Most Canadians say Canada is Broken

[taxme]

On 12/10/2019 at 9:38 AM, marcus said:

The First Nations could say the same thing about the white people who moved to this land. 

As a white person, I am certain that you're in the minority. This is how the world has been working since the beginning of our time. Human migration is natural. Even the First Nations migrated to this land thousands of years ago, through the north and Alaska, when modern day Russia was connected to what is now Alaska. More recently, the Italians, the Irish and the Jews, Indians and the Chinese were subject to discrimination as the mostly British settlers didn't see them as the same as them. 

Don't be afraid of the coloured people.

It's normal for big urban centres to attract people from all over the world. Everywhere from London to Paris to Berlin to New York, to LA to San Fran, to Toronto to Vancouver. It's normal and it shouldn't be scary.

You have two options:

1) Embrace it and take the good from the other cultures. 

2) Move to Maple Ridge

The Harper government had the exact same immigration policy as what Trudeau has now.

I feel like you don't have real experience with others. You can't see beyond their colour and language. I hang out with people from a mix of ethnic groups. Our basic thoughts, desires and beliefs are very much the same. Beyond that, I learn and experience from their culture and I'm sure they from me. Not to mention that some of them, despite them being a different colour, are probably more "white" than some of my white friends. Because they have been here for many generations and have grown up in smaller towns before moving to Vancouver.

I need to ask you this question. In your opinion, are the native Indians in Canada better off today thanks to the British/Europeans coming to Canada, and bringing them into the modern world of the time? Do you think that the native Indians in Canada today would want to go back to the good old days of living in tents with none of the modern conveniences that they enjoy today like running water, central heating, and electricity to run their TV's and appliances that they now use every day, and not to forget the toys that they drive and ride around in and on? Any comments on what I am asking you above? Just asking. 

[marcus]

On 12/14/2019 at 2:16 PM, taxme said:

I need to ask you this question. In your opinion, are the native Indians in Canada better off today thanks to the British/Europeans coming to Canada, and bringing them into the modern world of the time? Do you think that the native Indians in Canada today would want to go back to the good old days of living in tents with none of the modern conveniences that they enjoy today like running water, central heating, and electricity to run their TV's and appliances that they now use every day, and not to forget the toys that they drive and ride around in and on? Any comments on what I am asking you above? Just asking. 

Are you not aware of what the natives have gone through the last few centuries due to the European colonization? Everything from the killings, maiming, rape, diseases, land theft, residential schools and etc?

[taxme]

18 hours ago, marcus said:

Are you not aware of what the natives have gone through the last few centuries due to the European colonization? Everything from the killings, maiming, rape, diseases, land theft, residential schools and etc?

Of course I am aware of what went on against the native Indians in the past. But that was not the question I asked of you? Why are you not replying to my question but appear to be trying to avoid the question? Look, there is something you need to learn and know about here. "There is an old saying and it goes like this. "To the victor goes the spoils". One wins the war, the other one loses the war and the losers are subject to whatever the victor wants to do to them. That is how things work out in life. The victor does not hand back what they just won.  

It was the British and some other European people who discovered North America and conquered it, and there is nothing that can be done about that now. When they came here, native Indians were not living all that great of life like they are living today thanks to those British/European discoverers of North America. And one thing the British/European people did when they discovered and conquered North America was to stop the native Indians from killing each other. You must be happy about that, right?  A saving grace for the native Indians. Peace at last.

If the founders of this country all left North America and gave it all back to the Indians tomorrow, do you not think that the Indians would not revert back to the good old days of doing harm to one another? The native Indians of today should be dam grateful that the British/European people came to North America. There were many good intentions meant by those founders to try and make life more livable for the native Indians of that day. They stopped the killings. They tried to educate the natives. 

