That's a rather vague question. Do you want a my general thoughts on the whole thing (an entire essay's worth, by the way), a few words on what I feel should be done, specifically what the reclimation means to me, or what exactly?
...being vague is what I do best.
In my experience, general thoughts are...pretty simple, as the media pumps those out to the people(both sides, too). I'm assuming that you
would know more of the history than the general public, and from that, I'd like to think you could offer some great insight.
...
I suppose I am most curious about these two questions:
How does it affect you directly, and
have you been involved in any way?
I see and hear about it every day, outside of the reserve people who watch the news all have the image that we're a bunch of terrorists looking for a war, but that's not it at all. People look, I hear people talking about it. Hearing the things these people are saying about us just depresses me, how people can be so ignorant, they know nothing about what's going on yet insist on talking non-stop like they have some sort of authority and everyone cares about their opinion. At my high school things carry on as normal, my high school is in a small town nearby where people seem to all blend in together, being aware but completely uncaring about each other's differences. Friends of mine that go to school in Caledonia are a bit worried, I actually fear for their safety knowing the lengths white people go to, to injure someone they dislike, even and espescially if these people are simply associated by skin colour to those perpetrating what they see as "crimes".
Listening to the things these Caledonian people say, I hear racist remark after remark, talking about how "Bush would know how to deal with this 'indian problem'", and I chuckle to myself because to me these people are like kids struggling with all their effort to create artwork with some crayons and paper, and seeing their feeble attempts completed, some fascination with how people can be so stupid. Except, this is something these people aren't going to grow out of, and instead of paper and crayons their media is spoken word.
It affects me greatly. I work for Six Nations Parks and Recreation, and people don't want to come to the trailer park anymore (well, two people from the same phone number, haha), teams don't want to come to Six Nations to play our baseball teams, teams don't want to go to other places to play their teams because they have to travel through Caledonia etc. etc.
Have I been directly involved in any way?
I've brought food my mom cooked down to the site to feed the people there, I was there when the barricade was first taken down and the Caledonians got mad, beating the shit out of some guy. Then the pepper spray came so I was out of there. I haven't been there much, just standing around with my friends seeing what the heck was going on this time. Other then those I wasn't involved much.
wow.
I knew it'd be... different out there, but I think half of me, deep down, hoped that things wouldn't turn too hostile over there...
it's not too bad out here, hell, people barely acknowledge it!
mind you, we're pretty concerned about our burial grounds and resource rights over here...
same country, different worlds...sorta.
I really didn't want things to get violent, it was a peaceful protest at first after all. Apparently the OPP and the people of Caledonia didn't want it to be peaceful.