Technolandy

Day 136 (of 2024/25) #jackierobinsonday

I played and coached football. I live and cringe with my hockey keeper league. But baseball was my first love. I can recall my first Canucks game. The first BC Lions and Seahawks games – but as good as the Kingdome was for the ‘hawks… nothing beats my memory of first viewing that artificial turf climbing up, up, up the ramps for our annual family trip…

And every ballpark has the jersey #42 retired. April 15th is Jackie Robinson Day. The day the colour barrier was busted and 80 years of segregation came to an end. Not that racism has gone away in sports… the n-word is still heard by too many athletes in all levels of sports (even young hockey). But it marks the start of a mindshift… and the reminder that there are still a lot of articulate barriers that have to be overcome.

The first ____ to ____. Whether a skin colour; nationality; religious affiliation; gender… there are still many walls to be torn down and more equity and inclusion left to go.

And knowing many small steps are always taken… Jackie Robinson played for the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947, but an old Canadian Heritage Minute commercial reminds us that he had to take on some biased thinking as a member of the Montreal Royals first… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rt9ZENZbe5w

We can’t pretend that just because a barrier gets broken that everything is ‘fixed’.

We need to take the time to reflect and recall where discrimination exists – and how often systemic discrimination hides in plain sight… easy example: Passover was just celebrated, but it is Good Friday and Easter Monday that BC Schools are closed… for ‘our’ religious observance? Mandatory bias? Implicit recognition of one holiday being more worthy of a break than another? Not much done for Ramadan other than some reminders about why some students may not be eating, and it is not to be reported as neglect…

Love that #42 is celebrated today (those who know, know why that number is awesomemazing) but it is not just a day to watch some baseball now that it’s season is underway… it is an opportunity to see where bias (implicit and explicit) lives in our language, in our systems, in our thinking – and unpack it so that it can be discarded and we can focus more on justice, diversity, inclusion, and equity, no matter your skin colour… who you love (romantically or a romantically)… your faith… your ethnicity… your citizenship <— even when some of these are problematic to process (gender dress codes as a light example). These aren’t easy to process and digest – but it also wasn’t easy for Jackie Robinson to go first… and for so many others to be the first ___ to ___. And one day, we will use that phrase for the last time, because it’ll be more important that they ____ because they could… not because they had to go first.

We will get there… just not always comfortable.