Canadian Racism and AR/AO

I have been aware for some time now that nothing was really being done in the Canadian UU youth community to deal with racism and oppression. Some of this has to do with the fact that a lot of the material that has been developed in the UU youth community has been largely US-centric, coupled with the Canadian cultural tendency to believe that the US and Canada are SO different that our problems aren’t alike. I know Canadian UU youth care about racism and justice, but it really hasn’t been talked about, and there is even less diversity in our youth community than in the American youth community.

As both the National Social Action Coordinator for Canada(a position I held from 2004 until may 2007), and the Continental Social Action Coordinator, I have struggled with this reality, and have been trying to figure out how to bring effective and transformative AR/AO training and work to Canadian youth, without initiating the knee-jerk rejection reaction. This shift has to be done intentionally, and in a caring and strategic way, so that we do not end up turning all (or even a large portion of our extremely small community) Canadian youth away from this work as a result of bad experiences.

So far I’ve done the following:

-I’ve been a part of the CUC’s Racial and First Nations Equity Monitoring Group (Monitoring groups are volunteer committees that discuss, strategize around and take action on a particular social justice issue/area, these groups are mostly adults, though there are occasionally youth who are members), which has been adapting American AR curriculums, as well as other diversity curriculums made by Canadian UUs, to be used in Canadian congregations. These curriculums are available online here: http://www.cuc.ca/social_responsibility/diversity.htm

-I’ve tried to examine why so many Canadians have had bad reactions with American AR/AO trainings, so that we can address those issues – and I wrote an essay earlier this summer about this issue,( as well as a couple of other issues I have become aware of in the way YRUU does AR/AO) which can be found earlier in my blog.

-I’ve applied and been accepted to become a Groundwork trainer, and hope to help Groundwork in their efforts to become more continental and to produce Canadian-relevant content and materials.

Since the powerful and inspiring AR/AO trainings I experienced at Youth Council 2007, the group of Canadians who were present at Youth Council (YCRs, the Canadian At Large, a member of last year’s YRUU Steering Committee, one of the Groundwork Trainers, and myself) have committed to forming a strategy to bring exciting, relevant, transformative AR/AO training to Canadian youth. We are reviewing materials already available to us (such as groundwork materials, materials from the UN Association of Canada, and the curriculums developed by the CUC’s Racial and First Nations Equity monitoring group), creating our own programs and workshops, and forming a strategy that addresses youth at the congregational, regional and national levels.

I’m extremely excited about this process, and the possibilities it has for real change. This is clearly an area of weakness, and I’m really looking forward to addressing that weakness, and hopefully turning it into a strength instead. I hope that some of the materials we develop and/or discover will also be applicable to American youth, and can further strengthen the Continental AR/AO work.

Oh, and in case you want to check out the GREAT resource from the UN Association of Canada, the Kit, here it is: http://www.unac.org/yfar/education_e.htm

~Chris