SYSTEMIC RACISM

In any political or social organization, in any business there are systems. The question is: Is the system good or bad? It’s a bad system if the good people in the organization are demoralized and the bad people in the organization are emboldened.

In the free market those companies that have good systems thrive, those that have bad systems fail. But in those institutions that operate outside the free market, there’s a problem – there’s a problem in institutions such as Ontario’s public education system and our police forces. The former has institutionalized incompetence and the latter has institutionalized racism. Ask any good teacher if she or he can name just one teacher that should be fired and the answer will most likely be, “I can name two or three.” I think if you ask the same question of any good policeman, you’ll get the same answer.

As it stands now both good teachers and good cops get demoralized because they know they can’t do anything about bad teachers and bad cops. And the bad teachers and bad cops are emboldened because they know they can get away with anything.

In the free market, you can be fired for any reason – justified or not. If the reason is justified such as theft, you should get nothing. But perhaps the justification is open to interpretation. If you’ve worked for a company for a number of years and then are fired for incompetence, one could justifiably ask, “If I’m so incompetent, how come I’ve been here so long?” In such a case, compensation should be awarded. But no matter what the reason, justified or not, you’re still fired.

And this is the solution to systemic incompetence in education and systemic racism in policing – principals must have the power to fire teachers and police chiefs must have the power to fire cops - on the spot – justified or not.