Canada's Ugly Secret

[Greyblades]

It is the height of unfairness to blame, shame or even punish someone for the actions of those over which he has no control, whether they share a race sex or nation.

Alas it's also a ubiquitous human impulse that few if any are innocent of acting upon.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Well, the last First Nation representative we had here was extremely racist and saw all white people as a big group of "Euros" as though we were all the same.

[Noncommunist]

No, not really.

Iirc It was long ago enough that a most of the main perpritrators are dead or close to and the sufferers are insignificant numerically; The natives being less than 5% of the Canadian population. The need to deal with this wont ever become significant enough to force Canada to do anything, it could easily go it's entire remaining existence without being forced to shed a tear.

So the more successful the genocide, the more it's victims should get over it?

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

So the more successful the genocide, the more it's victims should get over it?

Absolutely not - but if it's been half a century then the punishment you mete out in retribution falls on innocent shoulders. A good example of this is reparations for slavery, something the UK has always refused. The UK government COULD give Africans and Afro-Carribeans in the US and the Carribean individual cash payments as compensation, in a legal sense, but that money would come from UK tax payers. You're be stripping the UK budget and directly punishing the most vulnerable in the UK for an atrocity that was perpetrated before they were born.

You rest of you remember Megas Methusaleh, yes?

He was full of hatred for "Euro's" and he blamed the problems of his people on the white man more or less exclusively. He was a relatively enlightened and well educated example of his people, though still young.

The First Nations' collective poverty is self-inflicted. By remaining on the reservations and not fully integrating into Canadian society they limit their economic options and those of their children. What they SHOULD do is demand the reservations be legally integrated into Canada proper, then when they are audited in the next Census the Canadian government would be forced to allocate resources on the basis of need, and their extreme poverty would guarantee the lion's share of tax and welfare.

In fact, this was the point of the residential schools - as horrible as they were they were intended to integrate the First Nations people into Canadian society. The difference between then and now if that then "Canadian" society was seen as homogeneous and now it is seen as multi-cultural.

Of course, it won't happen because the elders of the First Nations are weak and over proud - they would rather condemn their people to continued suffering than acknowledge the world has changed.

[Husar]

Absolutely not - but if it's been half a century then the punishment you mete out in retribution falls on innocent shoulders. A good example of this is reparations for slavery, something the UK has always refused. The UK government COULD give Africans and Afro-Carribeans in the US and the Carribean individual cash payments as compensation, in a legal sense, but that money would come from UK tax payers. You're be stripping the UK budget and directly punishing the most vulnerable in the UK for an atrocity that was perpetrated before they were born.

Why the assumption that you'd have to tax the poorest to pay for it?
There is of course the assumption that recipients would have to prove why they should get the money.
But on the other hand you'd make everyone pay for it instead of proving whose family got rich based on the atrocity and making these families which gained their money and power doing this pay the taxes for the compensation.
I mean if you're going to research who should receive money, you might as well research who should pay money, or at least who should pay how much if you assume that everyone profited at least a little.

[Greyblades]

We could also present the bill for sending the royal navy to forcibly end the slave trade and the wealth we gave up freeing our own slaves without a fight, plus all that infrastructure and education the locals now benefit from.
If we're going to start demanding the unagreed debts of the dead be paid by the living we might as well be fair and not only favour the non whites.
Or we could just find what perpritrators still live and let the courts decide what's to be done with them, leave the majority who had nothing to do with it alone.

So the more successful the genocide, the more it's victims should get over it?

Way to willfuly misinterpret there, skippy.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

[HopAlongBunny]

Part of the problem with "just get over it" is it bites both ways.
In many cases, covering a huge amount of land, no title or claim was ever ceded to the Crown.period.
So in fact a large amount of the population of Canada exists on land that legally, they have no title to.
Granted, the majority live inside of treaty territory, but with few exceptions those are not lands that are presently part of the land claim dialogue.
It has more to do with un/underdeveloped resources outside the treaty areas.

[Tuuvi]

I wish the article had mentioned exactly what these '94 recommendations, really pre-conditions to true reconciliation' were, if the Government is only willing to agree to one I cannot imagine they are as reasonable and rightous as the writer apparantly thinks they are.

