[LINK] "Idle No More sparks polarizing debate"

[rfmcdonald]

On the theme of Idle No More, Christopher Curtis' Edmonton Journal article comments on the extent to which Idle No More is sparking new national debate about First Nations and their issues, some anonymous commenters notwithstanding.

“Some people are very defensive and start seeing racism when, in fact, what they’re actually seeing is healthy criticism,” said Melissa Mollen Dupuis, who co-founded Idle No More’s Quebec branch. “But what you have to realize is that a lot of these people have been put down their whole lives. They’ve been discriminated against for being aboriginal, they’ve been beaten over the head with it again and again. So, naturally, they’re sensitive.”

Mollen Dupuis believes, nonetheless, that there’s hope for Canadians to engage in a meaningful dialogue about the future of aboriginal people.

Coming from a small Innu village on the northeast coast of the St. Lawrence River, Mollen Dupuis said she was scarred by racism when she left her reserve. But her fears turned into optimism when her college hosted an aboriginal awareness week when she was a teenager.

“My sister and I thought, ‘Oh no, people are going to say Indians don’t pay taxes, they’re a waste of our money,’ but we were wrong,” Mollen Dupuis said. “Non-native people would come into contact with our culture, they would learn about us and their opinions changed. It totally transformed the way I looked at things.”

University of Ottawa professor Michael Behiels says he isn’t surprised to see the discourse get ugly.

“For years, aboriginals have been out of sight, out of mind for most Canadians,” Behiels said. “We’ve lived in isolation from native people but now there’s no avoiding these issues anymore. And sadly we’re seeing a lot of ignorant and sometimes racist (rhetoric) across the country.”