Nick Noorani Website

A singer croons in Farsi while musicians strum their instruments before an audience of families gathered in a park for an Iranian holiday feast.
A banner looms over the crowd wishing them all a happy Norooz — the Persian New Year — from Lufthansa, the German airline.
Such scenes are becoming part of the marketing landscape as global companies look beyond Cinco de Mayo and Chinese New Year in their efforts to reach immigrant consumers who might miss a more mainstream message.
Just as Norooz offers firms a window into an untapped community, so too does the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, or Malanka, when Ukrainians celebrate the coming of spring.
“You can reach any community, any population, any small target group with the right expertise, the right media resources,” said Givi Topchishvili, chief executive of New York-based Global Advertising Strategies, which helps develop niche ethnic markets for Lufthansa and other corporate clients.
By working with advertising consultants who understand a group’s unique values and spending habits, he said, firms aim to deliver a relevant message at the right time, in the right place, in the right language.

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Minister will get more power in picking adjudicators for immigration body
They are in some ways the gatekeepers to Canada, deciding which refugee applicants get to stay and who must return to an uncertain future in their homelands.
In some cases, the decisions made by the adjudicators on the Immigration and Refugee Board could mean life or death for the people involved.
Now, the Conservative government is changing the way those adjudicators are appointed, putting more power over the selection in the hands of Immigration Minister Diane Finley.
Immigration experts fear the coming reforms will not only politicize the independent, quasi-judicial board but lead to a more worrisome outcome: an anti- refugee ideology that might close Canada’s doors to refugees.
Toronto Star March 3, 2007

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The Society of Difference
I’m honoured to be delivering the 8th annual LaFontaine-Baldwin Lecture–a lecture which commemorates the two great reformers of Upper and Lower Canada, Louis Hippolyte LaFontaine and Robert Baldwin. These two men lived through the tumultuous decade from 1837, when the rebellions in both parts of Canada happened, to 1848 when the reforms actually took place. These reforms changed the way in which our society developed. These two men were French-Canadian and Anglo-Canadian and they managed to assert the right of people elected to do the governing and to put through democracy in place.
As John Ralston Saul pointed out in his first lecture eight years ago, “1848 was the moment when the very legitimacy of our society was switched from the colonial elites to the citizens.” That initial establishment of what we now call “responsible government” was not perfect by any means–the population were largely illiterate and poor. Women did not participate in the franchise. However, it was a start for something which was so critical to our history, happening at exactly the right time for us.

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Between Michael Richards’ outburst in a comedy nightclub, Mel Gibson’s tirade of a few months back, and Michael Irvin’s musings about Tony Romo’s racial heritage, I’m wondering if we need a clearer definition of what it means to be a racist.
These three cases are clearly not equal: the context in which something is said, and the identity of the speaker obviously make a great deal of difference in how we react to the speech. But if there is in fact a hierarchy to hate speech, on what basis should comments be judged? I’m curious to hear the thoughts of others on this. But here’s a try.

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Canada should reconsider using the term “visible minorities” to define people facing discrimination, a United Nations anti-racism watchdog reports, suggesting the phrase itself is discriminatory.
The Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination released a report Wednesday on how Canada is living up to an international treaty aimed at eliminating racism.
While Ottawa is praised for some initiatives — including the establishment of a number of committees to fight discrimination and the toughening up of legislation against hate crimes — a number of concerns are raised relating to other issues.
Among those is the use of the term “visible minorities,” which the committee says “may not be in accordance with the aims and objectives of the convention.”

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The Canadian Press
Toronto (Mar 5, 2007)
Federal efforts to resolve the issue of foreign-credential recognition is being hindered by professional regulatory agencies, says Conservative MP Jason Kenney.
The agencies are “keeping the doors shut” for new Canadians trying to find work in their chosen profession, he told policy-makers at a weekend diversity conference

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