coolthingsiappreciate-blog asked: Hi, I am considering starting a blog similar to this one at McMaster. As a WoC I feel I have recently been aware of and dealt with a number of microagressions along with my friends. Has there been a lot of pushback and any tips?

Hey, I would totally recommend making a similar one. UBC Microaggressions was also recently created. :) I haven’t experienced much pushback but perhaps it is because we haven’t received an exorbitant amount of submissions. 

Promo it intensely. One thing that I would consider is whether or not you wish to be anonymous about it. Or alternatively, to share the responsibility of managing the account. This account is shared in case we need to respond to questions and need collaborative advice. It also diffuses the stress and responsibility of running a tumblr like this.

I hope this answers your question. Let me know if you have any other thoughts or questions!

McGill football players face sex assault charges

Beyond a microaggression!

Gender Binary

In my Organisational Behaviour class, the first clicker question in every class asks people to answer “Are you 1. Male or 2. Female”. This is a way of checking if the clicker system works. When I mentioned to the prof that this reinforced the gender binary, he laughed and said “it’s too difficult to change that. And it’s not like there’s anyone who would answer anything else.”

Black face, cultural appropriation, and more! Thanks SSMU!

So SSMU tried to make an anti-racist costume guide and it ended with SSMU in black face. They could have just used the photos from last year’s 4 Floors. 

Pictures linked below:

Black Face

Native Appropriation  

Mexican Appropriation 

lilmisschique asked: Mcgill is my top choice to attend next year. I hope to get in but after reading this page I'm extremely hesitant about my choice to apply. I'm Chinese-Filipina so I would be a minority because, as I hear, McGill is predominantly white? Is it always like how these posts say it is?

Sorry for taking so long to respond. To be honest, I haven’t been sure about how to do so. Recently, I found out that a Human Rights Complaint had been filed against the School of Social Work. I think in many ways the fact that it was accepted validates a lot of the shitty experiences at McGill. I learnt a lot being here and met tons of badass POC who have challenge me and reframed the way I think about the world. Sometimes in places of massive BS, we learn a lot about ourselves. The question is, is it worth it? I don’t know because I don’t know the intricacies of your life. I don’t even know if it was worth it for me in the long run. I will say that many times, people, friends, professors and staff would step up and make things better in those small micro-moments. There are also great student run resources like Queer McGill, the Union for Gender Empowerment, the Black Student Network, and SACOMSS (a sexual assault support centre). If you speak French, it is easier to resist the fucking bubble. Talking to peers who have been to different universities, there is a general concensus that McGill’s adherence to maintaining hierarchies of privilege is unique and extreme. But, a lot of other students have a great time here. It really depends.

Tumblr, what are your thoughts?

The McGill Daily » McGill School of Social Work accused of perpetuating systemic racism

asiansnotstudying:

This is HUGE news! Please signal boost!

Source: (The McGill Daily)

Written by and

A course lecturer and doctoral student at the McGill School of Social Work has filed a human rights complaint against McGill University, alleging systemic racism on the part of the School. In his complaint, Woo Jin Edward Lee alleges that the Employment Equity Guidelines of the School of Social Work, and generally campus-wide, perpetuate practices that discriminate against racialized persons for faculty positions.

The complaint was sent to Quebec’s human rights commission, and was officially received on July 4 of this year, on the premise of “discrimination based on race intersecting with gender and sexual orientation in violation of sections 4, 10 and 16 of the Quebec Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms.”

According to the School of Social Work’s updated list of professors, Lee is the only racialized person and visible minority – not including Indigenous peoples – registered as a lecturer this calendar year.

“I don’t think there is any representation of people of colour when it comes to the administrative level,” said social work undergraduate student Sidara Ahmad, adding, “I don’t think there is an understanding of what people of colour – students of colour – go through. I don’t think there is any acknowledgement of the discrimination and racism they face.”

Lee, a self-identified member of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) community, and a visible minority, is currently a course lecturer for SWRK 325: Anti-Oppression Social Work Practice. He is also a doctoral student specializing in the experiences of LGBTQ immigrants and refugees.

In April 2013, Lee said, he applied for a part-time faculty lecturer position at the School of Social Work, recognizing the lack of racial diversity at the School. “Out of 22 tenure- and non-tenure-track faculty members, one or two are racialized, and one is LGBTQ,” he told The Daily in an interview.

“I don’t think there is an understanding of what people of colour – students of colour – go through. I don’t think there is any acknowledgement of the discrimination and racism they face.”

A month after applying, Lee said he was notified that he had not even been short-listed for an interview. The five candidates short-listed for the position were all white women.

