New Zealand is honouring the Treaty of Waitangi and paying compensation to the Maori. Australia is starting on the path to reconciliation - they are paying reparation as well although little Johnny Howard won’t say sorry.
The US is not the only country making reparation for colonisation.
Umm, “No Irish need apply”- 'nuff said.
The suffering is there becuase they are POOR, not becuase they are amerinds. There is much suffering in the Ghettos, also. Much of that poorness is due to them insisting on their native ways. I have no problem with folks trying to live like their Great-grandparents- but no whining if it keeps you out of modern society, and thus means you can’t make a decent living. There are also tribes which have “gone modern”- like those who work on high-rise buildings, etc- they are not poor, not suffering- but they pay the price by losing some of their heritage. But that’s the price we ALL have to pay- if I tried to live like my Great-grandparents, i would be suffering too (unless you know where I can get a hundred or so serfs-cheap). It is unfair for Amerinds to demand to have it both ways, and that WE pay the price- after all, the Amerinds won’t pay the price for me to go back & live like MYforefathers.
I fail to see how Lola (whoever that is, no offense) is any more native than I am. I was born a resident of this land and a citizen of this nation. So were my parents. And my grandparents. And my great-grandparents. And my great-great-grandparents. So what’s your point? Aside from the possibility of being older than I am (which I don’t even know), Lola has no more claim to this land than I have, becuase I guarantee she did not live here when the “white man” invaded. She lost nothing when that happened. She wasn’t even thought of for at least a hundred years. So for that reason, applying the word “NATIVE” to a specific group of people solely because of their race, but not to other native people solely because of their race, offends me greatly.
Being that I look white and live in Newark, I have a really good idea what it is like to have people treat me differently just because of the color of my skin. I can assure you the “minority” groups can be easily as racist as the “white man”. If you really think there’s not much discrimination against Scotch and Irish, then I think you probably don’t get out much.
If this is not self-inflicted, I don’t know what is. Please tell me how alcoholism, drug abuse, child abuse, and suicide are caused by the “white man”. I’m really interested to hear this.
But that was quite specifically a deal made with them. You have to honor a contract, irrespective of how long it lasts.
And lots of people think that sucks. In fairness, though, it should be noted that we (I’m Canadian, but we have pretty much the same policies) give money to farmers largely for our OWN benefit, not because we feel guilty about the poor farmers. It’s done because we percieve it as being good business, even though there’s a dissenting opinion on that point.
Let’s be clear here:
**The people who are descended from the aboriginal peoples of this continent did not have their land “Stolen” from them. They were not alive when the conquest took place. **
I do not have claim to Wales just because my Welsh ancestors lost it to England. Neither does Jim from New Jersey have any claim to New Jersey because his ancestors lost it to the European invaders. You cannot claim ownership of something because someone who was related to you lost it in a war 200 years ago.
The situation with aboriginals on reserves is decidedly appalling, but the approach taken to it so far has been a colossal and miserable failure.
The experience in Canada has been, if anything, worse. The government spends billions of dollars, huge amounts of money, on native reservations. Native “bands” (the various local tribes) have been given pseudogovernmental powers and are allocated the money, ostensibly to make things better and promote native culture. Almost all the money is wasted and embezzled, with only a very few exceptions. The prevalent social problems on reservations have never gotten better; alcoholism, drug abuse, unemployment. Recently, in one native community, so many kids were sniffing gasoline out of garbage bags they had to bus them out of town because their parents were no longer capable of caring for them. Billions more will be spent next year, and nothing will be accomplished.
Given the fact that spending gazillions of dollars on this unique issue has never accomplished anything, my educated guess is that spending another gazillion won’t accomplish anything, either. Revolutionary as this sounds, I suspect that the answer is to stop being patronizing mommies and dump the whole system. No native status. Make it on your own. All laws apply equally.
