[ZTWsquared]

So what's the answer?

It seems to me that you're saying the first nations don't believe that the Canadian government has lived up to any of its agreements and that the courts are in collusion with them and first nations can't win ... and furthermore that if only the treaties and agreements had been honoured in the way that first nation's interpret them, all native problems would have been avoided and that all concerns with poverty, drugs, suicide, unemployment and the associated run ins with the law would be no different than the rest of Canadian society?

Sorry ... I just have a lot of trouble accepting that. There's got to be more to it than that.

IIRC there are some first nations that have won settlements from various governments worth tens if not hundreds of millions of dollars. Has that solved all the problems in those communities?

And what of the possibility that the first nations' interpretation of a treaty or an agreement is in fact wrong ... if first nations can't or won't trust the Canadian courts to be impartial and fair the alternative is anarchy ... and IMO we're close to that now.

How do you propose that the majority of Canadian society respond to a relatively small group that doesn't defer to the same authority structure as the rest of us?

How does saying "we don't trust or respect your judicial system unless it agrees with us" come anywhere close to creating an environment conducive to a lasting resolution?

I for one want nothing more than the relationship between first nations and the rest of Canadian society to be resolved peacefully and fairly ... to all parties ... and I'm prepared to support some significant compromises if an impartial and fair arbiter says they are warranted.

But I'll be damned if I'll do so with even a figurative gun to my head ... and my advice to anyone in our government who will listen, is to stop talking until the blackmail and the greymail ends.

I'm sorry if the first nations' believe that the Canadian system of justice isn't their system and won't in fact give them a just decision. But IMO there is no honourable alternative that doesn't either come out of the ballot box or out of a courtroom ... and native people have the same access to both as I do.

PDW,Jul 5 2007, 09:08 PM Wrote:I think the main problem here is people assume to much. Ya d-dub its easy to say all that stuff too but in reality if you dont really know the issues its hard to judge, and based off you argument, you really dont know the issues. Ya past is past, but thats quite the BS argument you have. If thats the case all peace agreements, treaties, legislation and our own constitution are utter crap, because what are they really but promises or agreements between two or more sovereign bodies that were made in the past. Provinces are crap too since they are invisible borders agreed upon in the past. Health care, taxes, everything.... Basically all I am trying to say is that our lives are based off these types of agreements, to say the ones ragarding First NAtions people should be null and void is quite a statement....

Second, I am first to agree that the people that get media coverage are the wrong people. We do need better leaders that get the attention of the media.. But wait, we do have those....Its just the radicals get more viewers, they are what people really want to see... Ipperwash had people try to get attention before the whole george incident, Kasechewan (spelled wrong, sorry) had people trying to get attention from the government years ago. Oka wasnt recognized until a blockade..  THe problem is that people only know of two types of Indian... The noble savage who loves nature, or the hot blooded warrior.. There is no room for the Intellectual Indian. Trust me, I spent a year studying this phenomenon.....
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