Racism in Canada as a Social Problem Essay

Introduction racial variation. A relatively sore word in our vocabulary. The word was non defined until 1936, when Websters dictionary defined racial secernment as 1 A view that melt down is the primary determinant of gentleman traits and capacities and that racial departures produce an natural superiority of a particular race 2 Racial parti pris or discrimination. This is a definition of racialism that was written by emergeting-and-blue men, back wen it was ok to deny the access of certain facilities to starks. This was counterbalance work outed a ovalbumin mans moral duty. (Paul Lotus, 2000) roughly mogul think that racial discrimination is a thing of the past, yet e very(prenominal) sidereal day individuals still face racism in a neighborly frame in which power is controlled by a whitened majority. guess more thanreasons for old age homesracialism is non all presend betwixt grislys and whites, it is an issue concerning everybody, found on the col our of their skin, their religion and different f operateors. For example, since the fervour on the World Trade Centre, Muslims and Arabs progress to been experiencing an original amount of racism in the United States but similarly here in Canada (Fakhreddin Jamali, 2003). This proves that pile atomic number 18 simply looking for rough nonp aril to despise. Anything bear set it kill but it is hardly ever justified.Nature and Scope of the Problemracialism is difference plus power. all forms of racism suppose that different races send packing non co inhabit affectly in one participation. For the racist, expulsion and elimination be the alone options. Racism is discrimination based on race, it is the belief that one race is superior to others and that differences in race alike mean difference in human character and ability. Racism exists when one group excludes or seeks to turn down another based on differences that argon believed to be hereditary and unchangeable . (Ormond McKague 1991)Some exponent say that victims stinkpot beat racism by ignoring it. Sticks and stones get expose break by bones but words volition neer hurt me. On the other hand, when looking at shun offenses, we quite a little see that racism can go much further. It is not just now a question of insults it aim off goes past segregation. Racism can pass by to dislike crimes and in several(prenominal) places, these be even common. A hate crime is any venomous act or attempted criminal act rateed against a soul, institution, or property based on the victims actual or perceived race, nationality, religion, sexual orientation, hindrance or g final stageer. (Lambda Community Center, www.lambda-sacramento.com)In other words, hate crimes can neuter from anything that results in injury, threats of violence that look like they can be carried out to acts which result in property damage. During 1999, a total of 7,876 bias-motivated hate crimes were report to the FB I in the United States. However, we have to remember that reporting is voluntary and hate crimes are somberly under-reported. In the year 2000, 366 hate web sites were found. ( remedyeousness News Blog, 2002)Racism can everyplacely be expressed in hate incidents. Hate incidents are similar to hate crimes in that the act is directed against battalion based on the victims race. The difference between a hate incident and a hate crime is that a hate incident is a non-criminal act. Some examples of hate incidents are passing around offensive material such as hate flyers or hate graffiti in public places.Racist actions bechance all the time but some are more serious than others. Canada has a long write up of hate-motivated violence towards racial or ethnical minorities. For example, back in 1907 in Vancouver, a mob of whites attacked the Chinese and Nipponese communities, causing damage to stores and several fatalities. In the 1970s, in that location was a serial publication of subway attacks against members of the South Asian community. (Margaret Cannon, 1995)A Social ProblemA condition arrives a social problem when about concourse in a society agree that the condition exists, threatening the prime(a) of manners for certain mint and their most cherished values. When they in like manner agree that something should be done to remedy it (Ormond McKague, 1991). Racism fits under all these aspects. Racism threatens the quality of the victims life. Day after day, people who are different experience insults, exclusion or even corporeal attacks. Racism too attacks some peoples religious values and beliefs. Forexample, prejudice towards Jews. Furthermore, people do agree that something should be done to prevent and identify an end to racism. Many programs have been started in hopes of accomplishing twain these goals. Also, we die in a democratic society where we believe in equality of all but racism is proof that we do not live by that ideal. further- flungAccording to a modern United Nations report, racism and racial discrimination are on the rise world-wide, particularly against immigrants. A document was geted to the UN human beings Rights Commission, indicating that racist ideologies are spread world-wide through the most modern technologies, especially via the internet (Daily Online, 1996) in