racism

Saturday June 12, 2020

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday June 12, 2020

‘Their time has come’: Calls increase for removal of statues linked to colonial legacy

As statues and monuments of leaders from bygone eras are being toppled in response to growing calls to end systemic racism and discrimination, the sentiment is also growing here in Canada.

Sir John A. Macdonald available at Redbubble.com

Just this week, protesters in Belgium vandalized a statue of King Leopold II, whose rule of Congo led to the death of 10 million people. At Oxford University, there are calls to remove a statue of Cecil Rhodes, an architect of the apartheid. And in Bristol, England, a statue of slave trader Edward Colston was dragged through the streets and dumped into the harbour.

Meanwhile in the United States, several statues honouring Confederate generals and slave owners have also been taken down in response to the anti-Black racism protests spurred by the killing of George Floyd.

Canada is not immune to this, either. A Change.org petition calling for the removal of a Sir John A. Macdonald statue in Montreal has received more than 10,000 signatures as of Wednesday evening.

Macdonald, Canada’s first prime minister, was an architect of the residential school system and led starvation tactics against Indigenous people in the Prairies.

“He was very proactive in starvation of Indigenous people, so why would we want a statue of him?” said Nakuset, executive director of the Native Women’s Shelter of Montreal.

David MacDonald, a political science professor at the University of Guelph, told CTV News Channel that he believes these statues should be taken down.

“(Macdonald) certainly was the architect of several genocides in Canada, therefore I think it’s time that we continue to address his legacies and there shouldn’t be bridges and schools and all sorts of things named after someone who so blatantly went out to destroy Indigenous nations in this country,” he said.

Montreal Mayor Valerie Plants told reporters on Wednesday that there are no immediate plans to take down the statue, but she is looking at ways to address systemic racism in the community.

“There is also an opportunity to create a dialogue between what was the past and what was right then or what was acceptable then, where at one point we’re like, as a society, ‘enough,’” she said.

November 9, 2018

A similar statue of Macdonald was taken down in Victoria, B.C., in 2018. Its artist said he is ashamed to admit that he didn’t know about residential schools until after he crafted the statue and now believes these monuments should also be taken down.

“We still need to confront our racism towards Indigenous people and if we have to tear down a few sculptures, great,” said John Dann.

Similar petitions in Toronto are calling for the city to rename Dundas Street, which is named after Henry Dundas, who delayed the abolition of slavery in the British Empire, and for Ryerson University to take down its statue of the school’s founder Egerton Ryerson,who also helped develop the residential schools. (CTV News)

 

Statues from r/canadapoliticshumour

 

Wednesday June 3, 2020

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Wednesday June 3, 2020

The Protests Will Spread the Coronavirus

The wave of mass protests across the United States will almost certainly set off new chains of infection for the novel coronavirus, experts say.

May 29, 2020

The virus seems to spread the most when people yell (such as to chant a slogan), sneeze (to expel pepper spray), or cough (after inhaling tear gas). It is transmitted most efficiently in crowds and large gatherings, and research has found that just a few contagious people can infect hundreds of susceptible people around them. The virus can spread especially easily in small, cramped places, such as police vans and jails.

As such, for the past several days, the virus has found new environments in which to spread across the United States. At least 75 cities have seen widespread demonstrations and social unrest as Americans have gathered to protest systemic racism and the killing of George Floyd, the black man who died last week under the knee of a Minneapolis police officer. Dozens of cities imposed curfews over the weekend amid widespread looting. It has been among the most turbulent moments of societal upheaval in the U.S. since the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. in 1968.

The pandemic and unrest together have trapped the country in a bind. The demonstrations oppose police brutality. But peaceful, masked protesters—and the journalists covering them—have sometimes been met with an overly aggressive police response.

“I don’t think there’s a question of whether there will be spikes in cases in 10 to 14 days,” Mark Shrime, a public-health researcher at Harvard, told me. “With so many protests happening, that are getting so much bigger, I don’t think it’s a question of if, but when and where.”

Coronavirus cartoons

Maimuna Majumder, a computational epidemiologist at Boston Children’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School, agrees. “All things considered, there’s little doubt that these protests will translate into increased risk of transmission for COVID-19,” she told me by email.

Yet that risk does not lead Majumder to oppose the protests. “I personally believe that these particular protests—which demand justice for black and brown bodies that have been brutalized by the police—are a necessary action,” she said. “Structural racism has been a public-health crisis for much longer than the pandemic has.” Even the COVID-19 pandemic has harmed black people disproportionately, Majumder told me. While about 13 percent of Americans are black, a quarter of all COVID-19 deaths where the victim’s race is known have befallen black people, according to the COVID Racial Data Tracker.

