Canada commits "genocide"

[mr friendly guy]

As reported by Russia Today

Canada guilty of decades-long 'race-based genocide' against indigenous people – inquiry
Published time: 4 Jun, 2019 03:08
Edited time: 4 Jun, 2019 16:44

Canada guilty of decades-long 'race-based genocide' against indigenous people – inquiry
Published time: 4 Jun, 2019 03:08
Edited time: 4 Jun, 2019 16:44

"The genocide has been empowered by colonial structures evidenced notably by the Indian Act (a controversial 1876 law regulating indigenous people's reserves in Canada), the Sixties Scoop (a 40-year-old policy of taking indigenous or mixed-race children from parents to be adopted by white families, discontinued in the late 1980s), residential schools, and breaches of human and Inuit, Metis and First Nations rights, leading directly to the current increased rates of violence, death, and suicide in Indigenous population," the report says.

READ MORE: Canada’s Trudeau asks Pope to apologize for Catholic Church’s abuse of indigenous children

It draws on testimony from 468 family members and survivors of violence against the targeted groups, as well as the insight of expert witnesses, tribal elders and officials. It took 24 hearings to compile the paper.

The report repeatedly refers to the Canadian government turning a blind eye to the plight of indigenous people as amounting to "race-based genocide." Arguing for using the bold term, the authors note that "genocide is the sum of the social practices, assumptions and actions" that had enabled it.

As the paper was presented to the government on Monday, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau admitted that "the hard truth" is that successive Canadian governments "have failed" indigenous people and promised to outline a "national action plan" to tackle the violence.

He still skirted around actually using the word 'genocide', which didn't escape the attention of some of the local media, but other ministers brushed off the criticism, with Justice Minister David Lametti saying that it was matter for scholars to decide whether the term is appropriate.

'It's almost like #MeToo, but worse'
The government needs to step up its efforts to cover the basic needs of people living in Indian reserves, Audrey Huntley, co-founder of 'No More Silence,' a Toronto-based organization gathering names of missing and murdered indigenous women, told RT.

"The reserves are underfunded, there is like chronic lack of housing, there is no safe drinking water," she said. She pointed out that the authors of the report, by their own admission, fall short of identifying all the victims of the 'genocide.'

"There is a whole bunch of really problematic criminal activity as regards to indigenous women and girls and unaddressed for all of these decades," Pamela Palmater, chair in Indigenous Governance, Ryerson university, told RT.

She said that Canadian public and the international community should put political pressure on Ottawa to "do something and to actually investigate state actors who are complicit or directly involved in the murders, exploitation and disappearances of indigenous women and girls."

The way the rampant violence against indigenous people had been ignored for decades is akin to the situation with women, she said.

"It's almost like the #MeToo movement when women have not been believed when they were raped or sexually assaulted. For indigenous women and girls it had been even worse."

According to Royal Canadian Mounted Police estimates back in 2014, over 1,000 aboriginal women were killed between 1980 and 2012.

I didn't know this about Canada. Hopefully some Canadians can give insight.

[The Romulan Republic]

1. RT is a worthless source, no better than Fox or Brietbart (with which it has much in common), and I guarantee that they are printing this only because its a chance to make a Western nation look bad, and that if it was Russia or a Russian ally committing genocide there'd be nary a peep from them, except perhaps to say that the allegations were Western propaganda or a false flag operation. You could have found any number of other sources to report on this (this is not an obscure story or one that's being ignored by the "mainstream media", at least here in Canada), and yet you chose to use this one, which no one who is familiar with RT will take seriously unless, like me, they've heard about it from another source.

That said, broken clocks are right twice a day, and this is a credible, very serious allegation, so let's treat it as such:

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/trudea ... -1.5161681

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says his government accepts that the murders and disappearances of Indigenous women and girls across Canada in recent decades amount to an act of "genocide."

The national inquiry into missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls found that Indigenous women and girls are 12 times more likely to be murdered or to go missing than members of any other demographic group in Canada — and 16 times more likely to be slain or to disappear than white women. The inquiry report described the deaths and disappearances as "genocide."

Trudeau didn't use the term during his speech at the inquiry's closing ceremony on Monday — but took a step further today.

"We accept their findings, including that what happened amounts to genocide," he told a crowd in Vancouver Tuesday.

