As some people know, In canada(quebec specifically), Native Americans live on reserves(land specified to them) and PAY NO TAXES because we stole their land. If they leave their reserve, they pay taxes. However, they cannot own property.

- 30 percent suicide rate among teens
-40 percent have not graduated high school
- 25 percent unemployed
- 55 percent of them abuse drugs or alchohol

Statistics were found in my History and citizenship education 4 book.

So....

Should they pay taxes? Or shouldn't they.

If you are a Canadian aboriginal or Native American and you're still alive, chances are you havne't faced the hardships your ancestors faced. I'm against reparations and believe that natives of North America should be equals under law.

if they come out of reserves and become part of the rest of canada, they should pay taxes like the rest of canada.

The same problem is being addressed down south of the border (South Dakota). Pine Ridge Reservation, one of the many here in the midwest, recently banned alcohol sales on it primarilly to keep preteens from getting it (teenagers and older obviously have other means of obtaining it, namely, walking to the city.) Reservations are total hell holes here, and are probably similar elsewhere in the continent (from what you say along with what I've read elsewhere) and I think that there needs to be major reform, particular to address drug and alchohol abuse (heavier fines against users won't help). One thing that would definitely help is if our highway patrol got some more funding to eliminate the drug trafficking which we know is going on but haven't stopped it yet because of cost issues. I believe human lives are worth more than money.

EDIT: To make my point a little clearer, I don't think that adding taxes would necesarilly solve the problem. Teenagers and adults are bored out of their mind, have nothing to look forward to, and are stuck in a cycle of poverty and alcohol. I think heavier restrictions and fines against supplies of alcoholic beverages and everything short of the noose for drug providers is the way to go.

I don't know if this is where you got the idea for this or not but soon natives are going to have to pay taxes on cigarettes which sucks for me because i can't buy mine for $20 a carton anymore.

Anyways i think that honestly they should be forced to pay taxes the only purpose reserves have nowadays are havens for meth dealing and drunken morons. Both Natives and low-life druggy trash alike spend there days sitting around like fat slobs draining taxpayers money. There not using the reserves for anything good and the ones that do complain (justifiably complain) that they don't want to live on some tiny land plot which is more or less a slightly more rural version of a ghetto.

Stick a division or two in them. Wait ten years. Demolish reservations, give all natives $5k head start.

Stop, whoa whoa whoa! That text book is out dated or you have no clue as to what you are speaking of.

As a native american I pay HALF the tax non-natives pay, AND CAN OWN PROPERTY anywhere I want. You are suppose to live on reservation land to recieve your benifits but majority of people don't care and accept the cards anyway because of the many things needed outside of reservation lands like post secondary education.

Sadly the suicide rate and drug addiction percentages and high school drop out rate are semi-true (many more native americans are graduating but still not enough).

And I think its fair that we get diffrent benifits because of what happened to native americans over the past and present has caused alot of native americans to live in poverty. Alot of the natives 40+ have psychological problems from residental schools that were over run with abuse.

The benifits natives recieve are slowly pulling native americans as a people up out of poverty and its going a long way to bettering everyone as a whole. maybe 200 years down the road if only a minority of natives face poverty, suicide, drug addiction and discrimination then these could be removed but as of now that would be highly unjust.

Also Is this an approprite topic?

Taxing will only increase the social burden placed on these people, thus increasing the troubles festering beneath. Before making such moves, radical social reforms must be placed to solve their problems. This could mean better policing in their territories, giving the unemployed work using livelihood programs or encouraging small businesses and more education and rehabilitation for the youth. But I honestly fail to see how taxing can solve the problems.

Giving you money won't fix those problems. Getting you out of reservations will.
Remember, we don't owe you anything. Our ancestors owe your ancestors something.

Yeah because they're still citizens of Canadia

Hmmm - maybe you should ask someone who lives in Caledonia, Ontario, if the aboriginals should pay taxes?

I used to get my cigarettes from there before the police started checking cars if that counts.

Hold up now. Read what I said about residental schools. The abuse that was suffered in the native community went into the 1980's. And if the effects of one persons ancestors are felt in the majority of the population of one race even to this day then how is there nothing to be owed? you can't just nearly destory an entire culture, leave there people with damages and in poverty and so oh well I didn't do it so its not MY problem. Go research native american discrimination.

Would you tell the jews to get over the hollocaust? or how about the blacks to get over slavery and segragation? or the gays to get over discrimination ? Honesty you must be one ignorant person to think that nothing is owed.

And money will fix the issues in the poverty aspect. You make it easier for native americans to make stable cahs, the free collage and they have chances of getting decent jobs. The more native americans that make it out of poverty the less drug abuse there is, the less poverty there is.
Its a slow start to helping those who are more or less defeated financially and emotionally.

