All quotes from
Pam's book
Canada
can’t have it both ways. Canadian
governments can’t create laws and policies to keep us in poverty and then
complain about the cost of poverty.
If we
can’t stay focused on living and acting on our sovereignty everyday, then we’ll
be easily led down the colonizer’s path of chasing “equality”, “section 35”,
and other government carrots – while missing the war going on around us.
Our
peoples deserve better than the fear, hesitancy, and willful blindness to their
suffering. We cannot shape Canada’s
section 35 illusion with eyes wide shut.
First
Nations children do not receive the same standard of health care as Canadians;
First Nations parents are forced to surrender their children to provincial
foster care if they can’t access the health funds they need; and this situation
is a violation of their basic human rights.
It is no
longer acceptable to call us savages, so the new word is terrorist --- a word
used to “justify” a whole series of unjustified surveillance, enforcement, and
military actions against our people.
There can
be no reconciliation without the truth.
Canada
has a long history of criminalizing every aspect of Indigenous identity…. It
was legal to take Mi’kmaq scalps; it was legal to confine us to reserves; it
was legal to deny us legal representation.
When we
survived, Canada made our traditional way of life a criminal act—hunting,
fishing, trapping, and gathering became criminal or regulatory offenses which
landed us in jail.
Studies
show that were Canada to eliminate the gap between Canadian and First Nations
education incomes, this would yield $179 billion (gross domestic product) back
to Canada.
Every
time Canada comes up with an idea on how to “fix” the “Indian problem” our
people are oppressed, assimilated, or lose our lives.
All the
wealth in this country is made from First Nations lands and resources. Every single government, business, or
industry is 100% reliant on the ongoing theft of our lands and resources. It is a fundamental mischaracterization to
say the bank funding comes from tax payers…. We, as First Nations, fund every
single program, service, benefit, and government in this country – not the
other way around.
Indigenous Nations are sovereign nations with their own laws, rules,
policies, governments, and justice systems.
Their status as sovereign nations are recognized in the fact of
treaty-making, as only sovereign nations can enter into treaties with one
another.
Colonial
oppression has been ongoing for hundreds of years over various colonial,
federal, provincial, and territorial governments of all political
backgrounds. Simply voting in the
Liberals or NDP will not change the colonial laws, policies, and structures
that overtly and systematically discriminate against Indigenous peoples.
Though
Indigenous Nations may have organized themselves differently according to
traditional rules contained within certain clans, houses, or districts,
ultimately they were always governed by the commitment to the collective ---
the Nation.
While
today’s Canada may be described by its settlers and other non-Indigenous people
as a post-colonial state, it is not post-colonial for Indigenous peoples.
There is
no such thing as benign neglect – Canada’s racism is conscious, overt,
systemic, and lethal.
We
deserve more than this anti-First Nations propaganda on our own homelands. We signed treaties of political, economic,
and military alliances – despite all that has been done to us, we have kept the
peace.
It is
time Canada accepted the fact that we will not be assimilated. Whether you call
it “aggressively contrary” “insurgency”, or “criminal” – we will continue to
protect our cultures and identities for future generations.
No matter
what our educational or employment background – all of our families have been
subjected to discriminatory colonial laws and polices which desperately seek
our assimilation or elimination.
Indigenous
people in Canada and indeed all over the world must fight the colonially
imposed requirement to be “authentic” or “pure” Indians. This stereotype includes the requirement to
live and behave as they did at some arbitrary and distant point in pre-contact
time.
Children
are still stolen from our communities by child welfare agencies at rates higher
than during the residential school era.
The state
of Canada which was previously a British colony, was only made possible by the
theft of Indigenous lands and resources, and the genocide of Indigenous
peoples.
We are
not to live in wealth that destroys the earth, nor in poverty that destroys our
spirits.
“Aboriginalism”
amounts to little more than “racialized violence and economic oppression meant
to bring about a silent surrender” of who we are as Indigenous peoples.
Indigenous
children now make up as high as 90% of all children in care (provincially)
despite the fact that they are less than 4% of the population.
Genocide?
Murder? Criminal negligence? Or passive indifference? Canada’s killing our people.
A
territory shared with Indigenous Nations based on formal agreements (treaties)
and informal agreements (alliances) was founded on three principles: mutual
respect, mutual prosperity, and mutual protection.
In Canada
and the US settler governments have committed genocide against Indigenous
peoples not under just one category but under every single category noted in
the United Nations convention.
Little
has changed in “Indian policy” since the 1800s—including the Indian Act.
What used to be laws against Indigenous peoples leaving their
reserves are now laws which take away rights when it leaves the reserve (taxes,
governance, jurisdiction, trade, identity).
94% of
Indigenous languages in Canada (47/50) are at high risk of extinction.
More than
1/3 of the funding that is set aside for Indigenous peoples is confiscated by
the federal bureaucracy to pay for their large salaries, vacations, and
professional development, which is used to increase the capacity and strength
of Canada’s bureaucratic army against Indigenous peoples. This of course does not include the funds
spent on legal counsel to fight Indigenous peoples in court.
It used
to be, in the old days, the only really disturbed or ultra-fanatical people
would say overtly crazy, racist things in public. Today, if you read any of the online comments
after news articles related to First Nations people, you will see a segment of
Canadian society filled with anger, hatred, and racism.
