because facebook is not a place for public arguing...

My cousin had his quad and dirt bike stolen out of his yard or garage recently. This is what he puts on facebook:

My opinion of the aboriginal peoples has been reaffirmed. Don't steal my stuff and demand that I change my views. How can I change a view of something that you constantly confirm, you steal, have no jobs, and beat each other. I am sorry to all aboriginals who are respectable people and apologize for this statement, but to all those who are not, and those who reaffirm this message, try it again, I'll be waiting

His friend later writes:

in response to Tiffany: "Yes, but i haven't seen entire towns full of such white people, i know of quite a number of 300+ population reserves that have 99% of their population belonging to the 'minority' that engage in such behavior. The fact is that the majority of indians want to blame everything on the white. Following their thought, i hereby blame my poverty and my being born in Manitoba on the whole of Europe as i come from a Mennonite background and many European nations forced the Mennonites from their homes. Oh, wait, the Mennonites did something with themselves instead of pouting; I have nothing to complain about."

For those people who engage in the behaviour outlined by Mr. Friesen, GET A JOB AND STOP BLAMING UR CRAP ON ME! (Blame it on the French and the English circa the 1600s if you want, their descendants did nothing to harm you)

For those who are of the Native American people group who are in fact doing something with their lives, nothing said here applies to you.

And i congratulate you on doing something which others very much like you in beginning circumstances find so difficult.

The ignorance of people never ceases to amaze me. I love how he ends his little rant with graciously releasing the "good Indians" from his racial stereotypes.

Guess what I found out tonight - Apparently my cousin has no idea who stole the stuff. It's assumed that it's Aboriginal people.

I'm not picking on my cousin. It's not just him - he's not the one guy with this attitude in the midst of hundreds of culturally diverse, tolerant, accepting, embracing people. This is the general feeling of many many people who live around here. It annoys me anytime I think about it. I almost wrote that it annoys me almost daily, but the truth is that I sit in my home with my kids and think more about Dora than the world around me on most days. But when people write stuff like this it just gets my blood boiling.

Of course I had to respond, and of course I didn't take a lot of time to really think and revise my statement so it was a bit rough. This is my response:

I like how the "majority of Indians want to blame everything on the white people" - when here we are assuming that if something has been stolen that it must have been someone with brown skin. Let's not talk about assuming blame. I live in Portage - I've seen people get their sheds broken into, vehicles stolen, etc. and even without witnesses or confessions, fingers automatically point to the Aboriginal population. Let's not get all self-righteous here with our accusations of blame-passing.
And about this 99% thing - you're meaning to tell me that you KNOW without a doubt that out of 100 aboriginal people, that only 1 of them is "good"? I'd like to know where you get your statistics - oh wait - this is from personal, worldly, life experience. Gotcha.

I should have really thought it out, made it a little more scathing.

It's true though - the double standards, that white people can do things and get away with things and as soon as someone "else" even toes the line it's used as yet another example to justify popular negative beliefs.

For example: (oh how i love examples)

Kids run amok. White kids, black kids, native kids, Asian kids. You can hardly walk down the street without seeing some kids on the sidewalk or rollerblading up and down the street. On my street there are kids of all ages running up and down. My own kids play in the yard unsupervised on and off throughout the day. Granted it's not the street (yet) but they're still out there, waiting for catastrophe to befall them because their absentee mother is in the kitchen doing dishes. You know what happens when a handful of young Native children is seen on the sidewalk or playing in front yards with no parents present? Let me get into character:

"Those native people never watch their kids. Their kids are out playing on the street. They're going to get hurt. They don't even want their kids. They don't look after them, they don't do anything with them, they don't supervise them. They just keep pumping out kids so that the government keeps sending the welfare checks their way. They don't deserve to have kids they don't really want. It's just a way to cheat the system. They should all be cut off. It's not fair that we have to pay so that they can all sit inside, sponging up our tax dollars while their kids are outside, unsupervised, unloved, unwanted, and growing daily into young hoodlums who are going to vandalize my car, rob my house, push drugs on my innocent white perfect angel children and end up in jail where I'll have to keep paying and paying and paying forever because the government continues to look after these people who don't deserve it and don't appreciate it.

