As you know this (Angels of the Road) blog site has
shifted focus to anti-poverty and social justice issues. Nowhere in Canadian
society is social injustice more prevalent then when it involves our Native
citizens. Last night one of my Tweeties (Twitter People) posted the link to a
very articulate article titled, First Nations won’t “get over” your ignorance by Chelsea Vowel a Métis woman
from Alberta. The salient points for our discussion are held in the following
excerpt. You can link to the full article through the title.
Canadians who
do recognize historical
injustice seem to understand it in this way:
1.
Bad things happened.
2.
Bad things stopped happening and equality was achieved.
(Though I've yet to see someone identify exactly when this happened.)
3.
The low social and political status held by indigenous
peoples is now wholly based on the choice to be corrupt, lazy, inefficient, and
unsuited to the modern world.
In this view,
there is no history of colonialism and systemic racism that informs the modern
view of indigenous peoples, because that problem was solved at some point in
the past. The real racism is in conflating legitimate dislike for indigenous
peoples (based not on race or ethnicity but rather on the bad choices we make)
with historic colonialism/racism which is over. In continuing to discuss
colonialism and racism as a present-day concern, we are engaging in
reverse-racism and oppressing blameless settlers.
Let me begin by
saying racism is alive and flourishing in Canada. I visited my home town last
year… and the racism was palpable. The Whites believing all Natives are lazy
drunks and the Natives believing all Whites are arrogant bullies. I have
encountered similar beliefs everywhere I have travelled but more so on an
individual basis. In my experience racism (or any other ism for that matter) is
far more likely to come from a place of ignorance than from a place of hate. Ignorance
can only be eradicated with information / education. When someone makes a statement
in front of me that is wrongheaded, I take the time to provide them with the truth
related to that misperception. The usual response is, “I didn’t know that”, or “I
never thought of it that way”. Maybe I have only influenced that one belief but
it is possible that their mind is now a little more open to examining their other
beliefs.
The best way to
change this is by dialoguing, informally and formally with each other. When my
nephew was in grade 4 or 5 his school partnered with the local band to have a Native
Awareness program offered after school. The
biggest problem was the program was open only to First Nations students. We can’t
legitimately blame people for being ignorant if we refuse to educate them.
The general
public thinks equality has been achieved because Apples (fully assimilated
Natives) do have equality. I mean no disrespect by that term. An Apple can play
golf at any country club in the nation; skin colour is not an issue. If he
parks his Lexus in front of the cop-shop to report his 15 year old daughter missing
from private school, I am pretty sure the police will be all over that. The prejudice has less to do with skin and
more to do with ignorance about Native culture and the effect the Indian Act
has on development for indigenous nations.
Ms Vowel is
correct that media carries a large responsibility for the problem. I would
suggest that they could be a large part of the solution. When I had television I watched 2 news
broadcasts CTV and APTN seldom did significant stories running on APTN get so
much as a mention on mainstream media.
Feminism did
not make any real strides until we made patriarchy the enemy not men. And in
the past 40 years (I know firsthand) much has changed for women. To make those
kinds of strides for Native rights we need to stop making the rhetoric Us Against Them. We need to discuss how
the Canadian establishments (courts, social agencies, business models etc) were
designed from a European perspective and do not fit with Native cultural norms.
Many successful, sustainable, environmentally sensitive businesses are built
around Native cultural models. And we will be seeing more and more integration of
that business model into the Canadian economy over the next generation.
This blog has
gone a little long and the discussion is far from over; so one last thought. Colonialism
was bad (not just here, everywhere), we cannot waste our time feeling guilty or
angry about a past over which we have no control… we must take responsibility and
action to change the future. Learning from and respecting each other, is
where we start.
Have a joyous
day.
