Another thought on the courts

Odd for me to write two posts so quickly after one another, but maybe the courts haven't really been a tool in "safeguarding rights", particularly for minorities, because institutionalized racism was largely done away with through parliamentary means during the 1960s and 1970s and by the time the Charter was enshrined into the constitution during the 1980s, there really wasn't much work left to do.

Maybe if we had individual rights enshrined into the constitution when the BNA Act was first drafted, Canada would've been a more progressive society, even sooner than it has already gone about it, but then again... perhaps allowing Parliament to allow itself to not violate rights was better than having those rights enforced by the courts.

This is probably so obvious, but I had never realized that the BNA act (our original constitution) was so empty, silent and weak on the issue of individual rights up until now.

I guess Canada was just lucky that we never ran into governments that were overly anxious to intrude on our freedoms.

Interesting

As I was preparing a personal statement for admission to various law schools, I was struck by something quite extraordinary.

I was trying to do some research, so I could make the point as to how the courts, and in particular, the Supreme Court of Canada have safeguarded and guaranteed the rights of minorities, and I came up with absolutely nothing of significance.

This is interesting only because, if I were an American, I could've easily pointed to a half-dozen Supreme Court rulings that guaranteed my right to equal schooling, that upheld my right to vote freely and so on.

My finding isn't actually a critique of Canada at all. It's actually quite nice to know that the Canadian Supreme Court has been allowed to be conservative because Parliament has been activist (and by definition, "liberal" in the good sense) enough over the decades to safeguard and ensure rights on their own.

Naturally, a lot of southern states had a lot of incredibly racist governments - it's nice to know that Canadian governments, at least eventually abandoned institutionalized racism on their own and didn't have to be forced to do so by the courts.

PS. If I'm wrong or mistaken in my analysis - please do let me know how the Supreme Court has struck down institutionalized discrimination and I would be very thankful as it would assist me greatly.

A certain kind of complex

On the side panel of this blog, I link to the blog of Amardeep Singh.

Amardeep Singh is an English Professor at some University on the east coast of the United States.

Considering that he's the only Sikh English professor at a mainstream North American university that I've ever heard of, I could only assume that he's a pretty smart person.

However... he seems to exhibit a sort of complex that too many Sikhs seem to have.

It may just be because Amardeep Singh is relatively secular when compared to other Sikhs, but there is undoubtedly a problem in my view that too many Sikhs have when referring to Sikh literature and Sikh art.

A few days ago, Amardeep Singh wrote a post about a Sikh Film Festival. In his post, when referring to movies that were going to be shown, he stated that "There do appear to be some propagandistic films in the mix on the full program, but also some films that might appeal to a general audience".

I wonder what makes him think that the "propogandistic" films might not appeal to a general audience. I do recall a number of my Sikh friends going to watch The Passion of the Christ.

I don't want to nitpick, and I definitely don't want to point to Amardeep Singh specifically, but too often have I seen what appears to be Sikhs apologizing for genuinely "Sikhi-based" literature or art.

To speak more generally, rarely do I see Sikhs dare to even state their belief in the superiority of their faith. I hear people from all other religions do this - Christians, Muslims and Jews among others, but Sikhs are usually the quickest and most likely (from my experiences) to state their belief in the equality of "all faiths" and they are also the most likely (from what I've seen) to misleadingly affirm their belief that most (some even say "all") faiths lead to god. While this is undoubtedly true (i.e. that all god-loving/fearing people will eventually find their way to god, according to Sikh doctrine), it nevertheless gives the impression of Sikhs believing that Sikhism is not at all more special than other faiths.

I don't know where this sort of thinking is founded - certainly not in Sikh scripture or history, but the vast majority of Sikhs nevertheless subscribe to this school of thought.

I'm going off-topic here, but I'd just like to say that it's perfectly fine to be diplomatic and therefore truthfully say that only god can judge a person's soul, deeds and destination in the after-life, but it is untruthful or simply misinformed for a Sikh to say that their religion is equal to all others, since Sikh scripture explicity rejects this way of thinking.

Sikhs who do go on about the equality of Sikhism in comparison to other faiths strike me as either uninformed about Sikh doctrine, or even worse, ashamed to proudly state their belief in the superiority and uniqueness of their religion.

