The Burlington Post... Oh dear.

My mom got all excited this morning when she found a letter to the editor in the Burlington Post - it had to do with race, so she thought I'd be interested. I was, but now I need to figure out the course of action. I always complain about the attitudes of people in Burlington - the ignorance, the intolerance, the ridiculous displays of wealth, the lack of desire to learn about the experiences of anyone who isn't white and upper class - and the sad part - the passing down of this narrow world view to the children growing up here. In my own experience, when I came here from England I was teased relentlessly at school by children of rich parents who didn't like my accent and who made fun of my second hand clothes. There are obviously people in Burlington who aren't like this - in my experience, a lot are. So why then do I freak out at the idea of actually writing something back to this person - maybe because race is such a sensitive topic and I know that if I accuse someone in Burlington of typing with bigoted fingers then there's a good chance that I'll get snowed under with protest. Maybe I'm terrified of having my name attached to that. I'm sure I'll get over it.

So when I see a letter in the Burlington Post that criticizes an article written a few days ago about the lack of non-white representation at City Hall - my interest is piqued.

The letter quotes the previous article as having said: "Burlington is white. Very white. Snow white." and suggests that this, to a "Canadian born citizen" is offensive. He asks why this is any less offensive than saying that a town is "Black. Very black. Jet black." or - be prepared to get pissed - why it's less offensive than saying that Brampton is "Brown. Very brown. Dirt brown."

I'll start at the beginning.

"Canadian-born citizen" is not synonymous with 'white.' It's problematic to think this way because, firstly, it erases people of colour who were born here (there are plenty), and it sorta sounds like this guy thinks the whites were the first ones here - like there was no human life on the land that we call 'Canada' before the whites showed up to legitimize the place. There was. And we still treat them like they're illegitimate.

Next, if this person can't see why "jet black" and "snow white" are less offensive than "dirt brown" then I don't seriously know what this world is coming to. To lay it out - we walk on dirt. We disrespect dirt. Dirt is "dirty" - it's unclean - it's less than clean. 'Unclean' invokes all kinds of offensive cultural stereotypes that are already associated with 'brown' people. On top of all this, with the amount of rampant racism that's flowing around right now that's specifically directed to middle eastern and Muslim people - they're terrorists, they won't assimilate, they dress funny, they smell, etc. etc. etc. - it's very telling that the racial epithet that this guy uses to describe them is far more offensive than the ones he uses to describe black and white. Can someone PLEASE let the world know that 'racism' doesn't just mean 'hatred of black people.' Stereotyping and discrimination of ANY non-white race fits into this category.

Finally, the idea that he's offended because he thinks he's being discriminated against as a white person is just ridiculous. I can guarantee that as a white man - who was admittedly born in Canada - that his privilege extends as far as to allow him not to notice that he even HAS a privilege. I wonder how many times he was teased, excluded, made to feel 'other,' or how many times he's faced flagrant racism directed towards him. If he really wants to know why "snow white" is less offensive than depictions of other races, why doesn't he go ask some non-white people to share their stories with him. Maybe then he'll get it.

What this sounds like, is a little boy upset that he's being left out of the whole "oppressed group" thing. He has nothing to complain about... so he's complaining about it.

If any of the (bahaha TWO!!) people reading this want to add anything, please comment. There's a good chance I'll woman-up and send something to the Post when I'm sure I've figured out what it is I want to say.