For CJRT, or others... Re First Nations

[Mitch Cronin]

CJRT,

In a post below you said: "Let's not forget, we have our own third world, cuban like locales here in Canada. We like to call them "reserves"."

For years now I've understood that some people have that view, but I'm somewhat mystified by it... I'm perfectly willing to admit that I may well be missing a rather pertinent piece of information, but here's what I see:

A "native" of this land, - or one descended from folks who were here before history records that we settlers arrived - is quite welcome to live exactly as you and I do. No discrimination of any sort is permitted. They can live where they please, work as and if they please, raise a family, etc., etc., etc... just like all of us...

However, unlike many of us, they can also choose a lifestyle of a different kind. If they choose, they can elect to live on a "reservation" and thereby be entitled to some things that I'm not entitled to. Details of which, I must admit, I only have anecdotal knowlege of... but I do understand that even maintaining an address on a reservation, regardless of whether or not they actually live there, they can, among other things, work beside me, in the same job with the same benefits, and they don't have to pay any income tax. I know this happens because I worked for years with a man who did exactly that.

I currently work with a man who married a "native" ("First Nation's" person? - I must apologize as I'm really uncertain as to what name is now appropriate for folks who we once referred to as "Status Indians"?), and he's a very wealthy man because of the tax advantages they have.

Now I understand there are some very under priviledged families living on reservations, in places I sure wouldn't choose to live... And I know there is much history there that none of us can be proud of, where they were treated extremely badly, had land taken from them, were forced to move to places they didn't want to be... and more, sometimes including horror stories of their children being taken away by outsiders who thought they knew best. None of which can be justified or made right again, or excused with cash...

But today..., it seems to me, that these folks have all the rights that you and I have, and a few more besides... How is it that they're somehow disadvantaged? What is it that I'm not considering?

[Guest CJRT]

Mitch,

let's agree first. There are aboriginal communities in Canada that exist at levels well below the standard of living that we enjoy ie. nutrition, disease and lack of clean water. For me, it's not all anecdotal as I have seen examples. How we have arrived at this position is a matter of history. To simply say that First Nations people have the same ability to chose the things "white" Canadians enjoy is overly simplistic. While the days of boarding schools, overt racism and discrimination, death bounties, and forceable re-location are over, the effects are still being felt in the general population. We accept at face value the concept of post-traumatic stress syndrome when it comes to our own people who have endured horrible events (ie Vietnam vets) but can't understand why the native population can't just "get over it". Do they have the same choices as us? I'm not so sure. A recent study came out that shows that 30% of disabled or behavior challenged aboriginal children from northen BC, Alberta and Yukon have Fetal Alchohol Syndrome. This amounted to a number of several hundred FAS children. This number rings far and above the same number in white Canadian disabled children in the same area. What does this suggest? Well one that the parents are chronic abusers of alcohol and two that these children will place a greater stress on a community already stressed. FAS children are prone to severe behavior challenges that can exist through adult hood. If we're thinking that the next generation of native children should adapt more to our lifestyle because they that much more removed from the past I think we would be wrong. A significant proportion of the next generation of children from these areas may not clinically be able to make the choice between living a clean "white" life or the way their parents have been living. The cycle continues.

Now are Canadian First Nations better or worse off then Cubans living under the Castro regime. Not sure. I'm sure poverty there is unacceptable as it is here. However, it's poverty that exists within a sovergein country that is unable to substantially support itself due to strict no trade rules forced upon it by another sovergein and unarguably more powerful nation. Our poverty situation exists within the borders of not only a wealthy nation but one that likes to present itself as a leader in compassionate politics.

I made my statement in the previous post because I interpreted someones post as suggesting that we as Canadians should not visit a place like Cuba because it only promotes and prolongs the system creating their misery. I disagreed and made the observation (one that Amensty International and the UN have already made)that Canada does not lay in a bed of roses when it comes to its past(that's recent by the way)treatment of its people much like the present Cuban regime. However, I didn't think,and still don't, that the plight of the Cubans or the First Nations is ill served by promoting tourism in our respective countries. Hopefully, by us going there to sit on the beach and tan our fleshy hides we are witnesses to the welfare of this nation as much as outsiders are a witness to the conditions our First Nations live under.

[Guest traf]

I would love to have their "disadvantages". Hunt and fish whenever they want, get special consideration for employment especially Gov't work, pay no taxes, get education paid for and even receive monies as a reward on top of tuition to go to school. Gonna cost me 120Gs/kid to send my children to school when they grow up. To top that off, I also have to pay for the natives with my taxes? Give me a break.

One country, one set of laws. Anything else is crap.

