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Seven Fallen Feathers

Racism, Death, and Hard Truths in a Northern City
Community comment are the opinions of contributing users. These comment do not represent the opinions of West Vancouver Memorial Library.
Nov 30, 2018wyenotgo rated this title 3.5 out of 5 stars
This an important book. Well researched, earnest, passionate, well structured and timely. So, why only 3 1/2 stars? Simply because it paints a disturbing picture, raises our level of concern, perhaps makes us feel guilty or at least uncomfortable with a set of circumstances that most of us feel helpless to do anything about. In that respect, it's akin to the depressingly frequent news stories of mass shootings in the USA or the abuses of corrupt governments elsewhere. It's an indictment. But an indictment is just an administrative legal instrument; it may set the wheels in motion for some other administrative event to occur but it never solves anything. This book is all about symptoms and the futility of treating them. Neither anything in this book nor anything being done by the parties involved (the government, the AFN, the various bureaucracies or other well-intentioned interveners) has addressed the root causes. Symptoms of a dysfunctional system include: -- The cultural, social and economic dislocation faced by aboriginal teenagers shipped off to school in Thunder Bay -- the high secondary school dropout rate -- the high incidence of substance abuse and dependency -- the racist attitudes of local residents and the police -- nearly 40% of aboriginal children being in foster care All of the foregoing are symptoms arising from a series of bad decisions and a current system that is faulty and doomed to fail. The book fails to address root causes or offer any substantive solutions. The arrival of Europeans destroyed the economic basis for the survival of an indigenous population that had lived in harmony with their land for thousands of years. In Canada it began with the fur trade which grossly distorted the economic base of aboriginals by making them dependent on settlers and merchants for goods they has previously lived without and dependent on markets for what they produced. This was followed up by wholesale confiscation of resources and a deliberate campaign aimed at obliterating the culture, traditions, language, beliefs and family structures of aboriginals. As a result, much of the aboriginal population is now poverty stricken, dislocated and dependent on government financial and social support. They have been made clients of the state, a trap from which they cannot escape. The amount of economic support being provided for schools, housing, health care and social services is admittedly inadequate and inequitable. BUT NO AMOUNT OF MONEY WILL FIX THIS. And the errors of the past cannot be undone. The world that aboriginals inhabited and understood before Europeans arrived is gone forever. Any solution must focus on measures to remove aboriginals from economic and social dependency and restore cultural, social and family structures within the aboriginal community itself. Societies that are self-sufficient and in control of their own destinies will survive, adapt and eventually thrive. Those aboriginal communities that have been given opportunities to run their own enterprises, make their own administrative decisions, keep their children in their own families are thriving. Those are the models that need to be emulated. The process needs to begin with the abolition of the Indian Act and a wholesale settlement of land claims in a manner aimed at making aboriginal communities self-sufficient and self-governed. Ms. Talaga has defined the situation very well. It would be encouraging for this to be followed up with a sequel outlining a set of workable proposals to address the root causes and make the entire growing aboriginal population a successful, self-confident part of our country.