Expect first nation protests everywhere and often in the next few years.

Like one chief in the north here said … Chief Jennifer Constant in Mattagami FN near Timmins … the government has put all resource development at risk because FNs won’t stand for this. There has been years of negotiation and relationship building with FNs and industry, now all that good will is drying up. Now any company that wants to go anywhere near FN lands will have entire communities protesting, blocking and fighting them at every turn. Their projects all just got more expensive because they pissed off the people who live on the land.

I get a lot of hostility when I try to engage with FN people socially in public. Which, fair enough. I try to learn the right lessons from bad experiences and the lesson I choose to learn is that I’m doing it wrong.

How can I help these efforts?

Anyone taking bets on how long it’ll be till RCMP officers are on the ground with assault rifles?

That’s where these “meaningful consultations” increasingly end. At some point this will either lead to protest of any kind deemed illegal in these zones, or these zones being closed to the public and militarized 🫤

Ontario has the OPP.

The RCMP has very little presence in Ontario.

Are they any better behaved?

From the people I know in Native Canada, there is a lot of hostility against most of Canada and there will be for the foreseeable future … because we have a lifetime of grievances against everything the government does to make us not trust anyone. Then there is the whole criminal Indigenous fraud and forgery that has been growing over the past few years (it isn’t Pretendians, it isn’t pretending … it’s outright forgery and criminal behaviour when what you are doing is basically creating an identity for financial or political gain by taking advantage of others). There is also the growing fraudulent Metis movement, especially in Ontario where people with a small percentage of Native blood are claiming left and right that they have rights to everything just like First Nation people when they have no basis for any claim. There is a real identified and historically documented Metis community in the prairie provinces … but none in Ontario, especially in northern Ontario.

This is all on top of what the government constantly holds back from our communities and then blames us for not having anything and not doing anything.

The best way to ally with First Nations … is to first identify us as ‘First Nation’ … it’s become political because the word ‘Indigenous’ has been co-opted by so many groups to encompass everyone and anyone (especially the Metis community) who wants to identify as First Nation.

Another way to support First Nations is to support and campaign for political parties that actually support First Nations and minority groups … like the NDP … less so the Liberals … but definitely not the Conservatives.

The time to support First Nations is at the election booth … it almost doesn’t matter how you support First Nations after events like Bill 5 happen … you can support them, join protests and share their grievances but that is almost too little too late … we all have to stop these things from developing in the first place by not electing conservative right wing nut jobs into power.

Nope.

As always, ACAB.