Since the European invasion of this area of North America began in 1497, no Mi’kmaq has ever been appointed by a Colonial, Federal, or Atlantic Provincial Government to any political, or bureaucratic position of importance in Atlantic Canada. Nor has a Mi’kmaq been elected to any prominent political office. This history is morally indefensible. However, in the year 2004, there is no movement afoot to change it, which makes the present situation, in this so called enlightened age, even more morally indefensible.

Such racism has its pitfalls for the oppressor. The exclusion of the Mi’kmaq from the public life of Atlantic Canada, and the corresponding economic exclusion accompanying it, has proven to be a very expensive cross for the modern public purse to carry. There is a lesson to be learned from this for any would be oppressors. When a state deliberately reduces a portion of its population to a marginalized poverty stricken degraded existence, it creates for its majority descendants an economially dependent basket-case that must be, in a more humane time, cared for and sheltered by them. This is precisely the situation in Atlantic Canada today.

However, this is not what the Mi’kmaq want. No intelligent people welcome poverty and dependence on others, especially their oppressors, for existence.

What we want is the return of self-government, we want to earn our own way, and most of all, we want our dignity respected. We are not the children of barbarians, as our ancestors were depicted to be by demonizing propaganda invented by the invaders, we are the children of a civilized, kind and gentle people. To eliminate systemic racism in this country, to make things right, this is something that needs to be taught in the country’s public school system.

All the before-mentioned applies to all of North America’s First Nations. Turtle Islanders have all been marginalized and driven to the depths of poverty by the invaders. Its time the children of the invaders accepted this and then seek out viable ways to set us free!

The before mentioned information tidbits are but excerpts from the history of the Mi’kmaq and other First Nations. For more intimate details of these, and much more, read the new 2006 edition of We Were Not the Savages, and such other great books as Stolen Continents and The Trail of Tears.

All my Relations,