That’s why I’ve proposed The RickJay Buyemout Aboriginal Project, whereby the government will tackle a novel solution:
Give up your native status and we’ll pay you $100,000. Cold, hard cash. Walk away from it forever, give up the tax breaks and the free university tuition and all rights for your descendants to claim the same, and you’re $100,000 up. We’ll pay you $25,000 for every kid you sign up and give them $75,000 plus interest when they turn 21. This is a special, one-time, absolutely-not-to-be-repeated offer.
I bet:
Oh, and no problem with the casinos; we’ll let you run them anyway. Hey, it’s a free country.
How do you figure my statement is completely false? A lot of the posts before this one addressed the points I wanted to make that just because there is alcoholism and discrimination among Indians does not mean that they deserve any special treatment from the US government.
And I could tell you about 50 hispanic people, 50 black people, 50 Jewish people, and yes even 50 white people who have been discriminated against during their lives. And who the hell is Lola?
Sorry, I was living near a bunch of Native Americans that were given free lunch, free school supplies, and nearly free housing while my non-Indian friends whose parents and families worked at the same factory, and made the same amount of salary had to pay for those things.
Your second link provides proof that it is not the fault of Native Americans that they have problems with alcoholism. What does that have to do with being entitled to government handouts?
I live near about 8 Indian Reservations. I know a lot of Indians and I have never seen a drunk Indian passed out on a street corner. I’ve never seen evidence of widespread alcoholism within these tribes. Yet millions of dollars are spent on these tribes that have their own casinos, golf courses, and rental properties. They should be self sufficient by now!!!
I’ve seen suffering before in my life…Just not at any of the Indian reservations near me.
Yeah, and veterans (white, Amerind, black, etc) have also served our country at one time in their life. Last time I checked, so do farmers. You said it–> All they do is grow the food we eat…hmmmm…yeah that’s a good comparison to the Native American funding.
They, veterans and farmers, have definitely provided a lot to our country and deserve it.
**
Let them have their culture, their dignity, and their livelihood. I’m not arguing that. In fact, the casinos, as much as I hate them, should be giving the Indians back their livelihood. Nowadays nobody stands in the way of Indians practicing their culture and I would hope that they are treated with dignity as well, but my Spanish culture, dignity, and livelihood is not subsidized by the government, yet we do a pretty good job without tax dollars.
**
I don’t think I deserve any tax money nor am I jealous just because they get money. The question I pose, is "Do Amerinds today really deserve it?
Just forget that I mentioned my friends are Indian, that has no effect on my viewpoint! I was not trying to soften any blow with that.
I don’t. But do you live in a small community where the Indians turned the elementary school into a cheesy casino? I don’t patronize the casino but I have to look at that eyesore every day.
jeel, I think your remarks are actually mixing up a number of separate issues and lumping them all into the complaint “why is there favoritism for Native Americans?” This is a much too simplistic (and not very well-informed) way of looking at the situation, so I’ll try to break out some of the different issues separately and maybe we can address them that way.
Why are they called “Native Americans”? Every US-born citizen is a native American. This silly and oft-repeated comment wasn’t made by you, jeel, but it needs a swat with the ignoranceswatter anyway. The designation is not meant to imply that Native American individuals are more “native” to this country than other individuals who were born here. It refers to the fact that Native American ethnic groups and civilizations are more nearly “native” to the continent than any others. Yes, it seems that the ancestors of these groups came over across what’s now the Bering Strait many thousands of years ago, but they’re still much more “native” or “aboriginal” to the American continents than are the European/African/Asian civilizations whose representatives started coming here only within the last millennium. That’s all that the expression “Native American” means, okay? Nobody who uses it is trying to imply that you are somehow less important as a citizen of the US than an Iroquois or a Sioux. Or if you really can’t stand the term, “Amerindian” or “Amerind” can also be used. But would you kindly cease pointing out your great discovery that the individuals called “Native Americans” are not actually more native than you are? Believe it or not, you’re not the first person to make that point, and most people who use the designation “Native American” continue to do so not because they’ve never heard your argument, but because they’re ignoring it on the grounds that it’s stupid.
