"Religious schools were not all bad". ..."Indigenous people should assimilate...give up their status cards and become Canadian citizens."
I will not sign. Not because I agree with the Senator. I am not sufficiently informed.
But because I find it abhorrent to punish a person for speaking her mind.
Not being conversant in the language of Treaties hundreds of years old and ,though familiar with accounts of abuse in religious schools,I tend to think not everyone was a pervert , not every act
had malicious intent.
Social media has provided us with a truly, realistic sense of how reality can be distorted.
I do however believe stories with photos of the awful misery of children living in reservations..high infant mortality. ..alcoholism ....child suicides from toxic substances.
Of aboriginal girls and women engaged in prostitution and an inquiry into numbers of missing and murdered aboriginal women...mothers, sisters, daughters.
Atrocities associated with aboriginals have been headline news for decades. No improvements are noted.
Many live full and productive lives , as they should . Too many don't.
Children are not removed from parental care despite that deprivation polluted water, unsanitary conditions, inadequate shelter, high Infant mortality are all part of their reality.
And the talk goes on ...and on ...and on.
A Conservative Senator has put an idea forward . . Indigenous people should assimilate. They should give up special status and become Canadian citizens.
I don't know if the idea has merit. I don't think being a Canadian citizen is a disadvantage.
The status quo does not commends itself.
I don't believe a person proposing an option should be cast out with weeping and gnashing of teeth.
The idea should be discussed frankly and freely ...if only for the sake of the children.
A friend of mine had been fortunate enough to have retired early in his life and decided that he would volunteer himself with an organization that heads to a country in Africa once a year for several months and help build schools, water purificatin systems, develop land for agriculture and many other things to help people in small towns and villages in dire need. The goal was to educate and provide all the tools needed so that people can eventually provide for themselves. This was his 5th and final year in this particular country. He was tired of returning every year and seeing all the work his group did dismantled. He discovered that there are people in this world that only want to be taken care of and even catered to. He'll be looking for another organization in the following year. He's looking to find a place where people have the hope and drive with the tools and funding needed to help and sustain themselves.
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