“Black Men in Nova Scotia Still Catching Hell But Surviving Against the Odds”

Last night I attended a lecture given by Dr. Wanda Bernard about her findings on the various research projects she’s done on racism and it’s effects on black men in Nova Scotia. She spoke of black male stereotyping, crime rates, how they cope with racism and so on.

I found Dr. Bernard to be a fairly engaging speaker and it’s obvious the passion that she has for the topic she was speaking about. I felt though as if she feels this racism is something that only black males are subject to, and that the stereotyping that is given to black males is the only stereotyping that is done.  This may have just been because of the topic and only having an hour and a half though to speak.

Some of the stories she shared though with the audience throughout her lecture were intended to be shocking but it made me wonder maybe if sometimes it’s not necessarily racism but community reputation and stigma. When she shared the story of her getting pulled over because they suspected her van was stolen, I must say that things like that happen in Eastern Passage where I live and I would say that’s because of community reputation, but not because of skin color.  I agree that police officers can attach stigmas to certain ethnic groups but I wouldn’t go as far as to say that many of them are racist and would go further as to say that there are more connections to skin colors or dress and the area that one is from. Eastern Passage and Preston are both areas known in Halifax area as being rough with a lot of drug violence. So are areas of Downtown Dartmouth, Highfield Park and Spryfield.

I also had the thought during her lecture that in our post 9/11 society that wouldn’t Middle Eastern people be subject to more skepticism and racism than African Nova Scotians? I think that nowadays if you had a black male and a Muslim man go into a store, the Muslim would be more heavily watched, with the skepticism that he is most likely speaks little English and is a terrorist. This makes me then make the conclusion that racism is something that affects all minority groups and not just black men. I think it’d be really interesting to do similar studies on other groups because I think that in many cases you would probably find similar results if not even more racism in the case of Middle Eastern peoples.