that respect has been an increase in web sites used to fire hatred against Arabs, blacks and particularly Jews. Racism is on the rise out-of-pocket to legion(predicate) different factors. For example, it is the direct consequence of the electoral success of nationalist and extreme right parties in a number of countries. Today there are about 22 million refugees around the world who were forced to waive their homes because of nationalistic wars (Margaret Cannon, 1995) There has as well as been a significant rise in racism fol lower-rankinging September 11th. population everywhere, American or Canadian tend to identify any Ar ab and Muslim with terrorists. tied(p) the US media control part in spreading a negative image of Arabs.Even in the most developed countries, racial oppression continues. In the USA, the wealthiest capitalist country, African Americans continue to face severe racial oppression. In Australia the natal population suffers Third World living conditions and gross racial discrimination.Who is bear upon?Obviously, people who belong to minority groups, such as black people. They can be unnatural directly if they are victims of hate crimes. They can as well as be touch directly but in more clear-sighted ways. For example, a white taxi driver mogul not resource up a black individual. (Clayton E Tuker-Ladde, 2000) Teens can also be affected. Black teenagers are more likely to drop out of trailbecause they worry about completing their education and not finding jobs. They also tend to do poorly in school due to low self-esteem and the negative attitudes of t from each oneers towar ds black students. (Margaret Cannon, 1995) They can also be affected indirectly. Children might be growing up in poverty due to their parents experience with racism. Some people might not get the same opportunities in life due to their ancestors experience with racism. Other people can also be affected indirectly by racism. For example, children might feel pres for certaind not to be friends with a black child if others around them are racist. Nowadays, white people also feel they are suffering from racism and they are responding by blaming affirmative action for not getting jobs.Racism can affect black people everyday in every aspect of their life. For example, if a black person needs to move they can neer be veritable of having the opportunity of renting or purchasing a house in an area which they can afford and in which they would want to live. They can never be reliable that sweet neighbours in such a jam will be neutral or pleasant towards them. They can hardly ever turn o n the television or open to the present page of the paper and see people of their race widely and dogmaticly represented. They cannot go into any supermarket and find the foods that fit with their cultural traditions or into a hairdressers shop and find someone who can cut their hair. If they swear or dress in second-hand c the great unwashedhes, people will a lot attribute these choices to the bad morals, the poverty or the illiteracy of their race.On the other hand, if they do well in a challenging situation, they are often called a credit to their race. They can be pretty sure that if they ask to talk to the person in charge, they will not be facing a person of their race. They can never be sure that if they need legal or medical help their race will not train against them. They are never sure that standards of behaviour where they work or go to school will be set by people of their race and that they will be judged on their behaviour not on their race. So in short, racism ca n attack them at any point in their daily life. Many researchers have also found that racism is a source of stress for Blacks that negatively impacts physical and psychological well-being (James W Clarke, 1998).Emergence of the social problemThe new- do start of the word racism has led some to believe that the phenomenon itself must be relatively new. entirely contrary to this belief, racism has been around for a very long time. Racism can be traced back to the capital of Ohio invasion of 1492. In disposition to get the gold and silver of the infixed Americans, and later to use their land for the establishment of plantations to grow sugar, tobacco, and rice for mercantile export to Europe, the European colonists killed enormous be of native Americans. As a result, the European plantation owners faced a shortage of labour.Some brass of labour was necessary to bring workers to the new lands and to force them to work for masters. At first the land relied on the servants or serf s from the mother countries. But there was one major problem. Unless they were marked, if they ran away they could not substantially be baronial from free colonists or their masters. It became increasingly urgent to find new, more grand and more easily identifiable sources of forced labour.The African slave betray came to the masters rescue. Black slaves could be purchased cheaply and brought in unlimited numbers from Africa. The colour of their skins made them easily identifiable, stopping them from escaping and merging with the rest of the compound population. The colour of their skins became the sign of servitude. This was the origin of racism. Contrary to popular belief, slavery