The question of homegrown terrorism is acute, but it isn't new. Last week some news sources reported the arrest of 17 Muslim Canadians alleged to have plotted terrorist acts in this country as if it were a historic first. It isn't a first, not by a long chalk -- which doesn't make it less pernicious.
When I was asked to comment on this aspect of multicultural Canada some 20 years ago, the terrorist suspects came from the ranks of militant Armenians and Sikhs. The issues were similar, though, and so were my views. It seemed to me that expecting immigrants to stop concerning themselves with the affairs of their former homelands would be unreasonable. Not only immigrants, but in many instances even their children and grandchildren maintain some emotional ties to their ancestral countries. This is as natural as it is wholesome, to use an old-fashioned word. Nothing should be done to discourage it. Probably nothing could be done. Roots go deep; that's their point.
However, Canadians of whatever background, be they naturalized, native-born, or third generation, owe their first allegiance to the country of their citizenship. This requirement is both reasonable and practical. It puts no stress on human rights or human nature. It's simply Canada's due.
The majority of individual immigrants from all ethnic groups have always recognized this. They or their ancestors came to Canada for the very purpose of becoming Canadians. Far from disputing the need for such loyalty, immigrants have been among its most ardent supporters.
On the whole, this is probably as true today as it has ever been. Still, there have been disturbing signs in recent years indicating an unwelcome change. Individuals from various ethnic or religious communities have committed violent acts in Canada, or used Canada as a staging area for committing violent acts elsewhere, to protest or avenge grievances in their ancestral lands. As a result, Canadian lives have been lost or endangered.
When immigrants or their descendants use Canada's territory for the commission or preparation of political violence, they commit (in addition to every other objection one might raise to terrorism) a specific act of treachery. They abuse the country that took them in.
Such acts usually involve only a handful of people. The rest of their community keeps a meticulous distance from them. Even when they share the terrorists' political views or sense of grievance, most Canadian Sikhs, Armenians, Muslims, Tamils, etc., wouldn't dream of plotting to blow up Toronto subway stations or behead Canadian prime ministers.
Periodically, representatives from these groups, sensing -- accurately -- the loathing and horror that terrorist violence engenders in this country, and sensing -- again accurately -- that such acts lower the esteem in which their community is held by other Canadians, set about to repair their image. However, instead of starting by dissociating themselves from the terrorists and unequivocally condemning their acts, many of these (usually self-appointed) community representatives have gone on the offensive.
For at least 20 years now, journalists and politicians have been receiving newsletters explaining and justifying the aims, causes and grievances that have served as a basis for terrorist acts. Community spokesmen have been giving statements to the press or appeared on television with similar messages. Complaints have been lodged with editors, broadcast executives, press councils and Human Rights Commissions about the identification of a given ethnic or religious community with terrorism. Lawyers have been consulted to see if the press could be persuaded -- or maybe even forced -- not to identify a suspected or convicted perpetrator of political violence as a member of a given group -- a Sikh, say, or a Muslim.
These statements, pamphlets or requests have condemned terrorism only fleetingly, if at all. Their authors' chief concern appears to be explaining their causes (riding, as it were, on the coattails of the terrorists) while voicing their indignation about their communities' poor image that causes their children to be taunted in school.
True, no child should be taunted in school because someone of his religion put a bomb on a plane. For Canada's Muslims or Sikhs the best way to achieve this is to dissuade their co-religionists from putting bombs on planes -- and to disavow those they can't dissuade. For any community, the answer lies in not raising terrorist sons and daughters, not in trying to tell the media how to report. Maybe, just maybe, some Muslim spokespeople in Canada are beginning to learn this lesson.
© 2006 George Jonas
CanWest Publications
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