[Guest CJRT]

Well Mitch i spent about 40 minutes or so writing what I thought was a good response and once again after selecting the post button...I found my self on a net error page..oh well...my disertation will have to wait for another life time.

I'll summarize it...

my response was in disagreement to another posters assertion that we shouldnt be going to cuba because it supports the present state of poverty in which Cubans find themselves.

My thoughts on our First Nations? Complex situation with no black and white solution. I think native leaders need to step up and take a more aggressive approach in trying to stop the abuses that exist in many native communities. On the other hand, we all accept at face value the concept of post-traumatic stress syndrome when it comes to one of our own returning from a horrible event. Yet we can't understand why natives don't "just get over it". Can they make the same choices that we make? Not sure. 30 %(several hundred) of the disabled native children in northern BC, AB and Yukon have Fetal Alcohol syndrome. A condition that is prone to severe behavior disorders through out life. This number is by far way and above the white communities in the same area. Will these future adults be able to make "right choices"? Native communities have the highest rates of abuse and suicide. They have the lowest standard of living on average in Canada. Seems like our aboriginals as a whole are a society in desparation. We all know that they weren't like this before Europeans got here and we all know that our solutions in the past haven't worked. In fact, I would argue that they are in a worse position than Cubans. Cubans for all intense and purposes are a European culture like us. Someone has taken that away from them in the very recent past but the prospects of them getting it back are very likely. There is no chance that the First Nations will ever get back what they had. And the journey to the place they are at now has been nothing less than civilized (sometimes not) genocide. What is sad is that while Cubans exist in poverty due to one: a dictator and two: oppressive economic sanctions by the USA, our first nations people exist in poverty in what is a very wealthy and supposedly compassionate nation.

So my arguement was that if one shouldnt go to Cuba because it promotes an oppressive regime and prolongs the condition of the Cuban people, then the same arguement could be said for Canada.

Mitch your statements with regards to how natives have an equality in their ability to make the same choices as we do. I don't believe they do as a whole. While the days of boarding schools, death bounties, forced re-location may be over etc., the effects are lingering and are very real.

[Guest CJRT]

test

[Don Hudson]

CJRT;

Re the problem, "I found my self on a net error page..oh well...my disertation will have to wait for another life time."

With the cursor in the Post a Response window, press CTRL A which will block all the text. Then press CTRL C to copy the text to the clipboard. Continue composing, but do this on a regular basis while composing your message.

I sometimes take the extra step of copying the text to the Notepad, (have shortcut, will travel) and even saving it in cases where I want to follow long dialogues later.

When (likely not if) you get the Net error page due to timing out, go to the top of the AEF page and click on "Home".

When on the Home page, click on "Airline". That refreshes the timer for you and then you can go to the post you're responding to, click on Post a Response and press CTRL V to paste your text into the window again.

It takes about 30 seconds to do all this and saves hours of painstaking re-composing/typing. BTDT...I copy (ctrl-A > ctrl C) all text before I post, to prevent the loss. (Hint...place the left-hand pinkie on the CTRL key, then using the middle finger, press A, then using the index finger press C, all without removing pinkie from CTRL...QED)

I don't know why this site times people out, as I'm sure lots of text has been lost but there it is...and here's the solution. (even had to do it on this post.)

kind regards,

Don

[DEFCON]

Did you know that there is plenty of physical evidence to support a claim that humans of european ancestry inhabitated most regions of North America long before the first record of native american habitation surfaced?

There is quite a battle going on in the US courts over a related issue at this time. A couple of guys found a skull in shallow water and called the police who in turn called in the professional palentology people who found an almost complete skeleton. Initially it was thought to be several hundred years old and likey to be an early european settler. As it turned out the skeleton belonged to a man described above and was approx. 7000 yrs old. The local indians took adavantage of some reclaimation act of the US and claimed the bones as their own stating their intention to dispose of them. The pros took up the matter and today the bones sit in protective custody awaiting the end game in the courts.

Why do you think the indians want to cloud the issue of "origin"?

[Guest neo]

CJRT et al,

If you get the error message and you haven't previously copied-all as Don Hudson suggests, you can still save the day.

1. Close all browser windows.

2. Log on again to AEF.

3. Go to place where you were attempting to post, and select Post Response from the menu. Post a one word 'test' message.

4. When the screen refreshes, your original lost post will be there, along with the test message.

5. Delete the test message.

Best,

neo

[Guest M. McRae]

For my part, I just want to be able to go back to Scotland and reclaim the lands that the British took from my Great, Great, Great Grandfather.

