The Toronto Star has the largest circulation in Canada. The paper has an enormous impact on federal and Ontario politics as well as shaping public opinion.
The Harper government is behaving in colonial ways towards our indigenous peoples.
“When the school is on the reserve, the child lives with his parents who are savages; he is surrounded by savages and though he may learn to read and write, his habits and training and mode of thought are Indian. He is simply a savage who can read and write.”
That was our first prime minister, Sir John A. Macdonald, speaking in the House of Commons in 1883, rationalizing the residential schools where aboriginal children were consigned to be cleansed of their Indian-ness.
Of the 150,000 who suffered that fate, many were sexually abused. Many were starved to be used as guinea pigs for nutrition experiments. Not until 2003 did Ottawa acknowledge the horror. In 2008 it formally apologized. More than 100,000 former residents have since been compensated from a $1.9-billion fund. A Truth and Reconciliation Commission has been hearing from survivors and examining 3.5 million documents, earlier withheld by Ottawa.
Thatgenocidal practice was but one element of a vast infrastructure of racism designed to keep “the white people, pink people, at the top,” writes John Ralston Saul, author, philosopher and Canada’s pre-eminent public intellectual.
“Canadians of European origin decided that ‘Indians,’ ‘half-breeds’ and “Esquimaus’ were among the destined losers when faced by our superiority, our Darwinian destiny. And so we set about helping them on their way to oblivion.”
The 1876 Indian Act deemed First Nations people as legally inferior. Later amendments banned them from leaving their reserves without permission, wearing aboriginal clothing off-reserves or performing the Sun Dance or the Pot Latch ceremony of feasting and gift-giving, or hiring lawyers (so they would not pursue land claims). They weren’t allowed to vote until 1961. Of the 60 indigenous languages, today 45 are in danger, a national tragedy.
For the rest of this article, click here: http://www.thestar.com/opinion/commentary/2014/11/29/the_problem_isnt_aboriginals_as_stephen_harper_suggests_its_us_siddiqui.html#