FREE ESSAY ON PREJUDICE IN CANADA

PREJUDICE IN CANADA

The topic of my position paper was supposed to be most people in Canada are not prejudiced
towards minority groups but I find it virtually impossible to argue this because everyday
I witness multiple occurrences of prejudiced behaviour. My textbook stated that most
prejudice is found in people who have little education or come from lower-income
families, but this statement does not seem to be true. The newspapers I read, and things
people around me say and do show that prejudice is around and likely always will be.
The people who have been deemed prejudiced because they are from lower-income families or
have little education have been raised to fend for themselves. Therefore, they may think
of immigrants as a threat, and believe they take jobs and money away from whites. Also,
due to their lack of education they may not be aware that many immigrants start
businesses of their own and employ many whites therefore creating more jobs.
Unfortunately, it is not just people in this group that are prejudiced.
The newspaper is a key piece of media that is often prejudiced, you just need to read
between the lines to realize this prejudice. Just yesterday I was flipping through the
Toronto Star and a certain headline caught my eye -- Parents of murdered child express
their Jewish anger and I thought to myself, their Jewish anger? I wasn't aware that
Jewish people had a different type of anger than any other ethnic group. Prejudice is
also all around me on a daily basis. I hear words like paki, chink, wop, Jew bastard and
nigger hourly when around friends and classmates. These racial slurs are thrown around
without a thought of the true meaning of them. It is unfortunate that parents do not seem
to have raised their children to instinctively know that using these slurs is completely
inappropriate and wrong. 
The most important role a parent can play in their children's life is that of a role
model, but many parents, rich and poor, speak or behave with prejudice regularly. Most
children grow up to have many of the same morals and beliefs as their parents, therefore
this chain of prejudice will likely never end. I wish I could say that most people in
Canada are not prejudiced towards minority groups but I fear that this just i