Well, this thread is pretty reflective of how I looked at this issue as a younger man.. but the truth is I had no exposure to the truth. I had only experienced the drunk/wasted homeless native stereotype on the train, read about bands resisting development in order to "get more", heard rumours about kids getting $20,000 cheques when they turned 18 just so they could go out and buy a truck and then crash it within 6 months.
I had also heard whispers about a people who lived a kind of life that had it connected deeply with Nature, but that way of life was dying...
Those things aren't truths - they are symptoms.. outcomes.
There are two things I think about when reading this thread.
First, regarding the comments on apartheid, there is a connection in that the South African apartheid system was modelled on the Canadian Reserve system. Interesting paper on it from the U of A can be found here:
http://ualberta.academia.edu/mariaca...tion_In_a_Word
So in some sense, it may be an intuitive leap that people are making... as one lead into the other, and if the essence of both systems are common, how different can they really be? I think we can all look at this and question the intent of the reserve system in our country and wonder how things aren't worse than they are.
The second is that as I get older, meet more people, see more things, get more experience with business (particularly development of major capital projects), get more exposure to law (specifically the protection of the right to own property - a fundamental component to our society), and develop emotionally/spiritually/metaphysically, the more my perspective on this issue changes.
I know many Natives that are enterprising, intelligent, fun, successful, great parents, and wonderful people. They are among my favourite people to work with, and spend time with and contemplate what life is about.
One young guy I am starting to get to know a bit better shed some interesting light on things for me. He was explaining his company and how he wants to build a small plant on his reserve to produce what he sells instead of buying it from the States. His family has been at it for YEARS because the reserve is still crown land and there is no clear/clean legal process to secure the development permits to do the construction they want to do. He went on to say maybe it is because it is an industrial process, but even a friend of his who wants to build a simple mixed use strip mall/condo development can't proceed for the same reasons. This was surprising to me... I had no idea.
The reserve system does give Natives some recongition on what was "theirs", and gives some small rights/ability to recover compensation for development, but its ineffective and seems like just enough to keep the rest of the world from saying its abuse. It reminds me of when an employer keeps shuffling a person around, marginalizing them until the employee gets so fed up they quit. Its like our government wants the Native population to "quit" - and it sure seems like it could be working.
I think there could be changes to the current systems in place that allowed Natives to become a bigger part of our culture and the conversation of day to day life. Quite honestly, there is a lot of philosophy and insight into who we are and what our place is in the Universe that Western Civilization could benefit from having integrated into our way of life but that's just my opinion.