White Toronto students in blackface win Halloween costume prize.

Apology sought after U of T students cause uproar with blackface for Halloween (Globe & Mail):

Five students dressed as members of the Jamaican bobsled team received costume award

A University of Toronto student group is demanding public apologies from organizers of a Halloween party after participants wearing dark makeup were given a costume prize.

Five students, who were dressed as members of the Jamaican bobsled team and covered their faces with brown makeup, received the award from an elected student representative of one of the U of T’s colleges.

White people think they know all about you from reading a book.

Sometimes a white person says something about people of colour that is untrue, and when you correct her, the white person will insist that she is right because she read it in a book.

You know that it is untrue because you do not (or somebody you know does not) fit into that generalization; thus, it is inaccurate to say that people of colour have that property, without qualifiers. For some reason, the white person believes that the written word should override the lived experiences of people of colour, even when that book is a fictional portrayal of, a study of, or an interpretation of our lived experiences.

Note that to give priority to one’s lived experience over a book in this case is not a case of anti-intellectualism. (However, it is probably often dismissed as anti-intellectualism by the white person, because of the assumption that people of colour are against book learnin’ and are opposed to something because it comes from a book.) Instead, disproving a universal claim by using one counterexample is an application of predicate logic.

To disprove the claim, “All X have property P,” all you need to do is to show, “There exists an X without property P.”

How does racism hurt white people?

Question: How does racism hurt white people?

Answers:

1. Racism sharply reduces white people’s chance opportunities in life to acquire new knowledge or new perspectives from intelligent or wise people.*
2. Racism causes white people to overestimate their abilities and to underestimate their own weaknesses. It prevents them from knowing themselves and stunts their personal growth.
3. Racism reduces white people’s chances of receiving help from others in times of desperation.
4. Racism compromises white people’s physical safety.**
5. Racism prevents white people from empathizing with and understanding human beings.

People of colour are not a story of suffering . . . Or resistance.

We are multifaceted.

And stories in which we neither suffer nor resist are just as authentic. They are a part of our daily lives.

(Click on “View subtitles” to turn on the subtitles.)

British employers racially discriminate against job applicants with African and Asian names.

Undercover job hunters reveal huge race bias in Britain’s workplaces (18 October 2009):

A government sting operation targeting hundreds of employers across Britain has uncovered widespread racial discrimination against workers with African and Asian names.

Researchers sent nearly 3,000 job applications under false identities in an attempt to discover if employers were discriminating against jobseekers with foreign names. Using names recognisably from three different communities – Nazia Mahmood, Mariam Namagembe and Alison Taylor – false identities were created with similar experience and qualifications. Every false applicant had British education and work histories.

They found that an applicant who appeared to be white would send nine applications before receiving a positive response of either an invitation to an interview or an encouraging telephone call. Minority candidates with the same qualifications and experience had to send 16 applications before receiving a similar response.