Here they are.

No, not really.

Iirc It was long ago enough that a most of the main perpritrators are dead or close to and the sufferers are insignificant numerically; The natives being less than 5% of the Canadian population. The need to deal with this wont ever become significant enough to force Canada to do anything, it could easily go it's entire remaining existence without being forced to shed a tear.

The Truth and Reconciliation Commission which the article talked about is part of a legal settlement reached in 2006. Canada has already been forced to do something.

Absolutely not - but if it's been half a century then the punishment you mete out in retribution falls on innocent shoulders. A good example of this is reparations for slavery, something the UK has always refused. The UK government COULD give Africans and Afro-Carribeans in the US and the Carribean individual cash payments as compensation, in a legal sense, but that money would come from UK tax payers. You're be stripping the UK budget and directly punishing the most vulnerable in the UK for an atrocity that was perpetrated before they were born.

You know this really isn't a very good comparison because some of the survivors of the Residential Schools are still alive.

The First Nations' collective poverty is self-inflicted. By remaining on the reservations and not fully integrating into Canadian society they limit their economic options and those of their children. What they SHOULD do is demand the reservations be legally integrated into Canada proper, then when they are audited in the next Census the Canadian government would be forced to allocate resources on the basis of need, and their extreme poverty would guarantee the lion's share of tax and welfare.

In fact, this was the point of the residential schools - as horrible as they were they were intended to integrate the First Nations people into Canadian society. The difference between then and now if that then "Canadian" society was seen as homogeneous and now it is seen as multi-cultural.

Of course, it won't happen because the elders of the First Nations are weak and over proud - they would rather condemn their people to continued suffering than acknowledge the world has changed.

Historically First Nations people have been treated as wards of the state and they were not allowed to manage their own affairs. They've also been subject to racism and discrimination which persists to this day and it's not as if they've been given equal access to economic opportunity. Never mind the fact that if they hadn't been displaced and forced to live in reserves they wouldn't be dealing with these problems in the first place.

[a completely inoffensive name]

You rest of you remember Megas Methusaleh, yes?

He was full of hatred for "Euro's" and he blamed the problems of his people on the white man more or less exclusively. He was a relatively enlightened and well educated example of his people, though still young.

He wasn't wrong though.

[Greyblades]

The Truth and Reconciliation Commission which the article talked about is part of a legal settlement reached in 2006. Canada has already been forced to do something.

"Forced"?

Chose.

[lars573]

Part of the problem with "just get over it" is it bites both ways.
In many cases, covering a huge amount of land, no title or claim was ever ceded to the Crown.period.
So in fact a large amount of the population of Canada exists on land that legally, they have no title to.
Granted, the majority live inside of treaty territory, but with few exceptions those are not lands that are presently part of the land claim dialogue.

Not true. In BC there are areas where treaties were never established (because the pre-confederation colonial government was delinquent in their duty). But that's the north coast. Vancouver (island and city) are covered by treaties. You must have seen a map of the numbered treaties? You know the ones negotiated by the early Dominion government. They cover most of Rupert's land and the north west territories. Even if later on they were breached by the Dominion Government, they still exist. And technically the residential schools were the government fulfilling treaty obligations.

[HopAlongBunny]

Treaties cover almost 50% of Canada's land mass. The somewhat larger than 50% is a huge amount of land.
The area where Crown/Native agreements exist is now much larger than the linked map, with apparently satisfactory agreements reached with the Inuit and Dene in the North.

http://www.aadnc-aandc.gc.ca/eng/138.../1380224163492

For the future, its a matter of living up to the agreements.

[PanzerJaeger]

"Judge Sinclair blamed the residential school system for the dysfunction, chaos and poverty in aboriginal communities today. They face high crime, addiction and unemployment rates and poorer-than-average prospects in health and education."

And there it is. Americans are very familiar with this hustle. It will be interesting to see how the Canadians react.

[lars573]

2 billion was set aside a decade ago, and 1.62 billion paid out to 98% of those who qualified by 2012 (details). This is something else entirely.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

He wasn't wrong though.

