Vancouver Sun Keeps Highlighting Negative News about Indo-Canadians
Recently we have been writing about the negative news headlines in Vancouver Sun about Indo-Canadians. Such negative news headlines create negative perceptions in general public that thinks that the majority of crimes are committed by Indo-Canadians. That was just proved by the recent survey. But, unfortunately, the Vancouver Sun doesn’t want to change its way of reporting the news. We still keep seeing the negative headlines every time an Indo-Canadian does something bad, but similar or even bigger crimes committed by others are smaller news and placed on inside pages. How many people read the news about a person killing his mother, or about another case of a person killing two individuals with a hammer? These were bigger crimes but didn’t make big news headlines. Can you imagine the big headlines had these murders been committed by Indo-Canadians?
When Vancouver Sun finds a new news story involving Indo-Canadians then they dig into their past crimes and make big headlines as you saw in the Tuesday, April 18 issue (Section B’s front page story - “Full jail term urged for sex attacker” - Click here to read the original article. ) about a crime that was committed by an Indian in 2000 and who’s serving a prison term. There are parole hearings everyday. Some are accepted and some not, but we see headlines only when it involves Indo-Canadians. This big news headline was about a sex crime, but another case of a stepfather raping his stepdaughter made for small news because that was committed by a white Canadian. No wonder this type of wrong coverage of news headlines is creating the wrong perceptions in the general public.
Our community should let the Vancouver Sun know that we don’t approve of their discriminatory way of news reporting and would like to see fair news coverage. More people, specially our politicians, should write to or call the Vancouver Sun editorial staff and ask them to give fair news coverage. If they still do not change, then we should start saving such news cuttings and if necessary show it to a judge or a Human Rights Tribunal about discriminatory news coverage. But I hope we won’t have to take that step and that the Vancouver Sun will start giving fair news coverage.
When it comes to positive news story we don’t see that in the Vancouver Sun. Just recently our community raised close to $350,000 dollars for the Children’s Hospital that was shown live on TV but which received no coverage in the Vancouver Sun. They seem to know every small negative news about Indo-Canadians, but don’t seem to know about such positive news.
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“If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.”
– Joseph Goebbels, German Minister of Propaganda, 1933-1945″
The article from the Voice Newspaper (pasted above) came as no surprise to us because we expected some sensible person would wake up and smell the foul odour of Kim Bolan and her shoddy reporting. The article from Kim Bolan (pasted below) was also no surprise, as the Sikh community in BC is now extremely familiar with the attitude and habits of the Vancouver Sun in publishing unsubstantiated, purposefully hyperbolic defamatory misrepresentations of the Sikh community.
As outlined in the Voice article above, Kim Bolan took another shot at Indo Canadians, particularly Sikhs, by highlighting the case of a horrible sex offender on the front page of the Lower Mainland section of the Vancouver Sun last week, while similar reports of equally disgusting crimes by men of other ethnicities and races are regularly ignored by the Sun. Of course it is important to clarify here that by all standards, the Indo Canadian community of BC and the Sikh community of BC completely and unequivocally denounce, detest, disapprove the crimes of this man and are disgusted with the same, and completely support the toughest sentencing for such awful crimes. However, it is also important to clarify that had such a crime been committed by anybody from a Christian background or of Eastern European ethnicity, there is a far less chance that it would be on the front page of the Lower Mainland section, and that it would be written by Kim Bolan. For those not familiar with Bolan’s writing - this article is one of at least a few dozen news articles written by Kim Bolan since 1985 attempting to manipulate the minds of BC citizens to have an inaccurate negative prejudice of the Sikh community.
A clear indication of Kim Bolan’s callous and conniving personal character is shown when in this article particularly related to a sex offender guilty of heinous crimes, Bolan finds it necessary to state the following:
“The unusual detention hearing — similar to that held in Kingston last month for convicted terrorist Inderjit Singh Reyat — is only taking place because prison officials believe Sidhu remains too great a risk to reoffend if released in August after serving the normal two-thirds of his sentence.”
