Because We Need More Protection for White Rights

[bcholmes]

The rights of non-native Canadians would have been threatened had the government not opposed an indigenous rights declaration that the United Nations overwhelmingly approved yesterday, Indian Affairs Minister Chuck Strahl said.

The Universal Declaration of Indigenous Peoples' Rights is inconsistent with Canadian legal tradition, and signing on to it would have given native groups an unfair advantage, the minister said.

— Montreal Gazette (A CanWest Global paper)

Apparently we're one of only four countries to vote no. Canada, US, Australia, New Zealand.

Comments

[sinboy.livejournal.com]

signing on to it would have given native groups an unfair advantage

Naaaahhh. It'd take gutting Parliament and installing a mostly indigenous representation to do that. Right now, it would give them *an* advantage.

But I guess giving any advantage that non-natives can't grind into dust is impossible. Feh.

[hellsop.livejournal.com]

What a surprise: all (ex-)Commonwealth contries, and all in places that got enough imported folks to actually colonize instead of just mooch in and run things for a while before getting tossed out of power.

Which leads me to a vocabulary complaint:

By contrast, most of the supporters of the document have been European countries with few indigenous citizens, such as Denmark and Germany, and much of Latin America, whose record of respecting indigenous rights is often poor.

Uhm, no. It's just in those European countries, White People are the indigenous citizens, and based on the complaints in the press there, they'd kind of like some support of the idea of White Rights, which the phrasing of "Indigenous" would probably give them over incoming Turks, Pakistani, etc.

[aquaeri.livejournal.com]

Actually, Denmark does have an indigenous community which hasn't always been well-treated by European Danes: Greenlanders.

Australia's Shame

[laura-seabrook.livejournal.com]

Non indigenous Australia has a disgraceful history of treating the folk who were here before them, by about 40,000 years. Almost as soon as the continent was colonised by Europeans, they started shooting, baiting, poisoning, swindling and dispossessing them of their inheritance. Not all settlers did this of course, but few resisted or stood up and decried the injustice of the genocide.

After Australia became an independent nation, it continued to abuse its indigenous folk. Families were torn apart when children were taken from their parents for "their own good" and placed in foster care, for no better reason than that the authorities could. Aboriginals had no right of vote until a referendum in the 60s granted them citizenship.

And my government has the gall to vote against the measures suggested that might help restore some dignity to these people.

I think I might add a "i think my government might suck" tag to my own journal.

Re: Australia's Shame

[aquaeri.livejournal.com]

Sing it, sister!

"complacency, thy name is me"

[rashelleym.livejournal.com]

I think it's interesting that the United Kingdom was apparently the only English-speaking signatory. And that representives from Nigeria, the Russian Federation, and several of the 'Stans (http://www.un.org/News/Press/docs/2007/ga10612.doc.htm) around the Caspian "oil treasures" simply didn't vote.

There exists in "my mind" not an iota of doubt that "our owners' self-government sucks." However, its "saving grace" is that it also blows. And in that eternal rhythm of sucking and blowing, self-government seems, really, to mirror its own nurtural cycles.