Ben Mulroney Unpacks Anti-immigrant Hate and Racism Through Punjabi Hip Hop Video Controversy

In a recent episode of The Ben Mulroney Show,
the host dives into the complicated intersections of
race,
media representation,
and immigration in Canada. 

The resurfacing of a Punjabi music video by the late Sidhu Moose Wala
comes at a time
when anti-immigrant
and anti-South Asian sentiment in Canada
increases exponentially. 

Online platforms like 6ixbuzz,
which once branded themselves as Toronto’s “voice of the streets,”
have become notorious for amplifying divisive narratives.
By selectively posting videos of Desi youth,
often problematically framed
to highlight cultural differences
And reinforce stereotypes
rather than celebration.

6ixbuzz has fueled a comments section rife with xenophobia, stereotypes, and outright hate.

One recent example
was a clip of Punjabi international students dancing at Yonge-Dundas Square,
which went viral
not for its joy
but for the torrent of racist backlash it generated.
Instead of being read as a youthful expression of culture
in one of the world’s most diverse cities,
the video became a lightning rod for complaints about immigration,
“overcrowding,”
and the alleged erosion of Canadian identity.

The comments revealed how quickly cultural moments of pride can be twisted into platforms for resentment and rage-baiting.

This environment mirrors the dynamics Dr. Cheryl Thompson and Ben Mulroney describe: racialized art and expression are too often stripped of context and weaponized,
feeding the rise of anti-immigrant hostility in Canada’s digital public square.

The episode, titled “Punjabi video sparks rage baiting online amid Canada immigration woes”, uses the resurfacing of a Sidhu Moosewala music video from seven years ago as an entry point to explore how cultural expression is often misrepresented and in some cases, weaponized against marginalized communities.

Joining Mulroney is Dr. Cheryl Thompson,
Canada Research Chair in Black Expressive Culture & Creativity,
who brings critical perspective to the conversation.

She highlights how media often strips cultural works of their historical and artistic context, reframing them as political threats
or moral failings
when produced by racialized artists.
In this case, a Punjabi hip hop video has become the focus of online outrage,
refracted through ongoing debates about immigration and Desi identity in Canada.

Hip hop culture, in particular, has long been subjected to distortion in mainstream discourse.

What was born as an expressive tool for marginalized voices 
has repeatedly been vilified, 
criminalized, 
or taken at surface value 
without an understanding of the deeper cultural narratives it conveys.

Mulroney and Thompson situate this latest controversy
within a broader tradition of cultural misinterpretation.

They point to works like Jay-Z’s Decoded,
where the rap icon painstakingly unpacks his own lyrics
revealing layers of metaphor,
symbolism,
and cultural commentary
that are often lost on audiences who read hip hop literally.

Jay-Z argues that rap should be analyzed as poetry, not police evidence.

This act of decoding
transforms hip hop from a scapegoat for social problems
into a powerful archive of cultural memory,
resilience,
and critique.

The same framework applies to Desi artists navigating the Canadian media landscape. 

Moosewala’s video,
now retroactively weaponized in online debates,
was originally an artistic reflection of community struggles,
aspirations,
and identity.
But divorced from context,
it becomes a vessel for rage-baiting headlines
that feed into anxieties about immigration
and demographic change.

By situating this controversy within a lineage of cultural misrepresentation,
Mulroney and Thompson underline the need for nuance
in how Canadians engage with racialized art forms.
To understand hip hop or Punjabi music videos
is to understand the communities from which they emerge,
not to flatten them into fodder for political fearmongering.

The real danger is in flattening these works into single narratives: “violent,” “foreign,” or “un-Canadian.” That flattening not only distorts the art, it fuels racism and feeds an outrage economy designed to divide.

Mulroney’s call to action is simple,
and it requires effort:
pause before reacting,
seek out the full story,
and immerse yourself in the cultural context before believing
or reposting
clips online.
Practice critical thinking.
Refuse to reward rage-bait with lazy clicks.
Support creators who contextualize
rather than caricature.

In short:
do the work.
Don’t be lazy.
Art is richer,
communities are deeper,
and truth is always more complex
than the comments section.

Stay informed!

The Pedogodgy of Sikh Diasporic Oppression on Turtle Island.

We repeat it like a mantra:
We were displaced.
Refugees of empire.
Survivors of genocide.
We carry the wounds of Partition,
of pogroms,
of state violence,
of colonial theft.

We carry that trauma in our bodies,
in our families,
in our prayers.

As Sikhs,
we are called to walk the path of dismantling domination.
Miri and Piri are not permission to colonize
they are the sacred fusion of justice and spirit.

We are not new.
We are not an anomaly.
We are part of a legacy
that refuses silence,
that walks with the oppressed,
that speaks when others turn away.