"There are many debates ongoing around words and use of words. Our focus as a country, as leaders, as citizens must be on the steps we take to put an end to this situation."

The 1,200 page report, delivered to the federal government in a nearly four-hour ceremony in Gatineau, Que. on Monday, included 231 recommendations for government, lawyers and police to address the levels of violence endured by Indigenous women and girls and 2SLGBTQQIA (two-spirit, lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, questioning, intersex and asexual) people.

Using research from Statistics Canada, the report said Indigenous women and girls made up almost 25 per cent of all female homicide victims in this country between 2001 and 2015.

"This report is about deliberate race, identity and gender-based genocide," said Marion Buller, chief commissioner of the inquiry, during Monday's ceremony.

Trudeau's comments are a departure from his response the night before, when he attributed the "genocide" description to the report's authors.

"The national inquiry formally presented their final report, in which they found that the tragic violence that Indigenous women and girls have experienced amounts to genocide," he said Monday.

'Is that an act of genocide? Is it?'

The use of "genocide" to describe the violence facing Indigenous women and girls has been debated heatedly since news of the report broke late last week.

Retired Lt.-Gen. Roméo Dallaire, who oversaw the 1994 UN mission in Rwanda that failed to prevent that country's genocide, questioned the use of the word.

"Is that an act of genocide? Is it?" Dallaire said, adding he has "a problem" with how the inquiry used the word.

"My definition of genocide, I read it very deliberately at the start of the Rwandan genocide, and it was a deliberate act of a government to exterminate deliberately, and by force and directly, an ethnicity or a group or an entity of human beings."

The former senator did say he feels that Canadians, especially politicians, have responded ineptly to the needs of Indigenous women and girls.

"That is scandalous and that is unacceptable in a country that has a Charter and believes that all humans are human," Dallaire said.

Human rights lawyer and former attorney general Irwin Cotler also suggested the inquiry's use of the word genocide was inappropriate.

"Perhaps they had to use a term like genocide in order to sound the alarm and people will take notice and finally action will result," Cotler said Monday.

"But I think we have to guard against using that term in too many ways, because then it will cease to have the singular importance and horror that it warrants."

Trudeau's comments followed a commitment today to spend $1.4 billion starting in 2023 to advance the health and rights of women around the world.

He was speaking at the Women Deliver 2019 conference in Vancouver, where he told the audience the money would make Canada a global leader in funding sexual and reproductive health rights.

First of all, the numbers speak for themselves. There is clearly something fundamentally evil about how First Nations' People, especially women and girls, are commonly treated in Canada, because those death rates do not happen by accident or coincidence, and they sure as fuck don't happen because the victims deserve it. That should go without saying.

Secondly, many people have and will disagree with the use of the term genocide. Many of them will be the usual Alt. Reich suspects, stoking white male resentment and fear-mongering about an "SJW/feminist war on white men". But not all of them will be. The term "genocide" for most people invokes something like the Holocaust, or (as noted above) the Rwandan genocide- a systematic extermination by the state. And I don't think that there's a credible argument that the Canadian government is deliberately seeking the extermination of First Nations people, though they have clearly not done remotely enough to address the crisis. Perhaps we as a society need to embrace a broader understanding of the term "genocide", but I understand that some people may fear that it is being overused, or even cheapened. I'll even admit, to my shame, that that was my first response upon reading about this report.

However, what term we use is far less important than the atrocious suffering and loss of life which is occurring, which is affecting one group of people in particular, based on race. What matters most is taking decisive action, now.

Trudeau has used the term "genocide". Alright. In that case, this issue must be from now on the foremost priority of his government, overshadowing all others. Because if there is a genocide happening in your country, you recognize that reality, and you do nothing to prevent it, you are directly culpable in it. Trudeau must make this the number one priority of his administration, or else he is simply using the term for political gain, while allowing the killing to continue.

[K. A. Pital]

You have to admit that for so many women to disappear without a trace, a high level of police culpability is required. Cases closed, perps not followed or investigated, cases going cold. Racism allowed it to happen.

Western settler states are racist constructs built on genocide, extermination of the locals. So this does not surprise me (in fact, I have known about this issue before the current news - but as many other things, the facts are taking decades to come to light).

