Yes indeed there was a Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples (RCAP for short),
and I did some work for it.
Ed
________________________________
From: Ray Harrell <mc...@nyc.rr.com>
To: "'RE-DESIGNING WORK, INCOME DISTRIBUTION, EDUCATION'"
<futurework@lists.uwaterloo.ca>
Sent: Saturday, June 1, 2013 5:44:17 PM
Subject: Re: [Futurework] They came for the Children and other ecological hubris
It seems there was an earlier Report by a Royal Commission on Aboriginal
Peoples. 1991
Page seven of that report is very interesting: It also puts the lie to the
propaganda about our civilizations being tribal hunter gatherers.
Here's the page.
https://www.aadnc-aandc.gc.ca/eng/1100100013497/1100100013637
From pg. 7 of Archived highlights from the Report of the Royal Commission on
Aboriginal Peoples:
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The ghosts take the form of dishonoured treaties, theft of Aboriginal lands,
suppression of Aboriginal cultures, abduction of Aboriginal children,
impoverishment and disempowerment of Aboriginal peoples. Yet at the beginning,
no one could have predicted these results, for the theme of early relations
was, for the most part, co-operation.
The relationship between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people evolved through
four stages:
• There was a time when Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people lived on separate
continents and knew nothing of one another.
• Following the years of first contact, fragile relations of peace, friendship
and rough equality were given the force of law in treaties.
• Then power tilted toward non-Aboriginal people and governments. They moved
Aboriginal people off much of their land and took steps to 'civilize' and teach
them European ways.
• Finally, we reached the present stage - a time of recovery for Aboriginal
people and cultures, a time for critical review of our relationship, and a time
for its renegotiation and renewal.
Many of today's malfunctioning laws and institutions - the Indian Act and the
break-up of nations into bands, to name just two - are remnants of the third
stage of our history. But there was honour in history, too; indeed, the
foundations of a fair and equitable relationship were laid in our early
interaction.
Stage 1: SEPARATE WORLDS
Before 1500, Aboriginal societies in the Americas and non-Aboriginal societies
in Europe developed along separate paths, in ignorance of one another. The
variety in their languages, cultures and social traditions was enormous. Yet on
both sides of the Atlantic, independent peoples with evolving systems of
government - though smaller and simpler than the nations and governments we
know today - flourished and grew.
America, separated from Europe by a wide ocean, was inhabited by a distinct
people, divided into separate nations, independent of each other and the rest
of the world, having institutions of their own, and governing themselves by
their own laws. It is difficult to comprehend... that the discovery of either
by the other should give the discoverer rights in the country discovered which
annulled the previous rights of its ancient possessors.
Chief Justice John Marshall United States Supreme CourtWorcester v. Georgia
(1832)
In the southeastern region of North America, the Cherokee were organized into a
confederacy of some 30 cities - the greatest of which was nearly as large as
imperial London when English explorers first set eyes on it.
Further south, in Central and South America, Indigenous peoples had carved
grand empires out of the mountains and jungles long before Cortez arrived.
The forging and maintaining of these confederacies are evidence of great
political skill...
Bruce Trigger referring to the Huron [Wendat] Confederacy inThe Children of
Aataentsic
In northern North America, Aboriginal cultures were shaped by environment and
the evolution of technology:
• The plentiful resources of sea and forest enabled west coast peoples to build
societies of wealth and
sophistication.
• On the prairies and northern tundra, Aboriginal peoples lived in close
harmony with vast, migrating herds of buffalo and caribou.
• In the forests of central Canada, Aboriginal peoples harvested wild rice from
the marshes and grew corn, squash and beans beside the river banks,
supplementing their crops by fishing, hunting and gathering.
• On the east coast and in the far north, the bounty of the sea and land - and
their own ingenuity - enabled Aboriginal peoples to survive in harsh
conditions.
The Americas were not, as the Europeans told themselves when they arrived,
terra nullius - empty land.
REH
From:futurework-boun...@lists.uwaterloo.ca
[mailto:futurework-boun...@lists.uwaterloo.ca] On Behalf Of Ray Harrell
Sent: Thursday, May 30, 2013 11:57 PM
To: 'RE-DESIGNING WORK, INCOME DISTRIBUTION, EDUCATION'
Subject: Re: [Futurework] They came for the Children and other ecological hubris
Thank you Natalia for your care in this.
