A few weeks ago, our ASTU class watched the documentary “Between: Living in the Hyphen”. This documentary depicted the stories of several multiracial Canadians who have dealt with discrimination and have trouble fitting in. These people are struggling to identify with one race or nationality and are constantly judged based on their genealogy.

Similarly, in Fred Wah’s Diamond Grill, the term “faking it” is frequently brought up. This is the idea that immigrants such as Wah “fake” their identity to fit in to a new culture. In doing so, however, they abandon their previous culture and give in to their new society. If they didn’t “fake it”, they would be judged by the general population. Wah and his family were afraid of the consequences of maintaining their previous culture, so they forced themselves to embrace a new culture. The problems faced by these Canadian citizens was troubling to me as I, like most people with knowledge of Canada, see Canada as a country that accepts and promotes all races without discrimination. However, this is clearly not true as the experiences of these people have proven.

I decided to further research into the racial issues that emerge in Canada and I stumbled across an article in the Toronto Star from 2012, titled “The Persistence of Racial Inequality in Canada” by Grace Edward Galabuzi, Amy Casipullai, and Avvy Go. In this article, it is stated that 32%, or almost 1/3 of Canadians, “believe that racism is a significant problem in Canada”. This alone is shocking. As a majority (55%) of Canadians believe we have overcome racism, there is still a significant amount that believe it is an issue. Further reading reveals that there is a significant difference in pay based on race. According to the article, “racialized Canadians earn an average of $30,385 per year compared to $37,332 for other Canadians, or 81 cents to the dollar”, and “the effect of these inequalities in the labour market is that racialized Canadians are three times more likely to live in poverty than other Canadians”.

This raises a serious concern for Canadians. Immigrants and non-white Canadians are afraid to show their true identity and thus resort to “faking it”. They do this because they are judged by fellow Canadians based on where they are from or what they look like. This impacts them emotionally and financially, as they receive less opportunities for less pay, and are forced to rid themselves of their native identities.

This in turn raises a question for all of us. Is Canada truly the accepting nation it is thought to be? The answer is apparently no. Racialized Canadians are belittled by the people in the country they have embraced, so much so that they are afraid to show their origins. We must ask ourselves what we can do to change this. A country that calls itself “glorious and free” must live up to that claim.