Frequently I’ve tried to tell people like Gary McHale, and Bob Kismet that most aboriginal folk realise that 30million white folk aren’t about to up and take off back to Europe and give back all the land. From what I’ve learned through speaking to certain people… my personal opinion is that it’s not unreasonable for Aboriginal folk to want at the very least these few things:

1. Honour the original treaties;
2. Stop outside encroachment inside reserve lines;
3. Stop building upon sacred sites;
4. Stop encroachment upon traditional land use areas outside reserve lines.

The problem is that it goes on all the time. The picture above is a privately owned recreation resort called Anicinabe Park in Kenora. I drive past it every day to take my babies to daycare on Wauzhusk Onigum First Nation. It’s a glaring reminder of the continual injustice of what makes up most of Canada. Anicinabe Park has from time immemorial been part of those Nish’s traditional land use area. CLEARLY!

This picture above is a satellite shot of Wauzhusk Onigum First Nation. In the lower right corner, indicated in red is the label that clearly says ‘Kenora Indian Reserve 38B’.  In the top left indicated in red is Anicinabe Park.  The reserve is all the land in between mostly.  It is plainly easy to see by it’s approximate location to the reserve, and without any other evidence that it was part of Rat Portage’s TLUA.

There was a siege in 1974 which included some members of the American Indian Movement coming up from down south to help.

Race relations in Canada would start to get somewhat better of the Federal Government pulled its thumb out of its ass and stopped the three things I listed above.  The question is ‘Will it?’.  I doubt it – Canada has too much to lose.

Below is a satellite photo with part of the route drawn in green on the route I drive my children to daycare on Wauzhusk Onigum First Nation (mostly called Rat Portage). The red line marks the location of the reserve line (give or take ten-twenty feet). The route shown in green is public land.

One morning about four weeks ago I was driving my children to daycare and got to the point where the blue roads begin. The City of Kenora had spent the night sanding the roads in Kenora and had come down the green road to where the blue roads begin and sanded all the blue roads. They didn’t even bother sanding the road to the reserve line.

Considering the part of the road they missed is nearly twice longer than the blue road parts they sanded, it smacked of racial bias that the City would sand those meager blue roads and completely ignore the green road right up till the reserve line. You can bet your life on it if 1000 white folk lived in a housing enclave just beyond the red line, the City would have sanded all down the road and then some.

No doubt someone will have some load of crap excusing the City’s blatant racially biased action and call it an oversight or some nonsense – but I just don’t see how you can overlook half a mile of road that is used twenty times as much as the blue roads.

It was just another reminder of the main reason why I think Canada sucks and needs a whole lot of fixing.