the french treated them as trading partners, and interbred with them (see metis people)

apparently native proxies were used heavily in the war of 1812 between canada as a colony and the USA, note that since canada wasn't officially a country yet and still part of britain, canadian militias and british soldiers were used, not canadian soldiers

anyways, the deaths amongst the natives effectively led to depopulation and led to the expansion westward we hear about for both canada, and the USA

in canada it was more muted though, a lot of that same kind of treatment still occurred, but less of it and canada has been paying for it for a while now monetarily

however, the treatment of natives as individuals (due to being part of the british commonwealth, which abolished slavery a while before the USA did)

led to canada being at first, essentially a 3 part nation

anglos, francos, and first nations of various groups

this has an impact in today's political environment, where many first nations (not natives, they immigrated from the land bridge) have ongoing dispute resolution over various land claims, particularly over mineral rich areas

the keystone pipeline project encountered a heavy resistance by the local native population (using the word for laziness sake now) for instance, and a variety of mining initiatives are blocked via the treaty system because of the impacts on natives

this can get annoying, but it's valuable in it's own right


however, due to the fact that the system hasn't changed or updated or implemented in a way that's inclusive of natives, combined with the fact that it was originally devised as a "they'll die off so let's just make them comfy so they don't become a pain in the ass" the system is a little detrimental to the natives too

tribal chieftains sometimes are very corrupt and play natives against the rest of canada, and obstruct aide initiatives due to the problems over sovereignty

however, I personally suspect that with the combined hatred for our prime minister stephen harper amongst many, many individuals, that the next government will gain a lot of grace with the native population and a little more integration will occur

many native reserves suffer "the africa problem" of poverty and an environment that is expensive as hell for people trying to maintain a first world way of life

some native groups are able to use local resources, and basically do a cooperative, version of labour, for say diamond mines or something, or... casinos :p

in canada, natives are essentially our version of black people, except our black people, who live in africa instead of the ghetto

but that's somewhat environmental, many of those groups as I've said are restricted to reserves primarily because the place is so far away from everywhere else that it's prohibitively risky to move anywhere else, furthermore there's the problem of moving away from everyone you know

which is seriously pissy, I know this because I'm in such a situation myself

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numbered_Treaties#List_of_Numbered_Treaties

you can read about what the numbered treaties actually mandated here

the first nations are also considered to be a different nation than the quebec or anglo-canada

quebec is also considered to be it's own nation

so we have (natives - a lot of nations but under one rough overall ethnic group) quebec - (french canada) and the rest of canada

this causes contentions in canada, and just like we had the FLQ crisis in quebec there have been armed standoffs between native reserves and canadian military even during the 1990's

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oka_Crisis

in this case, I lol'd at the fact that quebec, which is so obssessed about it's own sovereignty, had problems with another group concerned with it's own sovereignty within quebec, but of course canada has this same dynamic, with quebec and the USA

here is a picture

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/1/1f/Oka_stare_down.jpg


what this translates to however, is essentially a native population that wants sovereignty, and a decent way of life, historical events must be factored into play on how to actually fix the fact that the more remote locations are "africa town"

with rundown shanty shit and modern day construction type buildings with no real way of maintaining them, due to poverty and so on

and a system of rights that means a government either has to play by the natives' rules or it can choose to shit all over the natives, both of which have problems

I suspect the only way to get them outta this is to integrate more closely to canada on their own terms for their own reasons, but accept that some integration is necessary

this is why I think that the "everyone hates harperfest" will lead to the next government having more success, because someone can point and say "remember that guy? yeah"

the attawapiskat crisis was laid down on the conservative government's feet, but many of the canadian governments for a while now have been neglectful, but this is partly due to the militarism on the natives' side, as shown by the oka crisis


this is one aspect of multiculturalism people don't see in canada, but it does work to a large degree, and problems are being sorted out, more native communities are in fact modernizing and "getting with the times" without being pushed around by some asshat in government

it is slow progress

but "expectations of modernity + no way of maintaining them on one's own + no help from the outside = shitty shit" is the order of the day

it's not a problem of the welfare system in that there's welfare either

the problem, is that there is welfare, but in order to advance you have to essentially go for a relatively long period of time without any, which means being dirt poor, so there is not really a big alternative to living on reserves for those on them already/still