This report that you mentioned is the report by Kevin Annett and the
Independent Commission that broke the dam on the public blockade of
information. That report is the Foundation for the official government and
First Nation's Commission that Mike and I worked with and who produced the
report. There will more reports from this "Truth and Reconciliation
Commission" as the information grows. I hope the work that Mike and I did on
the future of the relationship between Canada and the First Nations will also
finally come out.
It's been a long time that I've spent learning about Canada and her
relationship with the First Nations. Early on I thought Canada had done
better than America and maybe she did but the US had more local tribal control
of the government schools earlier than Canada. I was stunned to understand
the late dates on the schools in Canada.
In 1980 when I went to Canada naively coming from the release of our religion
by the Congressional Freedom of Religion Act of 1978 and the first open Sun
Dances at Green Grass and Rosebud reservations, I had a much more "genteel"
belief about what had happened to Indian People in Canada. As I traveled
to Canada that summer I very quickly realized that the non-Indian's lack of
information and assumptions about culture, substance abuse and native potential
was inaccurate. I was used to the books of Rupert Ross and had assumed that
native people had access to all of the wonderful services and culture that made
Canada and the Canadian Arts Council so admired by those of us down South. The
medical plan, the welfare, etc. I was unprepared for the chauvinism and
paternalism that I encountered and I very quickly had to shut my mouth since I
was traveling on peanuts and could see my support network dissolve and my being
abandoned in
a foreign country with little resources of my own at the time. I also had a
pregnant wife traveling with me.
There are still amazing things in Canada and amazing people. The lectures,
the people on this list. My colleagues and friends and my writing partner.
Nunavut, the First Nation's Network, tremendous people I've met in my work
and through the Indian Telegraph. The incredible beauty and the rugged
honesty now showing its face in these reports. Wonderful musicians and
singers from all over the world. A general civility and loyalty to each other
and to Canada. The Massey Lectures, the schools, etc. but then there is this
other side, just as there is to the US.
Forgiveness and Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome requires respect given and the
willingness to change. It also requires equality and the recognition of how
much each side has taken from the other in the important things like
discoveries, models, systems, families, etc. Those things that cannot be
recovered as simple property and that constitute one's identity as a real
person. It's not about deserving what you have or who you are but about
the self destruction that comes from a person's inability to handle their own
prejudices, envy, jealousy, venality to the point where they cannot give their
own selves permission to be a real human being. One loses for themselves
what they cannot give to another, unless they are "damaged."
REH
From:futurework-boun...@lists.uwaterloo.ca
[mailto:futurework-boun...@lists.uwaterloo.ca] On Behalf Of D & N
Sent: Thursday, May 30, 2013 2:37 PM
To: futurework@lists.uwaterloo.ca
Subject: Re: [Futurework] They came for the Children and other ecological hubris
Ray,
I thought I had a copy, but it turns out my thick blue binder is called:
Hidden from History: The Canadian Holocaust
and it's penned by The Truth Commission into Genocide in Canada.
Cover to cover first hand reports; letters that are so painful you can barely
control your stomach. The ignorance and cruelty of the abusers, and the
positions of trust and authority they held is so completely shocking that I
cannot see anyone who either went through this hell or read through this report
able to trust government, church or educational systems again. Well, they were
all just badly raised abusers, but it will still take a few more generations of
weeding out, and we're only talking about those exposed to sentient and
empathetic educational and social environments.
Natalia
On 30/05/2013 10:31 AM, Ray Harrell wrote:
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/30/opinion/ecology-lessons-from-the-cold-war.html?hp
>
>If you read the report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission with its
>conclusions about the tenets of cultural warfare and the innocence of the
>ignorant general population then you will see that Charles Elton must have
>been or been influenced by First Nations philosophies and religion since the
>preservation of the eco-system and diversity is called the "Way of Right
>Relationship" and is the old traditional method of agricultural technology and
>spirituality of the First Nation's Peoples before the Canadian schools
>destroyed the processes. What I find interesting is that the general
>population is either incapable of reading or they just don't want to know
>about this since it has stirred no conversation and no response from anywhere
>except an occasional congratulations on being a part of the project.
>
>Thanks to Ed who has been there, but doesn't it matter otherwise and merit
>some kind of comment?
>
>REH
>
>
>
>_______________________________________________
>Futurework mailing list
>Futurework@lists.uwaterloo.ca
>https://lists.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
_______________________________________________
Futurework mailing list
Futurework@lists.uwaterloo.ca
https://lists.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
_______________________________________________
Futurework mailing list
Futurework@lists.uwaterloo.ca
https://lists.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