What kind of a moronic, pointless connection is that and how is it relevant? It’s more than likely that the detention hearing is similar to that of Carla Homolka or Paul Bernardo, or many other dangerous criminals like Homolka and Bernardo in Canada - why did she not use their names? Furthermore, Kingston is not even in Vancouver, or BC - it is in Ontario. Why did she not use an example more relevant to her audience? Because those dangerous criminals are not Sikhs, and if she was more professional she could not hit two birds with one stone, covering her negative news story while attempting to malign (by association) the character of Bhai Inderjit Singh Reyat in an article about a sex offender.
Kim Bolan is like hungry vermin that lives off any garbage thrown out of the Sikh community’s house. Her bread and butter are filled with the painful sweat and tears of Sikhs in BC. As a result of the heavy distribution of her tabloid host newspaper, the Vancouver Sun, and her own conniving tactics to present falsehood as truth, so many innocent-minded British Columbians have been misinformed, miseducated, and brainwashed to have a negative image of the Sikh community, furthering negative stereotypes and differences between Sikhs and other ethnic or religious communities. As a result of this, many young Sikhs face difficulties with acceptance and tolerance at work, school, and amongst the general public because their non-Sikh peers get a negative representation of Sikhs through the media. Many Sikhs face institutionalized and “whisper” racism because of the presentation of Sikhs as violent, angry, arrogant, and immodest.
Also, this is only ONE out of DOZENS of articles by Kim Bolan attempting to negatively portray Indo Canadians and Sikhs. We are not singling out this article. For more examples you can visit www.canada.com and search through Vancouver Sun’s archives using the keyword “Sikh.”
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Something to think about:
Has Kim Bolan ever covered any event in the history of the Sikhs of BC that would present the Sikhs as positive inspirational citizens of the Canadian society, or as innocent victims of a tragedy, or as good-spirited citizens working for the wellbeing of all humanity? In no particular order a list of events in recent BC Sikh community history that were ignored by Kim Bolan, while she is quick to cover anything that defames Sikhs:
* The car accident and passing away of three promising BC Sikh youth leaders - Bhai Parminder Singh, Bhai Charnjit Singh, Bibi Rena Kaur in 2004
* The business success of Williams Lake mill-owner Gian Singh Sandhu over several years
* The success of Khalsa School as a top private school in BC in 2005
* The proclamation of the Abbotsford Gurdwara as a Canadian Heritage site in 2003
* The success of anti-drugs workshops in Surrey high schools by VIRSA in 2006
* The awarding of the Order of BC to Dr. Raghbir Singh Bains in 2005
* The recognition of the 5 K’s and Vaisakhi by the BC Legislative assembly in 2006
* The arson attack against the Western Singh Sabha Gurdwara in Williams Lake in 2006
* Surrey Nagar Keertan - the largest Vaisakhi celebrations in North America in 2006
* The success of the Sikh Nation blood drives across BC over several years
* The success of Sikh youth in athletic competitions and games contests over several years
* The countless other positive initiatives sponsored, supported, developed, or inspired by the Sikh community in BC
* The countless tragedies, attacks, or assaults on innocent Sikhs in BC
- not “newsworthy” in the clouded eyes of Kim Bolan.
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Vancouver Sun Editors:
Are the editors and publishers of the Vancouver Sun completely innocent in this propaganda campaign? Absolutely not. The Vancouver Province newspaper and Vancouver Sun newspaper, having the same owner, have had the same agenda with regards to the Sikh community and misrepresenting the Sikhs as a whole. It is not reasonable to assume that just Kim Bolan or Salim Jiwa are responsible for their articles. The editors at these newspapers have a final say in the publication, and they are an accessory to the crime of defamation as they choose to not control the amount of misinformation in the articles written by Bolan and Jiwa.
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If Bolan is responsible to report on the affairs of South Asians, Indo Canadians, or particularly, Sikhs, then she is doing a horrible job as she has only attempted to highlight specific negatives, or present positive aspects as negative. Such an irresponsible and unprofessional reporter’s career could not survive at any other newspaper were it not for the internal racist agenda of the Vancouver Sun.
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