Color of skin major barrier for immigrants

Among the 41,666 people interviewed, several thousands of them said that it’s not income or religion, but it’s the color of their skin that has been the biggest barrier for them, a new study reported. And the general feeling among those immigrants was that greater unfriendliness crept in with darker skin.

Lead author of the book, Jeffery Reitz, said that they were surprised about the finding that there wasn’t much effect of religion. He said race turned out to be a major problem, with some Asian immigrants pointing it as troubling and most young black males terming it as a major barrier.

The author said that we generally think that racism is not that big a problem in Canada, but it isn’t.

The report found that people who faced more discrimination were more likely to be identified as per their ethnic group, and not as a Canadian.

The report also found that immigrants faced most discrimination while applying for jobs and at work, and also while they visited a store, a restaurant or a bank.

Reitz and Rupa Banerjee, Ryerson University assistant professor, wrote in their book “Multiculturalism and Social Cohesion” that among all minorities who are born in Canada, blacks have the least sense of Canadian identity and they hardly have trust in others. They wrote that blacks have high levels of volunteers among recent immigrants but it disappeared among second generation blacks.

The author said that there are clear indications of the presence of social problems in communities and there is perception of crime as well.