Canada

I have a confession to make.

I've been leading a group of white Christians for the past 6 months in unlearning our white supremacy. We've met once a month to do the hard work of looking our own racism in the face and calling it out, together. And I haven't really talked about it.

Not long ago, I spent an afternoon smoking a cigarette with a convicted drug dealer and thief. Well, I wasn’t smoking the cigarette, but I was there nonetheless, enjoying the second-hand smoke and conversation. Well, enjoying the conversation and avoiding the second-hand smoke.

Our choice of setting? The no-smoking area of a hospital courtyard, large ‘Fresh Air Area’ signs over our heads.

The past few weeks I have been taking a new bus route to work from my friend’s house. The route passes through Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside, a neighbourhood that is seen by many as a place of homelessness, poverty, and addiction. While there are many homeless people on the street who seem lonely and isolated, there is also a deeper sense of relationships and a tight-knit community where people care for and look out for one another, and share their hopes and pains with each other – like a family.

I’ve recently read three books which have helped me to become aware of my privilege. They can help us recognize how white privilege has shaped social structures, opportunities, and hopes – not only for white people, but for people of colour, as well.

Editor's introduction: Omar Khadr, an Afghan-Canadian, is accused of having thrown the grenade that killed American Sergeant Christopher Speer in 2002 when Khadr was 15. He was incarcerated at Guantanamo Bay for ten years. The Government of Canada’s interrogation of Omar at Guantanamo "offend[ed] the most basic Canadian standards [of] the treatment of detained youth suspects," according to a 2010 ruling of the Supreme Court of Canada.

Annie Pootoogook.

Bella Laboucan-McLean.

Cheyenne Fox.

Jane Bernard.

Therese Labbe.

If you grow up with some privilege, you probably don’t recognize it. Unconsciously, you take your “what is” for the furniture of the universe – “just the way things are,” not only for you, but for everybody else. Sure, you may see on television or via social media evidence that people in other places face bad situations – war, famine, natural disasters of one sort or another.

Do you find working for justice overwhelming? Same. It’s overwhelming because there is no-one-size-fits-all formula that lays out best next steps. It’s overwhelming because it taps into a lot of emotion. It’s overwhelming because there is so much need for justice that we often don’t even know where to start. Pursuing justice can feel overwhelming because our world moves so quickly, but justice comes slowly.

A few weeks ago my sister was visiting me and I excitedly wanted to play her some new music that I’ve really been enjoying. She listened and enjoyed it too. But she also raised a concern with me. She had been with me a few days and almost all the music we listened to was made by men. As a musician herself, she told me more about some of the struggles women face in the music industry.

And I realized I was part of the problem. The diversity in my music collection is not great.  

My friend Stephanie works with the Joy Smith Foundation (JSF), the organization I wrote about in my last article, “Human Trafficking and the Freedom Challenge”. JSF is a great organization doing excellent work, so I reached out to Stephanie with some questions about the foundation and human trafficking in Canada.