ROTHENBURGER: Would you jump in to stop someone’s racist tirade?

What preceded the tirade is unclear, but it apparently began with some sort of service issue.

It’s reminiscent of the “I’m a Canadian woman” video shot last year in a Dennys restaurant in Lethbridge.

In that one, a woman yells, “You’re not Canadian” at a group of men — whom she identified as Syrian — in a booth next to her. At one point she shouts, “Speak English if you’re going to speak. It’s Canada.”

The woman was identified as an employee of a Cranbrook auto dealership and was fired over the incident. The woman involved in the Burnaby rant hasn’t been identified but a child is seen in the video with her.

Could it happen in Kamloops? Of course, it could. We’d like to think it couldn’t, but it could.

We’re a very international community so we should be used to the sights and sounds that come with that, but it’s an open question whether that increases or reduces the likelihood racism will become overt.

We’re fortunate to have an incredibly diverse population ethnically and culturally. A good part of the reason for that is the international program at Thompson Rivers University. Almost three thousand students from 90 countries join domestic students every semester.

It’s a joy and a privilege to have these people among us. The largest numbers come from China and India but others come from the Middle East, Japan, Africa and elsewhere.

Aside from TRU, we have significant populations of Italian, Indian, Chinese, Japanese, European and many other countries here. For almost a third of the Kamloops population, English is not their mother tongue. That includes Francophones who speak Canada’s other official language.

No wonder we sometimes hear people conversing in a language other than English.

There’s no shortage of racism in Kamloops. It appears in graffiti on the walls of public bathrooms, it shows up regularly on social media, sometimes on signage, sometimes verbally.

The community does its best to discourage it, with conferences, walks, workshops, speeches, but it will always be there.

Being a place where so many different cultures are obvious should have a positive effect because we’re used to it, but it might actually spur some racism from those who think everyone should look and sound “Canadian,” however they define that.

Why hearing someone speak a foreign language sets some people off is perplexing.

In both the Burnaby and Lethbridge cases, the reaction was undeniably racist. But in both, the offenders referred to what they regarded as rudeness by the targets of their tirades. They had the impression they were being talked about by those using the other language, and feared they were being mocked.

This fear results from insecurity as well as, no doubt, from discomfort caused by what they see as a loss of the old Canada. Instead of embracing change and diversity, they despise it. They’re happy only if everyone else is the same as them, and that includes speaking the same language.

This resentment explodes at the sound of words they don’t understand. In the Burnaby case, the staff should have been aware that speaking about someone in a language they don’t understand is, indeed, rude, but it didn’t justify the rant.

What’s really important about such incidents is what we do about them, not after the fact but in the moment. The Lethbridge incident was only settled with the intervention of staff. The woman’s husband sat passively throughout her tirade.

In the Burnaby drug store, nobody stepped in to tell the woman she was being unreasonable, not even the man who took the video of the incident. He simply recorded it and posted it.

I watched one TV news report in which several people were asked what they would have done in that situation, and every one of them said they’d step in and reprimand the woman who was berating the store employees.

We’d all like to think that would happen and, yet, the reality is it didn’t. We’re reluctant to get involved in confrontations.

Of course, there are times we shouldn’t, when we might be placing ourselves in danger and should call the police. But when someone is yelling racist insults, it’s time to set aside our reluctance, step forward and tell the offender he or she is out of line.

Imagine the trauma caused to people who may have come here to escape persecution or simply because they believed they could have a better life, and then to discover their hopeful picture of Canada was an illusion. Imagine the hurt caused to Canadians who have lived here for many years and suddenly find themselves told to “go home.”

Do they emerge from such an incident thinking they must have been wrong about our country?

What a world of good it would do if another Canadian were to step forward and reassure them they weren’t wrong, that Canadian values are based on equality, not bigotry. That we don’t simply accept people from other cultures but that we’re thankful for them. That the Canadian mosaic is real.

When we don’t do it, we affirm the opposite.

Mel Rothenburger is a former mayor of Kamloops and newspaper editor. He writes five commentaries a week for CFJC Today, publishes the ArmchairMayor.ca opinion website, and is a director on the Thompson-Nicola Regional District board. He can be reached at mrothenburger@armchairmayor.ca.

—

Editor’s Note: This opinion piece reflects the views of its author, and does not necessarily represent the views of CFJC Today or the Jim Pattison Broadcast Group.

by Mel Rothenburger

ROTHENBURGER: Would you jump in to stop someone’s racist tirade?

Our Community