Alexandra Phelan, a professor of global-health law at Georgetown University, also told me she believed that the protests were justifiable, even amid the public-health crisis. She drew a difference between these protests, against police brutality, and the protests earlier this spring, which opposed mask mandates and social-distancing rules. At the very least, she said, many protesters this weekend were wearing masks, reducing the risk of transmission to the community. (The Atlantic) 

 

Tuesday June 2, 2020

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Tuesday June 2, 2020

God Bless, and please help, our friend America

It was Justin Trudeau’s late father who, in 1969, coined the best description ever of what it’s like living next door to the United States. “Living next to you is in some ways like sleeping with an elephant. No matter how friendly and even-tempered is the beast, if I can call it that, one is affected by every twitch and grunt,” he said in a speech.

April 29, 2020

Pierre Trudeau probably couldn’t have envisioned what is happening in America right now. Already weak and dazed thanks to poor stewardship, the elephant has become very sick over the past week. It is, in fact, convulsing. Its future is far from certain. 

It’s hard to watch. Even those of us who don’t care for many aspects of America — particularly Donald Trump’s America — feel sorrow and some trepidation.

The immediate crisis is the result of yet another unarmed black man being killed by white police. This time it started in Minneapolis. This time the black man, whose name was George Floyd, died after a cop knelt on his neck for just under nine minutes, while other officers stood by and watched. Floyd’s crime, apparently, was resisting arrest and acting belligerent, quite possibly under the influence. The cop who knelt on Floyd’s neck was charged with third-degree murder and manslaughter. And he was fired. Three other officers have been dismissed but have not yet been charged. 

May 5, 2020

The charged former officer has previously been involved in the fatal shooting of another suspect, and was the subject of 17 complaints during his two-decade police career.

The killing, caught on multiple videos, quickly went monstrously viral. And then all hell broke loose, and continues to do so, as recently as last night. Some demonstrators threw Molotov cocktails at police in Philadelphia, Pa., others set fires near the White House and faced tear gas and rubber bullets in Austin, Texas, Atlanta, Ga., and other cities. So far, deaths have been recorded in Kentucky, Detroit, Mich., and Minneapolis. Concerns have been raised about looters and vandals taking advantage of the protests.

It has been bad before when police kill unarmed black people. Tamir Rice was playing in a park. Eric Garner had just broken up a fight. Ezell Ford was walking in his neighbourhood. Philando Castile was driving home from dinner with his girlfriend. Dominique Clayton and Breonna Taylor were sleeping in their beds. But this is the worst in a very long time. Black Americans are 2.5 times as likely as white Americans to be shot and killed by police officers.

November 9, 2016

At times like this, you look to your elected leaders as a stabilizing force. The mayor of Minneapolis and the state governor have been trying. Not Donald Trump though. Rather than try to instill calm and call for unity, Trump went off on state governors during a video conference about the widespread violence. He told them to aggressively target violent protesters. He said “You have to dominate or you’ll look like a bunch of jerks…” He ordered them to seek “retribution”. He counselled aggression, telling the governors “You don’t have to be too careful.” He said of the violence: “It’s a movement, if you don’t put it down it will get worse and worse … The only time its successful is when you’re weak and most of you are weak.”

Presumably, Trump was referring to Antifa, the violence left-wing protest group. It has certainly been active and no doubt is responsible for some of the violence, but the wave is much bigger than that. 


Barack Obama, by contrast, condemned the violence and called for the protesters to come together for peaceful protest and change. Of course, Obama is not in the White House. Trump is. God bless, and help, America. (Hamilton Spectator Editorial)

USA, White House, Abraham Lincoln, John F. Kennedy, quote, BlackLivesMatter, racism, Donald Trump, white nationalism, bigotry

Letter to the Editor, Hamilton Spectator, Friday June 5, 2020

June 2 editorial cartoon said it all

Thank you Graeme MacKay for this cartoon (Kennedy’s ghost visiting Donald Trump)! It says it all. As someone who was a teenager when Martin Luther King, President Kennedy and then his brother Bobby were assassinated, I was in shock and devastated. The closest the U.S. ever came again to being in that position was when Barack Obama became president. Now we watch and listen to the rhetoric of the most disgusting president ever. Everything presidents Lincoln, Kennedy and Obama, as well as Sen. Kennedy and Martin Luther King, stood for are ignored by today’s “leader.” The election cannot come fast enough.

