‘Hate has no place in Hamilton’ rings hollow
Our leadership has failed to acknowledge and deal with the realities of it in this city
Last week’s disgusting attempt to terrorize a Muslim mother and her daughter in Ancaster rightfully prompted an outcry from Hamiltonians and the rest of Canada.
As one would expect, the mayor put out a statement on behalf of the city that: “Hate has no place in Hamilton” and reiterated a commitment to “Hamilton for all.”
But hate has been a problem in this city for years and that statement rings hollow coming from our elected officials when some of them have denied the severity of the problem, blamed activists for raising the alarm and did almost nothing to stand up to hate when it was in front of them on the City Hall forecourt every Saturday.
Add to that our ignominious designation in recent years by StatsCan citing Hamilton as the “Hate Capital of Canada” and our leaders’ dismissal of a thousand letters from citizens to remove a statue that symbolizes the cultural genocide of Indigenous people only to use their “process” as an excuse, and you start to wonder if we really are committed to every Hamiltonian feeling safe, respected and valued.
The incident this week comes just one month after the vicious terror attack that killed a Muslim family in London. That attack prompted an emergency national summit on Islamophobia. But, in Hamilton when a group of organizations hosted an important AntiHate Community Summit in May featuring local and international experts, there was not the robust involvement by elected officials that you would expect if fighting hate is a civic priority.
So what are we to make of their declarations that hate doesn’t belong in Hamilton? What do we make of a city that kept a white supremacist on staff until a national media outlet exposed it? What do we make of a mayor and majority of council that wouldn’t even defend the city’s front porch from hate-spewing groups each Saturday during the Summer of Hate?
What do we make of a mayor, who also chairs the Police Service Board, who dismissed as untrue criticism police stood back during the violence at Pride, only to have an independent inquiry say it was true? What do we make of a city council that needed citizens to urge them to do something after a school bus with hate signs drove up into the crowd at the forecourt at City Hall mere steps from children and a video of the incident went viral? The mayor took part in a photo op and several councillors stood with citizens against hate but the weak response brought national disgrace to Hamilton.
To end hate, experts stress the need for elected representatives to stand up to hate in a clear, consistent and meaningful way. The lack of meaningful action or consistent condemnation of hate from our mayor and council sends the wrong message.
We need substantive action against hate, not just platitudes, hollow promises, or silence from the mayor and council when it matters most.
To love Hamilton is to want her to improve, to truly be a city for all. Each of us has a responsibility to stand up to hate every time we see or hear it and our leaders must lead the charge. Only then will hate truly have no place in Hamilton.