The problem with people like you today is that you refuse to try and forget about the past. It seems like the British/European people of today always need to be constantly reminded of what went on in the past by those founders way back when. I had nothing to do with it. Got it? Do you ever see me crying about what the Romans did to my ancestors when they invaded the British Isles? NOPE. It's all in the past and I am happy to leave it there. Keep the history part of it but do not use it as an excuse to try and make everyone feel like you have and still are the victim of some past historical event which the native Indians keep trying to do every day.   So, are you going to answer my question or not? The floor is yours. 

[marcus]

21 hours ago, taxme said:

Of course I am aware of what went on against the native Indians in the past. But that was not the question I asked of you? Why are you not replying to my question but appear to be trying to avoid the question? Look, there is something you need to learn and know about here. "There is an old saying and it goes like this. "To the victor goes the spoils". One wins the war, the other one loses the war and the losers are subject to whatever the victor wants to do to them. That is how things work out in life. The victor does not hand back what they just won.  

Your question:

In your opinion, are the native Indians in Canada better off today thanks to the British/Europeans coming to Canada, and bringing them into the modern world of the time? 

Moot point. Everyone's life today is better today than it was in the past. Gun powder may have been an advancement, but in many other aspects, I disagree that the European settlers brought many benefits to their lives. They brought the opposite.

21 hours ago, taxme said:

It was the British and some other European people who discovered North America and conquered it, and there is nothing that can be done about that now. When they came here, native Indians were not living all that great of life like they are living today thanks to those British/European discoverers of North America. And one thing the British/European people did when they discovered and conquered North America was to stop the native Indians from killing each other. You must be happy about that, right?  A saving grace for the native Indians. Peace at last.

They weren't living great? According to who? 

You are comparing their living conditions then, to today? Like life pauses for everyone? Life wasn't great for the European settlers compared to today. This is a ridiculous argument to make.

21 hours ago, taxme said:

If the founders of this country all left North America and gave it all back to the Indians tomorrow, do you not think that the Indians would not revert back to the good old days of doing harm to one another? The native Indians of today should be dam grateful that the British/European people came to North America. There were many good intentions meant by those founders to try and make life more livable for the native Indians of that day. They stopped the killings. They tried to educate the natives. 

It sounds like that your understanding of the North Americans natives is really lacking. The John Wayne western movies don't really represent what their lives were like. You need to be educated in this regard.

21 hours ago, taxme said:

The problem with people like you today is that you refuse to try and forget about the past. It seems like the British/European people of today always need to be constantly reminded of what went on in the past by those founders way back when. I had nothing to do with it. Got it? Do you ever see me crying about what the Romans did to my ancestors when they invaded the British Isles? NOPE. It's all in the past and I am happy to leave it there. Keep the history part of it but do not use it as an excuse to try and make everyone feel like you have and still are the victim of some past historical event which the native Indians keep trying to do every day.   So, are you going to answer my question or not? The floor is yours. 

Because what happened in the past continues to affect the people today. 

It's like asking a person who was severely raped and abused as a child to get it together. You obviously have no understanding of what the European settlers did to the people and the generational effect it has on the people.

[dialamah]

On 12/14/2019 at 2:16 PM, taxme said:

In your opinion, are the native Indians in Canada better off today thanks to the British/Europeans coming to Canada, and bringing them into the modern world of the time?

Before the British/Europeans arrived, the Indigenuous people did not suffer from alcoholism, did not suffer family division, were not decimated by smallpox or suicide, were allowed to speak their own language and practice their customs, were allowed to roam the land freely.  All of that changed with White settlers; their families were destroyed, their way of life destroyed, they were herded on to small and poor plots of land, and forbidden from leaving without permission from the Indian agent.  Up until the 60s, they could not freely leave to work off-reserve, or to attend university.  So, do you think they were "better off"?

When you say "better off", I suspect you are talking about material things ' houses, cars, a better "standard of living".  But Indigenuous people have not been the recipients of a "better standard of living" in exchange for the loss of culture, language and family.  Given that these people lived successfully here for thousands of years before Europeans arrived, I'd venture to say they are worse off than they would have been without us.

But tell me, if Muslims promised you a higher standard of living, a longer and healthier life, would you be willing to embrace Islam in exchange for losing your culture, your language and your family?  Because if not, why would you think that's acceptable for First Nations?  

