Racism Part 1

We've all dealt with it. While I don't agree with it, it will always be around. There will never be a time when we are all joined as a group in our native dress singing and dancing under a rainbow while butterflies and poopless birds flit about in the sky.

What bothers me more than racism is reverse racism. It's not OK for anyone to say something deragatory about blacks, jews, islamics or any other group that feels the sting of racism on a regular basis. I don't understand why then it's OK to pick on the other groups. Have you ever heard the following?

"He welched/welshed on our deal!"
"I've been gypped."
"Irish people are always drunk."
"Typical Scot, always penny-pinching."
"Trailer trash redneck."

And so on and so forth. I have just insulted the Welsh, Gypsies, Irish, the Scottish and everyone who has ever been lumped in with the last group. I bet I would get in big trouble if I were to say similar phrases and use a "minority" group instead. Would you ever say "I've been Jewed!"? Hell no.

Notice I used quotation marks due to the majority population these minority groups make up in the GTA. I think "minority" really is a misnomer and should be updated.

It seems that it's become an increasingly acceptable practice to insult and act unfarily towards people as long as they are Western Europeans, a la white people. When did this become OK and why? When we think "racism", does it only exist for certain groups? I know for a fact that in the GTA, if you are a white male and you were thinking about a career in emergency services (i.e. Fire, Police and EMS), you had better have a back-up plan. Your skin and gender are not what they are looking for right now. Their mandate is to hire more people of colour and/or female gender because they need to better represent the population in which they serve. Can I not be a 29 year old white male when I'm rushing to an accident scene to help several black and southeast Asian people who were involved? Imagine how the bleeding hearts would be up in arms because an employer said, "Sorry, we don't hire black people even though we really have no valid reason for this decision."

Corporations are hiring people of colour now more than ever. They have to, it's a Human Rights issue. While I think equality is great, I have qualms about hiring because of colour. As a hiring body, I should offer you a job because of the contents of your resume and the interview. In other words, QUALIFICATIONS. It's not window dressing; having a rainbow of skin colours won't do shit for you if your employees are not able or right for the job. On the other hand, if you've ever gone to a bank in the Agincourt area you will notice that all the employees are Chinese. Pacific Mall, computer stores run by Asians, even churches are in this. Have you read their signs? Toronto Chinese (insert some denomination) Church, Mississauga Korean (same) Church. I know anyone can attend, but by naming yourself this, you are saying that your church specifically targets only these people.

Can you imagine if I set up a church and named it Toronto White Christians Church??

In a past tennis match between Venus Williams and some Russian woman, they checked each other as they crossed courts. It seems there was some feud going on and neither of them would move out of each others' path. Venus' dad fumed to the media that the Russian player was a "White Turkey" (she's tall and lanky). That is an outright racist comment but there was absolutely no backlash. Why?

Before you call me a cross-burning, Hitler loving, backwards and closed mind conservative, hate mongering Aryan, please note that I am not white. Or male. I am what you call a minority, but even I see what's going on in this world. Why the divisions? We don't have to love each other but surely we can accept that everyone's a little different and move on to a different topic.