Why do Native Americans get reservations and other things (like the right to operate casinos) that are denied to citizens who aren’t tribal members? Because the federally-recognized tribes are not just another ethnic minority, but semi-sovereign nations that have a “government-to-government” relationship with the United States. There’s been a lot of loose talk in this thread about “conquered land”, but in fact the US government acquired much of its current real estate through treaties with tribes that were recognized as fellow sovereign nations. As the federal Bureau of Indian Affairs states, in the colonial period,
Similarly:
So reservations and gambling rights and so forth are not things that the US government is “giving” to tribes because it’s trying to be nice to them or feels guilty. These are part of government-to-government arrangements (recognized in Article I, section 8 of the Constitution) made to honor treaties that have not been repudiated by the US. For more details, see the Department of the Interior’s Indian Trust Q&A.
Now if you’re opposed to Indian sovereignty on principle, that’s a different issue. You can petition the government and try to persuade your fellow citizens to cease recognizing the semi-sovereign status of the federally recognized tribes, and to attempt to gain full US sovereignty over all existing tribal lands and organizations either via negotiation or by armed conquest. But without such a decision on the part of the federal government, there’s no way to “stop giving the Indians special treatment.” That “special treatment” is currently a national obligation, regardless of whether you think the semi-sovereign tribes “need it” or not.
Why does the government give money to Indian tribes? Again, it’s not just because they feel guilty—it’s part of the legal obligation known as the Federal Indian trust responsibility:
Why are American Indians eligible for things like scholarships just because they have “Indian blood”? First, note that just having “Indian blood” or being ethnically connected to a Native American group is not automatically the same thing as being an official member of a federally recognized tribe. (You might be able to obtain tribal membership status—which, by the way, generally comes with some obligations and restrictions with respect to tribal law, it’s not just a title to government handouts—if you’re of Native American descent, but you’d have to check with the individual tribal government to find out its membership requirements, which vary from tribe to tribe.) Some tribal nations provide specific kinds of assistance for their own members; some kinds of “Indian-only” assistance from the federal government are mandated by the national obligations discussed above; and some affirmative-action/scholarship programs and the like give preferences to Native Americans (sometimes on the basis of official tribal membership, sometimes not) simply as one of the historically disadvantaged ethnic minorities like blacks and Hispanics.
So the root question is not, as you stated, “Do Amerinds really deserve to get tax money?”, but “What are the legal obligations of the US government towards the semi-sovereign tribal nations, and should we be attempting to negotiate changes in those obligations?” You can answer the second part of the question any way you like, but don’t confuse the federal trust responsibility with affirmative-action-type minority preferences. Hope that helps.
Where shall I start?
Daniel - I grew up next to and still live close to one of the wealthiest reservations in North America, the problems I referred to (in my prior post) did not come about as a result of these people being impoverished in any way. I understand jeel’s feelings as I too once looked at the First Peoples (let’s not argue about who is “native”) who live there and was just a tad envious of all the perks they received; no taxes on goods, no income tax, lots of free money, and no need to find a job. There was only one condition to enjoy this lifestyle, you had to stay on the reservation. This was/is government supported racism.
Rick - The amount of your buyout is way to small, $100,000 is less than half of what many kids receive on their 18th birthdays here. How many 18 year olds do you know who are responsible enough to handle a hundred thousand dollars? Horror stories abound here and I have witnessed many firsthand.
Your description of the situation on many reservations across Canada is accurate and it is indeed appalling. Major changes need to be made by the people who live there, not us.
I believe that we could find quite a few people living here who are intimately familiar with the residential school system, people who have experienced institutionalized and government supported discrimination and abuse.
Joe - “Please tell me how alcoholism, drug abuse, child abuse, and suicide are caused by the “white man”. I’m really interested to hear this.”