[taxme]

3 hours ago, marcus said:

Your question:

In your opinion, are the native Indians in Canada better off today thanks to the British/Europeans coming to Canada, and bringing them into the modern world of the time? 

Moot point. Everyone's life today is better today than it was in the past. Gun powder may have been an advancement, but in many other aspects, I disagree that the European settlers brought many benefits to their lives. They brought the opposite.

They weren't living great? According to who? 

You are comparing their living conditions then, to today? Like life pauses for everyone? Life wasn't great for the European settlers compared to today. This is a ridiculous argument to make.

It sounds like that your understanding of the North Americans natives is really lacking. The John Wayne western movies don't really represent what their lives were like. You need to be educated in this regard.

Because what happened in the past continues to affect the people today. 

It's like asking a person who was severely raped and abused as a child to get it together. You obviously have no understanding of what the European settlers did to the people and the generational effect it has on the people.

1. I will answer the question for you. Yes indeed, the native Indians are dam well better of today then what they were before the British/European founders came to North America. They would not have all of the toys and the many other things that the British/European people invented and created to make all of our lives better. Indians today in Canada appear to now have to be involved in every program or project that goes on in Canada today. Every time we see a meeting of premiers or the PM there is always some Indian people in the meeting and banging away on their tom-toms. They are not being left out of anything anymore. The British/European people of today pretty much need their blessing to get things done. Open your eyes. Gun powder was an invention of the Chinese, and because of that everybody has benefitted. 

2. Compared to how the Indians lived two to three hundred years ago, yes indeed they are living a lot better today than they did before the British/Europeans came along. And that is a fact whether you like it or not. I am not going to feel guilty for what other British/European did to the native Indians in the past. I have no white guilt over it. Maybe you like to grovel for forgiveness, but not this guy. Everybody living in the world today has it better than they did hundreds of years ago. 

3. What is there to understand? They lived the way they did in those times but are far better off today than the way they were living centuries ago. They had no initiative or involvement in trying to make their lives better. It took the Founders of North America to try and make their lives great. The native Indians need to get over their constant playing the victim all the time and get on with life. The British/European people are here. Let's just try to forget the past and get on with life. The Indians need to stop trying to remind me of what some other people did to them centuries ago. And you need to also. 

4. What happened in the past should not be constantly be brought up. I am fed up with their whining and crying about their always being the victim. We are all victims in one way or another. I am a victim of Chief Spreading Bull and his merry band of lefty liberal globalist ilk. I want my victim cries to be heard, and I want to see my day of reconciliation come. 

5. Being raped and abused is something hard for anyone who was to try and forget about the incident in their life time. And it still happens today. But the Indians of today are not the same victims of the tragedies that happened to their ancestors in the past. But yet they still act and talk like they are being "raped and abused" by the British/European people of today every day. They have been compensated with hundreds of billions of taxpayer's tax dollars to try and make amends, but yet it just does not seem to be enough for them. They still want more free money. I say bull chit to that. No more money. Go work for a living or go live in the bush and dry up. Enough already. All just my own opinion of course. Works for me. 

Canada is broken and I am of the opinion that with another four more years of this present day prime mistake of ours, Canada as we once knew it will soon be gone. It's not too late to try and fix the break, but we do not have much time left to do so. Globalist Trudeau is all our problem. He is trying to break Canada one day at a time, and he appears to be succeeding. 

Edited December 19, 2019 by taxme

[taxme]

2 hours ago, dialamah said:

Before the British/Europeans arrived, the Indigenuous people did not suffer from alcoholism, did not suffer family division, were not decimated by smallpox or suicide, were allowed to speak their own language and practice their customs, were allowed to roam the land freely.  All of that changed with White settlers; their families were destroyed, their way of life destroyed, they were herded on to small and poor plots of land, and forbidden from leaving without permission from the Indian agent.  Up until the 60s, they could not freely leave to work off-reserve, or to attend university.  So, do you think they were "better off"?

