The Socially Undermining Impacts of Race-Based Policies, By Chris Knight (Florida)

The adage "the road to hell is paved with good intentions" captures a profound truth about human endeavours, particularly when it comes to race-based policies. While often introduced with the supposed noble aim of addressing historical injustices or promoting equity, these policies frequently sow division, resentment, and social fragmentation. As John Carpay argues in his ZeroHedge article, race-based laws and practices, such as preferential grants, land acknowledgments, and ethnic-based privileges, undermine social cohesion by fostering inter-ethnic animosity, eroding trust, and entrenching divisive identity politics. This blog post explores how such policies, despite their intentions, destabilise societies and argues that equal treatment under the law is the only sustainable path to unity.

Race-based policies inherently categorise people by ethnicity or ancestry, creating a hierarchy of privilege that pits groups against one another. Carpay's example of his friend's son receiving a $5,000 university grant due to partial aboriginal ancestry, while his own son received nothing, illustrates this dynamic. The policy, intended to support disadvantaged groups, instead breeds resentment among those excluded, regardless of their own economic or social circumstances. This is not an isolated case. In Canada, race-based hunting and fishing rights, university admissions quotas, and government hiring preferences create tangible disparities that fuel perceptions of unfairness. A 2023 Angus Reid poll found that 68% of Canadians believe affirmative action policies based on race or ethnicity are divisive, with many feeling they penalise individuals for factors beyond their control.

The psychological impact is profound. When laws or policies favor one group over another based on immutable characteristics, they encourage an obsession with ethnic identity. People begin to view themselves and others through the lens of race, amplifying differences and fostering zero-sum thinking. This undermines the universal human values, merit, fairness, and shared citizenship that hold diverse societies together. As Carpay notes, such policies "predictably and inevitably produce inter-ethnic animosity, resentment, friction, and conflict."

History shows that policies emphasising ethnic distinctions often lead to social breakdown. In Rwanda, colonial policies that favoured Tutsis over Hutus entrenched divisions that culminated in the 1994 genocide. While Canada's context differs, the principle holds: when the state assigns rights or privileges based on ethnicity, it legitimises group-based grievances. The banning of Catherine Kronas from her school council for questioning a land acknowledgment exemplifies how race-based ideologies can suppress dissent and erode democratic freedoms. Her polite objection was met with censorship, signalling that certain ethnic narratives are beyond critique, a dangerous precedent for open discourse.

Contemporary examples reinforce this. In the United States, race-based affirmative action in university admissions has faced legal challenges, with the 2023 Supreme Court ruling against Harvard's policies citing discrimination against Asian applicants. Such policies, while aimed at correcting past wrongs, often create new injustices, alienating groups who feel unfairly targeted. In Canada, land acknowledgments, intended to honour indigenous history, are increasingly seen as performative and divisive. Carpay's point that few proponents of these acknowledgments actually transfer their property to indigenous groups exposes their hypocrisy and fuels cynicism among non-indigenous populations.

Race-based policies undermine trust in institutions by suggesting that outcomes are determined not by merit or need but by ethnic identity. When a student receives a grant solely due to ancestry, as in Carpay's example, it devalues the achievements of others and casts doubt on the recipient's qualifications. This breeds resentment and perpetuates stereotypes, as people question whether opportunities were earned or bestowed. A 2024 study by the Fraser Institute found that 71% of Canadians believe merit-based systems are fairer than those prioritising race or ethnicity, reflecting widespread discomfort with policies that deviate from equal treatment.

Moreover, these policies erode trust in governance. When school boards, universities, or governments value ethnic categories over universal principles, they signal that the system is rigged. This fuels populist movements, as seen in the rise of anti-establishment parties across Europe and North America, where voters reject elites perceived as favouring certain groups. The backlash against land acknowledgments, as Carpay notes, stems from their imposition as ideological statements, akin to mandatory prayers ruled unconstitutional by Canada's Supreme Court in 2015. Forcing citizens to endorse contested narratives about "stolen" or "unceded" land alienates those who value historical accuracy or neutrality, further fracturing social bonds.

