Apartheid Finally Comes to Canada
January 30, 2008 · By Shane Edwards
Sounds shocking? I don’t see how the move to create “blacks only” schools in Toronto can be seen in any other way.
Look into the history of apartheid in South Africa. Read what the original framers of the doctrine thought. They thought apartheid was for the best. They thought that Black Africans learned differently, were interested in different things. They thought that it was in the best interests of everyone to keep the races separate. Never mind that the ultimate effect was to neglect and ignore one race and highly educate and train another.
Some have said to me this is not racism, that because blacks are in favour of this, that it is not racism. I say to them, “Who was Uncle Tom?” If someone has been fooled or brainwashed into believing that there is something about their race that makes them unique or special (read: different or more controversially, inferior), then it is easy to think that they need to be treated differently. It is then easy to buy into “special schools” and “special neighbourhoods” and “special police” until suddenly you are in a colder, snowier South Africa. I refuse to stand for it.
Does this apply to voluntary associations? No. If a community of people who happen to be black or whatever want to create their own little private school, they should be free to do so. There is a world of difference between freedom of association and government instituted race segregation.
I abhor and revile any attempt to suggest that races are somehow “different” and that exclusion and separation are the solution to “race based” problems. As soon as we separate and divide our people by race, we begin to create institutional racism. This is the beginning of apartheid.
Updated: Another shot across the bow.
It does not sound to me like black students are being forced to go to this new black school. Therefore, I do not think it is reasonable to call it apartheid.
The real salt in the wound here that John Tory was absolutely pilloried in the media and by Dalton McGuinty during the last Ontario provincial election for daring to suggest that the province might endorse and fund more religious schools.
The media should be HOUNDING Dalton McGuinty night and day on his complete reversal and his selective pandering to PC cultures.
This looks like the thin edge of the wedge. Slippery slope, function creep, whatever you want to call it, I’m afraid of it here.
It’s not hard to imagine that after a few “successful” years, the school would expand the territory it covers, or be replicated in another part of the city. Soon you have 2 schools covering more areas, similar to the duplication already existing with public & separate school boards.
If your child lives in any area covered by 2 schools, and one is all black kids, and the other has relatively few black kids, where would you send your kid? Probably to the one that matches your skin colour.
This ’soft’ form of apartheid could soon morph into true apartheid. “Your kid wants to go to the black/white school? Why? There’s a white/black school just down the street. Go there.”
I’m all for recognizing that concentrations of ethnic groups exist in various parts of the country. Schools are free to reflect this reality in many ways, without resorting to setting up publicly-funded schools dedicated to them. They can have festivals, dances, dinners, plays, student groups, language classes, etc.
How about a Chinese school? Caribbean? Southeast Asian? How about we set up a “white only” school next? Let’s just see what the reaction to that one is.
How about a Muslim school? or a Jewish school? or a (God-forbid!) a Catholic school?
What will they think of next?!?! Soon we will see French schools! Aaaaah!
What will be interesting is to see if the board of ed forces students who don’t want to go to these schools to go, just to maintain some degree of diversity, otherwise the schools will end up not just 100% black, but in all liklihood, 100% black under-achieving social misfits.
So if your kid is a hard working white/black/yellow/purple or whatever student and the board says she MUST attend this school – how do you respond? Fight city hall? Pay for a private school yourself?
Creates a great case for school vouchers.
Apartheid in Canada? Damn your eyes. Canada is the model of tolerance and respect. Trudeau let the black slaves come here throught the underground railroad. 600 000 Americans died in the Civil War for oil. Lincoln was an ignorant hick from Tennessee.
Canada is the right formula. Look at our reserves and Quebec language laws.
Charles, you have just noted the hypocrisy of Dalton McGuinty, that Mark has already pointed out. Public schools dedicated to voluntary associations need to be either done away with or opened up to any group. You can’t have it both ways.
But what we’re talking about is not voluntary association like a religion. We are talking about RACE. We are talking about discriminating based on SKIN COLOUR. This is exactly what we have fought against and (for the most part) ended for the last 40 years. Now it is returning, in the guise of “care” but really thinly veiling the underlying beliefs that some races are better than others. Or in this case, some races have more “problems” than others, SOLELY BASED ON THE COLOUR OF THEIR SKIN. This is wrong.
[...] colleague Shane has started the first post here on the black school that was approved by the Toronto District School Board this month, and [...]
Shane,
I think we most definitely ARE talking about voluntary association — except for the fact that the school is getting tax dollars. I can not understand how you can see it otherwise.
As well, I genuinely see nothing wrong with ethnic or cultural or religious or insert discriminatory feature here at all. If this was a completely privately funded school, I would see nothing to discuss.
I do not agree that racial discrimination has been conquered. I believe it still exists.
—
Shit, what will the loony-Left think of next?!?! Soon, I am sure those creepy weirdo-pinkos will be demanding all male schools in the future!
That exception is the reason I have a problem with it. The minute that state steps in and starts endorsing racial segregation (whether voluntary or not) is the minute we start down the same road South Africa took.
You and I are also in agreement – if it were privately funded there would be nothing to discuss. However, it is not.
And again we are in agreement – racism does still exist, and the Toronto School board endorsing the creation of a race-based school has just given that bad weed of racism an official platform to grow and fester once more.
If that is the reason of your objection, I suggest that you object the public funding of all schools. Why do you care about the other details?
Rather than clashing on the grand battlefield of ideological principle, it might be interesting to consider this a bit more pragmatically.
Schools have several goals – primarily the transfer of skills and knowledge. There’s a rather overwhelming body of evidence supporting the premise that learning happens most effectively within a cultural context familiar to the learner. It seems to me that the proponents of this school are trying to maximize learning by minimizing the degree to which issues of context create barriers to learning.
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