Just as Bullying Awareness Week kicks off in Toronto, 16 youths (14 male and two female) are arrested at a Toronto school for allegedly sexually abusing a 16 year old female student for 18 months. Apparently the alleged victim finally overcame paralyzing fear of reprisal to report the abuse to a teacher.
Most certainly, I believe in the basic premise of innocence until guilt is proven, which is why I am happy these students have been released on bail, and allowed to attend school, though with restrictions. On the other hand, there was enough evidence to arrest 16 people, and the media reports that video surveillance tapes from the school are in police custody.
Though neither the accused nor the alleged victim can be identified (due to them being minors, a law I still don’t get) Ontario’s most major news producer showed them on television with faces pixelled out. All sixteen accused are black, the alleged victim is white.
“Why was the rest of the kids who were arrested black? Is this a racist thing, what is it? Is it a bias?” said the mother of one of the accused, then continuing on to state that “They (the school) don’t want them there because they waste time and run in the hallways.” The parent went on to lament that her child had been traumatized by the experience of being kept in a holding cell overnight till bail could be set by the court.
Of course its because the alleged victim, the police, the teachers and the school board are racist. This is obvious to anyone who is looking. Is it not possible that maybe, just maybe, those 16 students were arrested because they repeatedly raped, tortured and abused a fellow student for a year and a half?
Aside from all this, the parent freely admits her child is disrupting the school by “wasting time” and “run[ning] in the hallways.” Is that because of racism too?
While I will freely admit that racism exists, I am constantly amazed that every time a black person is arrested it’s because the police are racist. The system is racist. F*ck me, it drives me nuts. If crime is rampant in black communities, maybe the cause is the black communities, not the police? It’s so much easier to blame someone else than it is to look inward and maybe admit there’s an issue.
Many black boys are growing up without fathers. Why? Where are the fathers? Hell, where are the mothers? Because some don’t have fathers, some join gangs. Some commit crimes. Why do they join gangs? Why do they commit crimes? Who’s job is it to raise these children? The parents, or the schools?
Black communities should stop pointing fingers and demand more of themselves. Blaming the social issues inherent in black communities in Canada (and there are real and serious issues) on racism is selling those black communities short and perpetuating the problems. Demand more of their children. And more of their parents.
I was on the bus once, and two african-canucks walked on, wearing their duds all gangsta-like.
One of them was laughing because he’d just put a dime in the fare box instead of a token.
He started bragging about taking it to the man, and exacting revenge upon “the system”.
Two older ladies from Jamaica were sitting down near them.
One of them tore a strip out of the kid, blaming peopel like him for the image of black people propagated by the media.
She was right.
A lot of groups today, be it black, white, whatever, create their own problems.