The proponents of race-based policies often argue that they address systemic inequalities, but good intentions cannot justify harmful outcomes. Policies like land acknowledgments or ethnic-based grants aim to rectify historical wrongs but ignore the complexity of modern societies. Carpay's observation that aboriginals, like all humans, have a history of both good and evil challenges the romanticised narratives underpinning these policies. By framing indigenous peoples as perpetual victims and non-indigenous groups as perpetual oppressors, such policies perpetuate guilt and division rather than fostering reconciliation. They do little to address practical issues like poverty or addiction on reserves, instead diverting energy to symbolic gestures that inflame tensions.

The "road to hell" metaphor is apt because these policies, while well-meaning, create unintended consequences. They entrench ethnic silos, discourage integration, and undermine the principle of equal rights for all. Carpay's personal story, his grandfather's suffering under Nazi occupation juxtaposed with his friendship with a German Canadian, illustrates that holding individuals accountable for ancestral actions is a recipe for endless conflict. Yet race-based policies do exactly that, assigning guilt or privilege based on lineage rather than individual character or circumstances.

The alternative to race-based policies is not indifference to historical injustices but a commitment to universal principles. Equal treatment under the law, as Carpay advocates, fosters trust, justice, and cohesion. Policies addressing disadvantage should focus on economic or social need, not ethnicity. For example, means-tested grants for university students would help all low-income individuals, regardless of ancestry, without creating resentment. Similarly, addressing reserve conditions through targeted economic development, rather than symbolic gestures, would yield tangible benefits without alienating other groups.

By rejecting race-based policies, societies can value shared humanity over ethnic divisions, building a foundation for harmony and mutual respect.

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/race-based-policies-inevitably-produce-inter-ethnic-animosity

"A friend of mine is German Canadian. He was born in Germany, came to Canada at the age of 5, and speaks German fluently today. My own story is similar: I was born in the Netherlands, came to Canada at the age of 7, and speak Dutch fluently.

He and I are friends, but our grandparents were not.

My own grandfather fought against the Nazi invasion of the Netherlands in May 1940, and spent years in a prisoner-of-war camp in Germany. He returned home in 1945 with severe and permanent psychological damage. My grandmother, along with the entire Dutch population, suffered through five years of brutal German occupation. This included the Hunger Winter of 1944-45, when tens of thousands of people in the Netherlands starved to death.

Does my German Canadian friend owe me something (or anything) in 2025, based on the conduct of his grandparents or homeland?

If ethnic guilt can be transmitted from generation to generation, we face never-ending conflict and strife, to the exclusion of harmony, unity, and friendship. Hence Canada (and any other country, for that matter), would be wise to reject laws and policies that are based on race or ancestry. While the application of the principle "Equal rights for all, special privileges for none" will not by itself create a perfect society, following this principle will create more trust, more justice, and more social cohesion than basing laws on ethnicity or descent.

Another friend of mine has 1/32 aboriginal ancestry, or perhaps 1/64 or 1/128. On the basis of his ancestry, my friend's son received a special $5,000 grant when attending university; my son did not. I'm truly happy for my friend and his son. Who would not want a friend (or his son) to get an extra $5,000? But it's not fair. Based on his ethnicity, my friend also has better legal access to hunting and fishing opportunities than I do. I'm really happy for him. And it's not fair.

Race-based government policies predictably and inevitably produce inter-ethnic animosity, resentment, friction, and conflict. When laws are based on ethnicity or descent, people develop an unhealthy obsession with skin colour, blood lines, and other ancestry-based features—their own and those of their neighbours. This obsession is alive and well in Canada today. Canada's race-based laws and privileges have been implemented with the good intention of helping the disadvantaged, but this discrimination based on ancestry nonetheless damages harmony, unity, and friendship within society. Today in Canada, legislators, law enforcement, university admissions and awards departments, and school boards carve the people of this country into ethnic categories, and mete out different privileges to each, supposedly to advance "social justice."

