WHEN WILL WE TAKE ACTION?

Racism and oppression continue despite all the talk, Valerie Preugger writes.

I have been struggling to put into words what I am feeling with the protests in the U.S., about a president who inflames hate, and the call from so many to address this issue. One day after the chief commissioner of Alberta Human Rights sent out a message urging us all to learn about our own privilege and the impact of racism, W. Brett Wilson, a very privileged white man, impugned the election of Calgary’s mayor in racist terms.

I have been an anti-racist/oppression educator, researcher, activist and ally for over 40 years. I have seen the protests, the fine “messages” of solidarity, but rarely have I seen action.

This is a systemic and individual issue which, to quote author Charlamagne tha

God, requires an individual and systemic solution. So, we write our strategic plans, we do implicit bias training, we wring our hands at the injustice, and rarely is there any legislative or real change.

We need to tackle the roots of poverty, discrimination and unequal access to education, health care, job opportunities, politics and justice. The only place Black and brown people are overrepresented is in our criminal justice system as we continue to denigrate, harass, verbally abuse, assault, lynch and kill people with shades of skin darker than “ours.”

This has never been an issue of one cop with his knee on the throat of a Black man, it is about a system that allows that individual to feel he can commit murder and get away with it. It is a system that allows racial profiling, not only by police but by store owners, health-care providers, teachers, politicians. It is a system that does not have the political will to stand up and put the resources in place consistently and sustainably to effect change.

It is a system that has allowed Indigenous peoples in this country to face the most egregious injustices, not the least of which is cultural genocide, on a daily basis historically and today.

I see governments elected, start anti-racism actions, then a new government is elected and dismantles them, erasing all the hard work and hard-won progress.

When are we going to really stand up and live the reality that we are all human beings, not just put pretty language into constitutions and charters of rights and freedoms that is ignored in practice?

When are we going to individually challenge racism and discrimination when we see it, in the moment? When are communities going to band together to say not in my neighbourhood? And when will politicians and the elite, pull their heads out of the sand so that they are not caught without words when asked about this issue?

Racism is a human issue! No one is exempt from fighting against it and other forms of oppression.

We keep saying the time is now, whether it is about child poverty, gun control, violence against women, or systemic discrimination, but “now” passes like a fleeting cloud and we await the next Black or brown body lying in the street bleeding red blood, discarded, alone and dead, leaving a family shattered and racialized communities terrorized. We wring our hands and cry, “What a shame, oh, what a shame.”

But when will we stop the crocodile tears and start taking action? When?

Valerie Pruegger is an adjunct faculty member at the University of Calgary and the former director of the university’s Office of Diversity, Equity and Protected Disclosure.