By Hilary Beaumont
Truth isn’t good or bad. Truth doesn’t rely on conflict.
News is good or bad. News relies on conflict.
This contradiction is one reason Daniel Paul, the Aboriginal author and historian quoted in the feature “White Paper” doesn’t see himself reflected in Halifax’s newspapers. Those pervasive ‘good’ and ‘bad’ lenses combined with a lack of diverse faces in the media, are the reasons local newspapers misrepresent ‘racialized people’.
Newspapers print stories involving White people more often than stories involving Black or Aboriginal people. As a result, publications warp racialized people to a greater degree than White people. A lack of historical context, and a lack of racially diverse reporters in newsrooms, further contributes to this problem.
The feature aims to offer evidence of this problem, and solutions. My goal in publishing it is to continue the discussion the Daily News started. The feature does not aim to label any one newspaper, journalist or editor as ‘racist’. Though individuals make decisions daily that may contribute to this problem, the feature finds fault in structures and systemic ideologies rather than people.
In a survey of the Herald’s news photos, I found disturbing numbers. However, I do not intend to present the survey as a scientific analysis. It is not.
In the feature, I use several terms that may not be immediately recognizable. ‘Racialized people’ is a more current, less offensive term for ‘racial minority’ or ‘people of colour’. Equating the word ‘minority’ to any racial group is inaccurate on a global scale (four-fifths of the people in the world are racially diverse), and if you happen to be in North Preston (the Black population makes up 60 per cent of the community). ‘Minority’ can also be offensive because it lowers the status of a subject, while ‘majority’ places the subject on a higher pedestal. For these reasons, I use the terms ‘racialized people’ and ‘racialized groups’ throughout the feature. The words ‘Black’ and ‘White’ are capitalized to reflect their political connotations.
‘Racism’, according to the definition used by Frances Henry and Carol Tator in Discourses of Domination, is apparent in ideologies and institutional policies, but can also be attributed to individuals. “(Racism) manifests itself in euphemisms, metaphors, and omissions that support given ideologies and policies. It is reflected in the collective belief systems of the dominant (White) culture, and it is woven into the laws, languages, rules, and norms of Canadian society.”
In addition, I do not intend to misrepresent or offend any group or person by publishing this feature. Unfortunately, I am working within the same system and prevalent ideology that I criticize. I am also working with a limited word count, as every journalist does. Ironic as that may be, I remember what Daniel Paul said: “If it’s the right thing to do, do it.” He was referring to a White woman who found out the racist history of Nova Scotia while researching her genealogy. She published a book that shamed her family’s name, and she told the truth.
The truth is the local media do not accurately reflect the racial reality of Halifax. When the media do tell stories that involved racialized people, we do so in a tokenized way. The racialized people we do represent can be split into two categories: prominent public figure or criminal.
However, every year for one month, that polarization is replaced by positive, and sometimes empowering, coverage of Black people. February is Black History Month. It is also a media anomaly. Do reporters and editors need Black History Month as an excuse to cover stories about Black people? There is no good reason reporters can’t seek out the same under-represented sources and stories every day of the year.
Instead of anomalies, newspapers should aim to cover racialized populations as part of an overarching news philosophy. Tell stories about ‘us’, meaning humanity, not ‘them’, meaning ‘the other’. We have a collective history of racism and segregation. We have collective stories, though we all have differing points of view. Newspapers, and other media outlets, should aim to collect those different views as sources, and employ people who hold different views as reporters. If we become aware of our biases, and strive to correct them, we’ll have newspapers that show a flock of diverse truths rather than a dominant, White ideology.
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