This divisive and destructive conception of "social justice" is fiercely protected, to the point of silencing alternative views in the public square.

On April 9, Ontario mother Catherine Kronas politely objected to an indigenous land acknowledgement that was proclaimed at a meeting of her Ancaster school's parent council. She described land acknowledgements as political, controversial, divisive, and inappropriate. There was no drama or disruption at the meeting. Ms. Kronas simply requested that her viewpoint be noted.

On May 22, the Hamilton-Wentworth District School Board informed Ms. Kronas that she was banned from attending any further meetings of the Ancaster High Secondary School Council, to which Ms. Kronas had been re-elected in October 2024. The school board claims to base its ban on the "behaviour" and "conduct" of Ms. Kronas, but it was obviously her words that triggered this censorship of an opinion that many Canadians agree with.

Land acknowledgements are hypocritical virtue-signalling. I have yet to hear of a non-indigenous Canadian transferring the title of his or her home to an aboriginal for free, as part of a serious effort to return "stolen" land. Proponents of land acknowledgements will sell their property at market value, or bequeath it to their children or perhaps to a charity. They won't give it away to aboriginals (or anyone else) for free on the basis of it having been "stolen."

Land acknowledgements often include inaccurate claims about "unceded" territory when, in fact, numerous treaties formalized the sovereignty of the British Crown over the lands that are today's Canada. The treaties formalized British (and later Canadian) rule over the lands and over all of the people living on them. In areas where no treaties were signed, the British and French nevertheless imposed their agriculture, industry, technology, economies, roads, bridges, laws, courts, police, armies, politics, religion, language, and culture.

The fact that 500 years ago indigenous peoples were the sole inhabitants of what is now Canada "is of no real relevance to the present," argues lawyer Peter Best. Before and during the arrival of the British and French in North America, aboriginals fought, killed, tortured and enslaved each other, as other peoples living on other continents have done throughout human history. Every culture has its dark side, and human nature is a complex mixture of good and evil. Aboriginals have the same human nature as other people, and their past need not be romanticized.

Land acknowledgements presuppose that the massive non-indigenous immigration into what is today Canada, starting in the 1500s and continuing to the present, is a bad thing. Land acknowledgements suggest that Canadians of Chinese, Polish, British, Punjabi, Nigerian, or French ancestry should feel guilty about living in Canada, even if their Canadian-born ancestry goes back multiple generations. And yet, supporters of land acknowledgements will not put their money where their mouth is, and give away their own homes or lands to aboriginals.

While promoting unfounded and unnecessary guilt, land acknowledgements do nothing to help aboriginals on reserves who face unemployment, poverty, alcoholism, drug abuse, family violence, high suicide rates, and often the tyranny of corrupt local government.

If I am entirely or even partially wrong about what I've written above, it is nevertheless hard to dispute that land acknowledgements are political and controversial, which is why they should not be imposed on people at public meetings. Decades ago, Canada's public schools ended the practice of reciting the Our Father (the Lord's Prayer) in classrooms because it was deemed unfair to impose this practice on the children of atheists, Jews and other non-Christians. In 2015, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that state neutrality meant that the Mayor of Saguenay could not open city council meetings by reciting a Catholic prayer. The same reasoning should apply to land acknowledgements, which are political and ideological statements, and perhaps quasi-religious statements as well.

While land acknowledgements are obviously political and divisive, the immediate battle which Ms. Kronas needs to win is for her right, as a citizen and as an elected member of her school council, to simply express her opinion—a right guaranteed to all Canadians by the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms has provided for a lawyer who has sent a legal warning letter on behalf of Ms. Kronas to the school board, threatening court action if the board does not reverse its decision.

John Carpay, B.A., LL.B. is President of the Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms (jccf.ca).