andyt wrote:
The treaties are on a piece by piece basis with some First Nations. No treaties exist in BC for instance. So that's not going to help a lot of natives. And the treaties talk about hunting and fishing rights, mostly. I believe conservation has been deemed to supersede them as well. You want to allow natives to hunt and fish out of season as long as it's not harming conservation, OK.
A) No treaties in BC does not mean that it is a free for all, it just means that you've either got to establish Terra Nullis or you've got to pay the Indians for their land, or come up with a third option.
B) Part of Western Ontario and most of the West are covered by "Numbered Treaties" which talk abot alot of things including annual payments, land for each family (which cannot be taken without the agreement of the Indians) - a school on each reserve, tools for farming, health care etc...
http://www.aadnc-aandc.gc.ca/eng/1100100028689andyt wrote:
Education - we all have a right to that. Natives should be funded by provinces for education same as any other Canadian. Welfare, we all have a right to that. Natives should get the same access to welfare as any other Canadian.
Seems pretty despicable to me that we've promised the Natives very little in exchange for the return we get, and yet we cry and moan about every red cent that goes their way. We cry if they get to hunt or fish out of season - we cry when they take us to court for stealing their land (after the fact of the treaties) we cry foul when we underfund their reserves.
And we forced most of these treaty signings under duress by starving and harassing them.
Seems to me that we got a pretty good deal, and if anyone should be complaining it should be them. How is it possible that we get trillions and trillions of dollars in land and resources and this great country to live in, yet we stiff the Indians every chance we get.
If, as a Canadian, you think our values and our reputation are endorsed by our actions, then I think you need to take a better look at how we've allowed a portion of our population to languish and how our actions have crippled generations of these people.
Our legacy on this issue is something as a Canadian that I am not proud of.
andyt wrote:
Of course we have to do much more. But the only way forward that I see is that Natives start acting like other Canadians, not a special race with special privileges. Move to where the jobs are and go to work. Pay your taxes. Etc. I don't see how we can have a democracy with different rights depending on your race.
I see a way forward if Canadians start acting like Canadians instead of spoilt children. If we have made a deal then we should honour our commitments, make amends for our mistakes and really give some honour the intention of our word with the native folk.
We have dug a hole, and we can keep digging till the system collapses and we end up paying through the nose to right our wrongs, or we can take a good hard look at creating solutions today with the Indians instead of for them.
