Urban Informed's look at the stories that might not have received enough light from the past 7 days
Here are some items you may have missed or did not get much attention in the news cycle last week.
1) December 6th National Day of Remembrance
I know what you are thinking. This story definitely was part of mainstream news last week and I wholeheartedly agree with you. In fact, certain media outlets locally have been using the week to speak on what we now call femicides. I have no opposition to this important discussion because let's face it, the number of women being killed by men particularly in Quebec this past year has been disgusting.
Since the beginning of 2021 according to a report by Global News, 14 women have been killed by men in Quebec. This disturbing trend made this December 6th Day of Remembrance even more important for those who continue to pressure governments to enact stricter gun laws and to combat violence against women and support services like women shelters and programs that provide support for women in need.
The National Day of Remembrance on December 6th is in remembrance of 14 women who were murdered at the Ecole Polytechnique in Montreal in 1989. The women who were murdered were separated from the men in their class and subsequently killed by gunfire and one woman stabbed to death.
There is a park near the University of Montreal now that honours the memory of these 14 women. I used to live close to the park a decade ago and would walk by it everyday on the way to work and I can tell you that there should not be a Montrealer that does not know what that park is about.
If there is anything good that comes out of December 6th 1989, it is the Canadian public has to keep pressuring governments to take a hard stand against issues such as gun violence nationally.
2) Maine town elects Somali-American as Mayor
When I saw this story I took a double take honestly. We don't realize how spread out people in different communities really are until we hear a story like this. A town in the U.S. State of Maine has elected Deqa Dhalac as their new mayor.
What is making news about her election in the town of South Portland, Maine is that the population is 90% White. I like to call these break throughs. Communities where you have an overwhelming population and then you have someone, in this case Dhalac coming from a community not really represented in the wider community come through and win office. We have seen that locally here in Quebec in the recent municipal elections and other parts of Canada where people of colour from immigrant communities representing a small piece of the population win public office.
"I'm...really proud of the fact that I'm going to be opening a lot of paths for other folks who look like me, especially our young community members, to say, 'If this woman can do this, actually I can do that,'" Dhalac told the City Council last month after her nomination. - CNN.com
The interesting thing about Dhalac's election is that it is highlighting the growing numbers of Somali immigrants in states like Maine, Michigan and Minnesota. Think about U.S. Congresswoman Ilhan Omar who represents Minnesota and is also Somali-American.
According to this article, the Somali-American community in Maine number about 6,000.
Read story on CNN.
3) Quebec teacher removed from class for wearing hijab
So by now you all have heard of the school teacher who was removed from her job because she violated the Provincial law in Quebec prohibiting anyone from wearing a religious symbol and working in a position of authority.
First of all let's get this straight. It's a bad law. But my side eye goes to everyone in Quebec and other parts of Canada (mainly the political class) who have been sleeping on this since the law was given its stamp of approval two years ago!!! Where was the federal government, where were the opposition parties??? I am no genius or prophet but I could have told you this would happen, I am not surprised. We know this law discriminates yet our political class have not the strength nor will to defend religious minorities and for that matter linguistic minorities in Quebec.
I said what I said.
Second of all. Premier Legault is the worst Premier of my lifetime. I give him kudos on handling COVID for the most part but for almost everything else especially minority issues he has proven to be incompetent and stuck in the 1970's. Everything from his new language law to this religious symbols ban which by the way seems to not have the same discriminatory effect on Catholicism, ahem, to his denial of Systemic Racism yet apparent will to want to combat racism proves to me that he is a joke.
Legault and his regime are happy to toe the hard line and come down on the school for hiring the teacher whose name is Fatemeh Anvari and they want us to believe that because a majority of Quebecers are in favour of the law that it is good. For me that is like saying that because people in the U.S. South in the 1950's thought separate but equal was good, the federal government should have put their heads in the ground and let things stay the same. Just for you bleeding hearts, I am not comparing Quebec to the U.S. South of the 1950's.... yet.
Bottom line is this, can you think of young students who have been religiously influenced in school because they had a teacher who wore a hijab or any other religious symbol? I will get a coffee and wait for you to think about that.
As much as we want to holler and scream at the Quebec government though, think about the fact that the federal parties are sitting back, giving the party line responses to the media about how all Canadians should be able to have freedom of religion while Quebec uses the Notwithstanding Clause to get around facing the music on a bad law.
If Mme. Anvari and her school were trying to make a point then I applaud them.
Read Bill 21
Read the local story here
4) Local campaign to save a Black cemetery in Ontario
In Haldimond County in Southern Ontario, an abandoned cemetery known to have the buried remains of Black settlers from the United States will be restored. The cemetery is known to have the remains of Blacks who escaped to Ontario through the Underground Railroad and is known to also be the burial place of a niece of legendary Harriet Tubman.
Rosemary Sadlier, a Toronto-based historian and former president of the Ontario Black History Society, says the rehabilitation work can't come soon enough.
"Often, sadly, because of racism, because of ignorance, because of migration, the presence of people of African descent in certain communities is completely erased," she said, noting that cemeteries "often provide the only tangible evidence of their living there ... of a Black settlement."
We know that Ontario is rich with Black history as Black people poured into Ontario to escape slavery and they established communities, churches, schools, newspapers and yes even cemeteries. Even though we do not learn much about these people who came to Canada, their footprints are there, case in point this cemetery.
I remember here in Quebec there was an attempt to preserve a presumed Black cemetery in the town of St. Armand. Unfortunately, the land was privately owned and the owners did not want to cooperate with groups wanting to preserve this presumed piece of history. The government of Quebec of course, did not step in and then again why would they?
So bravo to Haldimond County and bravo to preserving Black history and telling those stories that we cannot learn in Canadian schools.
Read story on CBC News
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