Balaji Murthy Posted August 20, 2012 Report Share Posted August 20, 2012 BoC purges image of Asian-looking woman from $100 banknotes Read more: http://www.ctvnews.c...7#ixzz246ztADAM Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
constanius Posted August 21, 2012 Report Share Posted August 21, 2012 To be fair to the BoC; They show proposed designs to focus groups so as to try and avoid controversy, in this case it has backfired. Consider that visible minorities only make up around 20% of the population of Canada & that 20% is composed of Indian, African, Chinese, Japanese, Inuit & the other Native Canadian Indians, as well as people with certain disabilities etc. Showing a person from just one of those groups causes some people from the other groups to get upset because their group is not shown, I think it is nigh near impossible to represent them all on a banknote. Therefore the BoC goes with a person that looks like someone from the majority 80% considering it to be neutral, not intending it to be a slight against any of the visible minorities, or in fact against men! While I feel sorry for any prejudices & hardship visible minorities suffer I think that this just illustrates the impossibility of pleasing everyone in a multicultural society. I apologise in advance if I have missed any visible minority groups, it was not my intention to slight you in anyway. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Balaji Murthy Posted August 21, 2012 Author Report Share Posted August 21, 2012 I think that is a fair comment. I wasn't making a judgment on the issue itself, rather just highlighting that after relatively for a long time, the new series seem to be beset with needless controversies. First, the reaction about the Vimy memorial on the $20 bill, and then this. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
constanius Posted August 21, 2012 Report Share Posted August 21, 2012 I missed the Vimy memorial $20 bill controversy, as I was in hospital at the time, so I just googled it & found it quite funny what people thought they saw! Plus "many people in the $100 bill focus group mistook a DNA strand for a sex toy, while some saw a skull on crossbones on the new $50", perhaps they should just give up on focus groups and "publish & be damned". Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scottishmoney Posted August 22, 2012 Report Share Posted August 22, 2012 Good grief Charley Brown. What a complete waste of people's energies. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thedeadpoint Posted August 22, 2012 Report Share Posted August 22, 2012 Oy. I'm not one of those people who are anti-PC or super-PC, so please don't take what I say out of context. I agree with the above commenters. Perhaps some Asian-Canadian focus groupers were offended by the science stereotype? We certainly wouldn't get a great reaction in the US if we had an African-American playing basketball on a bill. We'd get "Why not as a scientist? Or a lawyer?" But discussion is good and healthy. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ccg Posted August 23, 2012 Report Share Posted August 23, 2012 To be fair to the BoC; They show proposed designs to focus groups so as to try and avoid controversy, in this case it has backfired. Consider that visible minorities only make up around 20% of the population of Canada & that 20% is composed of Indian, African, Chinese, Japanese, Inuit & the other Native Canadian Indians, as well as people with certain disabilities etc. Showing a person from just one of those groups causes some people from the other groups to get upset because their group is not shown, I think it is nigh near impossible to represent them all on a banknote. Therefore the BoC goes with a person that looks like someone from the majority 80% considering it to be neutral, not intending it to be a slight against any of the visible minorities, or in fact against men! While I feel sorry for any prejudices & hardship visible minorities suffer I think that this just illustrates the impossibility of pleasing everyone in a multicultural society. I apologise in advance if I have missed any visible minority groups, it was not my intention to slight you in anyway. Oy. I'm not one of those people who are anti-PC or super-PC, so please don't take what I say out of context. I agree with the above commenters. Perhaps some Asian-Canadian focus groupers were offended by the science stereotype? We certainly wouldn't get a great reaction in the US if we had an African-American playing basketball on a bill. We'd get "Why not as a scientist? Or a lawyer?" But discussion is good and healthy. This was almost echoed exactly in an Ottawa Citizen newspaper article today: It strains belief to think the bank intended any slight. Rather, it seems to have been caught on the horns of identity politics, whose first rule is: no matter what you do it’s wrong. Focus groups had apparently objected to the image of the Asian-looking woman on the notes — some (presumably non-Asian) because other ethnicities had not been so honoured, others (presumably Asian) because it stereotyped Asians as scientists. So: put her in, and you offend some people; take her out, and you offend even more. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thedeadpoint Posted August 23, 2012 Report Share Posted August 23, 2012 stick with smileys Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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