The Rez

[Apollonius]

[Ibrahim]

One of the primary critiques of the Indian Act that I hear from First Nations peoples is that it artificially imposed an executive structure on all First Nations bands that didn't necessarily exist previously or wasn't part of their traditional methods of governance. So aside from transplanting tribes far from their original homes and settling them on reservations flung across the Canadian north in the most inhospitable territory, they also set up a system in which individuals or families could (mis)manage the meager finances of these tribes to their own benefit, occasionally living affluently as corrupt mini tinpot dictators.

Furthermore, the payments by the Federal government (technically the Crown) to First Nations as agreed upon settlements from treaty negotiations (sometimes dating back over a century) are misunderstood in common popular culture as "welfare payments."

So the sum total of Federal policy towards First Nations people has been 1. to re-settle them in obscure, isolated, and inhospitable locations, 2. impose a frequently alien and corrupt system of local administration, 3. characterize their subsequent problems as a consequence of internal failures of self-governance, 4. tacitly imply that these failures are due to "laziness," 5. insist that opportunities (e.g. higher education) are readily available, if only you're willing to move a thousand miles way from everybody you know to an urban environment you are unfamiliar with and in which you may experience substantial racial discrimination, and 6. what local Federal government contact that First Nations do routinely encounter consists of RCMP who arrest them, and the staff of Residential Schools, who are infamous for their physical, sexual, and emotional abuse, as well as their (historical) curriculum of blatant racism and cultural genocide.

The only "consolation" that a rabid Canadian nationalist could employ to defend this legacy would be to observe that the US and Australian treatment of indigenous populations was just slightly worse.


Not to characterize all First Nations as passive victims. They have a large number of effective and determined advocates, especially in the legal field.

[noddy]

what to do with a lifestyle that doesnt exist anymore and creates people who cant be good little passive worker slaves in the cube farm.

you either neglect em (and hope they can work out a new culture for the new world by themselves) or you cultural genocide em into your culture.

this is all that can happen.. alien agenda is as alien agenda does, anyone that promises otherwise is a liar.

[Ibrahim]

A key component in justifying any act, historical or present, is to declare it to be unavoidable.

[noddy]

hmm, a key component in wallowing in your own vanity is declaring yourself better than the rest.

i didnt type the above lightly, ive been on the wrong side of it ... i have different parts of my extended family involved and im generally quite suspicious about inner city bleeding hearts having opinions on groups they havent lived with and dont understand.

which isnt to say that over time these people wont find a way to work with modernity in a way that works for them.. but i thought we where talking about external intervention from alien cultures..

[Ibrahim]

[noddy]

[Ibrahim]

[noddy]

aaah, thats good - i most certainly aint one of the people that looks down at these people, just the white analysis of them.

their are good outcomes for many aboriginal australians aswell but typically only the northern tropical ones which already had quite settled lifestyles and havent needed to adjust that much ... the furthur south you go, the drier and harsher it gets and those nomadic wanderers are generally the horror stories that dominate the media.

[Ibrahim]

[Apollonius]

[Ibrahim]