What the world needs now is love, sweet love

By Bill Fox/Columnist

Fifty-five years ago, this song seemed appropriate at the time, sung by Jackie Deshannon and written by Hal David and Burt Bacharach. That year, the war in Vietnam was escalating, the bravery of those who marched to Selma led to the passage of the Voting Rights Act. The United States occupied the Dominican Republic, Malcolm X was assassinated, and race riots erupted in Watts, California.

“What the world needs now is love, sweet love,” and perhaps even more so today!

I admit to being an idealist and forever a political optimist, however…

It’s becoming obviously clearer that there is systemic racism in places that disgust me. As I have mentioned before, my wife and I had the privilege many times of meeting John Howard Griffin, the author of Black Like Me. I cannot recommend this book enough, especially if you are having difficulties with movements like Black Lives Matter. Here are some meaningful quotes from John:

“Humanity does not differ in any profound way; there are not essentially different species of human beings. If we could only put ourselves in the shoes of others to see how we would react, then we might become aware of the injustice of discrimination and the tragic inhumanity of every kind of prejudice.”
“The negro. The south. These are the details. The real story is the universal one of men (and women) who destroy the souls and bodies of other men (and in the process destroy themselves) for reasons neither really understands. It is the story of the persecuted, the defrauded, the feared and the detested. I could have been a Jew in Germany, a Mexican in a number of states or a member of any ‘inferior group.’ Only the details would have differed. The story would be the same.”

“But since racism always hides under a respectable guise – usually the guise of patriotism and religion – a great many people loathed us for knocking holes in these respectable guises. It was clear that we would have to live always under threat.”
A friend sent me some information about another best seller that hits even closer to home – 21 Things You May Not Know About The Indian Act. If you want to get fired up about social justice in Canada, this book is a great start and gives a deeper understanding of the cultural genocide that took place in our country, which is so blatant and clearly documented within the legislature.

This breakdown of the Indian Act is a bird’s eye view of the contradictions and double standards that the government continually used to oppress the Indigenous people of Canada.

The government pursued their own interests of accessing the land and its precious resources, along with aggressive assimilation tactics to erase Indigenous culture, by constantly changing and creating new rules that expanded across every aspect of life in order to suppress and prevent a culture from thriving within it’s confines.

It is vital to go back into history and see where this foundation of systemic racism has planted its deep roots in order to recognize it, name it and work to dismantle it.

As one Indigenous writer said, “We want better education for our children, access to clean drinking water and proper sewage; we want to live in a house free of mould; and we want a chance at life in Canada, without discrimination and racism.

We want, in short, the same as the average Canadian already has. But in so many of our communities the federal government has failed to provide those basic needs and our people turn to alcohol, drugs and suicide.”

Twenty-five years ago, the so-called Oka Crisis brought to the forefront the day-to-day struggle to affirm Indigenous rights that are supposedly guaranteed, protected by Ottawa, but ones that are flouted and disregarded so easily by a government. All this because someone wanted to expand a golf course using sacred Indigenous burial grounds. Where are the priorities?

I accept loving critiques at Bdfox@rogers.com