With the upcoming census in early May, this is a good time to give some thought to what it means to be of a particular race or ethnic origin. My own thought has always been “people are people” and certainly Canada has prided itself as a one of the world’s best countries when it comes to racial and ethnic integration. The focus of the census however, is counting and categorizing. So the question arises: what is race? What does it mean to be of a certain ethnic origin? If a person is 1/2 A, 1/3 B & 1/6 C, how are they categorized? If an “objective” standard is to be used, it is difficult to identify what that might be. In addition, even if we could agree, advances in science might make entire previous classification schemes invalid. The other option would seem to be self identification. Such a system would allow people born in one ethnic group, but raised in another to be identified in a manner they prefer. It would also allow groups to alter their identification when they cross borders, if they feel this is to their advantage. The self identification method, however, is subjective in the extreme and would presumably allow unlimited switching. Perhaps, there is no good answer. How much did that census cost again? —Anonymous
This article appears in Mar 31 – Apr 6, 2011.
From what newspaper editorial section did you copy and paste this one from OP?
Whar it sez race, I yoozhly puts NASCAR.
HYUK!
You mean “optional long-form survey”, right, OP?
What about sex? Do you go by genitalia possessed? at birth or present time?
Hormone levels? Appearance? Psychological? Why are the choices male and female? What if you possess male genitalia but your testosterone levels are contradict? What if you have possess male and female genitalia? Or no genitalia (John Bobbitt)?
Is that you Mr Harper?
Actually, Kim’s got a point. There are some people who are genetically one gender, but they have the opposite gender’s genitals and “feel” and “look” like that gender.
Take the East German women’s swim team in the 80s — chromosomal tests revealed that some, while having boobs, female genitals and identifying and ‘feeling’ female, they were genetically male and were disqualified.
And ANY one of us can have this issue (mind you, those bitches WERE kinda manly lookin’).
“advances in science might make entire previous classification schemes invalid”
Race is, in fact, scientifically invalid, OP. There is nothing biologically real about racial classifications. Although obviously race has some pretty real consequences, it is ontologically subjective – it’s just a social construction.
The correct response to the racial question is: HUMAN (although NASCAR is cute).
Also, I hate to nitpick, PK, but I think you mean that they were genetically one sex, not gender. ‘Sex’ refers to biological things like genitals, hormones, etc, while gender refers to social behaviours, traits, etc (although, admittedly, the jury is still out on the full impact of biology on gender presentation, but that’s another convo).
Screee Kim. Once, back in the 90’s I actually did put HUMAN in the Race line. And 6 to 8 weeks later I got a very nice phone call from someone at Stats-Can who did appreciate the humor but needed a proper answer so they could key in the data and raise my taxes.
And by “Kim”, I of course meant “Oceanchick”.
Garcon!, more coffee, s’il vous plait.
I wonder if they will have a section for “Terrorist/Tamil” given the 450 boat people the Gov’t let in. Oops, 2-3 got deported for being found out as terrorists to date.
oh yeah, those hyphenated name pretenders again. if you live in this country, have a citizrenship for here, then you are a fucking canadian. no bull-shit-crap names. you are either a canadian, pure and simple, or you are another ethnic origin, you are not going to be both.
if i was to hyphenate my origins, it would be french-english-german-dutch-american. see how fucking stupid that looks and even sounds worse.
This year I’m going to write Pierogi-Haggis-Borscht-Wurst because I have a lot of each in me.
LS is dafeg (I always wondered) = p
I’m a smerf (scottish-micmac-english-russian-french).
tick the “all of the above” box.
as to the sex question, i usually put down, when i can get it. the others are a fun thing too, race, too slow to qualify. name,any cartoon name will do here. age, ice of course. and height, taller than when i was ten. weight, same as above, but heavier.
those census forms can be quite entertaining, if you take the time to be origional.