The Multicultural Council of Saskatchewan hosted a public forum on racism in Fort Qu’Appelle Sunday afternoon.
About 30 people attended the forum, with many sharing personal experiences and ideas to combat racism.
“We think that it's really important for people to have the opportunity to talk about racism, to share their own stories (and) to really be able to listen to other people's stories,” said Rhonda Rosenberg, Multicultural Council of Saskatchewan (MCOS) Executive Director. “It's important to have it not be a scary taboo subject too, that it is something that we can and need to talk about.”
Rosenberg said racism still exists, and event like these are important to battling it.
“We saw in the wake of when Colten Boushie was killed in August last year, the social media comments that came out, to the extent that the Premier had to say, ‘Racism has no place in Saskatchewan,” said Rosenberg. “We saw it again in conversations about Syrian refugees (and) we saw it with the horrible shooting at the Mosque in Quebec City.”
The forum was part of the council’s International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination programming, which was celebrated around the world on March 21. A similar forum took place in Saskatoon last week, and organizers hope to extend the event to other cities in the future.