[The Romulan Republic]

You have to admit that for so many women to disappear without a trace, a high level of police culpability is required. Cases closed, perps not followed or investigated, cases going cold. Racism allowed it to happen.

I don't deny it. There does not have to be an official policy of extermination for many police officers to turn a blind eye, or even be guilty themselves (misogyny, of course, is also doubtless a factor).

Western settler states are racist constructs built on genocide, extermination of the locals. So this does not surprise me (in fact, I have known about this issue before the current news - but as many other things, the facts are taking decades to come to light).

What would you propose be done to rectify the situation (short of disolving the nation and handing over all territory and government to the First Nations, because that can't happen). I'm not being facetious- I genuinely want to know.

[mr friendly guy]

1. RT is a worthless source, no better than Fox or Brietbart (with which it has much in common), and I guarantee that they are printing this only because its a chance to make a Western nation look bad, and that if it was Russia or a Russian ally committing genocide there'd be nary a peep from them, except perhaps to say that the allegations were Western propaganda or a false flag operation. You could have found any number of other sources to report on this (this is not an obscure story or one that's being ignored by the "mainstream media", at least here in Canada), and yet you chose to use this one, which no one who is familiar with RT will take seriously unless, like me, they've heard about it from another source.

1. Your link didn't turn up on the first page of my google search when I typed "race based genocide canada,", so I suspect google's algorithm works by sensing our geolocation. The first 3 links (aside from journal articles or organisations I haven't heard of, ie NOT big news sites) were Broadcasting Bullshit Corporation, WaPo and RT. I refuse to post a link from Broadcasting Bullshit Corporation if I can help it. I would rather use Putin's mouthpiece than that. Frankly, there are some aspects of RT reporting that is superior to Broadcasting Bullshit Corporation's.

2. Of course they're posting it to make the West look bad. Western media does the same thing to its geopolitical rivals. The trick is, following the source. Since they are quoting a Canadian government report, if in doubt trace the original source before making a conclusion. Or people could do what you did, find another outlet and see who agrees with whom and in regards to what they agreed on.

[K. A. Pital]

What would you propose be done to rectify the situation (short of disolving the nation and handing over all territory and government to the First Nations, because that can't happen). I'm not being facetious- I genuinely want to know.

Try treating people with dignity regardless of their race on a state level? Remove racist police. Rehaul the state. Make sure citizens are equal regardless of skin color and origins...

[The Romulan Republic]

What would you propose be done to rectify the situation (short of disolving the nation and handing over all territory and government to the First Nations, because that can't happen). I'm not being facetious- I genuinely want to know.

Try treating people with dignity regardless of their race on a state level? Remove racist police. Rehaul the state. Make sure citizens are equal regardless of skin color and origins...

Of course. But those are broad goals/principles (with which I thoroughly agree), rather than detailed policy.

For example, you mention equality- how is that best achieved? By trying to integrate First Nations peoples more into existing Canadian society, or by granting greater autonomy to the First Nations as sovereign states? That's a very thorny question here, especially since existing treaties (flawed as they are) do grant First Nations a degree of sovereignty/autonomy, and we are legally bound to uphold those treaties (an obligation I fully believe we should uphold, though I would also support renegotiating those treaties if all parties involved agreed to do so).

Edit: That said, my starting point would be to listen to the First Nations, and to give them what the majority of their people feel is in their best interests, provided doing so does not violate Canadian or international law. That is our obligation to them, rather than repeating the White Man's Burden and trying to tell them what is best for them.

[Wicked Pilot]

This has been widely reported on here in Washington State too as the problem doesn't stop at the border.

[Solauren]

Part of the problem is the locales lot of the disappearances happen in are isolated.
I'm referring to the girls that have disappeared from highways and the like.

My family drove up to Timmins once, from Toronto. (This is in Ontario). There were big stretches of highway where we did not see any vehicles for miles and miles. Other times, the only vehicles we saw were big transport trucks.

(On that note, one night on the way back, we stopped by the side of the road for a rest break, and my Dad had to stand by the front of the car holding a cup of coffee to keep the truckers from stopping to offer help. Those rigs are a pain in the ass to get going again).

In isolated conditions, it would be very easy for someone to pick up a hitchhiker, and then 'disappear them'. And alot of first-nations settlements only connection to the rest of the world are those isolated routes. I am told this is especially true in British Columbia. (Never having been there, I can't speak to experience on it.)

