On March 21, CUPE Ontario joins allies and supporters around the world in honouring the UN International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination. The day commemorates the tragic events 65 years ago in the township of Sharpeville, South Africa, when apartheid-era police murdered 69 peaceful protesters who were demonstrating against the system’s oppressive pass laws.
The tragedy of that day galvanized the world. Today, March 21 serves to remind us of our own role in confronting racism. As trade unionists, it is our obligation to take on the hard work of dismantling the structures of racial inequality and injustice, whether in our workplaces, our communities, or in our union.
Because we live and work in a system rooted in racial oppression, every struggle we encounter as workers is bound up with other struggles, including the fight for racial justice. Racism divides workers and falsely promotes our differences; it is our job to remember and honour what we have in common as members of the working classes.
This commitment to solidarity is at the heart of CUPE Ontario’s Anti-Racism Organizational Action Plan (AROAP), which guides us in identifying and working to dismantle individual and systemic discrimination and racism in our union. One of the plan’s key components is Women in Leadership Development (WILD), which helps Indigenous, Black and racialized women take their places as leaders in our union.
We’re proud of this work and particularly of the positive and visible changes it is making in CUPE Ontario.
This is especially vital in the current political environment, when the forces that would benefit from us being divided seek to “other” groups like migrant workers, international students, immigrants, and refugees. Those forces, especially those on the far right, want to undermine our collective power by dividing us from those with whom we should have the most in common.
Programs like AROAP and WILD help us withstand and overcome those forces internally, while the work of CUPE Ontario committees like Racial Justice and International Solidarity help connect us to the struggles for economic and social justice at home and abroad.
Through our commitment to working class solidarity, we are taking a stand against injustices and human rights violations experienced by working class people in places like Palestine, Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo. In these regions, racism and colonialism have resulted in continuing exploitation and oppression. Violent policies and practices that perpetuate segregation, racial and ethnic divisions, land confiscation, and unequal access to resources come under particular scrutiny on the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination. The ongoing effects of these injustices underscore that fact that racial discrimination has no borders. But then, neither does our solidarity.
On this International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, we re-commit to challenging racism in all its forms and to building a world rooted in dignity, equality, and justice for all.
