ICYMI: Desmond Cole is bravely attacking racism in Toronto

[Saviolo]

Desmond Cole is a columnist for The Torontoist:

http://torontoist.com/author/desmondcole/

and Toronto Life:

http://www.torontolife.com/author/desmondcole/

ignited a bit of a firestorm when Toronto Life published his article attacking the Toronto Police Services practice of carding, and its incredibly racist implementation in this article:

http://www.torontolife.com/informer/features/2015/04/21/skin-im-ive-interrogated-police-50-times-im-black/

People would love to imagine Canada as a serene, post-racial society without this kind of trouble, but POC are still dying in Canada. It's overshadowed a little by the massive troubles that are erupting throughout the USA for the same problems, but it's still an issue, here. Since the article was posted, he's been talking about it non-stop on his Twitter feed: https://twitter.com/DesmondCole and finding a great deal of support and a bizarre amount of resistance.

It's worth your time to read the article and do some browsing of his Twitter feed.

Remember that carding is not simply "collecting data." Each instance of carding is recorded as a "non-arrest police interaction" which is something that can show up on a background check. Toronto Star did an article about this last year: http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2014/05/17/no_charges_no_trial_but_presumed_guilty.html outlining the problem of people being denied jobs and housing based on things like these non-arrest interactions showing up on background checks.

[Spazito]

1. Carding is racist in it's institution and is racial profiling...

Canada is as racist as the US, imo, the primary target of racists being indigenous peoples and the black community.

[Saviolo]

2. It's true.

I think many people (and many Canadians, especially Torontonians) want to believe that Toronto specifically and Canada generally are very much post-racial, but it's not true.

It is worsened by the fact that most of the police in Toronto come from smaller communities surrounding Toronto where diversity is rarer. They see fewer POC in those communities, so when they see so many more of them in Toronto, they don't know how to deal.

Also, being First Nations in Canada still guarantees pretty terrible treatment by just about all levels of government.

[Spazito]

3. Canadians wear blinders when it comes to racism, imo...

A kind of 'la la la, I can't hear/see you'. As a Canadian myself, I see instances of racism all too often.

[Saviolo]

4. We like to believe we're all past that

But I think that we work so hard to look past it, that we miss it when it's right under our noses.

I can't believe how much support carding had from the Mayor's office in Toronto.

[Spazito]

5. He is flip flopping all over the place on this...

First he defends it then he calls for it to be stopped and now he wants the police board to delay any reforms until a Provincial review is completed months from now.

Here's an article by the Star, confusing as hell re what the Mayor has said, done or not done:

http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2015/06/17/toronto-carding-reform-put-on-hold-for-provincial-review.html

[Saviolo]

6. To top it off:

They've already had professional reviews of the practice of carding, but they refuse to release the findings.

Mr. Cole is convinced that carding is thoroughly illegal, and I'm inclined to believe that it is at the very least incredibly immoral.

[Spazito]

7. There has been a challenge to it's constitutionality filed this past June...

"A black law student who says police have stopped him approximately 30 times in “carding” incidents is asking an Ontario court to declare the policy unconstitutional, have all information gathered from him expunged and order police to reveal the identity of anyone to whom it gave that information, so it can be destroyed."

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/law-student-challenges-the-constitutionality-of-carding-by-police/article24910075/

I don't know when or if the case will be heard.