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Posted by Albert King <aking@mb.sympatico.ca> on Wed, 24 May 2000 18:05:52 0000
Dave Kennedy,
In rely to your message on indian treaties.
I reitterate my statement. Are we supposted to make the natives think that their
treaties last forever? The response should be no! This is the year 2000. It
should be time to get over past mistakes and grow up a little bit. Treaties
might of ment something 150 years ago, but in today‘s world they are totally
useless. What purpose do they serve? Native leaders fight so hard for treaties
because if they didn‘t there would be no purpose for native leaders. No more
power and money for them. Because then we would all just be Canadians and we
would all live in Canada. Indians can own private land, exercise rights to free
speech, vote, and live where ever they choose. We don‘t need treaties to ensure
they have enough gunpowder for winter, or adequate amounts of twine to build
their shelters. They can buy twine and gun powder at the corner store, like any
other Canadian.
So if treaties don‘t exist to protect their basic human rights, then why are
they around. Some say that it‘s just. That they were here first. First of all,
natives didn‘t inhabit all of Canada. Nor did they have any sort of national
government. Before the Europeans came it was basically a bunch of tribes roaming
around, hunting and fighting other tribes. They felt that they owned all the
land, most likely because most natives had no permament settlements. Canada is a
overwhelemingly European decent population. We have a government and legal
system based on European traditions and natives have to learn that we aren‘t
going anywhere. They have been duely compensated for our past mistakes and then
some, considering the technological advances brought to them.
Natives are not, nor where they ever sovereign peoples. To be sovereigen
requires a level of statehood to be achived and even prior to contact with
Europeans they had not reached that goal by European standards. Indians are not
a nation, the European concept of a nation does not include tribal communities.
Unless we want to turn Canada into a modern day form of the Ottoman Empire.
There can only be one political community in Canada at nation status, that‘s the
federal government. Provinces, cities, households, tribes, cultural groups,
religious grouos are all subordinate and cannot be nations. Aboriginal‘s cannot
successfully exercise their "right" of self-government oin reserves because time
has showen that native government is riddled with corruption, difficulties
stemming from the small size of the people they govern combined with an overly
ambitious agenda as well as a dependence on transfer payments. It‘s wasteful
familistic factionalism.
When I say that treaties are being re-negotiated I also mean that in Ontario
natives argue that the current treaties mean different things then what they
accually say. They are reinterpretating them for more land and power. Indians
cannot ever be successful on their working solely off their own land base for
many reasons I won‘t go into here today.
While I could sit and write many more pages about this topic I think you get it.
Treaties may have ment something many years ago, now they are stupid and if
naitves want to be this petty about race then mabye we should take back our
cars, computers, electricity, phones, fax machines, and modern clothing. Two can
play at this game.
--------------------------------------------------------
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to majordomo@cipherlogic.on.ca from the account you wish
to remove, with the line "unsubscribe army" in the
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Dave Kennedy,
In rely to your message on indian treaties.
I reitterate my statement. Are we supposted to make the natives think that their
treaties last forever? The response should be no! This is the year 2000. It
should be time to get over past mistakes and grow up a little bit. Treaties
might of ment something 150 years ago, but in today‘s world they are totally
useless. What purpose do they serve? Native leaders fight so hard for treaties
because if they didn‘t there would be no purpose for native leaders. No more
power and money for them. Because then we would all just be Canadians and we
would all live in Canada. Indians can own private land, exercise rights to free
speech, vote, and live where ever they choose. We don‘t need treaties to ensure
they have enough gunpowder for winter, or adequate amounts of twine to build
their shelters. They can buy twine and gun powder at the corner store, like any
other Canadian.
So if treaties don‘t exist to protect their basic human rights, then why are
they around. Some say that it‘s just. That they were here first. First of all,
natives didn‘t inhabit all of Canada. Nor did they have any sort of national
government. Before the Europeans came it was basically a bunch of tribes roaming
around, hunting and fighting other tribes. They felt that they owned all the
land, most likely because most natives had no permament settlements. Canada is a
overwhelemingly European decent population. We have a government and legal
system based on European traditions and natives have to learn that we aren‘t
going anywhere. They have been duely compensated for our past mistakes and then
some, considering the technological advances brought to them.
Natives are not, nor where they ever sovereign peoples. To be sovereigen
requires a level of statehood to be achived and even prior to contact with
Europeans they had not reached that goal by European standards. Indians are not
a nation, the European concept of a nation does not include tribal communities.
Unless we want to turn Canada into a modern day form of the Ottoman Empire.
There can only be one political community in Canada at nation status, that‘s the
federal government. Provinces, cities, households, tribes, cultural groups,
religious grouos are all subordinate and cannot be nations. Aboriginal‘s cannot
successfully exercise their "right" of self-government oin reserves because time
has showen that native government is riddled with corruption, difficulties
stemming from the small size of the people they govern combined with an overly
ambitious agenda as well as a dependence on transfer payments. It‘s wasteful
familistic factionalism.
When I say that treaties are being re-negotiated I also mean that in Ontario
natives argue that the current treaties mean different things then what they
accually say. They are reinterpretating them for more land and power. Indians
cannot ever be successful on their working solely off their own land base for
many reasons I won‘t go into here today.
While I could sit and write many more pages about this topic I think you get it.
Treaties may have ment something many years ago, now they are stupid and if
naitves want to be this petty about race then mabye we should take back our
cars, computers, electricity, phones, fax machines, and modern clothing. Two can
play at this game.
--------------------------------------------------------
NOTE: To remove yourself from this list, send a message
to majordomo@cipherlogic.on.ca from the account you wish
to remove, with the line "unsubscribe army" in the
message body.
