Posting something relevant to Canada, for a change.
Apparently, people from the Tyendinaga reserve in Ontario are finding themselves forced to get militant about a land dispute. Why? Well, sure, there’s a negotiation process happening, which would doubtless yield results some year or decade. But by then, the land itself would be literally gone:
The reason Mr. Brant isn’t willing to let the negotiations take their course is that these talks are designed to take decades. And as the time passes, the land disappears. . . . At the gravel quarry near Deseronto, the loss of land is painfully, insultingly literal. The quarry is on land never ceded by the Mohawks of the Bay of Quinte, a fact the federal government has acknowledged. The only question is what form compensation for the theft will take. The Tyendinaga band council and Ottawa have been negotiating over that question since last November. The problem arose because, as the two parties talked, trucks were carrying 10,000 loads of newly crushed gravel out of the pit every year - an estimated 100,000 tonnes. While they bargained for the land, the land itself was disappearing.
But it got worse. There was a pile of wood on the edge of the gravel pit that the people occupying the quarry used to feed their bonfire. As the pile depleted, it became apparent the wood had been covering up a large pile of garbage: old washing machines, leaking industrial batteries, oil filters, hydraulic fluid, bed frames, antifreeze. They explored some more and discovered it was all over the pit: piles of hastily covered junk, some of it half-burned, much of it toxic, including broken up pieces of asphalt from the highway. (You can still see the yellow lines.) “When it rains, the whole mountain turns into a rainbow of chemical fluids and oils, all flowing down into the water. Then it all leeches into the ground water,” Mr. Maracle told me, pointing to the murky green pool at the bottom of the pit. Not surprisingly, the mine has become a powerful metaphor, a vivid illustration of the failures of the negotiation process, and the problems with being patient. While the experts talk, good land is trucked out and toxic junk is trucked in - and without direct action, there would have been nothing left to talk about.
I found this Naomi Klein piece at ZNet, but was surprised to note that it had actually been in the Grope & Flail. Good for them, although I expect their other coverage of the issue (if any) would be rather different.
There's a day of action planned for Canadian First Nations people on June 29. Non-aboriginals are encouraged to protest as well.
Jeese, there's a thought. Give our first nations people their given right to treaty nogotiated land and abolish the Indian Act !!
One might say we're "Bleak-Housing" first nations to death.
(That is the Dickens where the ridiculously complicated inheritance lawsuits drone on until the lawyers' fees finally eat up the entire inheritance, right? Skdadl?)
Yes, that's the one. And unfortunately much of the litigation involving aboriginal land claims is very much like the case in Bleak House, in case you might be tempted to see litigation as an alternative to negotiation.
Litigation has some upsides, in that it can be used to force governments into action (or to stop doing something). If someone's going to pick your pockets while he haggles with you, maybe a more straightforwardly adversarial process is preferable. But litigation can be just as costly and time-consuming as negotiation, as well as being a blunt instrument that's frequently ill-suited to obtaining the desired remedies.
The BC treaty process allows for the possibility of "interim measures" to deal with the protection of treaty-related lands and resources while negotiation takes place, and considering how long it's taking to negotiate treaties in BC, interim measures are just as vital there as they evidently would be in Ontario. The issue of what constitutes sufficient interim measures is itself the source of a large volume of litigation.
Yeah, it's a "bleak" state of affairs, all right. I'm sure a lot of First Nations and aboriginal groups see direct action as a last resort, but I understand how they can come around to the point where they find it necessary. And at least from a legal point of view, it's arguably the most appropriate response. Why should you legitimize the settlers' legal system by using it, or legitimize the settler governments' assertion of sovereignty by negotiating with them?
Negotiation process,my ass.Its more about stall and delay,give just enough hope in order to "preserve" the peace,while in reality doing nothing.
First Nations peoples understand only to well militant action is one of the only ways to get action.
Laws get changed,or reinterpreted or just ignored out right when it involves F.N peoples using the laws of the land in their continual struggle for redress.
Anyway it's good to see POGG-eh talking about FN peoples.
F.N issues get very little coverage not only within the MSM but also within the progressive "blogsphere" and alternative media.
I would also add that the level of ignorance in the progressive "community" in regards to F.N peoples and issues,is still quite high and totally unacceptable.
I read Bleak House for a novel course in University. I mentioned it to my father.
He commented that oh yes ... he remembered in 1904 when the case was finally through the court system. Wikipedia says this about its' writing:
"published in 20 monthly parts between March 1852 and September 1853."
What is that dumb quote about justice delayed is not justice at all?
Same old bullshit. Different day. I agree, the governments (federal & provincial) use intimidation, then they use bullshit jurisdictional disputes, then they use "negotiation," then they accept litigation, ... and when First Nations turn to direct action out of frustration, assholes like Gary MacHale and Mike Harris start puking crap about the sanctity of the "rule of law," and scream for the police to teach the "fucking Indians" a lesson.
It makes one livid.