We came to survive
and ended up participating in the very systems
that continue to displace and perpetuate genocide
against First Nations, Inuit, and Métis peoples.
Systems that enact violence upon Black communities.
Systems that use us
and our broken relationship with India
as political pawns.

We had no choice.
We had to leave.
We had to rebuild.

We bought homes on stolen Indigenous land.
We built Gurdwaras on territories never surrendered.
We started trucking businesses,
farms,
gas stations,
banquet halls
and never once asked:
Whose land are we standing on?

As if ownership means belonging.

We’ve extracted.
We’ve ignored Indigenous resistance,
while repeating our own stories of survival.

That’s the colonizer in us.
The part we haven’t yet healed.

“It sucks, cause I learned my people are really out here proud of colonizer shit,
I really don’t know why we out here riding colonizer dick,
Taking our oppression on and off like some kind of colonial trick,
Acting like the privileged ass pricks that make us sick,
Forgetting that we’re Sikh!
Stop playing their game, and pushing the gas on capitalism’s fame,
Cause we’re losing the climate change game,
And this land is worse than before we came,
We’re just in love with the Raj & out here imitating that bitch’s reign,
Participating in the exploitation of mama earth on stolen land, no shame!”

This excerpt from my poem “Cultural Debris of Punjabi Patriarchy”
is not just about land,
it’s about our relationship to life.

As Freire reminds us:
oppression is not erased by role reversal.
As we flee one empire,
we risk becoming the face of another.
Being displaced does not excuse settler responsibility.
We must move beyond the "banking model" of identity—
where we deposit pain and expect liberation as interest.

No.

Liberation is co-created.
It begins with dialogue.
It deepens with consciousness.
It flourishes through action.

This is what Guru Nanak did:
Walking from village to village,
listening to the people,
disrupting caste,
disobeying empire,
speaking truth to kings.

So I ask you, Sikh brethren:
Whose land are we on?
Whose knowledge have we erased?
Whose liberation are we ignoring while chasing our own comfort?

If you're in BC,
you're likely on unceded Coast Salish,
Squamish,
Tsleil-Waututh,
or Musqueam territory.

In Ontario,
perhaps Haudenosaunee,
Anishinaabe,
or Mississaugas of the Credit territory.

In the prairies
Treaty 6, 7, or 8:
Home to Cree,
Nakota Sioux,
Métis,
Dene,
or Blackfoot peoples.

It is our responsibility to know these lands,
to know these territories,
and to understand:
They have been stewarded since time immemorial.

Not owned.
Not sold.
Cared for.

And what have we done?

We’ve joined the capitalist machine.
We’ve chased success through business,
through property,
through hustle.
Sometimes,
we’ve treated this land like a new Punjab to conquer.

Neutrality is a luxury.
Complicity is a choice.
And accountability is a form of love.

Our histories of rupture,
of migration,
of borderlines and forced displacement,
do not absolve us from the histories we now walk into.

Sikhi teaches me another way.
It invites me back to relationship:
with land,
with body,
with spirit.

Sikhi is about rupture
and remaking.
It’s about building and shaping for the future.
It’s about making sure our healing
doesn’t come at someone else’s expense.
It’s about dreaming new ways to exist
outside domination.
And that is deeply, deeply aligned
with decolonization.

Not just as a political act,
but a spiritual one.

And as Freire teaches:
Liberation is not gifted, it’s built.
It’s not about reversing roles,
but about reshaping relationships:
with each other,
with the land,
within ourselves.

So decolonization can’t only be about land back.
It must also be about self back.
It must be about unbecoming the colonizer within us
the one who craves control,
who confuses comfort with righteousness,
who replicates harm in the name of healing.

True Sikh living demands more.
It calls us to chardi kala in the face of empire,
to nimrata in the face of ego,
to seva that doesn’t just feed—but frees.

To unlearn power.
To re-root in Guru’s hukam.
To walk in right relation
with the land,
with people,
with the Divine.

This is not about guilt.
It’s about responsibility.

No one is disposable. But everyone must be accountable.

Decolonizing our Sikh diasporic realities
isn’t separate from the Earth.
It’s right here:
in the rhythm of the river,
in the soil that shifts and refuses to be owned,
in the wind that carries no passport,
in the tenderness of chosen family,
in the sacred act of sitting in sangat
and speaking what is true.

As Sikhs, we are called to walk in Nanak’s way
to see divinity in all,
to refuse power that demands erasure,
to walk humbly,
to speak boldly,
and to serve without seeking ownership.

As I watch
from Turtle Island
what is unfolding in Panjab,
in Kashmir
in Pakistan
in India
today,
I am reminded of what that means for us here.

Stay rooted.
Stay soft.
Stay in good relation.

nanak naam chardi kala tere bhane sarbat da bhala!