Published in the Victoria Times Colonist 08 August 2006
George Jonas, in his attempt to discuss the “reasonableness” or racial profiling (Aug. 29) ventured into the related topics of international terrorism and by necessary implication foreign policy and foreign affairs.
Jonas’s reference to “western lives” implies that there is a greater struggle taking place on the global stage between “west” and “east.”
Simplification and categorization of complex issues is a natural human tendency. However, the current international conflict in the Middle East is no great struggle between ideologies — this is not the Cold War.
It is, at its heart, a struggle for self-determination, a phrase popularized in Versailles in 1919 by Woodrow Wilson. The same self-determination that central and eastern European states fought so desperately for in the 20th century is being demanded by states in the Middle East.
And until the root of the problem, namely British colonialism turned American imperialism, is categorically rejected here at home, the tactics promoted by the present ruling class may continue to appeal to some.
Jonas minimizes the effect of racial profiling by writing that “we worry about the feelings” of those being profiled. The implication being that such concern for “feelings” need not mitigate our tactics in attempting to preserve the security for millions of “western lives.”
Looking back in history, it was likely more than mere feelings that were hurt when Jewish citizens were forced to wear the Star of David by the democratically elected German government of the ‘30s and ‘40s.
The protection of minorities as mandated by national (such as the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms) and international (such as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights) instruments resulted from our collective revulsion at the atrocities of state terror and war.
Discrimination based on one’s “race, national or ethnic origin, colour, religion, sex, age or mental or physical disability” is intolerable in a just and democratic society.
These principles did not crystallize in domestic or international law at the whim of fanciful legal theorists. They came about as a result of the countless injustices perpetrated by those in authority.
I wonder if the collective hearts of those who witnessed the scourge of intolerance and helped draft the Universal Declaration of Human Rights skip a beat every time someone suggests abrogating from the principal of equality, particularly when the suggestion comes from one who may have suffered from inequity himself.
Jonas is mistaken when he states that we “do the terrorists’ work by maximizing disruption and minimizing efficiency.” Nowhere in terrorist lexicon will one find disruption and efficiency as central themes. One will, however, find violence, intimidation and coercion in such lexicon. The way in which we “do the terrorists work” is not by recognizing that racial profiling runs contrary to nearly a century of evolving human rights law, but by using violence, intimidation and coercion to undermine the very foundations of our purported just and democratic society, one in which the rights of all races are presumed equal and protected.
The insidious effect of racial profiling is borne by all in society and is unjust and unfair to all of us, not just “to them.”
What is most astonishing is that during the Holocaust in Hungary in 1944-45, it was Jonas who witnessed the effects of racial profiling first-hand and it is he who some 60 years later contends it is “a reasonable tactic.”
Such shortsightedness in no way promotes a just society, only a society that bends to the “legitimate” tactics of the racial ruling class at any given point in time.
Presently, it is not the elusive Muslim and/or Arab “terrorist” that I feel threatened by (that is if I haven’t somehow lost my status as a member of the “us” club by dissenting or by being a racial minority) but one 60-something Hungarian-born Canadian who purports one set of rules apply to him and another to me.
A set of rules, incidentally, that is supported by the only legitimate use of force allowed in our society.
www.sahota.org
Rajinder is a lawyer based in Victoria, British Columbia who recently practiced as an associate in the International Capital Markets group of a major multinational law firm representing major investment banks in New York City. He previously articled with a leading international law firm in Toronto focusing on general commercial and commercial litigation matters.
Rajinder received a Master of Laws degree from the London School of Economics and is a graduate of both the Faculty of Law and Faculty of Business at the University of Victoria.
Rajinder directs his spare time to better understanding issues of social justice, including the relationship between International Economic Law, Human Rights and the Law on the Use of Force; these subjects constituted the focus of his his master’s thesis. Having been born and raised in Victoria, he looks to direct his attention to local issues of justice.
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