The Rights of Native Americans and First Nations

[ResidentWeevil2077]

I'm not going to write an excruciatingly long essay outlining my point. I will simply say that Native Americans and First Nations of Canada are not treated as equally as everyone thinks or is led to believe. Firstly, we live a small plots of land (called "Reservations", or simply "reserves"), much smaller than what we originally had before Europeans settled here. Most of the time, we can't develop our land the way people can off our reserves, either because the land is unsuitable for any kind of development, or because we live in welfare systems. the welfare system ends up creating what I refer to as "Reserve mentality", since we become so dependant upon the funding we receive through welfare that we simply become lazy to find work. Alcoholism sets in because we can't cope.

 

This creates the problem of "every Indian is just a drunken bum". Our problems are too complicated for even me to explain here. I only want to make this a discussion about what people think of us Natives.

[Marcus Wolfe]

I don't really know what to think of the First Nations of Canada. I wish, as I do for virtually all groups (Nazis and other facists/tyrants excluded), that they would be looked upon with respect and treated with dignity. They have the same rights as all other humans, and I really appreciate their culture.

 

The problem is, we white men have always looked down on Natives because of their economic values. This started back in the first days of colonization, when the Coureur de Bois ran through the woods. Fur traders would exchange everyday metal objects (like hatchets, pots and pans, etc) for vast quantities of beaver pelts (which were very high in demand but low in supply in Europe)

 

 

Basically, we've been ripping you off since day one and you only learned about it in the last century or so. And we really need to stop.

[batlham]

I'm not going to write an excruciatingly long essay outlining my point. I will simply say that Native Americans and First Nations of Canada are not treated as equally as everyone thinks or is led to believe. Firstly, we live a small plots of land (called "Reservations", or simply "reserves"), much smaller than what we originally had before Europeans settled here. Most of the time, we can't develop our land the way people can off our reserves, either because the land is unsuitable for any kind of development, or because we live in welfare systems. the welfare system ends up creating what I refer to as "Reserve mentality", since we become so dependant upon the funding we receive through welfare that we simply become lazy to find work. Alcoholism sets in because we can't cope.

 

This creates the problem of "every Indian is just a drunken bum". Our problems are too complicated for even me to explain here. I only want to make this a discussion about what people think of us Natives.

Well my family never made it to the Oklahoma Res. They went into Kansas after the trails of tears.

For many years..it was never talked about. Even my grandmother believed the whole family could get lynched if people knew they were Cherokee.

I very much dislike Reservations. I think it enslaves Natives economically. My great grand parents, on the other side of my familly, lived on the Hopi Res...they were there to help build schools, homes or what ever buildings were needed.

It is a shame..life on the Res. It should not be like that. However, I know no solutions that would help.

Another social program would only keep them more enslaved.

 

Do you have an idea what could be done??...you have a better view of the problem it sounds.

[ResidentWeevil2077]

I want to mention that I'm not racist toward white people (or anyone else for that matter), but we've suffered many indignities (and are still suffering somewhat) that I feel should be discussed. What bothers me the most is the Canadian Gov't is unwilling to acknowledge the First Nations in Canada as much as immigrants, like, say, muslims, or Africans, or even Chinese. Not that I'm saying our rights trump everyone else's rights, but we're still not treated as fairly.

[kungfubellydancer]

Wanna know a strange story? Well, on my mom's dad's side of the family, we have a long history of being racist rednecks. In fact, my great great grandpa (not the native American one mentioned; he was from my mom's mom's side) got banished from Georgia.

 

Well, he worked in a train yard, and one day he left his coat hanging in the shed. Apparently a black man took it for unknown reasons, and grandpa beat him to death to retrieve the coat. Back then it wasn't really a crime to kill a black man, so grandpa and his family got banished and settled in Ohio for the remainder of our family's lives. It's hard to believe we came from Irish nobles.

 

But nowadays, you'd hardly imagine that this religious family ever were racist; my second cousin married a black man native to Kenya; my mom married an Arab, among other acts of cultural acceptance.

 

The end!

[ResidentWeevil2077]

Well my family never made it to the Oklahoma Res. They went into Kansas after the trails of tears.

For many years..it was never talked about. Even my grandmother believed the whole family could get lynched if people knew they were Cherokee.

I very much dislike Reservations. I think it enslaves Natives economically. My great grand parents, on the other side of my familly, lived on the Hopi Res...they were there to help build schools, homes or what ever buildings were needed.

It is a shame..life on the Res. It should not be like that. However, I know no solutions that would help.

Another social program would only keep them more enslaved.

 

Do you have an idea what could be done??...you have a better view of the problem it sounds.

I haven't the slightest clue as what can be done - like I said, our problems are quite complicated for a single solution or group of solutions to be applied. All I can say is we might have kind of a Catch-22 (if you don't know what that is, it's a solution to a problem that cannot be achieved because of conflicting conditions from problem; a "damned if you do, damned if you don't" situation)

[Malchik]

I'm from the UK so have no equivalent to relate to. What is it precisely that the native Canadian or American cannot do that the incomers can? Are they restricted from moving, prevented from taking certain jobs, unable to purchase houses etc? Or is it more of a cultural thing, such as not having freedom to use their own laws etc? Or are you talking of inherent prejudice against them for whatever reason? The first two can be relatively easily dealt with if the will of the government is there. If it is the latter there is no short term solution. That kind of attitude is usually inbred over several generations. In an ideal world the prejudice would vanish once shown to be a nonsense through mutual integration but where prejudice becomes discrimination this can be difficult to deal with. And also, to the party against which the prejudice is directed, integration can seem like absorbtion. Then the desire not to be absorbed can too easily be misread as a desire for 'independence'. No, there is no easy answer.

