#racial projects

[professormiitomo-blog]

[yourgothmom]

For those of you who think Canada is this lovely place full of nice people and happy moose and whatever:

Remember that we have (not had, but present tense have) a law in effect called the Indian Act which (in the long and short of it) controls the lives of those with Native Status.

I say those with Native Status because those who had gone through Residential Schooling were effectively whitewashed, and are no longer legally considered Native. At least those who survived through the Residential Schools, which was a very few of them. 100% of the students were malnourished, they were raped, abused, enslaved, demoralized, dehumanized, and so on. In essence, these schools were a form of mass genocide inflicted by the Canadian Government so the European immigrants (read: colonizers) could assume land rights.

"But what about modern instances of awfulness, Tabitha?" Well, I guess if you want something more recent than 1996 (when the last residential school was closed, a mere 17 years ago) we could talk about the Grand River land dispute in which the Canadian Government assumed Six Nation land which they were granted to borrow in a treaty, and built highways upon that land... that the Six Nation legally owns... but the Government has effectively stolen now. This dispute has been ongoing since 2006.

"What about an example which isn't about Natives!"

Sure: Anti Terrorist Act which states that people suspected of terrorism are legally allowed to be detained without due process. This act led to the prosecution of countless brown people. The act holds provisions for secret trials, preemptive detention, and expansive security and surveillance. Only some of the provisions have expired (circa 2007), and following the Boston Bombings, the act to reinstate these provisions passed on May 13, 2013. This year. This is a clear racial project, since most (if not all) of the people detained under this act were racially profiled.

Not to mention the clear wage differences between the races and sexes. We might not have had (as many) black slaves, but Canada is just as much of a shithole as anywhere else.