When you say "better off", I suspect you are talking about material things ' houses, cars, a better "standard of living".  But Indigenuous people have not been the recipients of a "better standard of living" in exchange for the loss of culture, language and family.  Given that these people lived successfully here for thousands of years before Europeans arrived, I'd venture to say they are worse off than they would have been without us.

But tell me, if Muslims promised you a higher standard of living, a longer and healthier life, would you be willing to embrace Islam in exchange for losing your culture, your language and your family?  Because if not, why would you think that's acceptable for First Nations?  

1. There are still people like you around that cannot stop bringing up the past, and want to continue to make all white people of today feel guilty as hell for what other white people did in the past. I am offended by this constant reminder of what some other white people did to the Indians, and still try and blame me for their native problems. The white people of today had nothing to do with what went on way back when. But yet we still are, and I say enough already. The guilt ridden bleeding heart white people of today needs to get over their white guilt feelings, and they need to stop allowing themselves to be seen as guilty for what happened in the past. I do not. I am trying to look forward to the future, not worry about the past. Git it? 

2.The Indians have been compensated in the hundreds of billions of taxpayer tax dollars for decades now, and those native Indians should all be multimillionaires if they had handled all the tax dollars properly that was given too them. But they did not. They still stuck with booze and drugs, and who knows what else they did with those tax dollars. They did not have too, but they did. That is not my problem, it's their problem. If the government would give me a million tax dollars to try and better my life I would have jumped on the chance. But most native Indians did not. They just went and mostly blew all those tax dollar on no doubt many foolish things. My tax dollars at work. Thanks. 

3. The native Indians are better off today. But they refuse to do anything to try and help themselves. Not all do but many have. The native Indians of today are not the victims of the past. It is the white people that appear to be the victims now. They are always being told just how bad they were and still are. What a bunch of crock that so many white people keep eating up like candy. Their own success was that they somehow managed to stay alive and survive and not all go extinct. 

4. There is only one answer for this question that needs to be asked. Take a poll of all the native Indians in Canada, and see if they feel that they are better off today then what their ancestors were centuries ago before the white man/woman came along, and made their lives so miserable. As if all white people lives were not miserable. It bloody well was just as bad for many white people as for Indians in the past. But we won't mention anything about that at all. And if they feel that things were better back then, then okay. There will be no more tax dollar handouts, and seeing that you already have plenty of land of your own to live on, then head on and go back to the good old days, and stop trying to live like white people do today. You stay on your reserves, and the Indians can stay off our white reserves. They are now free to do so. My answer is that they will not go for it. I know that it is very politically incorrect to speak like this, but that is just politically incorrect me. I just can't help myself. I refuse to kneel down before the sacred cow called political correctness. Works for me. 

5. I already live a longer life and healthier lifestyle, and do have a high standard of living, and so I do not need to become and embrace the Muslim religion at all. Why would anyone in their right infidel mind would want to join an archaic tenth century religion like Islam anyway, and lose their own culture and traditions anyway? Islam has nothing to offer the British/European people of the world except a whole bag of religious misery. I do not see very many native Indians or white people running to join the Muslims. Do you?  

Canada is broken and fast becoming unhinged because we are paying too much attention to the past, keep apologizing to everyone who has been wrong done by in the past or keep trying to change the makeup and culture and traditions of Canada to please incompatible foreign cultures. That is a great way to break up any country. Deplorable. 

[Zeitgeist]

10 hours ago, dialamah said:

Before the British/Europeans arrived, the Indigenuous people did not suffer from alcoholism, did not suffer family division, were not decimated by smallpox or suicide, were allowed to speak their own language and practice their customs, were allowed to roam the land freely.  All of that changed with White settlers; their families were destroyed, their way of life destroyed, they were herded on to small and poor plots of land, and forbidden from leaving without permission from the Indian agent.  Up until the 60s, they could not freely leave to work off-reserve, or to attend university.  So, do you think they were "better off"?