[DEFCON]

Exactly! I was born here and they were born here. Has our government created a giant and growing impovrished state within the state vis a vis its policies? What especially ticks me off is watching a guy that looks no more indian than me demanding more from me based on the fact that he's one eigth native or the like.

[Guest AME]

CJRT

You post a compelling arguement, the problem is how do you help someone who doesn't seem to what to help themselves???

You can't stop someone from drinking, or force an alcoholic to not have children, and in todays society you can't remove a native child from their parents no matter what danger they may be in.

The government has numerous programs in place to "assist" these people, from housing for a dollar down and a dollar a month to free health care and post secondary education.

In all fairness 20 years ago the percentage of people taking advantage of these progams was at best miniscule, to-day however there seems to be more and more people pulling themselves out of the cycle and that is why we're seeing more demands and claims from these people everyday.

I think the Canadian government has done as much or more than any other nation to help it's native population, and maybe just maybe is time that the hand outs be changed to a hand up, and given to only those who're ready to make the change.

Brett

p.s. As a foot note, I think the native impoverishment may come in a close second if compared to the poverty of the inner cities

[Guest traf]

Bunch of lazy freeloaders is what the Gov't has on its hands now. Why would they work when they can get it for free seems to be the mentality. Can you blame them? If I was offered everything for nothing, I would stand up and be proud peoples also.

Now how does the Gov't go about changing policy without being accused of neglect or abuse? Figure that out, and you should be able to cure world hunger at the same time.

[Mitch Cronin]

Thanks for the responses CJRT. It appears this one wasn't lost after all...

I do agree with much of what you've said. But I'm not sure where you're placing the blame.... Or what the solutions are?

The poverty that exists in these communities doesn't seem to me to be something that exists because our various governments haven't been trying to help. Perhaps the efforts have failed for the most part, or perhaps they've consisted mostly of band aids being put in all the wrong places, but there are, and have been attempts made to improve things... I know that some have studied the problems at length and tried to make the right fixes, but it seems so far that almost all efforts have fallen short.

I don't know what more needs to be done, or what less, perhaps? Other than caring for those that can't care for themselves of course, such as the FAS children you mention... But what can be done to prevent more of that from occurring? Education? It's already offered. Opportunity? What? ,and how? If the problem is that the opportunities you and I have aren't suitable, what else could be offered? Traditional native cultures didn't need our brand of opportunities, and as I understand it, the opportunities to live in the traditional lifestyles do exist. But few choose that way of life any more.

I have a lot of respect for the ways of those traditional native cultures. I suspect much of their ways of life could only have survived in total isolation? Once Europeans were on the scene, the exchange of methods and goods, not to mention the loss and degradation of their land, made for changes that could never be reversed. So what now?

I think I understand that you're saying that what we offer in terms of what you call the "white" way of life is insufficient, but what else can we offer? Isolation is no longer available and there's nothing anyone can do to change that. Unlike the poverty that exists in Cuba, (and I absolutely agree that staying away from Cuba is no way to help them) the kind we see here isn't imposed by restricted movement. My viewpoint may be simplistic, but from my perspective, it's real.

I don't know what the solution is, and perhaps it's not about choices, but I do believe the choices exist. And in many cases, those choices are more than those available to the likes of me and my children. So I think it's unfair to compare this situation with that of the poverty in Cuba. Or to stamp such labels on us as Amnesty International (or whoever it is that says we're rotten buggers for how we treat our native population?) does, from a safe distance. Mind you, I don't know what, if any suggestions for solutions they may be offering?

Cheers,

Mitch

[Guest The Gapper]

I used to live on the REZ and my native boss did well using the advantages available to him,(I would to)but be darned if everyone who he called family, didn't cheat, lie and steal from him every chance they got. It's almost like they refuse to let anyone get out of the trap cause it would make the rest of them look like slackers!!!!

As for the money problems, U can throw money hand over fist but if it doesn't get to where it's needed whats the point??? Too much power is in the hands of the chief and the cronyism involved makes Ottawa look like the Vatican. I was pretty much the chief's b#$ch for that year and flew my busiest season ever hauling around him and his family. Meanwhile the "out" crowd on the reserve is starving and rotting in filth. There is little if any sense of fairness and responsiblity for the common good in most cases, just a select few share the wealth.

First nations people have many advantages and oppourtunities but they are held back by their own greed and racism amongst each other.(not to mention other cultures, but that is a whole different topic)

Many claim first nations people have too many advantages but I would not trade my life for a tax free one on the reserve. They can have what is considered life on "easy street" cause I sure don't want it if living in Red sucker Lake is what it takes..

******CBC paints the worst picture of the native problem I have ever seen!!!! No wonder southern ontario doesn't have a clue about what really goes on up there!!!!