Gwen Vance, Hamilton

Wednesday May 13, 2020

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Wednesday May 13, 2020

Bryan Adams’s Instagram post draws rebukes from Chinese-Canadian organization, social media users

A prominent Chinese-Canadian activist says she is shocked, disappointed and angry about an Instagram post on Canadian singer Bryan Adams’s official account that she and others say is racist.

January 29, 2020

The post contains a snippet of Adams singing his hit song Cuts Like a Knife. An accompanying description expresses his frustration that COVID-19-related restrictions have led to the postponing of three shows at the Royal Albert Hall in London, England.

“Tonight was supposed to be the beginning of a tenancy of gigs at the @royalalberthall, but thanks to some f–king bat eating, wet market animal selling, virus making greedy bastards, the whole world is now on hold,” the post read.

“My message to them other than ‘thanks a f–king lot’ is go vegan.”

Amy Go, president of the Chinese Canadian National Council for Social Justice called the post racist and believes it could stoke hatred of Chinese-Canadians.

“People look up to public figures. He is seen as an idol by many,” Go said. “It justifies this racist hatred against Chinese … This is so irresponsible and just so, so, so, so racist.”

Coronavirus cartoons

As the coronavirus pandemic has spread, many have raised concerns about growing anti-Asian and anti-Chinese racism in Canada, with reports of anti-Asian hate crimes on the rise in Vancouver, including physical and verbal attacks. 

But on Tuesday morning, the singer issued an apology on Instagram “to any and all that took offence” to his post. He said he just wanted to rant about “animal cruelty in the wet-markets being the possible source of the virus, and promote veganism.”

“I have love for all people and my thoughts are with everyone dealing with this pandemic around the world,” he wrote in the post. 

As of 10 p.m. PT Monday, his original Instagram video had received more than 1,500 replies. 

Many of the comments expressed love for his music and dismay he would not be touring, but dozens of others accused Adams of racism. (CBC)



 

 

Friday February 21, 2020

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Friday February 21, 2020

Despite His Billions, Bloomberg Busts

You can buy ads and saturate the airwaves with them. You can buy allies, especially with the right budget.

February 7, 2020

But you can’t buy a debate performance, and that’s why Mike Bloomberg’s on Wednesday night mattered so much. This was the man talking, not the money.

And the man needed rescue — from his bloodthirsty rivals and even more so from himself.

Making his first appearance alongside other contenders for the Democratic presidential nomination, Bloomberg knew that he would be under furious attack and had clearly resolved not to show any negative emotion. But that meant that he often showed no emotion at all. Or he looked vaguely bemused, and that didn’t communicate the coolness that he intended. It signaled an aloofness that he very much needed to avoid.

He made a groaner of a joke about his wealth, saying that he could hardly use a plebeian instrument like TurboTax to ready his tax returns for public consumption. He made light of past harassment-related complaints from female employees: “None of them accuse me of doing anything other than maybe they didn’t like a joke I told.”

February 11, 2020

He repeatedly — and laughably — suggested that he wouldn’t tear up nondisclosure agreements with women who have sued him or his company because they wanted the silence as much as he did. Elizabeth Warren hammered and hammered him on this point, but he wouldn’t budge, and that left the impression that he couldn’t budge. The truth would be too ugly.

My first sketch of Michael Bloomberg. Kinda’ resembles actor Christopher Plummer in this depiction. More work needed? Or, why bother? Maybe he’s washed up?*

Ugly: That’s the word for this ninth debate of the Democratic primary season. It had the fewest candidates — six — but the most nastiness, because those candidates clearly felt an urgency to diminish their competitors and elevate themselves before it was too late. A meager haul of votes in the Nevada caucuses this coming Saturday could effectively undo one or more of them; a poor showing on Super Tuesday less than two weeks from now would definitely be the end of the road.

It’s no wonder they wanted a bite of him. It was the first time since Bloomberg announced his run for the presidency that he was within reach. For three high-spending, high-flying months, he campaigned essentially as a phantasm, ubiquitous in television commercials but averse to interviews, a supposed paragon of electability who had yet to put himself before voters, more idea than actuality, able to be seen but not touched.

But on Wednesday night, that changed abruptly. The apparition became flesh. And it was bruised from the get-go and bloodied soon after. (Continued…NYT)

 * It was my second time drawing him, actually. The first time I sketched Michael Bloomberg was while watching him on TV as he spoke to delegates at the 2016 Democratic Party convention.