abroad. The UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination has stated that they have doubts regarding the use of this term since this term may be considered objectionable by certain minorities and recommended an evaluation of this term. In response, the Canadian government made efforts to evaluate how this term is used in Canadian society through commissioning of scholars and open workshops. Another criticism stems from the semantic applicability of the classification. In some cases, members of "visible minorities" may be neither "visually" discernible from the majority population nor form a "minority", at least locally. For instance, many Latin Americans living in Canada self-identify as White Latin Americans and are visually indistinguishable from White Canadians. Moreover, some members of "visible minorities" may form a majority minority population locally (as is the case in most parts of Vancouver and Toronto). Since 2008, census data and media reports have suggested that the "visible minorities" label no longer makes sense in some large Canadian cities, due to immigration trends in recent decades. For example, "visible minorities" comprise the majority of the population in Toronto, Vancouver, Markham, Coquitlam, Richmond, Ajax, Burnaby, Greater Vancouver A, Mississauga, Surrey, Richmond Hill and Brampton. Yet another criticism of the label concerns the composition of "visible minorities". Critics have noted that the groups comprising "visible minorities" have little in common with each other, as they include both disadvantaged groups and groups who are not economically disadvantaged. The concept of visible minority has been cited in demography research as an example of a statistext, meaning a census category that has been contrived for a particular public policy purpose. As the term "visible minorities" is seen as creating a racialized group, some advocate for "global majority" as a more appropriate alternative. Furthermore it is not clear why minority definition should center on the "visual", and the concept of "audible minority" (e.g. those who speak with what appears to the majority to be "accented" English or French) has also been proposed, as speech often forms the basis for prejudice, along with appearance. See also Affirmative action Classification of ethnicity in the United Kingdom Colourism Employment equity (Canada) Ethnic penalty List of visible minority politicians in Canada Majority minority Minority language Multiculturalism in Canada Race and ethnicity in censuses Race and ethnicity in the United States Census Racialism (Racial categorization) References External links Visible minority population and population group reference guide (2006