[ResidentWeevil2077]

I'm from the UK so have no equivalent to relate to. What is it precisely that the native Canadian or American cannot do that the incomers can? Are they restricted from moving, prevented from taking certain jobs, unable to purchase houses etc? Or is it more of a cultural thing, such as not having freedom to use their own laws etc? Or are you talking of inherent prejudice against them for whatever reason? The first two can be relatively easily dealt with if the will of the government is there. If it is the latter there is no short term solution. That kind of attitude is usually inbred over several generations. In an ideal world the prejudice would vanish once shown to be a nonsense through mutual integration but where prejudice becomes discrimination this can be difficult to deal with. And also, to the party against which the prejudice is directed, integration can seem like absorbtion. Then the desire not to be absorbed can too easily be misread as a desire for 'independence'. No, there is no easy answer.

Our problem is prejudice from the Government of Canada - no matter how many times we've tried lobbying them, they seem to just turn a blind eye and deaf ear to us. Sure we have no problem integrating into society while still maintaining our culture and heritage, but the problem stems from resentments of the gov't.

 

EDIT: I'm not sure if those you in the UK are familiar with news coming out of Canada, but since about the early 1990's, the First Nations in eastern Canada (specifically the Six Nations tribes - look it up on Wikipedia for more info) have been fighting with the Canadian Gov't as well as the Ontario Provincial gov't over the lands they've been given (a land dispute). So far nothing has really been achieved since neither side is willing to come to an agreement or settlement. This is just one of many fights with the gov't.

[Jhaerlyn]

I'm from the UK so have no equivalent to relate to. What is it precisely that the native Canadian or American cannot do that the incomers can? Are they restricted from moving, prevented from taking certain jobs, unable to purchase houses etc? Or is it more of a cultural thing, such as not having freedom to use their own laws etc? Or are you talking of inherent prejudice against them for whatever reason? The first two can be relatively easily dealt with if the will of the government is there. If it is the latter there is no short term solution. That kind of attitude is usually inbred over several generations. In an ideal world the prejudice would vanish once shown to be a nonsense through mutual integration but where prejudice becomes discrimination this can be difficult to deal with. And also, to the party against which the prejudice is directed, integration can seem like absorbtion. Then the desire not to be absorbed can too easily be misread as a desire for 'independence'. No, there is no easy answer.

 

Its not a matter of not being able to do .... Its a matter of psychology ...

 

For example, the untouchables of India .... the biggest problem that they face to day is that, even if you take an untouchable and put him, say in England and give him a free education ... his psychology, his thinking patterns and processes, his emotional responses, his drives, have all been shaped by a society that dictaed overtly and covertly that he and all his kind are worthless. And they have been told that for HUNDREDS OF YEARS. Its hard to over come stuff like that in one or even two generations.

 

 

I'm from an immigrant family, my parents were exiled to the US from CUba ... well, they came because of religious persectution, for the most part. Once my parents were here, they worked hard and became what they decide on being.. for the most part.

 

Some may say, see? if that new comer can just get here and pick up and go, why cant you all who've already been here? ...

 

As a teacher I've been able to clue in on the reason: my parents and I have never had to read about how our ancestors were raped and pillaged over and over again, losing their land and being duped by the "superior" white man.

 

The funny thing about that history that is taught in our schools... primary and secondary ... is that its mostly inaccurate. For example, Batlham mentioned the trading of metal 'trinkets' for pelts and how the White man Ripped off the indian over and over ...

 

well that's not actually accurate. For the indian, getting those pelts was easy and they couldn't understand why these weak white people couldn't just get the furs themselves. And those hatchets and things were of Great value to the indians because they didn't have such things and they were able to make very useful things with them. ... things that mostly ended up helping them hunt more beaver.

 

now I don't know enough about Canadian history ... going to school in the US, history tends to really only focus on the US ... so I can't speak much about how the Indians there were treated .... but in the NE, the English propensity (at the time) to consider him/herself superior to everyone, especially non-whites ... lead to VERY lopsided justice .... a white man could send his cows on to the native's farmland and not have to worry about retribution ... If the native tried to take the white man to the white court, he was dismissed as a non-white and therefore had no grounds for a suit .... if he took justice into his own hands, the very same court system had him dragged into it, and usually, as part of the settle ment for his crime of killing the offending cow, the Native american would have to forfiet his land ...

 

stuff like that ... abuse of that kind happened over and over .... anyway... I have to go now ... I'll post more tomorrow.

[ResidentWeevil2077]

now I don't know enough about Canadian history ... going to school in the US, history tends to really only focus on the US ... so I can't speak much about how the Indians there were treated .... but in the NE, the English propensity (at the time) to consider him/herself superior to everyone, especially non-whites ... lead to VERY lopsided justice .... a white man could send his cows on to the native's farmland and not have to worry about retribution ... If the native tried to take the white man to the white court, he was dismissed as a non-white and therefore had no grounds for a suit .... if he took justice into his own hands, the very same court system had him dragged into it, and usually, as part of the settle ment for his crime of killing the offending cow, the Native american would have to forfiet his land ...

 

stuff like that ... abuse of that kind happened over and over .... anyway... I have to go now ... I'll post more tomorrow.

Like I said, it's a Catch-22