the other press

 

 

  

Tom Mellish
OP Staff Writer

It is fitting that the bal-
lot in the public referen-
dum on_ the . First
Nations treaty settle-

“ment arrives at ou door
in a yellow envelope. In
the referendum voting
process there is no
abstaining option, and
no room for neutrality if
you don’t know the
issues. The background
information in the package
and at wwwireatyreferen-
dum.ca was sorely mea-
gre (www.bctreaty.net fills
in most of the blanks, and
its content is highly rec-
ommended).

The disassociation of
BC from its indigenous
population is obvious.
Our colonial perceptio--
simply by sewing a
maple leaf onto our
baggage--is that we'll
get better treatment
than an American. Our
perception is that BC
reserves hv become
ghetto-like pockets where the First Nations
survive.

One isn't told that the colonial government of
BC took away from the indigenous population
the right to acquire Crown land, reduced the
size of their reserves, denied that they had
ever owned the land, and paid no compensa-
tion for the loss of traditional lands and
resources. It is no wonder they remain skepti-
cal and disillusioned; they were cheated, liter-
ally robbed by the colonial government.

The new myth of “supernatural” BC, that it is
as pure as the driven snow, is bullshit. No mat-
ter how many roads are built, how many land-
scapes changed, it will remain that BC is a
province built upon treachery and deceit.
Denial of responsibility is how most British
Columbians sleep at night as they build their
hypocrisy on the backs of atrocity. Guilty by
association, no measure of propaganda
expounding the glossy multi-cultural ad cam-
paign of BC’s potential, rather than what is has
been and is, will ever erase the fact of how this

 

 

province was stolen. Conquest—the great and
horrible plough of assimilation. Conquest
made this country, this province, and this
place out of the domination of another culture.
The self-aggrandizing white axiom, “Go West
Young Man” is cacophony to the roar of injus-
tice that nearly wiped out the people who were
here before you or I.

In the end it’s going to take nothing less than
a whole heap of compassionate listening to do
this fairly. Compassionate listening is the key
to this lock. No amount of force will open the
way between us. The tripartite process, of fed-
eral, provincial, and aboriginal—is all well and
good, but I'd like to press for an impartial
rather than a provincial representative: a medi-
ator, who is neither Canadian, nor First
Nations. In the end, if all goes well, cross-pol-
lination will populate North America with
Golden children. We, the mixing pot—two
branches of the same tree—will look back on
our ancestors who had a terrible falling out,
and hopefully learn from our mistakes.

 

>>>otherpress 05