... having been breathed out

Observers of the [Viola Desmond] trial would have been struck by the absence of any overt discussion of racial issues. In the best tradition of Canadian 'racelessness,' the prosecution witnesses never explained that Viola Desmond had been denied the more expensive downstairs [theatre] ticket on the basis of her race. No one admitted that the theatre patrons were assigned seats on the basis of race. In an interview with the Toronto Daily Star several weeks [after the 1946 expulsion of Viola Desmond for sitting downstairs at the Roseland theatre despite management's refusal, due to her race, to sell her a downstairs ticket, theatre owner] Harry MacNeil would insist that neither he nor the Odeon Theatres management had ever issued instructions that main-floor tickets were not to be sold to Blacks. 'It is customary for [colored persons] to sit together in the balcony,' MacNeil would assert. At the trial, no one even hinted that Viola Desmond was Black, that her accusers and her judge were white. On its face, the proceeding appears to be simply a prosecution for failure to pay a provincial tax. In fact, if Viola Desmond had not taken further action in this matter, the surviving trial records would have left no clue to the real significance of the case.

[...]

[Reacting to the results of the trial in The Clarion newspaper, James Calbert Best] castigated Canadians for their complacency:

We do have many of the privileges which are denied our southern brothers, but we often wonder if the kind of segregation we receive here is not more cruel in the very subtlety of its nature. [...]

True, we are not forced into separate parts of public conveyances, nor are we forced to drink from separate faucets or use separate washrooms, but we are often refused meals in restaurants and beds in hotels, with no good reason.

Nowhere do we encounter signs that read 'No Colored' or the more diplomatic little paste boards which say 'Select Clientele,' but at times it might be better. At least much consequent embarrassment might be saved for all concerned.