Tolerating insensitivity at our borders

The vast majority of us in Canada, even yours truly, have been guilty at one time or another of racial or ethnic insensitivity. Most of us, however, learn from our mistakes. This one could be very costly for Canada.

A group of dancers from Papua New Guinea, or PNG, was supposed to come to Canada for a four week cultural exchange with the Shuswap nation. Instead they were interrogated for four hours from some really stupid border agents who didn't realize that the group was speaking Tok Pisin, or pidgin -- a type of Creole . A phrase such as "Me like work 'em a sing-sing" means "performing a song," or "car no more bin sit down along here" means "no parking," and so on. The tragedy of errors escalated to the point where the border guards thought the dancers were paying for their visit here by getting work, or were otherwise unsponsored -- and were ordered to go back.

The PM of PNG, Michael Somare, has fired off an angry protest letter to PMS warning the country may ban Canadian companies from doing business there (which, given their vast natural resources would hit primary production companies operating overseas hard), and will also file a protest with the United Nations. Oh that would be nice -- a fellow Commonwealth member which also recognizes Betty Windsor as sovereign, a developing country with continuing internal problems not the least of which is a multi-year civil war on the island of Bougainville, placing sanctions against a developed country.

Not surprising, really, given Harper's refusal to sign the Convention on Aboriginal Peoples or even to place it to Parliament for ratification. Not surprising, given the xenophobic attitudes of many Con MPs and Senators as well as a large chuck of the rank and file membership. Not surprising, given many people at the customs agency (the report is unclear as to the seniority of the inquisitors or whether they were just summer students) have been known to detain people from Austria, a EU state, because their passports are marked Republik Österreich with no English translation other than on page three -- and if they can't or don't want to read German (let alone Pidgin) then their basic training is even more stupid.

Maybe some cultural sensitivity training is in order. Or perhaps Harper should be sent out to the battlefields in Bougainville to fend for himself for four weeks. Maybe then the message would be sent from the top down that this kind of BS is not tolerable any more than that Taser™ incident last year against someone who was from an EU state. Honestly, I'm surprised the shock devices weren't used in this case -- given the attitudes of Border Services the last little while, it could have gotten to that point.

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