According to Lee, when meeting the director of the School, Wendy Thomson, he was informed that his application was rejected because he lacked clinical experience. The job posting never mentioned the necessity of such experience, Lee said, asking only for five years of experience as a social worker in Quebec’s community, health, or social services. The job posting also included the University’s statement committed to diversity and equity in employment, “[welcoming] applications from indigenous peoples, visible minorities, ethnic minorities, persons of disabilities, women, persons of minority sexual orientations and gender identities and others who may contribute to further diversification.”

“The hiring committee’s internal and unwritten requirement regarding clinical experience produces a recurring, adverse impact on racialized persons who are underrepresented in clinical institutional settings in Quebec,” said Lee about his application rejection.

“I have been serving as course lecturer at the School of Social Work since 2008, in addition to devoting hundreds of volunteer hours in serving the McGill social work department and broader Montreal community,” said Lee. “It’s disappointing and saddens me that I was not at least short listed for the part-time faculty lecturer position. There are hiring criteria and procedures that must be reviewed by the human rights commission because there have been so few racialized teaching professionals that have been hired by the School within the last ten years. This is why I hope that my complaint of systemic racism in hiring will lead to change and better representation of the Montreal community among the School’s staff.”

Ahmad told The Daily about the very real implications of being a racialized person in the School. “I am one of the very few students who is racialized in the School of Social Work, and as soon as I started the program, I had a situation where there was discrimination and racism involved. [Lee] was one of the few faculty members who provided the support and the space to talk about it.”

Lee has been studying at the McGill School of Social Work since 2007, and is the recipient of numerous fellowships and scholarships for his studies. More recently, Lee was one of only four recipients in McGill history to receive the Award for Equity and Community Building, in the academic staff category. He was nominated by 16 students and community members. According to an article published in the McGill Reporter, this award “recognizes the work of students, faculty and staff committed to advancing equity and diversity at McGill.”

“In universities and corporations, the many professional and managerial positions produce a professional stigma when someone raises a claim of discrimination.”

“For me, just seeing where the students are before they take [Lee’s Anti-Oppression Social Work Practice course] and where they are after, it’s essential,” said undergraduate social work student Katrina Topping, who had previously taken Lee’s Anti-Oppression course, adding, “It challenges students to question who they are, both as people and as social workers.”

Lee has been teaching at the School for six years – as a course lecturer for five years in addition to being a teaching assistant for one year. He has also worked in the Montreal community sector for another six years and spent five years practicing social work with marginalized children and youth in Calgary.

“I think that there does seem to be some type of resistance to incorporate AOP – anti-oppressive practice – in a really big way,” said Topping.

Another current social work undergraduate, Annie Preston, added, “I think there is a structural change in the School that needs to be happening to push for this.”

On his part, Lee has been pushing for change. “There has been a lack of racial diversity that was apparent from the very beginning, it was something that I noticed when I served as Equity Commissioner for PGSS,” said Lee, who also co-created the Racialized Students Network (RSN).

In addition to the RSN, Lee is also the co-founder of AGIR, a community organization that advocates for LGBTQ immigrants, refugees, and non-status migrants in the Montreal area. He is also a member of the Social Work Association of Graduate Students (SWAGS), and was the co-coordinator of Ethnoculture, an annual event that raises awareness about LGBTQ racialized and ethnic minority communities in Montreal.

In the fall of 2009, the Principal’s Task Force on Student Life and Learning launched the McGill University Student Demographic Survey to “foster sensitivity to cultural and personal differences in the delivery of academic and other administrative supports to our students.” The survey was completed by 2,070 McGill students.

According to the survey, 26 per cent of students from any ethnic group – excluding students who identified solely as white – reported discrimination by fellow students, and 18 per cent reported some level of discrimination by McGill employees.

Section 2.6 of McGill’s Handbook on Student Rights and Responsibilities describes discrimination as “any action, behaviour, or decision based on race, colour, sex […] which results in the exclusion or preference of an individual or group within the University community. This includes both the actions of individual members of the University and systemic institutional practices and policies of the University.”

According to Fo Niemi, co-founder and executive director of the Center for Research-Action on Race Relations (CRARR), his organization does not receive many complaints from universities.

However, Niemi argues that this is more of a reflection of an unsafe environment for disclosure of discrimination rather than an absence of discriminatory experiences themselves. “In universities and corporations, the many professional and managerial positions produce a professional stigma when someone raises a claim of discrimination.”