When you say "better off", I suspect you are talking about material things ' houses, cars, a better "standard of living".  But Indigenuous people have not been the recipients of a "better standard of living" in exchange for the loss of culture, language and family.  Given that these people lived successfully here for thousands of years before Europeans arrived, I'd venture to say they are worse off than they would have been without us.

But tell me, if Muslims promised you a higher standard of living, a longer and healthier life, would you be willing to embrace Islam in exchange for losing your culture, your language and your family?  Because if not, why would you think that's acceptable for First Nations?  

That's actually off the mark in the other direction, and that's the problem we're having now, a demonization of "white settlers", as though much of what happened that by today's standards would be called injustice happened all of a sudden, intentionally, with unjust treatment in mind.  For almost the first 150 years of European settlement in Canada, from about 1608 until 1750, European settlers came and Indigenous peoples more or less continued their way of life amongst the scattered European settlements.  Fur and other trading lifted both the Indigenous and non-Indigenous.  For example, Indigenous benefitted from horses and hunting rifles.  Europeans benefitted from acquiring corn, potatoes and tobacco (blessing or curse?).  Smallpox and other diseases to which Indigenous did not have the same immunity as Europeans, did kill many Indigenous, but so did the Black Death (plague) in Europe at different times.  Europeans and Indigenous in what is now Canada formed alliances (French-Huron and Iroquois-English, for example) and interbred (Metis).  Indigenous didn't have the same notions of property as Europeans, but they also didn't have the near the same level of social organization or advancement in terms of what we would associate with an advanced civilization today, except perhaps in the more settled and wealthy coastal villages in BC.  Obviously Central and South America (and parts of what is now the Southwest US) had advanced Indigenous civilizations.  Aztecs, Mayans, Incas, and further back to the Olmecs and others demonstrated advanced civilizations for those historic periods.  There was certainly plenty of war among most Indigenous groups in Canada, and most of the territory was occupied by different groups at different times, one group displacing another.

Within Canada, the clash of civilizations really picked up in the 19th century as more and more Europeans arrived, many of them fleeing poverty and starvation in places like Ireland during the potato famine.  These immigrants came with their customs and values and set up their communities to reflect what they knew.  As these growing communities pushed further north and west there was push-back over land, treaties were formed, and occasionally there were violent clashes, such as just prior to the founding of Manitoba.  The first schools and mandatory education in what became the first provinces of Canada were run by a mix of different Christian denominations and the government.  Education was seen as progressive as it is today, but one of the dominant beliefs among most educators at that time was that Indigenous beliefs ran counter to the dominant religious beliefs of the society and that other "Indian" cultural practices and the persistent use of Indigenous languages were preventing progress for Indigenous.  As is the case today, education for many small northern communities means leaving the reserve for education.

Indigenous were not forced to stay on the reserve in the way you characterize, but yes, there were Indian agents who saw to it that Indigenous kids attended school.  Indigenous did not have voting rights, and in the case of residential schools, many Indigenous children lived far from their parents and were forced to shed their cultural traditions.  It was a misguided practice, but the authorities thought they were helping.  Families suffered and there was abuse in schools.  However, abuse existed in most schools (non-Indigenous and Indigenous).  Even today many children from small northern communities must leave home to attend high schools.  The high school may be Indigenous run, but that doesn't make it much easier on families. 

Sir John A. McDonald is demonized for saying that the government of Canada shouldn't feed or clothe the Indigenous.  He wasn't being genocidal.  He was making a point about the moral hazard of government stepping in to do the bulk of the work that people should be doing for themselves, such as clothing, feeding, and housing people.  Was he wrong?  What we have now are many reserves where government stepped in to build housing and infrastructure that the local community has neither the skills nor the resources to replace or maintain.  It didn't matter before Indigenous people began living in and expecting the kinds of housing and infrastructure that the Europeans expected, but who doesn't want warm, well-built shelter?  It is true that sometimes the reserves created were not the native territory of the people living there and that the treaties were poorly or unfairly brokered.  Courts are settling these and it will take time.  The Indian Act enshrines the reserve system, for good and bad.  There are some advantages in terms of taxation and free higher education, but at the same time, the Indian Act is archaic and racist by today's standards.  There are certainly tax and land benefits to having Indian Status, which is a form of two-tier citizenship.  It needs to be replaced, but there are vested interests that benefit from the current state of affairs.  The federal and probably all provincial government would like to see it replaced, but the changes have to be proposed by Indigenous people or else the government leaves itself open to accusations of interference. 