"each step of the way must be conducive to gain and not starving your ass out"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attawapiskat_First_Nation#Housing_and_infrastructure_crisis

attawapiskat is possibly the worst of them, so it's got a big list and set of things one *might* expect when visiting a reserve

note that this one made national headlines recently

the history of natives and all that is tied in with the history of canada however, and I suspect that canadian attitudes towards the world are shaped largely by the fact that we have an internal historical precedent for dealing with places like africa, because we understand colonialism's impacts because of our daily lives are impacted by it and the relatively larger number of natives in our population means we can't run around demonizing them all the time

the whole metis thing is also important, I'm partly inuit and either blackfoot or cree (distantly) not enough to identify as native but enough to recognize part of native history as family history

this helps negate a lot of the racial prejudicial stuff in society

due to the increased poverty of natives however, they do make a large group or even majority of the people in prison for violent crimes

if one were to point to canada and say "gun control doesn't work, violent crime is on the rise when you don't have guns" I would have to point out the fact that many of those crime statistics are due to the tribal nature of a reasonably large amount of our population

have a july 29th 2012 article

http://news.nationalpost.com/2012/07/29/baffin-island-community-under-siege-after-latest-shooting-attack-on-nunavut-mounties-rcmp/

there was also an article by that news company that essentially said alcohol was banned in one place and then when they let it back in everything went crazy with a sudden huge rise in murders

File 134504953491.jpg - (11.86KB , 450x338 , crime_canada.jpg )

Regardless of how well the natives as a whole are doing (though, I'm not sure making such a statement even makes any sense) I've studied up on the Voyageurs (holy fuck) a bit, and there was a hell of a lot of constructive cooperation with the Natives from day 1. Plenty of confrontations too, but compared to how shit went in the US, it was like a happy-go-lucky play date up there. And it's reflected today both in the names of things, the languages, the fact that they still have some natives left at all, and in the integration of the old cultures and their values. Consider how important resource protection is to Canada vs how important it isn't in the US, for instance.

The thing that most strikes me when I go to Canada is how much elements of native culture are integrated into Canadian culture today. Look around US towns and cities. Tell me how much Native American culture you see. Fucking none at all. Even hundreds of years later, it still actually LOOKS, like the euros came over, saw resources they liked, immediately killed off the natives, put the rest in concentration camps, enslaved & brought over some africans to do their work, and proceeded to build Europe II. Then did the same dumbass cultural bullshit europe did five hundred years ago when it ate shit, and are now wondering why it's all going to shit just like it did then. Pretty sure Canada got the smart europeans, and the US got the rednecks & eurotrash.

>>13008
>Consider how important resource protection is to Canada
Consider that the forests in Canada that have major roads going through them have been clear cut except for the last couple hundred feet surrounding the roads, so that Canadians driving through won't realize just how much of their country has been raped by industry.

>>13015

That might be the dumbest point I've ever heard anyone try to make.

>>13017
>point
No, you made a statement, which I pointed out was factually inaccurate.

Let me guess, when fact checkers point out Romney/Ryan lies, you think they're making a dumb point too...

>>13018

You haven't showed anything to be factually inaccurate, only provided a statement of your own which is hilariously factually fecal itself, and verifiable by me, since I now both live in Canada and spend much time in these non expertly concealed clearcut forests. Where logging does take place, strict reforesting measures are implemented, because logging co's aren't fucking retarded as they were a hundred years ago, & still are in the US. Clearly you have never been to nor flown over any part of Canada & so much as looked out a fricken window. Put down the politics press trash and start using your brain.

Christ almighty... Canada doesn't value their natural resources because of a giant clear cutting conspiracy that no one notices because Canadians only observe the forest from their cars... Only on the Internet.

>>13023
>strict reforesting measures are implemented
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiga

"The main forestry practice in the boreal forest of Canada is clearcutting, which involves cutting down most of the trees in a given area, then replanting the forest as a monocrop (one species of tree) the following season."
"Industry officials claim that this process emulates the natural effects of a forest fire, which they claim clearcutting suppresses, protecting infrastructure, communities and roads. However, from an ecological perspective, this is a falsehood, for several reasons, including: a) Removing most of the trees in a given area is usually done using large machines which disrupt the soil greatly, and the dramatic diminution of ground cover permits large-scale erosion and avalanches, which further damage the habitat and sometimes endangers infrastructure, roads, and communities. b) Clearcutting removes most of the biomass from an area, and the various macro and micro-nutrients it contains. This sudden decrease in nutrients in an area contrasts with a forest fire, which returns most of the nutrients to the soil. c) Forest fires leave standing snags, and leave patches of unburned trees. This helps preserve structure and micro-habitats within the area, whereas clearcutting destroys most of these habitats."

maybe you need to rethink your smug superiority, the pointless shit your government is doing isn't any better than what anyone else in the world is doing

>>13026
Well some blurb on Wikipedia that's clearly not biased at all is all I needed to see.
Call me completely convinced.

>>13027
You know what they say: Reality has a liberal bias.