Indian Winter

Idle No More: Attawapiskat protester (Photo credit: jonathonreed)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Billions of dollars are owed to the First Nations people according to the

treaties that have been signed between them and the Federal Government

since Confederation.

Today they are knocking on the door asking for their money and demanding

to be free of Federal Government inept monitoring and control.

 

The Conservative Government, however, would rather put the money

elsewhere.

 

If you are like me and your home town newspaper is controlled by the Sun

Media right wing conglomerate, it is sometimes difficult to get the other side

of a story.

You can watch for opinion columns like the one written by Warren Kinsella. 

He is intelligent, amusing and refers to himself as the Sun's 'token

Liberal/liberal'. 

Jeesh.  That's an understatement.

To me he often sounds like the only journalist over at Sun who isn't frothing

at the mouth and afraid of water.

Anyway.

Reason is out there. 

The article, Attawapiskat: Firing back at the racist rants and ignorant

responses with facts, on rabble.ca is a must-read.

It was written by Âpihtawikosâ, a  Métis originally from Alberta now studying

Civil Law in Montreal.  You can read it here.

 

An essay, entitled Truth is more complex than Attawapiskat audit can tell us,

(sorry you'll have to google the title to read it), by John Ibbitson at

the Globe is also worth your attention. 

But whatever else you do, tie your tent down tightly.

 It could be a long bitter winter.

Attawapiskat

My first teaching assignment was grade 5 in Dawson City, Yukon.

I had a student named Terry.

He seemed like a nice kid, but he didn't come to school.  If I remember correctly, he showed up for a few days at the beginning of the first term and that was it.

Eventually the band/school liaison  person, a quiet native woman named Margaret, and I went to Terry's house to talk to his mother.

The house was much like the Attawapiskat homes we see on TV except that Terry's mom and about a half dozen other native women were sitting in a grim line against the wall waiting for us.

I was so overwhelmed by the anger, resentment and hatred in that bare, dirty room that I simply informed her in a shaky voice  that her son was not attending school.

There was no reply.

Wordlessly Margaret turned and went back outside and I stumbled after her.

  

Terry never came back to school.

Ever.

Recently Christina Blizzard wrote an article about Attawapiskat that appeared in Sun media newspapers.  Public outrage has been rolling across the country ever since. 

Young children dropping out of school, drinking putrid water, living in unheated shacks  but with giant TVs.

Unfortunately it isn't a new problem and don't kid yourself, it isn't just happening in Attawapiskat.

We can call for decent housing, fresh water, new schools. Like the NDP we can insist that the army go in and make things right. We can hold inquiries. We can blame the government, the band members, the chief, the financial advisers or the man in the moon.

It doesn't matter.

 The truth is, there is no solution.

Not one that will be found by the likes of us.

The way out will come from the Native people themselves.

But won't be easy and it won't be quick.

We need to stand back and listen.

Related articles

• NDP calls for military to aid Attawapiskat (ctv.ca)
• Attawapiskat must pay Ottawa appointee $1,300 a day (thestar.com)
• Attawapiskat’s chief denounces Ottawa’s ‘blame-the-victim’ response (theglobeandmail.com)