Let me also just state that it's totally wrong to be bigoted and elitist when approaching this topic. For example, I would never tell a Christian, Muslim or Jew that he couldn't go to "Heaven" or Paradise, since firstly, I believe that he or she could as a god-loving person... though I don't subscribe to the belief that mechanically accepting Jesus, repenting for sins and realizing that you're a sinner automatically guarantees you a seat in Heaven (I only believe that Sikhs are capable, though for the vast majority it is unlikely, to reach even higher eternal spiritual states), and also, I wouldn't say such things for the sake of preserving respect and a certain understanding. It's completely unnecessary to bring someone to your set of beliefs through fear and self-doubt.

Where I went to school...

This is a relatively fair (and therefore rare) news article concerning Khalsa School when it first opened in the 1986/1987 school year. I was born in December of 1986 and unfortunately, I've never seen anything but negative coverage of Khalsa School for my entire life (due to the subtle racism of certain reporters and the willingness of many others to be manipulated in order to create the most extreme impression of division and turmoil within the BC Sikh community), and yet, it continues to grow rapidly and will eventually become the largest private school in British Columbia:

Sikh School Cherishes Honor and Good Things From Society

By Daphne Bramham of the Canadian Press

This article features an in-depth look at the Khalsa School, Vancouver.

VANCOUVER – Along a busy street, tucked behind a row of trees and a standard metal school fence, a unique experiment in Sikh education is taking place.

Children’s artwork brightens the dark hallways. A small boy wearing the school’s uniform of gray pants and navy sweater, his head covered with a navy kerchief, strains on tiptoe to reach the drinking fountain.

In a relaxed atmosphere, 106 children from kindergarten to Grade 6 are taught British Columbia’s standard curriculum. But the Khalsa School, which organizers say is the only Sikh-run school in North America, also instructs students in the principles of Sikh religion and culture.
They are taught Punjabi, but all other classes are in English. Daily readings from the Sikh holy book, the Sri Guru Granth Sahib, are read in the language they were written in, then translated and explained.

The only thing not discussed at the school is politics, said acting principal Gurbakhsh Singh Gill.

The Canadian Sikh community (estimated at 200,000 with nearly half in British Columbia) has been splintered by violence over the last three years since then Indian prime minister Indira Gandhi sent troops storming into the Sikhs’ Golden Temple at Amritsar in Punjab state.

“We teach basic religious principles,” said Gill, stroking his long white beard. Matters like establishing a separate Sikh state are “political decisions not related to what we teach.”

Nine-year-old Amarjit Kaur Parhar said she asked her parents to send her to the Khalsa School when it opened in September.

“People at the other school used to bother me because I had a turban,” she said. “Children bothered me because I am Punjabi and because I am Sikh. They bothered me because I wore a (ceremonial) knife and they called me names.”

Gill said: “If you want to retain your culture, the first thing you must have is your own school. It is for the honor of the community.”

R.S. Malik, a local Sikh businessman, is the president of the Satnam Educational Society and is credited with turning nine years of hoping into reality.

Malik said setting up a separate school is important for the community’s pride and also to keep the children from what it sees as the corrupt Canadian society.

“We are isolating them from sex at 10, from smoking and from drugs,” he said. “In this society, the family structure is pretty weird. I want to separate my children from that and teach them to respect themselves and their own parents.

“We can be successful and be isolated,” he said. “We don’t need to learn the bad things from your society. We can mix sometimes, though, and learn the good things.”

The Satnam Trust was established to raise money for the school that may some day be expanded to include a residence for students from kindergarten through university.

The trust purchased about five hectares of land for $200,000 in suburban Richmond five years ago, which could be used for expansion.

Students pay $40 a month to attend, which accounts for 18 percent of the operating budget. The rest comes from donations. Books are provided by the provincial Education Ministry and the school will be eligible for grants after three successful years of operation.

“Our teaching is to make people better human beings,” said Gill. “We don’t proselytize. If you are a Jew, all that we ask is that you become a good Jew. We say there is a God. We say love Him and love by any name you want to call Him.”

Two women among the five teachers are not Sikhs. Gill said they are not required to learn anything of Sikh religion or culture, but they may not smoke at school and they must cover their heads.

“How else can you prove that you love others if you don’t allow them in your school?” Gill asked. “I believe that if the kids are not exposed to other religions, they can’t be good Sikhs.”

Here's hoping they don't read this

No matter what anyone says, it has become clearer to me than ever before that people with Phd's are... no smarter than anybody else.

Many of the students (and probably the majority of them in the future) in my classes are likely smarter (and more mature) than half of my professors.

