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Do you not find it ironic that an immigrant non-white professor is being criticized by mostly white Canadians for her views and different experiences? Actually yeah maybe Canada is racist after all.
I'm guessing you didn't grow up in Canada. There's a whole Wikipedia article on the topic[0], some of which is covered during the common Canadian education. Other examples are commonplace knowledge. In particular, Aboriginal peoples have generally been treated quite poorly throughout Canada's history. This is further evidenced by the recent headlines, if you don't live under a rock.
I do have experiences in other countries to compare with, but I am not interested in comparisons, and I really don't know what that matters. I don't know any of that has to do with my statements.
> Nowhere is perfect, but allow me to say that Canada (and even the US for that matter) are vastly less racist compared to many places.
Sure, Canada (and the USA) might be "less racist" compared to other places but that doesn't really mean anything. I think very highly of Canada compared to my experiences in the rest of the world, and I'd like to add I did not feel this way until after experiencing other parts of the world. The more I experienced elsewhere, the more I appreciate how good Canadians have it.
But that doesn't mean it's a bastion of equality and its people without prejudices. We can always do better.
Let me offer an analogy. You might think that some aspects of the Canadian government are corrupt, while I on the other hand would grant that there might be some issues but would emphatically agree that “Canada is NOT a corrupt country”. Would you still say something like: “Supporting the idea that you (individual, organization, country, whatever) are not corrupt makes it convenient to ignore efforts to combat corruption ("why should we combat corruption when there isn't any") which should be universally supported.”? Would you still agree that it’s right to cancel someone over saying that “Canada is NOT corrupt”?
Because I see very little difference between the two situations.
Regarding the example you provided wherein the professor was fired from her job:
- You're entitled to your own opinion, you're welcome to publish it, etc.
- Your opinion can be bad and others may dislike you for it. That's fair. You are not free from repercussions.
- A tenured professor is a representative of their university, an employee. They are a face of the school, they teach classes, etc. As far as I'm concerned, no employer should be subjected to bad PR solely because of your shitty opinion. If they want you gone, tough, that's what you signed up for.
- It sounds like the university took this seriously and launched an investigation. Seems like the right thing to me. No one should be subjected to an environment where they do not feel safe or comfortable, let alone paying university students. How should an Aboriginal student feel?
Next, the fact that you see very little difference between opinions on racism and corruption in this example is pretty concerning. For one, race is a protected class, but like birth gender, sexual orientation, etc. affects everyone. It's an intrinsic part of the individual, the identity. A more apt comparison might be "Canada is NOT sexist" which I don't think would receive a response surprising to anyone.
I don't think any individual stance on corruption, at least in North America, could be considered remotely controversial. Except, maybe, to people who have been personally impacted by corruption, which I imagine is a small cohort, but the same would apply for practically any topic.
Looping back around, I dislike the notion that "it's right to cancel" anyone. We're not executing people without trial. People aren't (usually) going to jail or dying. In your first example, it seems the professor chose this hill to die on, instead of apologizing or attempting to show some empathy. Their choice.
The mistake you and others here frequently make is that people are not logicians in isolated environments. People are emotional, have vastly different experiences and varying degrees of education, and a variety of communication skills. Life, or Twitter, isn't a structured debate, even if you'd like it to be. If you piss a lot of people off, you're going to have a bad time. The very connected world in which we live changes things. If you have a controversial opinion that might piss people off, maybe don't share it somewhere easily discovered by said people. Or better still, maybe consider why they might be pissed off and reflect on your choices.
