Canada has no history of colonialism? WTF?

Really Harper, Canada has no history of colonialism? By Harsha Walia 28 Sep 2009 "We also have no history of colonialism..." - Prime Minister Stephen Harper. On the heels of a massive exercise of U.S. police repression against G20protestors, including use of a wartime sonic acoustic weapon also beingutilized in Iraq, Stephen Harper made the above declaration during a pressconference in Pittsburgh where it was announced that Canada would be hostingthe next G20 meeting in 2010. Perhaps Harper and I are not on the same page - is colonialism not definedas the practice and processes of domination, control, and forced subjugationof one people to another? As most bluntly stated by Duncan Campbell Scott,Head of the Department of Indian Affairs in the 1920's: "Our objective is tocontinue until there is not a single Indian in Canada that has not beenabsorbed into the body politic and there is no Indian question." I expect Harper has read the federal government's own report on the RoyalCommission on Aboriginal Peoples, which explicitly lays out Canada'simposition of a colonial relationship (indeed, that is the heading of one ofthe chapters) on Indigenous people. Measures employed include the IndianAct, residential schools, forcible relocation including to reservations, theimposed Band Council system, institution of a pass system (which wassubsequently borrowed by apartheid South Africa), germ warfare, outlawing ofceremonies such as the potlatch and traditional activities such as fishing,failed treaty processes, and other forced assimilation polices including theAct for the Gradual Assimilation of Indian Peoples. Considering that his government has so ardently voted against it, it wouldbe safe to presume that Harper is aware of the 2007 United NationsDeclaration on the Rights of Indigenous People. If Canada has no history ofcolonialism, then what else could possibly explain that Canada - along withother settler states such as Australia - have yet to sign on to theDeclaration? Other than the glaringly obvious and painful reality ofcolonization, what would make the Declaration "unworkable for Canada", asstated by the Harper government? This Declaration, endorsed by an overwhelming majority of the 144 memberstates, recognizes that "Indigenous peoples have suffered from historicinjustices as a result of, inter alia, their colonization and dispossession"and therefore affirms that "Indigenous peoples have the right ofself-determination". According to the Declaration, thisincludes: the right to autonomy and self government, right to maintain andstrengthen political, legal, economic, social and cultural institutions,collective right to live in freedom without being subjected to acts ofgenocide, and right to redress and compensation for the lands, territoriesand resources confiscated, taken, occupied, used or damaged without free,prior and informed consent. And was it not Harper's government that finally issued an official apologyfor residential schools which separated children from their families,communities, and culture in order to 'take kill the Indian in the child'. Ithas been extensively documented that children suffered unimaginableabuses- including sexual violence, physical beatings, emotional andpsychological torture, and death - in residential schools. The traumas ofthis colonial legacy continues today with Indigenous peopledisproportionately experiencing poverty, poor health, incarceration, youthsuicides, unprecedented levels of violence against Indigenous women, childapprehension, and substandard levels of access to basic needs includingwater and homes. Indigenous people from Akwasasne, Tyendinaga, Six Nations, AthabascaChipewyan, Kitchenuhmaykoosib Inninuwug, Secwepemc, and many more are forced to throw up blockades to halt environmentally devastating mineralexploration, clearcut and logging practices, and resource extractionactivities that continue to infringe on their lands. Clearly, Harper hasnot been blind to these very public struggles that his government iscomplicit in criminalizing as Canada becomes notorious for a growing groupof Indigenous political prisoners, prisoners of Canada's colonial democracy. So obviously what Harper meant to say was the more factually accurate:"Canada has no history of colonialism, except for the ongoing internalcolonization of Indigenous people and the external colonization andoccupation of, amongst others, the people of Afghanistan. Not one to breakwith history, my government too has been making strides in asserting greaterdominance over Indigenous peoples lives, lands, and governance. " At least we can take some comfort in the fact that Harper is just anotherhypocritical and self-serving politician and not a history teacher.