The emotional part is going to take longer, maybe once the native population is back up and discrimination is down and the government and the people that ran the residental homes keep up there apologies then it might help.

As for calidonia There was negatives on both sides of that fight. Does that make what either the natives or the towns people did right no? two wrongs don't make a right.

Where do you live? In Quebec, what i posted applies, and the textbooks are dated 2008.

I live in ontario. And when I purchase something and use my stat card I don't pay pst but still pay the gst.

And I can own property.

I would actually getting pissed off about what someones great great grandfather did isn't going to help you. I Have infact told blacks and jews to get over Slavery and the Holocaust there not affected by it. My grandfather lived in Manzanar which wasn't an absolute rape of human rights like slavery and the Holocaust but its not to far off. Yet i don't ask my white friends to give me anything just because there grandparents beat up mine. Thats the kind of mentallity that has held society back and stopped it from moving forward. Native Canadians came from Siberia do you give the squirrels whose homes you destroyed extra rights and reservations? Why should you get any then?



Which is going to change pretty soon if i'm not mistaken.

Wow just wow. This is not about grandparents we are talking parents in some cases here. And if you feel that native americans will just magically become self-sufficant with higher taxation and no free collage then I seriously hope you do some more digging into how minorities (Not just natives) have been treated well into the 20th century, and how dimminshed there cultures are.


I am going to stop posting in here as this is really getting me angry and upset. I seriously hope this thread gets locked this is a really bad topic to even get on.

If you can't then your own incapabilities are at fault. Just so you know i am a minority and my culture is basically non-existant in North America. You say your discriminated against and you'd be correct but the only reason for that is because decent aboriginal people (like yourself?) choose to let us only see the ugly drunkards asleep on our city streets rather then coming out of your reserves and teaching us about yourselves. Also the fact that you don't pay taxes (AKA What this threads about) adds to the discrimination.

Also we're not talking about parents we're talking about the white mans great great great great grandparents who sailed over on boats and took over North America. They eventually felt bad about taking "your land" over and decided to give your ancestors a break on taxes. However aside from discrimination that Natives visible minorities bring upon your culture you don't face any more discrimination then I do.
Yes you'll have to adjust your culture a bit to fit in but so did i so did every non-european settler in North America but they overcame it. Why can't you?
Seriously stop using discrimination as a scapegoat your a minority congratulations now get over it.


Also interesting Tidbit. My Grandma is about the same age as most people my ages parents (47) so we could very easily be talking about grandparents.

It's probably best for everyone to assimilate into the rest of society at the moment. Anyone who was going to benefit from reservations already did.

I'm not trying to say what people did to Native Americans was wrong, but I personally look at the whole dispute like a war. Two sides duked it out on and off for however many years and eventually the Europeans/Americans/Canadians won. The losing side doesn't usually get benefits from the winning side.

You can hardly compare it to that.

Actually, its probably worse. Look up some of the things that happend from not having a home land to slavery,segrogation,residential schools, various discriminations issues, forced sterilizations, lose of culture ect.

blacks still have homelands (if they can trace their roots)

only other minority effected worse was probably the aztec/maya cultures that were assimilated in with the spanish. There's nothing left of them save for a few crumbling temples because there culture was completely destoryed.

So do you.

Its called Siberia/Eastern Russia if you really want to go back there you can i think it would be a great loss to Canada and the U.S if you did but its up to you i suppose.

And if you think that you or any of your currently living parents/grandparents have gone through anything like the Holocaust you need to seriously rethink my friend. Canada doesn't owe you any rights just because they beat up your great great grandpa thats like me saying that the Japanese owe me special rights because they took over Okinawa decades ago. Sorry but your living in a fantasy world get out of it please.

That doesn't even cover up the bias in the answer to what I said.


+1. You didn't have a leader condemn you to death.

No proof where the natives came from some people think natives were once nomatic peoples that CAME TO CANADA and the us through russia durring the last ice age. And i'm sorry but native americans have been living in canada an the united states for thousends of years.

And I don't remember the japanese ever taking over the island of japan. As far as recorded history goes they have allways been there.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Japan

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadian_Indi...l_school_system

http://www.angus-mcleod.com/pastandpresentopression.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Native_Americ...merican_Slavery


Try reading these and get back to me.

Okinawa was originally settled by the Chinese and has never (geographically) been considered part of Japan infact geographically it should be its own country and was at one point.



@Bolded: AKA Invaded and raped the country until they gave up.
@Italics: Read that.



Then we were invaded by white people sound familiar?


Also thousands of years doesn't mean forever if you want to get technical we probably all come from East Africa where all immigrants sorry to break it to you.

People dont/shouldn't need a homeland just to be happy. I could care less where I came from. If people started thinking about what they could do, rather then what people have done, everyone would be happy.

What Meidou will do to get some more smokes

anyways this is a difficult issue and I don't know what should be done