I do that quite well don't I? It's because I hear it All. The. Time. It's a given understanding in this town that every last white person in this town finds solidarity in the fact that we are undeniably superior to this parasitic lowly "brown" class. I'm glad I'm not a brown person here. Not because I fancy myself better, but because I wouldn't want to live under this shadow of distaste that hangs over each and every one of them. Why aren't they all driving in from the reserve everyday to hold down steady paying, community enhancing jobs? Because they don't want to hang around and be snubbed by the masses who feel this way. Believe it or not, they aren't stupid and they know what everyone thinks.

For those of you who are reading who live in or around Portage or Winnipeg, or anywhere near here where these beliefs are common - I apologize for lumping "everyone" together. I know we don't all feel this way.

Let me continue with my rant.

Backtracking:

To quote myself: "It's a given understanding in this town that every last white person in this town finds solidarity in the fact that we are undeniably superior to this parasitic lowly "brown" class."

Personal Examples:
The other day I was buying meat at the local deli. I commented to the deli girl that the store was really busy. She said that yes, it was - because it was welfare day. She made the "you know what I mean" face. Of course I know what she means. Everyone complains that the lines are longer at Wal*Mart, the isles are fuller at Co-op, the Natives are out in force on Welfare Day. When do you go shopping? On payday? Go figure.

I was at the park last week. I ended up sharing a picnic table with a girl who was there supervising a few Aboriginal kids. I'm not exactly sure what her job title was, but she told me that she brought the girls over here to let them get off the reserve. Like Deli-Girl, she used "the voice" and made the "you know what I mean" face. Why is it assumed that everyone who is white joyously shares in your racist views?

You know what else kind of annoys me? The $100 universal child care check. Everyone gets $100 a month for each child under the age of 6 that lives in your home. As housewives we all eagerly await our monthly entitlement. Why do I call it an entitlement? Because we are entitled to it. As stay-home moms we need our contribution to house, home and community recognized. We deserve this money. It's about time the government decided to help out us poor little homemakers. You know why we get this money? Because they decreased funding to public childcare facilities and instead give everyone this $100 per kid under 6 years old.

I have a couple of issues with this:
Firstly, why is it that when Aboriginal people get money it's considered a handout and a drain on society, and when white people get money it's well-deserved and we should keep this government in office forever so that the money never runs out (I said from the start it was blatant vote-buying).
Secondly, I really really hate the idea that the money could have been going to help fund affordable daycare for people who really need it. There are poor families and single moms out there who work their asses off for crappy pay and subsidized daycare is the only way they can make ends meet. It's those families who need the money. I'll admit that it's nice to get the extra cash every month, but the idea that it's being taken from those who really need it bothers me. If we can afford to stay home with our kids we don't really need that money. If we're only $100 a month away from destitution then maybe it's time to get jobs.

Ever notice that our wonderful, democratic, western countries can drop bombs on foreign soil and barely flinch as the lives of peasants, women and children are snuffed out? Isn't it nice to have terms like "collateral damage" to smooth over the truth of what is happening elsewhere at our hands? Isn't it also interesting that when a Canadian or American soldier is killed that it is the utmost of tragic occurrences?

I know this is all over the place. That's why it's a rant. It's supposed to make sense in it's small chaotic way.

Bringing it back home, I have a solution. I think it'll help us all deal with the Indian Problem.

1. Let's set a curfew. They should all be in their homes after 8pm. This will stop the crime in our community.
   
2. Let's set aside special times of the day/week that the Aboriginal people can shop in our stores, eat at our restaurants and fill up at our gas tanks. While they are there they must use special designated restrooms and water fountains. This schedule will be posted publicly to help those who wish to avoid these places of businesses during these times.
   
3. Let's set up a special schools to separate groups, making the educational process better for all.
4. Let's ban the practice of Aboriginal ceremonies, religions and teachings. The sooner they strive to be more like us the sooner everyone can live in harmony.
5. Aboriginal people should be indentured to serve in our homes as servants, housekeepers, groundskeepers, etc. to work off the debt they have incurred against hardworking, right leaning members of society.
6. Last, but certainly not least, any Aboriginal person deemed not fit to parent children in ways best determined by a neutral counsel will be sterilized and have their children immediately removed from their care.