Yes, he absolutely was - he was completely wrong, about everything.

I was not out to get him, and neither were the VAST majority of Canadians.

Anybody who lumps me in with Spaniards, Italians and Greeks, or them with me, doesn't understand what Europe is - but then neither do most people in the US, of any colour.

[Husar]

Anybody who lumps me in with Spaniards, Italians and Greeks, or them with me, doesn't understand what Europe is - but then neither do most people in the US, of any colour.

Yeah, Europe is a big continent with a long, rich, colourful , diverse and wonderful history. And people should not forget that Great Britain is not part of that continent anyway since it is an island that is very special.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Yeah, Europe is a big continent with a long, rich, colourful , diverse and wonderful history. And people should not forget that Great Britain is not part of that continent anyway since it is an island that is very special.

I take it you don't understand Europe either.

[Greyblades]

Yeah, Europe is a big continent with a long, rich, colourful , diverse and wonderful history. And people should not forget that Great Britain is not part of that continent anyway since it is an island that is very special.

[Pannonian]

Yeah, Europe is a big continent with a long, rich, colourful , diverse and wonderful history. And people should not forget that Great Britain is not part of that continent anyway since it is an island that is very special.

Given that what's traditionally thought of as Europe is founded on the Roman empire, it's a bit hypocritical of a German to exclude Britain from the definition of the continent. England, France, Benelux, Austria, and the Balkans, are all part of classical Europe. Germany, Scotland, Ireland, Scandinavia are outside classical Europe.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Given that what's traditionally thought of as Europe is founded on the Roman empire, it's a bit hypocritical of a German to exclude Britain from the definition of the continent. England, France, Benelux, Austria, and the Balkans, are all part of classical Europe. Germany, Scotland, Ireland, Scandinavia are outside classical Europe.

Point - Germany only became part of "Western Europe" when it was divided between the Soviets and the Allies, it should have been reassigned to "Central Europe" on reunification of the two halves.

[Husar]

Given that what's traditionally thought of as Europe is founded on the Roman empire, it's a bit hypocritical of a German to exclude Britain from the definition of the continent. England, France, Benelux, Austria, and the Balkans, are all part of classical Europe. Germany, Scotland, Ireland, Scandinavia are outside classical Europe.

It were the people from proper Europe who liberated the rest from roman oppression and paved the way for a network of wonderful, peaceful yet glorious nation states, the ultimate step in human development.

Point - Germany only became part of "Western Europe" when it was divided between the Soviets and the Allies, it should have been reassigned to "Central Europe" on reunification of the two halves.

Central Europe is still Europe whereas that island is really quite special geographically and the people are very, very special unlike all the others.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

It were the people from proper Europe who liberated the rest from roman oppression and paved the way for a network of wonderful, peaceful yet glorious nation states, the ultimate step in human development.

There's really no way to paint the Fall of Rome as a positive step in Human development. You realise that the germanic Barbarians were the ones who overstressed the Pricipate's economy and caused it to reform into the Dominate, paving the way for centuries of feudal drudgery, right?

While it's not fair to modern Germans there is a reason why your people were painted as the monstrous "Hun"

Central Europe is still Europe whereas that island is really quite special geographically and the people are very, very special unlike all the others.

You're just jealous because some of my ancestors had Roman Citizenship and yours didn't.

[Husar]

There's really no way to paint the Fall of Rome as a positive step in Human development. You realise that the germanic Barbarians were the ones who overstressed the Pricipate's economy and caused it to reform into the Dominate, paving the way for centuries of feudal drudgery, right?

While it's not fair to modern Germans there is a reason why your people were painted as the monstrous "Hun"

"Barbarians" is a roman term indicative of it's own hubris that, together with an unhealthy potion of corruption and greed, ultimately led to its fall at the hands of said "barbarians". The feudal system wasn't that much worse than what the romans did if you consider all factors. Wasn't it largely the idea of absolute power given by religion that gave feudal lords an excuse to do what they want rather than the feudal idea of an exchange between security provided by the lord for work provided by his subjects? The romans could also do what they wanted with everyone who happened to be a slave and were quite bloodthirsty "barbarians" just for fun and giggles. The aqueducts and so on were nice but didn't make their behavior any more civilized no matter how much they liked to pretend it. The caesars were also not that much better than a feudal king/emperor and that after all the bad experiences they had made with kings already.