Look up. Learn. You should conclude that these problems are more common in indigenous peoples around the world and that our ancestors contributed to the problems that exist today.
jeel - Your statement is still incorrect as you infer that the reservations around you are indicative of reservations across North America, your 8 reservations do not make up a majority.
Should we continue to pay?
Yes.
Why?
Look up the word treaty.
For the record, Lola is my wife. She is Metis and does not receive the same perks as natives with treaty status. She is a lovely shade of mocha and for the life of me I still don’t understand why people would treat her differently because of that. It doesn’t happen often but the fact that it does indicates that society still has a long way to go before we all treat each other equally regardless of race, colour, beliefs, etc…
Kimstu - thanks, now jeel and a few others don’t have to look too far to see what a treaty is and how it applies to the relations between our respective governments and these sovereign nations within our borders.
Oh, but that gummint help has un-looked-for benefits…to somebody.
Anyway, I’m right alongside the Indians taking money from white men who can’t do math. “Double-Down, Kemo Sabe?”
I don’t see what birthday gifts for rich kids have to do with it.
$100,000 is a huge amount of money to an impoverished aboriginal living in a shitty house on a reserve. Enough to move to a city and get a real job, even. It’s more than their band will ever give them.
That’s their problem (and I did say 21; you said 18.)
the reason for the buyout is that
The only way to solve this is to get them off the public teat, but
Just kicking them off would almost certainly be illegal, and unilaterally breaking a treaty is wrong.
If they wanna live on the reservation, let 'em. It’s a free country. I don’t know why anyone would want to live in Winnipeg, either, but 500,000 people do. But “Indian Affairs” has done more to harm “indians” than anything or anyone else. Get rid of it.
Hey Rick, I think I may have not expressed my thoughts clearly enough… the large sums of money I was referring to are the one’s that go to “kids” here who happen to have treaty status, their money is kept in trust until their 18th birthday and I have seen people receive $200,000 + Cdn. Like I said… it’s a wealthy reserve and differs from many reservations across North America.
If you were an impoverished aboriginal living on the res in a shitty house going to the city to get a job would be an excellent strategy. If you want to work for the government they have this in place
The Employment Equity Act: The 1995 Act applies to federally-regulated employers in the private sector, as well as federal departments and agencies and Crown Corporations with 100 or more employees. Under the Act, employers are required to identify and remove barriers to the recruitment, promotion, retention and training of members of four designated groups: women, Aboriginal people, persons with disabilities and members of visible minorities.
It would seem that aboriginals were having some difficulty landing jobs or getting promotions along with other groups. It happens in the private sector too, that’s why we have a Charter of Rights to make this kind of discrimination illegal.
In a perfect world we wouldn’t need either would we? People would get hired based solely on their qualifications and nothing else.
We live in a truly great country with awesome people (like ourselves) but I think our society as a whole needs to change it’s perception of aboriginals, minorities, the disabled, and women. I see prejudice and racism all too often and I don’t have to go to far to find it.
I don’t know why anyone would want to live in Winnipeg either 
Maybe that question should be sent to GQ for some answers…
A little late, here, but I’ll hit a couple quick points.
Daniel, no, Amerinds do not, by and large, have the same opportunities that most anglos have. You say this is not a racial thing, but simply because they’re poor. I say, why the fuck do you think they’re poor? And no, it’s not because “they want to live like their forefathers.”
Jeel, I don’t know what part of NM you live in, but try wandering through Gallup, Grants, or Shiprock sometime. If you live in the Land of Entrapment and you believe that all tribes and peublos are wealthy you’re blind. If you believe there is no alcohol or drug problem on reservations, you’re blind. And if you think all the casinos are making money hand over fist, you’re blind and don’t read the paper.
