More mutual respect and tolerance
Racist graffiti in Vancouver; comments by the vice-mayor of Markham, Greater
Toronto, that the Chinese were "taking over" the community; a
columnist of the Vancouver Sun wrote that the English speaking people were
moving away from the Vancouver East area because there were too few English
speaking people living in that area......these were some of the incidents
happened recently. While we understand that racial conflicts is
part of the human history, it is everone's responsibility to solve the
problem.
Canadians comprise people coming from the four corners of the world and
Chinese is a major source of immigranats during the last few years.
The long history and deep cultural roots of the Chinese make it hard for
them to intergrate into their new country in a short time. On the
other hand, the local people need timeto understand their new neighbours.
There are two important elements needed in this transition period: respect
and understanding. Withoutthese two elements, racial conflicts will
precipitate.
To live in a new place, one needs to understand the practice of that place
first. There are quite a numberof chinese immigrants do not know the
Canadian way of doing things, on the contrary, they import badhabits from
where they came - this is a situation that few can deny. Jumping
queues, being inconsiderate to others in public area, picking ears, nose and
cutting finger nails in the open, speaking Chinese loudly in quiet places,
packing their cars at free will, cutting down old grown trees........just to
name a few examples.
Such bad habits have long been condemned by many good Samritans. However,
most of their voices havenot been heard. Reason? There are people said
that these are their "rights" - simple human rights of freedom.
They do not understand that the terms "selfishness" and
"freedom" are only separated by a very thin line.
There are, other kinds of criticisms to the Chinese too. Talking
loudly in Chinese restaurants, living in luxury, not understanding
English, not donating blood (nor money).... etc. These are comments
given by people who measure others by using their very own standard.
The charm of Chinese restaurants istheir glittering noise. Being
wealthy is not a sin, and living in luxury is purely just a matter of
livingstyle and taste. Cannot commnicate in English does not make a
member of the commnity less useful. As for do not donating blood or
money, we believe that it is a matter of getting the message across.
In fact, the Chinese community has been very active in many local charity
events like "walk with theDragon" and "Famine 30 Hours".
Prejudice leads to conflicts and crashes. Both Chinese and non-Chinees
need to understand each other more in order to relieve the tension.
With more breathing space, we can have a happier commnity.
Let us be brave enough to be more tolerant and be on guard against those who
try to judge others by the colour of their skin.
- Foster
Lo August 21, 1995 Translated by:
Eric Wong
Profile
A music critic, a lyric writer, a columnist, a commentator and a
journalist with over 30 years of experience in HK & Canada.
|