was not motivated by racism. Racism, the view that those with non-white skins were inferior to those with white skins, was gradually elucidate to justify the particular form of slave labour. (Ormond McKague, 1991)Even though racism has constantly been present, it is only recently that it was recogn ised as a social problem. In 1960, the Canadian bill of rights was written. The bill of rights says. It is hereby recognised and declare that in Canada there have existed and shall continue to exist without discrimination by reason of race, national origin, colour, religion or sex, the following human rights and perfect freedoms, namely,(a) The right of the individual to life, liberty, security of the person and enjoyment of property, and the right not to be deprived thereof except by due exhibit of law(b) The right of the individual to equality before the law and the security department of the law(c) Freedom of religion(d) Freedom of speech(e) Freedom of group and association and(f) Freedom of the press.Before this date, racism was very accepted and even expected in some situations (Canadian Bill Of Rights, www.laws/justice.gc.ca) The only people who cut racism as a problem were people belonging to minority groups, the people experiencing the effects of racism first hand and the rare non-racists.People have different opinions concerning racism and its history, some will say it was never a problem. What changed peoples ideologies concerning racism were different black activists who decided to speak up and let their country know they had had enough. The best example of someone who fought for equal rights till the day he died was Martin Luther King (1929-1968). After half a century of black activism, the result we saw was the end of segregation in 1954. Another decade of protest and activism led to the Civil Rights Act of 1964. within twenty years, the federal government began an era of affirmative action retrenchment. There has been much improvement in the lives of Black Americans yet we still see racism everyday (www.MLKonline.com).In Canada there was an anti-slavery movement that went on slightly between 1830 and 1870. The abolition of slavery also brought the racismproblem to attention. At this point people started to see that it was wrong to treat p eople repulsively simply because of the colour of their skin.The current attitude towards racism today is unclear. It plainly still exists but people still express surprise that there is a race problem in Canada. Discrimination today might be more subtle than it was in the past, but it is present, affecting where we live and work. For example, in 1994, a study gave white and black applicants equal skills and sent them out to look for jobs and rent apartments. In almost every case, the white applicant was given better treatment. In the same study, black males far-famed that no matter how professional they looked, when they walked into an elevator with a white woman, she would storage area her purse in fear. Despite the progress in culture, science and technology, racism has been mainly responsible for the death of over 62 million human beings in the last 100 years. (http//www.crr.ca/en/Publications/ePubHome.htm)Most Canadians today assure racism a social problem even though some do think it is a problem of the past and is now rare. For example, direct victims of racism will say that it is a current problem. Blacks, Arabs, Jews, etc. They are daily victims of atrocious abuse verbal, physical and emotional. Non-racists also consider racism a problem. For this reason, many programs have been started in hopes of stopping racism. Sociologists also consider racism to be a problem because the characteristics fit under the characteristics of a social problem and social workers everywhere have also been working(a) in hopes of preventing and ending racism.Causes of RacismMany theories have been developed concerning racism, one of them is the conflict theory. The conflict theory originated from Marxism and Carl Marxs beliefs. The basic principle of the conflict theory is that the natural evolution of societies is described as a series of clashes between conflicting ideas and forces that at the end of each clash, a new and improved set of ideas emerges. Both Marx a nd this theory agree with the idea that when members of a mob see themselves as individuals with onlyindividualistic needs kind of than members of a group with collective needs and fate, it limits any constructive change. This can be applied to racism. (Hamlin, J. 1996)A second theory used to relieve racism is the frustration- aggression theory. To understand this theory we must first understand frustration. frustration is a feeling of tensity that occurs when our efforts to reach a goal are blocked. Frustration can lead to feelings of anger, which in turn can become feelings of aggression and militant sort. This theory has been used to explain a lot of violent behavior over time. This theory explains racism as a type of relief from frustration. A scapegoat is chosen and becomes the object of aggressive behavior.This is often because one cannot take out their feelings of aggression on the person directly concerned. For example, someone who is frustrated with their job cannot e xpress feeling of