Another explanation for the rarity of complaints arising from university staff lies in a Supreme Court of Canada decision, under which unionized people cannot independently appeal to the human rights commission unless the union has found a specific reason to file a grievance in the place of the employee. “That might explain why in many unionized workplaces, such as universities, we do not see very often claims of discrimination going forward,” said Niemi.

As a part-time course lecturer, Lee is a member of the newly-formed McGill Course Lecturers and Instructors Union (MCLIU). However, the union is currently in negotiation with the University for its first collective agreement, and Lee believes he would not have been able to go through the usual grievance procedure in place.

Among the remedies sought, Lee’s complaint asks the Commission to require changes to the hiring policies of the University in general and the McGill School of Social Work in particular, and to order the School to adopt a mandatory employment equity action plan to increase the number of racialized individuals among the School’s faculty and course lecturers. Lee also seeks material and moral damages.

“There are many other students that have been in situations where they have been discriminated against,” said Ahmad, adding, “and found support with [Lee].”

He’s Canadian

I was tabling for a first-year orientation information booth at my university along with many others, all POC (people of color), mostly East or South Asian. We would try to greet first years and their parents so we could engage them in conversation and give them free stuff. We tried to catch the attention of a student and his mother, both white, but his mother shook her head at first and tried to keep walking. When we tried again, she said “oh no, he’s Canadian.”

microaggressions:

Working in issues of diversity at a large pre-dominantly white university and standing up in front of a group of peers, academics and top administrators in response to a ‘diversity report.’ I critiqued the lack of words like ‘racism’, ‘oppression’, etc., in the report. The Principal of the school responded that the report was written to not ‘offend or alienate anyone’.

Apparently, myself and thousands of other racialised and marginalised students do not count as ‘anyone.’ At a predominantly white university. Made me feel worthless, tired, disappointed, weak.

(via microaggressions)

agoldenfieldofflowers asked: Hello, I just found your blog and it is wonderful! I am not a student at McGill but many of my friends (and myself as well) have experienced many microagressions on our campus (in New York, USA). I was wondering how you started this blog and how you get submissions? Thank you!

Hey!

Honestly, I just started the tumblr and posted it strategically on Facebook (groups, etc.) and then it started spreading. Coming to think of it, I do need to signal boost to remind people that it exists now that a new term has started. :)

Start one up! I think it creates a good platform to discuss issues that are not always in the public forum.

Please let me know if you have more questions!

<3

Abnormal Psyc Prof strikes again. As he discusses the no cell phone use in class on the first day of school, he says,“ we have sharia law here, you’ll get stoned on the third ring.” Why disgusting people like him are still allowed to teach is beyond me.

Hoodies Up: Justice for Trayvon Martin in Montreal

asiansnotstudying:

In light of the Zimmerman Trayvon Martin trial, Students of Colour of Montreal have organized a gathering this Wednesday, July 17, 8pm, at Phillips Square in downtown Montreal. Please spread the word! Read More

Thank you to all who have publicized this event! Over 700 people have shown their solidarity by RSVPing to this event. We hope to see those numbers tomorrow night!

This morning, one of our event organizers was on CBC Morning Daybreak to talk about the event. Listen Here

Tonight at 7:30pm ET, tune into CKUT 90.3 FM Soul Perspectives to hear one of our other organizers give details about what Wednesday night’s event will entail.

Top-Down Culture of Institutional Oppression

In a Faculty Council meeting, professors present a question for the dean, asking what the dean is doing to address the fact that pressure on profs to produce is ever-increasing, while they are being required to teach bigger classes and with less teaching support.  Profs are experiencing the effects of this pressure on their mental and physical health, and now in addition are facing the threat of salary freezes. The Dean’s response is to completely dismiss the concerns that are being shared. She expresses total disregard for the health and well-being of the faculty, saying that what was described is usual work for tenured profs. and that salary freezes are not confirmed.

Here’s the picture from the group.

Here’s the picture from the group.

Racist McGill Memes

Hey, I haven’t been able to update this tumblr for the last couple of days and so wasn’t sure what date this was referring too. I scanned the facebook  page and couldn’t find it but it is possible that I simply missed it or that it was removed. Do any of you remember this post? Or have any background information? I would like to be able to link directly to the post! Thanks!

On the “Spotted: McGill Library” Facebook page, a post with 344 likes thus far is captioned “Me trying to keep up with asians in the library”. And links a video of a cute baby sea lion struggling to travel in the sand.

East-asians don’t even strike me as that highly represented at McGill, yet they are still being forcefully sectionalized through totally unwarranted ‘positive’ stereotypes.

here’s the link:  https://www.facebook.com/SpottedMcGill