Historical fact, present reality D
uring Black History Month, it shouldn’t be a crime for anyone, regardless of their skin colour or citizenship, to recognize the racist roots of the United States.
That is not a political statement but historical fact and present reality.
To this day, a disproportionately high number of blacks are in U.S. jail with longer sentences and several sectors of the American economy would collapse without cheap Hispanic labour.
Gregg Popovich, head coach of the NBA’S San Antonio Spurs, recently said it best.
“We live in a racist country that hasn’t figured it out yet and it’s always important to bring attention to it, even if it angers some people,” he said. “You have to keep it in front of everybody’s nose so they understand it still hasn’t been taken care of and we still have a lot of work to do.”
America has come a long way, particularly in the past 50 years, if a powerful and prominent white man like Popovich is taking that stance and stating it so forcefully. But, as he says, the job is nowhere close to being done. Canada is no different, of course.
This country is just as racist and just as flawed as its southern neighbour. While Canada has acknowledged its genocide against its Indigenous peoples and has apologized for residential schools, the systemic racism remains, embedded in our laws, our health care, our politics and our culture.
Popovich’s statement doesn’t mean he’s unpatriotic or is ashamed that he’s a white American man. In the same way, anyone who acknowledges Canada’s racist past and present can still love the country and its people but insist on being better and being part of that effort to be better.
Even when it’s hard to do that. Especially when it’s hard.
And it’s hard when watching the video of the recent arrest of fitness trainer Jamiel Moore-williams in Vancouver. The former member of a UBC Thunderbirds football team that won the Vanier Cup was tasered, thrown to the ground and kicked and punched by seven white members of the Vancouver Police Department.
His official crime? Jaywalking at 2:30 in the morning. His other crime, the one he wasn’t charged for? Being a six-foot-four, 22-year-old black man.
Moore-williams gave an emotional interview to CTV Vancouver.
“I’m a big black male crossing the street and they acted out of fear rather than doing their job. What are they scared of?”
What, indeed? And what is the Vancouver Police Department scared of now? Loss of morale from disciplining officers who not only abused their authority and assaulted a civilian but, based on the video, clearly told a different story to their superiors? Loss of public faith in the police?
That faith is already eroded by the video and further damaged by the Vancouver Police Department’s unwillingness to accept responsibility for what happened and hold its officers accountable.
This is how racism corrupts society, poisoning trust in important civil institutions like the police and humiliating an accomplished young black man who now has to plead with the world to not see him as a thug but to see him, as Martin Luther King said, not for the colour of his skin but for the content of his character.
Hopefully, the courts will right this particular wrong, but that hope is a cautious one.
Coach Popovich says the problem of racism needs to be kept in front of everybody’s nose but sadly some people can’t — or won’t — see even that far, for fear of the personal and social responsibility that comes with it.