The obvious answer to this particular aspect of this, is increased patrols and monitoring of those isolated areas. i.e Photo-radar, free emergency phones on the road, that sort of thing. Problem is, no one wants to pay for it.

Please note: I'm just pointing one one of the logistical situations that contributed to it. Even if the underlaying, impleded, and associates social issues were dealt with, this problem would also still exist.

[Straha]

Hell of a thing to put genocide in scare quotes like that...

[mr friendly guy]

Hell of a thing to put genocide in scare quotes like that...

The Canadian prime minister used that term, so naturally I put quotes around the word.

[Broomstick]

Secondly, many people have and will disagree with the use of the term genocide. Many of them will be the usual Alt. Reich suspects, stoking white male resentment and fear-mongering about an "SJW/feminist war on white men". But not all of them will be. The term "genocide" for most people invokes something like the Holocaust, or (as noted above) the Rwandan genocide- a systematic extermination by the state. And I don't think that there's a credible argument that the Canadian government is deliberately seeking the extermination of First Nations people, though they have clearly not done remotely enough to address the crisis. Perhaps we as a society need to embrace a broader understanding of the term "genocide", but I understand that some people may fear that it is being overused, or even cheapened. I'll even admit, to my shame, that that was my first response upon reading about this report.

Personally, I distinguish between active genocide, where the massacres are deliberate and/or some sort of explicit national policy (such as the WWII Holocaust and the Rawandan genocide, to name just two) and passive genocide where the massive death is not something pre-meditated, deliberate, or policy but which nonetheless results from a confluence of forces.

Not sure if we can get that to catch on or not. And there are certainly cases where one could argue there is an overlap.

[The Romulan Republic]

Secondly, many people have and will disagree with the use of the term genocide. Many of them will be the usual Alt. Reich suspects, stoking white male resentment and fear-mongering about an "SJW/feminist war on white men". But not all of them will be. The term "genocide" for most people invokes something like the Holocaust, or (as noted above) the Rwandan genocide- a systematic extermination by the state. And I don't think that there's a credible argument that the Canadian government is deliberately seeking the extermination of First Nations people, though they have clearly not done remotely enough to address the crisis. Perhaps we as a society need to embrace a broader understanding of the term "genocide", but I understand that some people may fear that it is being overused, or even cheapened. I'll even admit, to my shame, that that was my first response upon reading about this report.

Personally, I distinguish between active genocide, where the massacres are deliberate and/or some sort of explicit national policy (such as the WWII Holocaust and the Rawandan genocide, to name just two) and passive genocide where the massive death is not something pre-meditated, deliberate, or policy but which nonetheless results from a confluence of forces.

Not sure if we can get that to catch on or not. And there are certainly cases where one could argue there is an overlap.

By the latter definition, Republican health care policy is also genocide, to give just one example.

[Gandalf]

Personally, I distinguish between active genocide, where the massacres are deliberate and/or some sort of explicit national policy (such as the WWII Holocaust and the Rawandan genocide, to name just two) and passive genocide where the massive death is not something pre-meditated, deliberate, or policy but which nonetheless results from a confluence of forces.

Not sure if we can get that to catch on or not. And there are certainly cases where one could argue there is an overlap.

As someone on the bad end of what you would call a "passive genocide," I don't know if I would ever want that to catch on. It reads like an attempt for privileged people to get away from any responsibility for events within their own control.

[Broomstick]

Personally, I distinguish between active genocide, where the massacres are deliberate and/or some sort of explicit national policy (such as the WWII Holocaust and the Rawandan genocide, to name just two) and passive genocide where the massive death is not something pre-meditated, deliberate, or policy but which nonetheless results from a confluence of forces.

Not sure if we can get that to catch on or not. And there are certainly cases where one could argue there is an overlap.

By the latter definition, Republican health care policy is also genocide, to give just one example.

Yes.

As someone on the bad end of what you would call a "passive genocide," I don't know if I would ever want that to catch on. It reads like an attempt for privileged people to get away from any responsibility for events within their own control.

Hmmm... yes, I see your point.

With me, whether or not the bad effects are intentional or not they still need to be remedied. You are correct that some would see it as a way to evade responsibility.

[Gandalf]

Indeed. When a conquering power subjugates people, their welfare is on the conqueror.