At a busy time of year in the school calendar, a sizeable crowd took time out of their studies on Thursday to attend the Racial Profiling workshop hosted by the Black Students’ Association and Muslim Students’ Association. The event was part of the Student’s Administrative Council’s (SAC) Expression Against Opression series.
Ever since the Toronto Star’s expose on the topic, racial profiling has been hot in this city. Associate professor Scot Wortley from U of T criminology spoke first about his research work to answer the question of whether racial profiling exists.
Wortley shared some interesting facts. He found that black men with higher incomes were more likely to be stopped by police than those with lower incomes. In a study on Toronto high school youth victimization he found that black students were more likely to be stopped on two or more occasions and were more likely to get searched and charged than white students. “If [you are] black, your chances of getting caught and labeled are much higher…it impacts how these youths perceive Canadian society.”
He spoke about the reluctance of the police to confront these issues. Following Sept. 11, when this topic became increasingly pertinent and sensitive, Wortley saw that it became harder to conduct his research. “Funding opportunities have been blocked. Now that it’s a big issue, obstacles have been put up” revealed Wortley. In the United Kingdom, data is taken on the race of those who are stopped by the police for things like speeding. A study there has shown that black people were eight times more likely to be stopped than whites. In Canada, this kind of data collection is not done. Kingston, Ont. is a recent exception to the policy. “It’s a positive move that’s being made,” said Wortley in reference to Kingston. “It has angered the Toronto police force…we’ll see how this drama develops over the next few years.”
Riad Saloojee, the next speaker in the evening, was adamant in his view that racial profiling is ineffective. “I’ve never seen any study that shows profiling works,” he said. Riad is a lawyer and executive director for CAIR-CAN, a national Islamic grassroots organization working for anti-discrimination and political advocacy. Riad brought an activist view to the subject of racial profiling and highlighted the fact that the attention of police has been turned toward the Muslim community in the past two years.
He spoke of the unprecedented hate activity that had been perpetrated upon Canadian Muslims after Sept. 11 and the climate of fear that anti-terrorism legislation has created. “The feeling among Canadian Muslims is that you can easily be smeared as a terrorist and the consequences are far reaching and severe.”
Riad is concerned about the public acceptance of racial profiling. “A lot of the academics don’t even produce a reason why there needs to be racial profiling, it’s just deemed rational,” he said. He gave some examples of recent complaints to his organization about police and security guards harassing innocent people.
Riad stated that since many immigrants come from places with an unreliable police force, “people find it difficult to come forward and complain, especially about law enforcement.” This was echoed by the next speaker, Communications Director for the Canadian Race Relations Foundation Patrick G. Hunter, who said “I’ve heard of people getting harassed for lodging a complaint. They know where you live. There is a sense of fear in the black community.”
It would have been interesting to hear the police point of view on the issues raised during the workshop, but they had declined an invitation to attend. Some thought their absence said more than they bargained for. “The reason the police won’t speak and acknowledge racial profiling is that they will have to set a standard for policy. They don’t want this because it is more work for them,” suggested Brett Cumberbatch from the Black Students’ Association in his closing statements.