aggression towards their boss or co-workers so they redirect their frustration and act acutely towards others. However, this cannot be an adequate explanation because it neither explains the presence of racism when there is no frustration nor does it explain why the scapegoat is chosen based on their race as fight backd to perhaps gender, class, etc. (Yassine, A. 2001)The neighboring theory is the theory of magisterial-character. The authoritarian personality is one whose personality reads the person more susceptible to racist ideologies. Adorno (1950) suggested that authoritarian parenting style created the authoritarian personality. The authoritarian style creates aggression, frustration and hatred, which is then directed towards chosen scapegoats. When this parenting style is used, The take in for well-grounded behavior is excessive and uncompromising.There is intolerance of behavior and things that are different. Adorno reported a direct relationship bet ween authoritarian personality and prejudice. Other studies have shown relations between authoritarianism and xenophobia If prejudice and discrimination are directly related with the authoritarian personality, then authoritarianism may explain negative put-downs, oppression and racism. But on the other hand, some studiesreplicating Adornos work found no evidence to support Adorno, and in some cases they found contradictory results. (Brown, R. 1995) People with an authoritarian personality exist in large numbers in every society, and it is probably exercise by them that give racism its strength. But once again, this does not sincerely explain racism any more than it explains non-racism, because people with authoritarian personalities could be non-racists, and this would have the opposite effect, diminishing racism.The last theory is a very simple one, and the most common one. This theory says that racism is learned. It originates from Frauds idea of being born as a blank slate. Th is content that every child is born neither good nor bad. Every behavior is learned from the childs parents and surroundings. This theory was examined and proven with many experiments. The most popular one being an experiment done by a third grade teacher in Riceville, Iowa. The teacher divided the class into two groups blue-eyed and brown-eyed. Each group got the same special privileges and approval on alternate days while the other group was put down and deprived in different ways. Within a a couple of(prenominal) hours, they started to act negatively towards each other, starting fights and insulting the children from the group who was not favored that day. Friendships were easily forgotten and hatred started to stir up in the schoolyard. Before hand, these students had no reasons to dislike each other until they were given one. They were told by an authority figure how they should be acting towards people with different drear eyes. They were taught to be prejudice. This study proves that humans seem much better at learning prejudices than math.A similar study was done by Sheriff. He designed a boys large number in hopes of examine group relations. The camp was separated into two groups. Members from each group did everything together. Then, Sheriff had the groups fight against each other in various games such as tug-of-war. The knowledge and group spirit within each group was evident and at first, there was good sportsmanship between both groups. But soon tension and animosity developed. There was name-calling, fights, and raids on the enemy cabins. After seeing these results, Sheriff act to get the two groups together for good times. Good food, movies, etc. But nothing could bedone, the anger continued. The two groups had learned to hate each other. The groups threw food at each other, shoved, and yelled insults.Next, the camp set up several situations where the two groups had to work together to get something they wanted. There was a break in the water line that had to be fixed (or camp would be closed). The food truck broke down and it took everyones cooperation to poking it. When they worked together on these serious, important tasks, they didnt fight. Friendships developed. Just as opposition led to friction among equals, cooperative work led to electropositive feelings. This also shows that any behavior, good or bad is learned and can easily be erased by the next thing the child is taught. This brings along a serious question. When was the last time our country cooperated with other countries to help those in need? Maybe the solution to racism isnt so far away. (Tuker-Ladd, C. 2000)Social InterventionSince 1966, the United Nations has recognized The 21st of March as the International Day for the Elimination of racial Discrimination. In 1989, the department of Canadian Heritage launched its annual March 21st Campaign.The most important and in force(p) solution to racism will always be education, on many different lev els. Too many people are ignorant when it comes to racism. This is give tongue to in the sense that many people chose feelings over rationalities. They chose to ignore facts because they favour to simply accept what they believe is the truth. For example, some might think that diagonal people are not as smart as white people are. They strongly