4. Racism
There was this guy who used to hang out at the front gates of McGill University with a sign that essentially blamed the Jews for everything. Free speech laws allowed him to display his fuckery for the whole world to see and as a result he created a Hitler-sized paw print all over my fabulously liberal institution. This guy would spend all day in the blistering heat or freezing cold proudly displaying the fact that he hated Jews. He would endure criticism, chicken nuggets hurled at his face, and people threatening to kill him, yet he still spat his racist tripe all over the streets of Montreal. From my understanding all of this hate stemmed from someone hitting on him while he worked at Montreal Jewish Hospital. His whole life became a perpetual plea for the young impressionable minds of McGill to join with him in his hate.
My encounters with this gem were numerous and often hilarious through the years. From me smacking his ass as I walked by him, to him telling me I probably had Jewish roots because I didn’t agree with him, there was never a dull moment in the life of this nutfuck. Then one day he vanished, people very quickly forgot about his antics, I get boners thinking that he was beaten to death in one of Montreal’s heavily Jewish communities.
This is one example of racism that I’ve seen in one of the most liberal cities in one of the most liberal countries in the world. I’m really not sure what pisses me off so much about racism, oh wait, yes I do, it’s that everyone who thinks racism is justified is fucking dumb beyond all measure. Take Hitler for example, didn’t get into the university he wanted, took out his frustration on six million people. Ann Coulter… can’t even spell her name properly and the south during the Civil War, all inbred little fucks who lost because they pointed their guns in the wrong direction. Most racists either have small penises and have to compensate for it by ripping on another group of people or are just horribly uneducated. Let’s take Joe Redneck from northern Mississippi, Joe claims that white people are superior to blacks, I’m sure Nelson Mandela would agree with this comment. Or Torquemada, almost single handedly wiped out the Jews in Spain, dude acted tough, but would have cried like a little child if any Jew bumped into him in a dark ally.
People tend to feel they can run their mouths when they are protected by an overpowering majority, this is psychotic and is never justified. We see this with xenophobic tendencies from homogeneous populations. As nation-states become more and more diluted, the ability for an individual to voice their arrogant/ignorant opinion on race, dwindles.
Bringing myself back to my original argument, I feel very strongly that education has a very direct effect on the acceptance of race, gender, sexual orientation etc. Even in Canada we are still very far away from living in a world void of racism. All races are protected as equals under the law, but unfortunate socialization leaves us peppered with false stereotypes and an exclusionary subconscious.
Good post.
Multiculturalism is a load of crap. It teaches us to recognize differences in race, religion, etc.; the fact that we see people of different backgrounds as being fundamentally different from ourselves is the primary cause of bigotry et al. In truth we are all human, and there should be an underlying fellowship from that alone, not the extensive estrangement we see between not only people of different races, but also people with different interests.
This is an ill-informed comment in my opinion Andrew. Multiculturalism, as a concept, is not “a load of crap”, it depends on how we apply it. If multiculturalism means we have Mexican themed lunches at our places of work, or we talk about MLK every Black History Month, just because we feel we have to, then yes I agree multiculturalism is effectively useless. But if we can have a truly genuine discource in society about different cultures, and learn to appreciate, not merely highlight. their differences then I think it will ultimately turn out beneficial. The “we’re all human, lets give each other handjobs under a rainbow” logic that you effuse is fundamentally flawed as well. The truth is, we are all different, as much as we like to pretend we aren’t. We come from different social, economic and cultural backgrounds and to lummp everyone into one “human race” is wrong. I agree that we should think this way, but unfortunately that’s not gonna happen anytime soon, and what you seem to be proposing is to not even bother learning about other cultures and shove everyone into a homogeneous melting pot. This policy hasn’t worked in the United States, and it’s sure as hell not gonna work in Canada. So, don’t be afraid to learn a about a culture you may know little about, I’m sure it’s not gonna turn you into a raving, rabid racist, and if it does, well you had other problems to begin with.
I need not go out of my way to learn about other cultures. I do about a few, sure, but it’s pointless to know them all. The fundamental difference is that I don’t care what cultural background one is from, what colour their skin is, what their religion is (excepting blatantly unjust/backward ones…), etc. I can respect them and give them the benefit of the doubt, even if we disagree on many points. Yes we may have different cultural backgrounds, but in essence isn’t that what is making us different? You could take a child from a christian family, (disregarding skin colour), give him to a muslim family, and chances are the child would be muslim. We are essentially the same, we may have different backgrounds, etc, which shape our personality, but at our core we are all still human, the core that makes us what we are, that gives us our capabilities, is fundamentally the same.
The Hitler example makes sense, unfortunately the Ann Coulter and the South in the Civil War examples are wrong. You may not agree with what Ann Coulter has to say, but she is not stupid. Ann Coulter is a very well-educated woman and would be considered to be very intelligent by any accepted method by which to measure same. I don’t agree with James Carville on many issues but I certainly don’t call him stupid. He, like myself, has an opinion and has the right to express it. Same goes for Ann. I also don’t get why you brought her into the post about racism. I haven’t ever heard her say anything that even bordered on racist. Conservative yes. Racist no.
As a southerner, I next take umbrage to your bringing in the South during the civil war into this discussion. A popular misconception is that the Civil War was fought because of slavery. While slavery was certainly an issue, it was not the only issue and didn’t become a larger issue until 1863 when Lincoln drafted the “Emancipation Proclamation” in hopes to cripple the south’s economy. Prior to that, the majority of the North didn’t give a shit about slavery. I am sure you are familiar with the saying, “the victors write the history books.” This has never been more true than when talking about the Civil War. Does the South have people that are racist? Sure. The South is no different than any other place in this country or any other country.
I could write for days on this issue. I invite you to e-mail me if you would like to discuss this further. Maybe I can give you a different perspective on this as I am a southerner and you are Canadian. I am sure that I can give you some insight and facts on this that you have not gotten before.