Further, why don’t you learn a little more about how far all those handouts you’re railing against actually go? Go visit an elementary school in Isleta or Shiprock sometime. Yeah, they’re just rolling in cash. :rolleyes:
Why do we keep using the term “Native” Americans? Science has shown that there are NO humans who are truly indigenous to this country. Mitochondria DNA proves that what we call “Native” Americans are actually of Asian descent. They’re not native to this country, they just got here first…
Uh-oh… There I went and opened up a whole new can of worms. Maybe this point would have made a better “new thread” instead of a reply to one.
See Kimstu’s post which covers this quite well.
:rolleyes: back at you…
Did you read my OP? I stated that I believe that the poorest of tribes still need help!!! Just as the empoverished coal miners in West Virginia do. I have been through Gallup, Shiprock, and Grants…and I’m aware of the terrible situations that the Native Americans face there. I say keep spending to help them out. But Pojoaque, Isleta, Sandia etc. continue to thrive with casinos, but I am constantly reading about more and more US government money being granted to these richer tribes. I should have been more clear on my stand that the empoverished of this country should continue to receive aid.
And if the casinos fail? Who will bail them out?
By the way, my OP was not a question of the treaties that the US has with the Indian tribes. It is an argument that they are unfair and overpaid. My opinion is that the treaties went overboard. They definitely had the right intention, but some of it still seems unfair. boo hoo. I guess all I can do is whimper about it!
jeel: My opinion is that the treaties went overboard. They definitely had the right intention, but some of it still seems unfair. boo hoo. I guess all I can do is whimper about it!
Horse feces, jeel! If you object to some of the current laws intended to carry out the Indian trust responsibility, you have every right to make your objections known! Run, don’t walk, to the THOMAS Congressional Information on the Internet site and search current legislative bills for the keyword “Indian” or “Native American.” You’ll be shown fifty or more bills concerning legislation about Native American issues. I particularly recommend, for your specific interests, HR1814, S2719, S399, and S985, which are directly concerned with reservation business development and casino gambling. Read the bills and urge your reps to take action on them as you recommend! No guarantees that you’ll change the course of history, but it’s got to be more productive than mere vague gripes on a message board.
(Mods, why doesn’t the bb get some software that allows insertion of audio clips so I can fade out these public service announcements on some patriotic music, huh?.. :))
Nothing will change for the Native Americans until they get out of the rut they’re in. “Duh” must be running through your minds right now. But I’ve not seen any plans that would get the Native Americans out of the rut they are in. I not see any plans that would facilitate the various tribes into being able to produce anything of value to the outside world.
I don’t buy that the white man is to blame for all their woes. If they’ve got high levels of drug abuse and alcoholism they have only themselves to blame. But let’s face it the United States screwed them over in the past so let’s do something to change that.
I’m not interested in getting into a pissing contest over who owes what to who. What I’d like to see a plan that would give the tribes a hand up instead of a handout. If they continue to live on the dole they’ll simply whither away until they die. I’d rather see them thrive.
Marc
MGibson: *But I’ve not seen any plans that would get the Native Americans out of the rut they are in. I not see any plans that would facilitate the various tribes into being able to produce anything of value to the outside world. *
Then you’re obviously pretty uninformed on the subject. “Unable to produce anything of value to the outside world”? Wow. You will be reassured to see some more hopeful data from the Department of the Interior:
Yes, many tribal communities still have a lot of economic and social problems, and indeed there are many plans at the tribal and national level for trying to ameliorate them (despite the fact that the Director of the BIA somehow forgot to send a singing telegram to your home in order to explain to you what they are. :rolleyes: If you could be bothered to look for some information about them, the Congressional bills I mentioned to jeel might be a place to start). But the idea that Native Americans as a whole are just sitting around in some vaguely specified “rut” and would “wither away” if it weren’t for the “handouts” from Uncle Sam is simply ignorant.
Case in point. Without Uncle Sam they won’t wither away. They’d have to just go on making a living like the rest of us. 