B.C. Man Takes ICBC To Human Rights Tribunal for Nixing “White Pride” Vanity Plate
VICTORIA, November 28, 2015. A man we’ll call “West Coast Willie” announced today that he has filed a complaint with the British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal because the Insurance Corporation of British Columbia (ICBC) has rejected his request for a vanity licence plate “WHT PRD” — White Pride.
In the Spring of this year, Willie applied to ICBC to use the letters “WHT PRD” on a vanity plate. He explained that he was proud of his “racial identity and heritage.”
The waiting time is usually a month. When, after three months, he’d had no reply. he phoned them. “Oh, it’s been returned to us [from the Ministry of Highways]. That slogan,” he was informed, “may be considered not in good taste.”
Being a persistent chap, Willie didn’t give up. “I e-mailed the director of the department.”
When he replied, he reported that he’s Googled the term “White Pride” “and I found it on ‘White Supremacist’ sites. It is the department policy that ‘no slogan may be offensive.”
Willie took his case to the manager of customer relations and the fairness commissioner at ICBC. He got nowhere.
“I’m a white guy and proud of who I am but I am just not allowed to express myself.” he is convinced that “Black Pride”, “Gay Pride” or “Indian Pride” slogans would face no problems.
On November 10, he filed a complaint against ICBC with the British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal charging them with discrimination on the basis of race, colour and place of national origin.