Aye, sailor. I agree with much of what you’re saying, in a sort of generalized, abstract sense. But I don’t think that “we are all equally equal”, as you say, and for better or for worse, there are difficult problems that arise when we try to figure out how best to accommodate difference (cultural, linguistic, religious, etc.) within and between nations.
No matter how much I would like to agree with your statement that “Your rights should not depend on who your parents were,” this simply isn’t the case in the political system in which we all live, where the circumstances of one’s birth determine one’s citizenship and “nationality”. One’s membership in a given nation, as a political entity, has a lot to do with the arbitrary facts of who one’s parents were.
With regard to the Makah case, it’s thus important to remember that the Makah are a political community and not simply a “culture”. Like many white New Agers in the U.S., you can adopt certain facets of Indian culture to suit your own peculiar desires, but this by itself doesn’t make you a member of an Indian “nation”, just as a Chinese national (living in China) can’t claim to be an American citizen by virtue of wearing blue jeans and eating hamburgers.
The Makah “nation”, as a political community, have a formal agreement with the U.S. that allows them to hunt whales. You, as an individual who merely wants to adopt Indian culture without belonging to the Makah political community, do not have the same rights.