Now, I'm NOT trying to trivialize the concerns behind some of the efforts;
but I guess it seems more appropriate to view them as something local rather
than something global. As for our own concerns? Well, I know for a fact that
a much more pressing native issue with US ramifications concerns Hydro Quebec's
Great Whale project, which will be flooding huge amount of the James Bay region
now being used (& as far back as anyone can tell) by Inuit and Cree people; a
project whose whole viability turns upon a US energy market (esp NY); a project
whose political motivation seems largely to underwrite Quebec's solvency should
it decided to go it alone. This has people LOTS more excited than the US
Columbus Day stuff (500 yrs or no).
Or, we're far more concerned about recent constitutional proposals put together
which offer to entrench aboriginal rights to self-government, but on terms which
the Assembly of First Nations (according to Ovid Mercredi) find unacceptable;
and which Metis apparently find attractive. This is something we find far more
important.
Or, the questions concerning the future of native people in Quebec -- should
Quebec separate, as now seems pretty plausible. Governmentally, such things
have always been under federal jurisdiction, one not benevolent, to be sure,
but with far better hopes for the future than what we can expect from a Quebec
unfettered from federal contraints and Canadian public opinion.
So, you see, it shouldn't be too hard to understand the detachment with which
the adrenalin and urgency surrounding the 500th anniversary celebrations is
viewed; and I would be very much surprised if my native countrymen (who have so
far not said much about this in public) were very much exercised over the US
celebrations.
I guess I'm just wanting to draw attention -- once more -- to the essentially
_American_ character of the thing, and wishing to remind friends down there --
once again -- that American issues are not global ones.
Dan Jorgensen
Oh yeah, a post-script on the north of the border sense(s) of things.
I guess it seems somehow typical that the assumption would or should be
that Americans (both for and against the Columbus Day stuff) would just
expect the rest of the hemisphere to want to get involved in all this
stuff, to take sides on the issue of US celebrations, to seize the
opportunity for an ideological stand -- about a US event. And I guess
it is also typical that while all this fire and smoke (pomp & circumstance,
vitriol and rage) is going on, it wouldn't occur to us north of the border
to expect Americans to care about what goes down on the Canadian scene,
though what may be at stake could determine the constitutional -- and there-
fore logal and political status -- of Canadian native people for as far as
we can imagine a future.
You see, neither on this side nor your side of the border is it expected
that Americans know about or care about Canadian issues [who us? no, it's
not really that important] but it IS true on both your side and our side
that we are expected to take American concerns seriously. Even when it's
a matter of defining constitutional law on one side and partying [or party-
pooping] on the other. And the funny thing is that this doesn't seem to
change very much if it's native concerns that we're talking about....
Dan