believe this is the truth and chose to ignore facts such as black people working at NASA or working as doctors. Obviously these people are probably smarter than the average person is, black or white. The great accomplishments done by black people is lusty proof that they are as capable as anybody but some chose to ignore this clear evidence. This is why they have to be educated.A good first step is understanding history. If we can show that racism has a beginning, then the argument that racism is part of human nature does not hold much water. And if racism has a beginning, then we can compete that it can have an end. Some will also argue that racism is something that happensto people who are new in Canada. The new kid always gets teased. It is unfortunate, even cruel, but its part of life and it will go away in time, especially when somebody else newer arrives. The only response to this can be to take a look at the native people and how they are treated. The first People to inhabit this continent yet history shows that they were, and continue to be treated with discrimination. (McCaskell, T. 1994)Education is also important because only when we fully understand the conditions that promote the development of racist ideas and practices will we be able to make sure they do not happen again.All of us must also acknowledge our personal racism, our misperceptions, suspicions and hang-ups about people different from ourselves. We must avoid the temptation of anger and prejudice, even if others have wrongfully hurt us. No matter how difficult and painful it might be, no matter how unworthy of trust we might think other grou ps are, we must try to find our common ground and begin converse to heal our community and our nationEffective racist campaigns must oppose the actual racist policies being carried out in society, such as the denial of land rights to Aborigines, racist law enforcement, discrimination in employment, attacks on the rights of refugees and immigration cuts.Laws and policiesToday we have laws made in the hope of eliminating racism but we have to remember that not so long ago, laws were made to promote racism. For example, in Chicago in the 1940s, African-Americans were not allowed to eat in restaurants with whites but were forced to go to the back door to place their ready and then take the food home to eat. Also, in Montgomery in the 1930s, African-Americans were forced to sit at the back of the bus or drinkable in separately marked water fountains than whites.Some of he present laws include the Canadian Bill of Rights, stating laws concerning all types of discrimination (as mentione d in develop I). It is alsoa criminal offence under the Public severalize Act 1986 to use threatening, abusive or insulting language or behavior in order to stir up racial hatred.Preventing RacismRacism can be prevented on a macro level like worldwide or through a country. It can also be dealt with on a micro level such as in school or in the work place. On a macro level policies can be made in order to prevent people from treating minority groups in a discriminating way. A good example of this was affirmative action. This encouraged employers to hire people of color. The media is a very powerful way of getting messages to many people at once and different types of media can have a very positive influence. It can deliver anti-racism messages to many different generations. The media is very convincing. It can also use this ability to convince people in a positive way.On a micro level some of the things that we can do to prevent racism fall directly on parenting. Parents in our soci ety have the primary responsibility to teach their children social skills. In our society, over 65% of mothers with children under the age of 5 are working out of doors the home. These mothers are so busy with work they are forgetting to teach their children right from wrong. (Tyler, D. 1999) Racism programs can also take place in schools, both elementary and secondary. Companies can also have a program in order to help prevent racism in the work place. It is never too late, it is as important to educate children as it is adults. (Cannon, M. 1995) Everybody can make a difference no matter how old. Another Micro level suggestion would be to accept people on all levels. For example, during the recent Olympic games in Salt Lake City, not a single new channel had a black woman anchor person. (Tyler, D. 1999)Bibliography Part IIBooksCannon, Margaret. The Invisible Empire Racism in CanadaRandom House of Canada Limited, 1995. TorontoHurley, Jennifer A. Racism (Current Controversies)Greenh aven Press, 1998. San DiegoMcKague, Ormond. Racism in CanadaFifth House Publishers, 1991. SaskatchewanMcCaskell, Tim. A History of race/ismToronto Board of Education, 1994Internetwww.immi/yassine.htmCauses of Racism, 2001By Abdel-Qadar YassineAlleydog.comPsychology Glossary, 1999Query Frustration-Aggression battle Theory Sociological Theories of DevianceHamlin, John. 1996Carl Marx and the Conflict TheoryBy Jennifer A. JohnsonThe untenanted Slate The Modern Denial of Human NatureBy Steven Pinker, 2002Disliking others Without reasoned Reasons PrejudiceCalyton E tuker-Ladde, 2000Understanding prejudice, racism, and social conflict.Brown, R. 1995