The People Speak : Masochistic Universities; Illegal Workers; Clueless Joe; and ‘Little Mosque on the Prairie’ “
FROM D.R. :
I am a university professor. What interests me is how our universities have been radically turned away from our Western heritage. As your organization well knows, university administrators are looking for ways to make our universities more and more “international”, and in this effort are asking professors to teach more “relevant” non-western topics. UBC is, for all intents and purposes, an Asian university with a few sheepish Canadian characters underground. It is pathetic that a nation can be so lacking in pride.
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FROM H.A. :
I am an immigrant from Mainland China. I work for a bottling company just outside Toronto. About a year ago, the company started hiring young East Indian workers. There are now 30 to 40 of them working at this plant. I found out that these workers entered Canada on student visas to attend two colleges. However, they are not attending classes. They work at the bottling company and are paid $7 per hour cash. I have reported this information to the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA), but nothing has been done. The CBSA admits that it gets so many complaints about immigration violations in southern Ontario, that it cannot handle them. It seems to me that 30 to 40 illegal East Indian workers should be a significant issue for the CBSA or for the Canada Revenue Agency (and the Canadian public) who are getting cheated out of income taxes. What is going on? Why is no enforcement happening?
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FROM C.W. and M.B. :
Globe and Mail reporter Joe Friesen recently authored an article entitled “The Philippines Now Canada’s Top Sources Of Immigrants”. According to the article, about 40,000 Filipinos arrived between January and September, 2010. In the article, the reporter didn’t even ask whether Canada needed these people. He just seemed to assume that this was the case. Is this reporter as clueless as he sounds or have he and others at The Globe and Mail been told not to ask questions and merely tell Canadians how wonderful they are to allow Filipinos into Canada so that the Filipinos can send $1.5 Billion in remittances to the Philippines. Remittances now amount to more than 10% of the Philippines’ annual GDP. Reporter Joe also told us that the Philippine government regards these people as “heroes of the nation”.
Reporter Joe probably doesn’t know that in a B.C. town recently, Smitty’s Restaurant replaced the Canadian cook with a Filipino cook. So did the local A&W. I suspect other franchise restaurants are doing the same thing all across Canada. If people walk into a Tim Horton’s in western Canada, they find that the majority of the staff are Filipinos. Are these low-paid people then going to collect federal tax credits or provincial “working poor” subsidies because they earn so little? Next week, can we expect “clueless” Joe to do a report on displaced Canadian workers or on the real cost to Canada of importing Filipino (and other) workers that Canada does not need?
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FROM W.J. :
So I’m in downtown Toronto. I’ve just gotten into a taxi to go to a hospital to have work done on my leg. The driver is a new Canadian, of Indian ethnicity, I think. Quite affable. Mid 40s, GQish, modern, good looking, middle class. He looks like one of those guys, supposedly with PhDs, driving a taxi because his credentials weren’t recognized.
“I’ll give you $10 for the trip to St. Mike’s (St. Michael’s Hospital)”, I said.
“No problem, we’ll do that for you, sir”, he replied.
He sported a small 3″ by 3″ picture of himself with a woman and two young kids on the dash, as many cab drivers do.
“Nice picture. Is that your family”? I said.
“Yes, sir”, he answered.
“Where are you from originally…India?”, I asked.
“No, Pakistan, Sir”, he replied, quite affably.
“Oh, Pakistan. I see”, I said. “You know, while sitting at the doctor’s office an hour ago, I read an article about white people born in India. I was surprised. Is that true?” I asked—just speaking my mind and making small talk. I know people often respond well to candour…
“Oh, yes, there are white people in India, from when the British were there. There were some in Pakistan too, but not any more. They mostly left”.
“Interesting. I had no idea there were Caucausians who are Indian or Pakistani. You don’t usually think of that. Why did many leave?”, I asked, just curious…
“I don’t know…in fact, a high Minister in Pakistan has grandparents who were British….”, he said…quite nonchalantly
“Oh, interesting. So … are those white people considered true Pakistani…are they accepted….?”, I asked, rather innocently.
His tone changed, and he hastily responded ..”They never stayed. They left. They are back in Britain, or around the world somewhere.”
“Really. Interesting….Why is that?” I pressed again, eager to find out the answer and to learn something about an obscure aspect of Eastern Society.
Very quickly now, speaking rapidly and in a high, stressed pitch, he added, “If they stayed, they would be killed. So they leave. Only Muslims can live in Pakistan. They won’t convert. So they go”. . . and he went on, elaborating the point for some time…
“Yeah, there is an extremist element to Islam, I know. . . but we in the West have extremist Christians, too. Every religion has its whackos….” I said, trying to be empathetic.
As if he didn’t hear me, he went on in the same fast-paced, high-pitched way, “The Koran is very specific about Islam..you must convert…it respects all religions…. Jesus Christ, you know, he came before Mohammed, so he too is respected…”
And I said, “Yeah, but look at Salman Rushdie…they put a bounty on Rushdie’s head because he wrote something negative about Mohammed…that’s just crazy…”, I interjected, (laughing).
He responded, continuing in a very fast-paced tone…louder now…wagging his finger at some invisible figure on the dashboard…..”No. Not, not crazy. He insulted Islam. In Islam, no one may speak against the Prophet. No one can speak against Islam. That is why they will kill him. If I saw him right here, right now, I would kill him. That’s it. I would kill him right now. I wouldn’t even have to think about it…Kill him..”
And I had to ask, again not losing my composure, quite earnestly…”so…ah…. are you a Muslim, Sir?”
“Yes…and the Koran…it is a very good book. You should read it. It has much wisdom in there. You should read the Koran. It is very peaceful. Very peace-loving. Only if you speak out against the Koran or Islam, that you must not do…”
We arrived at the hospital on Bond Street. The gentleman accepted my $10, and I left. . . amazed that there is truth to these warnings, in television shows like “24” and “Sherlock Homes” and from moderate Pakistani radio announcers and academics. Extremism is in our midst after all…
So, the moral is: next time you take a cab, ask whatever you like. You might be amazed at what you discover…. Needless to say, CBC TV’s “Little Mosque on the Prairie” will never have someone like this taxi driver appear as a character on that program.
