Imam not surprised at Canada's low view of Muslims

By Jasminee Sahoye

A representative of the Canadian Council of Imams (CCI) says findings from a recent survey that showed that there is a lower “positiveness” among Canadians towards Muslims than for 10 other subsets of society studied is not surprising.

However, Habeeb Alli, CCI secretary, says the survey conducted by Montreal-based Association of Canadian Studies (ACS) is a mere sample, adding that it is difficult to grasp feelings of people in statistics.

He said even though much has been done to improve the image of Muslims following 9/11, some events in Canada such as the “Toronto 18” (a group of men who wanted to mimic 9/11) reinforce the negativity.

The national survey polled 2,345 people found that the level of "positiveness" Canadians feel towards Muslims is significantly lower than for the 10 other subsets of society included in the survey, well below that felt for Hispanics, Jews, Blacks, Atheists and Aboriginals.

Just 43 percent of those polled by the firm Leger Marketing between September 30th and October 3rd expressed "very positive" or "somewhat positive" views of Muslims. Jews, in contrast, received a 72% approval rating, Aboriginals, 61%. These findings, according to the ACS, are very similar to those from polls conducted in the US and Britain. The report on the poll concludes: "In all three countries, it is relations between Muslims and non-Muslims that represent the population's dominant concern."

Alli told The Camera that efforts are being made to have a greater integration of Muslims into the Canadian society.

In late 2006 and early 2007, Environics Research Group surveyed Canadian Muslims to gain insight into this minority religious community’s attitudes toward Canada and its desire to participate fully in Canadian life.

The survey results offer cause for optimism about the successful integration of Muslim immigrants (about nine in ten Canadian Muslims are foreign-born) into Canadian life. Canadian Muslims expressed simultaneous pride in Canada and pride in Islam, a willingness to participate in and adapt to Canadian norms, and a condemnation of the extremism that is sometimes cast as commonplace in other countries with significant Muslim populations. Although seriously concerned about discrimination and underemployment, Canadian Muslims expressed feelings of goodwill toward Canada and were the least likely Muslim minority in any Western country surveyed to express a sense that the bulk of their compatriots are hostile to Islam.

"The findings of the ACS survey confirm what many of us sensed intuitively: that Canadian Muslims face largely negative perceptions as they go about their daily lives. This is sure to influence their experiences professionally and in other ways, and likely results in various forms of discrimination," asserted Canadian for Justice and Peace in the Middle East(CJPME) President, Thomas Woodley. CJPME urges municipal, provincial, and Federal governments to take steps to improve cross-cultural understanding, and to ensure that Muslim Canadians are not the victims of explicit or implicit discrimination.

In 2009 and 2010, the government gave $450,000 funding to an independent study on antisemitism, conducted by the Canadian Parliament Coalition to Combat Antisemitism (CPCCA.) In the testimony provided to the CPCCA, Canadian law enforcement officers and university administrators uniformly testified that anti-Semitism was holding steady or diminishing. It is unclear why the government prioritized anti-Semitism, which is not a problem in Canada, and failed to commission similar studies on any other form of discrimination.