Column by Dominique Jacobs, a Professional Communications student at Royal Roads University.
As we observe another International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, it is crucial to know our enemy, in order to defeat him. So, in an effort to understand racism, we must examine Black History. We have to understand the attitudes surrounding slavery, namely that European-Canadian colonizers perceived enslaved people as property, not as human beings. Furthermore, slave owners viewed slavery in racial terms, with Aboriginals and Africans serving and White people ruling. Slavery was so pervasive that “slave ownership was found at every level of colonial Canadian society,” says Historian George Tombs. Slavery was the predominant way of life for most Black people for over 200 years in Canada, which means Blacks have been enslaved, longer than free.
The fact is that these wide-spread, deep-rooted attitudes of white superiority don’t just disappear with changing laws. For example, the last segregated school closed in 1983, 150 years after the abolition of slavery and a year after the launch of The Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Black and brown bodies were perceived as commodities, and it’s this perception that breeds the idea that people of color are inferior. Historian Afua Cooper says that, “Slavery was the context in which current race relations were created, which is black inferiority and white superiority.” Add prejudice and fear, which the media has stoked and perpetuated for years, and you have racism.
| Dominique Jacobs is a Professional Communications student at Royal Roads University. Jacobs led the 2018 Black History Month campaign and on-campus event for the university. (Submitted photo) |
If you understand that capitalism was built on the foundation of slavery, then you should consider that racism is sewn tightly into the fabric of our societal systems. Recent studies show that racial disparities exist across the board in health status, civic participation and services. Regardless of education, employment and income, disparities persist for racialized people in Canada. We are more likely to be unemployed and underemployed. Racialized Canadians earn an average of 81 cents to the dollar in comparison to other Canadians, which means that racialized Canadians are three times more likely to live in poverty than other Canadians. But I don’t need a study to tell me that, because as a racialized, immigrant woman, I get it.
In the Spring of 2013, I faced racism in the workplace, so severe, that after I was unlawfully terminated, I took my case to the Human Rights Tribunal - and won. I think most adult Black Canadians can attest to experiencing racism, whether in the workplace, DWB (Driving While Black, and yes - that’s a real acronym) or during police encounters. And as parents we have to deal with the heartbreaking chore of explaining this reality to our children. Our prime minister issued a statement last month saying, “It’s time Canadians recognize that anti-black racism and unconscious bias do exist and it’s time to take action to ensure that there is equal opportunity and treatment of Black Canadians.” These are dangerous times with the emboldening of white supremacist groups and the current political climate of our southern neighbors. The “talk” becomes more important now than ever.
Admittedly, it’s hard to fully comprehend racism and its effects if you haven’t directly experienced it, but it starts with understanding the history and the systems constructed from that history. We can never fully understand Canada without reference to Black people, yet Blacks have been largely erased from the history books, so that there is no reference to the brutal discrimination of the past, which led to the racism of the present. “One of the key values that we are told Canadians promote nowadays is the diversity of the population, but the fact that the institution of slavery has been ignored for hundreds of years, minimized as much as possible and never taught in schools, means that somehow we are failing to uphold the value of diversity,” says Tombs.
The elimination of racial discrimination will start when the history is told and understood in its entirety. Canada prides herself on her exceptionally inclusive ways, however, for this to ring true, recognition and contributions of all peoples must first take place. It starts in our schools. It starts with our children because kids aren’t born with prejudice. They have a chance to see a future free of racial discrimination.
But learning Black History during one month - the shortest month of the year, won’t do it. Just as eliminating racial discrimination one day of the year won’t either.
Dominique Jacobs is a Professional Communications student at Royal Roads University. Jacobs led the 2018 Black History Month campaign and on-campus event for the university.
Correction: A typo has been fixed to read “the last segregated school closed in 1983, 150 years after the abolition of slavery.”