Monday, October 31, 2011

First Nation Law Trumps Canadian Law: Politics, Ignorance or Racism?

The politics of BC treaty news is interesting. It's hard to find news that is informative and isn't the site of partisan politics. Take the case of the Vancouver Observer's March 2011 coverage of MP John Weston's suggesting treaties are "un-constitutional". It's written by Daniel Veniez, a self-described centrist with federal liberal ties. The article is a poke at Prime Minister Harper, so the comment section of the article, naturally, is subject to partisan attacks. However, the attacker goes too far and reveals his or her own ignorance or worse - blatant racism. Here is the last two lines of the attack:

"Has Mr. Veniez actually read the treaty?

What about the part where Sliammon law trumps Canadian law. If Veniez supports this measure fully, this opens a very dangerous and slippery slope." [RtHourableSirJohn]
Slippery slope to what? First, under the treaty Sliammon law is Canadian law. Second, the attack is referring to the rules of paramountcy. Under the treaty, Sliammon law is paramount to federal and provincial law (i.e. "trumps") in some matters and in others federal and provincial law is paramount. Why would the attacker think that it's a slippery slope to empower Sliammon to control its own culture, government and other matter internal to Sliammon?

Is it politics, ignorance, or racism? The more I read about BC treaty news, politics, ignorance, and racism are not mutually exclusive or exhaustive categories.

2 comments:

  1. Hey chief, you clearly have no concept of Canadian law. It's not rasicm to want to protect your home and business from ending up on indian land where I have no rights.

    to me, sliammon law is paramount to sharia law

    ReplyDelete
  2. Considered removing the comment above, but it proves the point of the article, nicely.

    ReplyDelete