Do African Americans and black Canadians really feel Canada is more racist than the United States? (unemployment rate, high school)
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I agree that there are much larger, more highly developed black communities in the United States. A black Canadian poster emphasized this cultural phenomenon and its corollary: more direct conversations about race are possible in the US. (They're actually quite common.) As for comments about the American South, where I grew up, yes: the South can show a very racist side compared to most all of Canada. However, the South also has "Black Meccas" like Atlanta and New Orleans. Other southern cities (Memphis), midwestern cities (St. Louis, Chicago) and northeastern cities (Philadelphia, New York, Washington) have large, vibrant black American cultures and institutions. The US also has a good number of HBCUs (historically black colleges and universities) where students can experience this culture day to day. These schools and countless non-HBCU state and private US universities, large and small, offer extensive African American study programs up through the PhD level. All of this contributes to a more direct, and more honest, confrontation with racism here versus Canada.
The south isn't more racist than the north, so I vehemently disagree with you.
The US certainly has greater racial problems than Canada. That’s practically undeniable at this point. The incident that happened in Minneapolis is just one in a long string of events that’s gotten coverage. However, Canada is not immune to bad cop behaviour. A few years ago, there was a Polish man who vas visiting relatives in Vancouver and got tasered to death by the police because he couldn’t understand the orders given by them.
But that's not true; the racial problems are given more weight in America because it simply is way more multiracial than Canada. Racism, when it occurs, is therefore felt much more, and it's much more publicized and talked about...
Do African Americans and black Canadians really feel Canada is more racist than the United States?
Anyone who think that's black people have a problem in Canada is not Canadian. Chinese, Black, Caucasian, it's all the same in Canada. Everyone is a minority. Indigenous people are the group that has suffered police abuse in Canada. Blacks don't really have a right to claim abuse in Canada, even though they are capable of making a lot of noise, more noise than Indigenous people. Black people should have more respect for the real victims in Canada.
But you could argue the legitimacy of that statement for both countries, however, black people obviously excel more in the US than in Canada - did you not read one of the earlier posters statements? Black people also have more of a community in the US than they do in Canada.
Oh, there is certainly less racism in Canada if one approaches the argument from a quantitative standpoint, however that should not be an excuse to pretend like Canada doesn’t suffer from that as well. As we’ve seen with many of the solidarity protests happening worldwide, many who are taking part in those events are using them in order to decry injustices happening in their own countries. As you correctly pointed out, the US has had a particularly dark history, with slavery and racial segregation that still hasn’t fully been resolved. That is at the root of the issue plaguing America for the past few decades.
But Canada had slavery and racial segregation too, but guess what, it isn't talked about, because the limited black population in Canada means it can be easily ignored. The very few black people Canada had throughout history were met with similar forms of racism, including slavery and forms of segregation.
You can't preach to a country that has been experimenting with multiracialism throughout it's entire history about how horribly racist it is, when your country isn't remotely as multiracial in comparison.
First, there IS racism in Canada, and no one will convince me that Canada, overall, is a less racist society than the US. I say that as someone who grew up mostly in Southern Ontario, the most diverse part of Canada by far, and one of the most diverse in the world.
Racism in Canada is more muted, perhaps, and because demographics in Canada are different (i.e far fewer Blacks, the demographic this thread is about) racism against blacks doesn't rear its ugly head as often, simply because the context in which racism typically thrives doesn't exist in Canada.
In other words, if the black population in the city of Toronto, which easily has the largest black population in the country, were to suddenly increase from its current 9% to 90%, which is Detroit's black population, or to 65%, which is Memphis', or to 63%, which is Baltimore's, then you bet you'd see a big increase in people expressing racist views. There would be white flight way out to the suburbs, just as there was in Detroit in the late 60s. And the Asians would be fleeing in panic to, maybe, Prince Edward Island.
Which brings me to your statement that "Chinese, Black, Caucasian, it's all the same in Canada," which isn't true, nor should it be. It's also kind of a paternalistic thing to say. You, as a white person (?), have a) determined that you know the experiences of Blacks, Asians, and Arabs right across Canada, and b) decided to disregard ethnic heritages of millions of immigrants and first/second generation Canadians.
"Anyone who thinks that black people have a problem in Canada is not Canadian." Yes, they certainly ARE Canadian. Though African Canadians certainly didn't suffer in history as their American counterparts have, I wonder what kind of response you'd receive if you were to make that claim to African Canadians who grew up in Africville, in Halifax, Nova Scotia.
Mostly excellent post, I'd just like to point out that "white flight" occurred, in large part, as a response to the riots that broke out in most major American cities in '67, '68, and in '72, over comparable issues. In many ways, what we're going through now feels like a repeat of the late 60s.
Anywhere that whites and blacks live together results in racial failure. No end to it. We just cannot get along because we are too racially unalike. Once the two sides finally admit that and separate, no more fuss. Do whites get into daily conflicts with people of the South Pacific isles? No they do not, and we know why that is, don’t we?
Anywhere that whites and blacks live together results in racial failure. No end to it. We just cannot get along because we are too racially unalike. Once the two sides finally admit that and separate, no more fuss. Do whites get into daily conflicts with people of the South Pacific isles? No they do not, and we know why that is, don’t we?
complete and utter crap, i am sorry for swearing but posts like this make my blood boil
Now, as to that post about blacks and whites never being able to co-exist peacefully; yep, Porterjack concisely nailed it.
Intrusion of anyone's normal comfort zone (traditional heritage) causes strife everywhere but in equal parts throughout the demographics of any nation. You can be upset over the loudspeaker call to prayers suddenly booming out over loudspeakers in your community but if you bother to ask, instead of assuming universality, you might find out that it also upsets those Muslims that have enjoyed a decade or two of living in your community without having to be reminded so intrusively, it's time to pray.
Talk to people, ALL people. You might be surprised at what you learn.
I'm finding that's the one single constant I can ALWAYS rely upon now at my adancing age - surprise.
I didn’t realize many African Americans immigrated to Canada from the U.S. in recent decades.
To be honest I don't think many African Americans have done so in recent decades. Maybe it's different in some other provinces but in all my 7+ decades here although I've met a good number of black immigrants here in BC I've only ever met one black family that had immigrated here from USA and that was back in the late 1960's that they came here. All the rest of the black immigrants I've met here have been from other countries.
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