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March 29, 2005 - IMMIGRANT YOUTH BLAZE NEW TRAIL

IN FIGHT AGAINST RACIAL DISCRIMINATION By Carlito Pablo

Combining diverse art forms from hip hop, dance, theatre, spoken word, video to martial arts, a group of Vancouver immigrant youngsters has opened up a new front in the effort to overcome racial discrimination, violence, bullying, and peer pressure.

Under the direction of the Multicultural Helping House Society, a social service center for new immigrants, 14 high school students of various origins delivered a powerful message for diversity through Colour Blind? Youth Confronting Racism, an integrated arts performance held at the Vancouver East Cultural Center last March 21.

The performance, which was presented on the occasion of the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, struck a chord among the audience. The open forum that followed the performance, saw the audience asking the cast to perform at other venues and interact with Vancouver teachers.

Honorio "JR" Guerrero, youth program coordinator of the MHHS, said that the Vancouver Technical Secondary School has in fact invited the Colour Blind troupe to re-stage their inter-disciplinary arts performance sometime in May.

The Carnegie Center , according to Guerrero, has also expressed interest in hosting a repeat performance by the teens.

Guerrero likewise noted that the Vancouver School Board, for its part, has requested a dialogue with the Colour Blind? cast regarding past experiences of discrimination and ways of dealing with these cases.

Guerrero produced Colour Blind? in collaboration with the Kathara Cultural Theatre Canada and Momentum.

" The message from the cast was clear: to be who you are and letting others be who they are," Guerrero said.

Guerrero said that the concepts behind colourblindness is two-pronged. One, is that racial discrimination will disappear if people look at one another without consideration of color. Second, is the acknowledgement of a person’s colour, to see people for who they are, colour and all.

"This is the very idea around colourblindness that this project challenges. We, as Canadians, know how important diversity is within every aspect of our lives," Guerrero stressed.

" It is through recognizing and respecting the colours that we wear that ultimately promotes greater cultural understanding, a move towards de-mystifying cultural stereotypes, onwards to the elimination of racial discrimination" he added.

Darryl Persello, youth probation officer of the Ministry for Children and Family Development in Burnaby , was one of those who watched the presentation.

" The use of traditional and modern music was brilliant," Persello said in an e-mail to Guerrero. "The messages behind it about anti-violence and anti-racism are also incredibly important."

" Try and get that group into the schools and to as many groups as you and they have the energy for," Persello also urged.

Alden Habacon of the ethno-culture and arts-oriented Schema Magazine said in his review that the students can "certainly teach a thing or two about dialogue."

" I’m just saying that what has been missing is a fresh dynamism on the topic of anti-racism that can only come from youth participation," Habacon said.

" Want to know what the future of Canada’s diversity will be? Ask these teens, who know it will be the result of how they negotiate their differences and express their unique cultural identities!" Habacon also said.

• More previous events (Memorial Service, Multicultural Helping House Society's Youth Program PROGENY, etc.)