hate?

....

Crimes that are motivated by greed, profit, money, perceived justice, settling of scores, etc..

[lio45]

Originally Posted by someone123

"We have a problem" is a weird way to frame it. We have always had a crime problem for all of human history and we will have one for the foreseeable future. Obviously the ideal number of racially-motivated crimes is 0 and none of them are acceptable. Unfortunately in life we all need to assume non-zero risks (even more true for disadvantaged folks), and we need to balance priorities. Driving the number of racially-motivated crimes to 0 might not be possible or the social trade-off might not be worth it (e.g. spend tons of money and build a police state). So for the purposes of determining the burning issues of Vancouver it matters if we're looking at 30 incidents of graffiti a year or 500 stabbings.

Agreed. Making it a binary choice between "we have a crime problem" and "we don't have zero crimes per year" is pointless - it will always be the former then, which means we just stop distinguishing between having an actual crime problem, and having no real crime problem i.e. minor crime.

Some places have a crime problem.
Some places don't.
All places have some level of crime.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by WarrenC12

The worst part of all of this is we determined later that very few cases came from travel with China. The local asian community was the first to use masks and stop meeting in crowds.

I never said it was logical, just that it was somewhat understandable in the context of a deadly pandemic originating in China, given human nature and the fact that not everyone out there is rational.

Think of someone you consider of average intelligence, then keep in mind that there are 1.4 million people in the Lower Mainland who are dumber than that person.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by MolsonExport

Not nearly as much as your property dealings. Quebec, New Hampshire, Florida, now Vancouver. Am I missing some?

I forgot to address your post correctly but I did own a duplex in Texas for five years, which I recently sold.

Also, I don't own anything in Vancouver (yet). I am probably not going to relocate here permanently. Still on the fence on that one.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by theman23

Any comments on the Wendy Mesley and Jessica Mulroney incidents?

Observing that in the Anglo world the Voldemort Word seems to be the equivalent of casting a Killing Curse on one's career...?

[casper]

Originally Posted by WarrenC12

So we have a racism problem, or these things are acceptable in limited quantities? I don't get it.

This started when I posted a link saying hate crimes were dramatically higher this year, and you disagreed based on "investigation rigor". As if the VPD, for some reason, are trying to inflate these particular crime stats.

We have a racism problem and if you definition of success is no racism at all we will never accomplish that goal. We will hopefully make significant in roads to solving the problem. In the same was as murder is a problem, and despite how hard we try we will never eliminate murder. The best we can hope for is to bring it to as a level as possible.

I am not a visible minority, though might guess that I am first nations (and they would guess wrong) and if I spent a few weeks vacations someplace warm and had a tan they might pick me out as from the middle east.

Would I report a crime to the police? Only if it was serious and I had an expectation that they would be a positive contributor in resolving it. So my total interaction with the police in the last 30 years consisted of:
- stolen hub-caps on a rental car in Montreal (it was important to the rental car company to have some file number).
- a business scam (hard to detect but I had phone numbers and paper work, we detected it before becoming a victim) that I thought they had a hope of catching but all they would do is redirect us to the RCMP who phone system were in a constant state of overload.

If I was actually a visible minority I am certain I would never report any of these these harassment examples.

I am not surprised the number are low.

[MonctonRad]

Originally Posted by lio45

Observing that in the Anglo world the Voldemort Word seems to be the equivalent of casting a Killing Curse on one's career...?

The thought police are certainly doubling down at present, which is in itself a crime of opportunity.

Doublespeak rules the day in Anglophone North America. 1984 has finally arrived..........

[LakeLocker]

Originally Posted by casper

I would say a significant amount of crime is not driven by hate. Many criminals rationalize their crime by saying they are taking money away from corporations or insurance companies.

And this is an argument a child would make or a very clever sociopath.


When you rob a place the odds you give the cashier etc PTSD is considerable.

Dealing drugs increases the number of people addicted.

If and that would be an if these criminal were perfectly ordinary people in day to day life.

The number of these people engaging in sexual assaults, rapes, child abuse etc is also very considerable.

[LakeLocker]

Originally Posted by someone123

I always found this puzzling. Was there ever that much historical interaction between Africans and Chinese? I've heard that some Asians are particular about skin lightness and consider it better to be fair-skinned than dark-skinned.

I had a friend whose parents were Eastern European, living in metro Halifax circa 2000. They explicitly forbade his sister from dating black guys and would say things like "roll up the car windows" if they saw a black person (which happened all the time; the area I lived in was probably 5-10% black), as if they were going to get carjacked by a schoolkid in this incredibly boring suburb. My friend found it very embarrassing and frustrating.

To assume these people wouldn't be racist is to assume we haven't made any progress.

When I'm at my cousins in Toronto it is just a given I'm gonna hear a boat load of racism, homophobia, sexism and general ethnic/religious conflict overtones.

I've forgot how many times I've "learned" that all the racism is in Barrie/Kitchener/etc. I just get use to hearing that it is white doug ford supporting hicks that are the problem.

If you want to support immigration you just have to accept that this is gonna be part of the parcel. Again the only way you'd think otherwise is if you assume minorities can't be racist, or that our society made them racist.

I get the allure of deflecting the problem onto the majority, but it is complete nonsense.

Regardless I don't see the point of even talking about it. What on earth are you gonna do about it? If you just target everyone it is worst than the problem itself. And how do you narrow it down to which groups of people need to learn.