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.