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Originally Posted by saffronleaf
Yup, the three Prairie cities are actually very diverse. I think part of the reason they get overlooked in this regard is (i) people not updating their views to match up with the current stats and (ii) the overall population size is still a bit on the small-ish side. It's as arbitrary a number as any, but I think when Calgary and Edmonton hit 2 million, they'll get more recognition in general.
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How long did it take Toronto to be seen as "very diverse"? It was not very diverse in the 70s. But at least by the 90s, people were bragging of its diversity and multiculturalism.
Even in the US, people complain that portrayals of big cities (eg. New York and LA) have not caught up to the current demographics and they've had much longer to do so and a much larger pool to draw from for their media. I mean, NYC was certainly diverse enough in its actual demographics long before people complained that "Friends" in the 90s and 2000s didn't really show many minorities.
It seems like people can take about a generation sometimes to update their view of what the "average" demographics of a city are like. But among the younger generation, it seems the view is rapidly changing -- many kids today in Canadian cities grow up with double-digit percentages of minorities and do not see them as "exotic" or "foreign" the way people thought of them 30 or even 20 years ago.