Why I’m not enthused by the election of Mark Carney...yet

Canadian Prime Minister, Mark Carney,

waving at supporters after his election victory.

Photo: Financial Times

Mark Carney is a protest candidate. He was not elected for his policies, necessarily. He was elected for likeability as a contrast to Trudeau (who he advised informally). He was also elected for demeanor as a contrast to Pierre Poilievre, the 'Canadian Trump', who has, for the good of Canada, lost his seat. Good riddance!

Poilievre talked of change but he's been holding the same parliamentary seat since 2004. The people of Ottawa-Carleton and Bruce Fanjoy said, 'yes, change indeed!' And change they engendered!

Carney, for better or for worse, symbolizes calm, order and the status quo Trudeau had apparently compromised. Trudeau had made Canada 'unfamiliar.' On principle, status quo scares the hell out of me. But given Trump's menace, I'll give Carney the benefit of the doubt! After all, he talks like that smooth-talking uncle whose words make issues less painful!

But I'm not celebrating...yet. I'm not dismissing him either.

For those of us living at the margin and studying those who live at the margin, Carney's victory is something to approach cautiously. He is a man who has never done groceries. He has no clue how the average Canadian lives. He is now elected to learn what it means to be Canadian. The man had three passports. A true globalist.

He was recently called out about lying about his first call with Trump. He had said Trump 'respects Canada's sovereignty'. That was a lie. He failed to tell Canadians that Trump repeated the call for Canada to become the 51st state in their first phone call. Why lie to Canadians about such a fundamental issues?

Recently, he first stood by liberal candidate, Paul Chiang, who had called for a conservative candidate to be abducted and taken to the Chinese consulate for a bounty. Really? Chang would later resign as a candidate even after Carney stood by him!

I'm glad Carney won. No doubt. But I'm not enthused by his taking over in Ottawa...yet. He is too close to the centre that he risks becoming centre right. Poilievre even complained that Carney has copied his platform. Carney wants to be different from Trudeau so bad that he will risk pandering to the conservative, old guards within the liberal party. Yet, he was Trudeau's informal advisor. There are conservatives who find it 'respectable' to be called 'liberal.' Carney was once asked by Prime Minister Stephen Harper, a conservative that molded Poilievre, to be finance minister.

Celebrate. But celebrate with caution. Carney is a neoliberal, a neocon of Obama variety! I'll wait to be impressed! I work with children and youth and my daughter plans to attend university in Canada. I'm yet to see a policy on Carney's platform that would give them something about which to smile.

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Kuir ë Garang (PhD) is the editor of TPR. 

Self-esteem and Discrimination

As someone who grew up in war conditions and lived as a refugee for a long time, I'm  sometimes considered by many people in the 'west' to be prone to (or have)  low self-esteem, be poor or illiterate.  Living as refugees or displaced persons, who depended on the good will of others put people in a situation where they don't think much about themselves. But that's not everyone though.

As I stood by our front desk at my place work talking about Race and Identity in relation to my book, Is 'Black' Really Beautiful?, the issue of why many African peoples in North America become so over-sensitive when racial issues come up! For many rational people, this owes its origin to slavery and racial segregation.

But one of my coworkers, a person  of European descent, was surprised to realize that her 'black' friend, a very intelligent woman, easily becomes irritated by simple things she [friend] considers racist. The friend considers any mention of a watermelon racist; and complains a lot about 'white privilege.' This means that discrimination is considered something 'whites' don't face because of 'white privilege.' In any discussion between 'blacks' and 'whites', 'white privilege' issue comes up!

While racial discrimination is not something anyone can deny, it's sad to make everything about race. Racism has been taken to the extreme extent that any expression of racial pride by people of European descent is considered morally suspect. These people are human and should be allowed to express, freely, the pride in what they've done and who they are.

We shouldn't make ourselves emotional prisoners of Europeans utterances. We shouldn't feel emotionally hurt when things like watermelon are mentioned. We can't feel emotionally paralyzed if we're called monkeys. When are we going to have emotional strength! Don't we have things to say that can make Europeans emotionally hurt? And if they can't get emotionally hurt then we need to learn from them to be emotionally strong.

Inter-racial relations work well when we are honest with one another. This sounds utopian but it works!

This mindset has been adopted by some South Sudanese.  Simple things are tribalized. This speaks a lot about how we feel about ourselves. When we misconstrue what other tribes say about us, then the chances of us living together in peace are compromised. Instead of understanding issues in the manner others intended them, we simply rationalized them in the way we want regardless of the plea by the people who first spoke the words to us or about us.

Instead of focusing on important issues like police brutality or discrimination in the justice system, we complain about being called monkeys or calling people racist when some, like my co-worker, mention watermelon or fried chicken. We can't put our emotional health in the hands of others but then blame them when they can't take care of our emotions.

Developing strong self-esteem can help one in distinguishing between actual Racism and misunderstanding. We can't call someone racist when they are being proud of themselves or when they say something that offends us even when  they didn't mean to offend us.

A person who's well grounded, with strong self-esteem, thinks beyond the simplicity of everyday insults; and works towards changing the bigger things that affect the lives of the discriminated groups in a significant manner.


TO BE CONSIDERED...