there are four people with indian ethnic backgrounds, and they are all clearly people of colour.

i'd like to be terse, but i think it's actually an opportunity to remind people that canada is not the united states. that applies both to the history of the country and to it's existing demographics. as others have pointed out, there are very few people of african background in canada and most have emigrated here since 1970. there's no asians in the cabinet, either; in canada, in 2015, that is a far more conspicuous omission. the legacy of slavery that underlies american structural racism is really absent here. it's disingenuous to bring in language meant for alabama or south africa. and, explicitly rejecting it is a question of being clear-thinking.

sometimes when things are invisible it's because they've been erased. but, sometimes when things are invisible it's because they really simply aren't there.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/canadas-blacks-still-waiting-for-their-moment-of-real-change/article27175310