A cabinet advisor appointed to help manage $595 million in media subsidies says racist Canadians share an “omnipresent belief in white supremacy.” Professor Karim Karim made the remarks at a federally-funded workshop by the Community Media Advocacy Centre, the same group subsequently stripped of funding for anti-Semitism..“The Community Media Advocacy Centre’s progressive and forward thinking activism bears the seriousness and substance appropriate to the task at hand,” Professor Karim told a May 14 workshop in Vancouver. His remarks were videotaped..The workshop was led by Laith Marouf, senior consultant with the Advocacy Centre that received a $133,822 grant from the Department of Canadian Heritage. The funding was revoked following disclosures of social media posts in which Marouf referred to Jews as “human feces,” “bags of s–t” and other anti-Semitic slurs..According to Blacklock's Reporter, Marouf opened the Vancouver workshop by asking for a moment’s silence for a Palestinian “assassinated” by the Israeli military. He described the Israeli Defence Force as “Zionist occupation forces” and called Israel the “Zionist apartheid regime.”.“Today we are gathered here to speak about racism in the broadcasting sector of the colony of Canada,” said Marouf. “We can see how media upholds white supremacy, genocide and colonialism.”.Marouf then introduced Professor Karim, former director of the Carleton University School of Journalism. Karim in 2020 was appointed by cabinet to a Canada Revenue Agency panel to determine which media would qualify for lucrative subsidies including a 15 percent subscription tax credit and payroll rebates worth up to $13,750 per newsroom employee..“The rise of populism has fostered a certain acceptability of racist discourses in some quarters,” said Professor Karim. “Politics being what it is there still will be resistance as long as there is a denial of the existence of racial hegemony, as long as there is a promotion – people don’t even know they are doing it – but as long as there’s promotion of white supremacy,” he added..“The omnipresent belief in white supremacy enabled people who saw themselves as good Christians to perpetuate unspeakable cruelty and rapacious robbery in the name of civilization,” said Karim, adding: “It is embedded deeply in the habitual ways of doing things and manifests itself from time to time in discriminatory behaviour not only of broadcasters but also of politicians and public servants.”.“Media workers continue unconsciously to reproduce racial hierarchies and portrayals that slip into the stereotypical,” said Karim. “The older dominant discourses remain in the minds of many audience members.”.Karim did not reply to questions regarding his attendance at the Vancouver workshop. Blacklock’s in 2020 reported Karim was among two appointees to the Independent Advisory Board on Eligibility for Journalism Tax Measures who had published anti-Opposition writings. “Stephen Harper plays the politics of hate,” Karim wrote in one 2015 tweet..Another board member, Margo Goodhand, a former Winnipeg Free Press editor, had written a 2013 column headlined: “We Need Justin Trudeau To Silence Bullies.”.“I’m watching new Liberal leader Justin Trudeau these days as he goes up against Team Harper and I have to admit that I wish him well,” wrote Goodhand. “I need him to stand up to the bullies,” she added.