You're just jealous because some of my ancestors had Roman Citizenship and yours didn't.

I don't know how far you traced your family tree back but even if you could prove that, I'd rather take pride in my ancestors fighting and beating the USSPQR than them having been part of such a corrupt empire that expanded by killing off the neighbors and subduing them to its rule.

[Pannonian]

I don't know how far you traced your family tree back but even if you could prove that, I'd rather take pride in my ancestors fighting and beating the USSPQR than them having been part of such a corrupt empire that expanded by killing off the neighbors and subduing them to its rule.

You have the right to be proud of your history of fighting against the USSPQR. But shouldn't you look for another term to describe yourself, other than European? Since, after all, you fought hard and well to keep yourself out of that world, much harder than we did in England. Unlike you, we failed to resist, and so got folded into Europe like the French.

[Husar]

You have the right to be proud of your history of fighting against the USSPQR. But shouldn't you look for another term to describe yourself, other than European? Since, after all, you fought hard and well to keep yourself out of that world, much harder than we did in England. Unlike you, we failed to resist, and so got folded into Europe like the French.

No, why? I see European largely as a geographic term and the roman empire was part of Europe but not the be all end all of what makes Europe. There's no need to make up new terms if there already is one that everyone understands. To call only the roman areas Europe seems a bit weird nowadays, even if the Romans did that.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

"Barbarians" is a roman term indicative of it's own hubris that, together with an unhealthy potion of corruption and greed, ultimately led to its fall at the hands of said "barbarians".

Hundreds of years of constant attacks and barbarian incursions progressively eroded Rome Civil society, resulting in militarisation and the loss of collective Civil Right.

The feudal system wasn't that much worse than what the romans did if you consider all factors. Wasn't it largely the idea of absolute power given by religion that gave feudal lords an excuse to do what they want rather than the feudal idea of an exchange between security provided by the lord for work provided by his subjects? The romans could also do what they wanted with everyone who happened to be a slave and were quite bloodthirsty "barbarians" just for fun and giggles.

Religion largely tried to restrain Feudal Lords, their caprice came from the lack of Civil Law (as provided by SPQR) and the social upheavals of the Renaissance is largely a rediscovery of Roman Law and its application to contemporary society.

The aqueducts and so on were nice but didn't make their behavior any more civilized no matter how much they liked to pretend it. The caesars were also not that much better than a feudal king/emperor and that after all the bad experiences they had made with kings already.

At least in Rome you couldn't be executed for being a homosexual - that was largely a capital offence in barbarian cultures.

I don't know how far you traced your family tree back but even if you could prove that, I'd rather take pride in my ancestors fighting and beating the USSPQR than them having been part of such a corrupt empire that expanded by killing off the neighbours and subduing them to its rule.

Far enough to know some of my ancestors were Welsh cattle drovers.

[Gilrandir]

To call only the roman areas Europe seems a bit weird nowadays, even if the Romans did that.

If we do, then Turkey, Syria, Israel, the Lebannon, Jordan, Egypt, Lybia, Algeria, Tunisia, Marocco are Europe as well.

[Husar]

If we do, then Turkey, Syria, Israel, the Lebannon, Jordan, Egypt, Lybia, Algeria, Tunisia, Marocco are Europe as well.

I meant only the areas of Europe that were roman, not all roman territory.
Although now that I looked it up for 10 secs, it would indeed get a bit odd if we were to use roman names: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Europa_(Roman_province)

[Pannonian]

I meant only the areas of Europe that were roman, not all roman territory.
Although now that I looked it up for 10 secs, it would indeed get a bit odd if we were to use roman names: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Europa_(Roman_province)

Whether or not we use the classical geography of Europe to define inclusion, surely we can use it to define exclusion, ie. that Germans are not Europeans. After all, that's your game at the start of this discussion, wasn't it?