There are two major problems with the reserve system: 1. Unsustainable communities that offer little in the way of natural resource or other business development or that may not be near any major centres and amenities are maintained at tremendous cost to locals and government.  2. Because no tax revenue is collected from reserves and yet there is an expectation that government should solve infrastructure and other problems on the reserves, there is a huge net government expenditure required and a lack of local investment or ownership of local infrastructure.  If renters generally don't take as good care of buildings as owners, imagine how much worse it is when there's no rent paid or collected.  Ideally, Indigenous peoples should be self-sustaining by drawing on their own natural and personal resources.  That's how it should be.  It works better in communities rich with natural resources, particularly out west and in places like Nunavut where true self-government exists and there's no question about who owns the resources, even if outside companies are paid to extract or the federal government builds infrastructure.  True political self-determination requires true economic self-sustainability.  There is some corruption on reserves where chiefs or the band councils misappropriate funds.  There are also situations where Indigenous communities make a lot of money from private companies for extracting natural resources, yet they double dip and receive outside government funding.  This is possible because such contracts with private business are protected from disclosure to the public and governments.

So progress for the Indigenous is a mixed bag.  I think the reserve system and Indian Act are broken, but I don't think they are easily replaced, nor do I think the problems will all be solved because some Indigenous benefit from the conditions that are the source of the problem.  All governments can really do is promise to sustain the funding and seek to support Indigenous-led reforms, as long as they are truly representative of the vast majority of Indigenous people.  That's another problem, some of the loudest and most aggressive voices are not the most representative voices, as we saw on the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women Inquiry.  Racism does exist, including among police.  It's also important to recognize that there's a certain amount of responsibility ascribable to Indigenous peoples for the problems that they face today, despite the poor context in which these problems have arisen.  We need to seek ways to expand opportunities, but if it's about more money, there will always be push-back from taxpayers, and most of the taxes are paid by non-Indigenous peoples.  The generations that are trying to address the systemic problems that remain today did not create these systems.  This is particularly apparent in cities where up to half of the population are foreign born.  How much responsibility do they have for centuries-old injustices, many of which weren't seen as injustices at the time?

Edited December 20, 2019 by Zeitgeist

[Marocc]

15 minutes ago, taxme said:

I do not see very many native Indians or white people running to join the Muslims. Do you?  

There are quite a few even if you don't personally know any.

[taxme]

7 minutes ago, Marocc said:

There are quite a few even if you don't personally know any.

I agree that there are some people that have gone over to the other side. With the Islamic religion life appears to be oh so quite boring indeed. Having to pray four or more times a day to some guy called Allah is not my idea of having fun. Those that join that religion never really had a life at all. They were boring already. Sure, we infidels do commit some bad non-Muslim approving things, but still we do plenty of things that are fun that one cannot do in the Muslim world. There will be no joining the Muslim religion for me. I do enjoy my infidel ways. 

[Marocc]

2 minutes ago, taxme said:

I do enjoy my infidel ways. 

You might in this life.

It's probably not wise or accurate to say such people never had a life at all. Muslims can live lives of many kinds. Prayer is 5 times a day minimum.

[taxme]

9 hours ago, Marocc said:

You might in this life.

It's probably not wise or accurate to say such people never had a life at all. Muslims can live lives of many kinds. Prayer is 5 times a day minimum.

It looks to me like all you do as a Muslim every day is pretty much just pray your life away. What is the purpose of praying a minimum of five times a day anyway? Wouldn't once a day be enough? What do Muslims do for fun besides pray all day long? Just asking.