Of course, I'm not stupid enough to name anyone in particular, but I'm just getting sick of the irrational, emotional and personal rants I hear in my Political Science classes.

This is why I only took History classes last year... for the sake of maintaining my sanity. (Requirements force me to take a certain number of classes outside of my major this year.)

I thought I would try to create some basic ground rules for Political Science professors.

1) Stop catering to what you believe to be the leftist (note "leftist" and not "liberal") prejudices of your students. It is so very annoying. Your students will respect you more if you try to be as objective and fair as possible. (As thankfully, most of my History professors are - even when they're leftists outside of the classroom) Maybe I'm being too specific here, but having the first two lectures of the class on American Government focused on "political failures" and specifically pointing to dozens of current examples of said "political failures" doesn't exactly allow us to take you seriously, especially when those "political failures" are largely examples of what are obvious expressions of the democratic will of the people. (Does it really require me to ask whether or not the topic of American government, the longest lasting form of democratic constitutional government in existence, requires more than the discussion of "political failures" in the course's first 2 lectures? Is the topic that superficial? Especially when nearly every one of the cited "political failures" can apply in any other country as well?)

2) Discussing the feelings of violence that come over you when you see President Bush on the television (and then when you seemingly wait for applause from your students immediately afterwards) doesn't allow us to take you seriously either.

3) Lavishing fawning praise on Marxists such as Noam Chomsky might endear you to a few students in the short term, but when they graduate and find jobs (that aren't as professors of political science), they won't really look back at you with much seriousness.

Ahh... mostly, I'm just sick of them all being so damn political. That's all.

Stop trying to push your agendas.

I know it's a political science class, but it is excruciating and embarrassing to watch some of them sometimes.

PS. Someone let me know in the comments if I should delete this post.

Revival of Dastaar? (Turban)

When I was growing up, I remember how rare it was to see females wearing dastaars. Up until I was around 6 or 7 years old, I regularly mistook the odd dastaar-wearing girl for a boy. That is how sad things had become.

A necessary and vital part of the Sikh uniform was completely abandoned by nearly half (the female half) of the supposedly Amrit-dhari or baptized Sikh community. The numbers today aren't where they should be, and I personally rank the issue of females not wearing dastaars as the most pressing panthic issue out there, but there has most definitely been a spike upwards in dastaar-wearing in recent years.

There's probably a hundred different reasons for this trend, but let me discuss a few.

When whites started converting to Sikhi in the 60s and 70s, I think it meant a lot that all of the female converts donned a dastaar. Not only was it such a logical step for an outsider converting to Sikhi to take, but it also showcased that to the larger Sikh community. (The conversion of white Sikhs also helped highlight how most Punjabis aren't born as Sikhs, but are Sikhs because of how they live their lives - but that's another topic altogether).

I also think that many Sikhs and Sikh organizations have made an effort to showcase women with dastaars in a more positive light than they did before. For example, when my university's SSA was hosting its annual conferences these past two years, we had 4 female speakers, all of whom wore dastaars.

I think one of the other major reasons for a spike in dastaar-wearing (at least in North America and the United Kingdom - I'm not aware of any spike in India) has to do with demographics. Most Sikh immigrants started arriving in Canada, the US and England during the 70's and 80's. Their children are now growing up to be in their teens and in their 20s, and since the dastaar is seen to be a symbol of empowerment, royalty and a strong identity, instead of say, religious-wear for women in other faiths which is the exact opposite of that, it's only naturally becoming more frequent for teenage Sikh women to wear dastaars.

I was thinking about this issue when I was at the Nagar Keertan (Sikh parade) in Abbotsford yesterday and I saw the likely hundreds of Sikh women wearing dastaars (undoubtedly some of them for the Nagar Keertan alone), and I realized that only a decade ago, we would have probably seen less than half of those dastaar-wearing women at a nagar keertan.

While there definitely has to be more education about the Dastaar and its importance and necessity for all Sikhs (instead of the sexist idea that it was made for men alone), we will probably see another doubling of Sikh women wearing dastaars in the Nagar Keertans to come.

As I was walking past the main float yesterday afternoon, I was struck by a young girl of around 5 years of age who was being carried by (who I presume to be) her mother. The mother as you can see was not wearing a dastaar, while the daughter was. This is in stark contrast to the usual practice.



This is an excellent trend. Even Sikh mothers who (for whatever reasons) choose to not wear a dastaar themselves, are recognizing the importance of the dastaar for their daughters.