Letters

Previous letter “a gross distortion”

I am surprised you printed the letter from Sean Donnelly in the May 9 edition of The Ring (“Equality for whom?”). Such a gross distortion of history, law, and politics does not belong in a newspaper published by an educational institution.
According to Donnelly, returning lands and resources that settlers stole from indigenous nations is generous. Riiiiight.
Indigenous self-determination is not charity: it is justice that is long overdue. Really, indigenous lands and resources were never settlers’ to keep or “give away,” as Donnelly suggests. We’ve simply been taking them, greedily and violently, and then blaming indigenous people for the poverty we’ve imposed.

It is tempting to dismiss Donnelly as an ignorant wingnut. And yet the sad truth is that Donnelly is probably accurate when he claims to represent the views of a number of British Columbians and Canadians. His views are certainly shared by the politicians in a succession of provincial and federal governments who have vigorously opposed indigenous sovereignty.

Donnelly probably does speak for the users of Sun Peaks who feel a ski resort is more important than the homes and hunting grounds of the Secwepemc people who live there. And I’m sure he would feel a warm brotherhood with the ranch hands at Gustafsen Lake who, in 1995, threatened to “string up some red niggers” when Sundancers refused to remove the fence that kept cows from defecating on their sacred site.
People that claim to speak for British Columbians and Canadians continue to violate the rights of indigenous people — rights that are embedded in Canada’s constitution, and reinforced by international law and numerous UN resolutions. How long will this be accepted as business as usual?

Joshua Goldberg, Victoria