‘A meaningless number’
‘Why celebrate? We’re older than that’
CANADIANS BEING CANADIAN (whatever that means), there would not be tons of evidence, on a Google Street scan of the country, that we’re happily bouncing on the diving board of patriotism, readying for a plunge into a major celebration — Canada 150.
In the United States, there would be flags and bunting on every side street, streamers and gonfalons, bandstands in parks with skirts of Old Glory and cascading swag and valance. Here, for 150, there’s been a modest spike in spell checks on the word “sesquicentennial” but not a lot else.
I’m exaggerating. But if the lead-up to 150 is typically subdued throughout the country, it is positively nullified on the reserves, at least judging by Ohsweken, among the people of the Six Nations.
I drove along Chiefswood and some of the tributary roads that run off of it recently. On a front yard on Sunrise Court, I saw a lonely lawn chair, unoccupied, with a Canada flag pattern.
“Why celebrate?” Lynda Powless asks, rhetorically. “We’re older than that. Canada’s birthday is not important here. In terms of indigenous history, it is a meaningless number.”
Powless, as owner/publisher/editor of Turtle Island News, with offices on Chiefswood Road and serving Six Nations Grand River Territory, has a unique vantage on the community’s temperature.
It is decidedly cold on Canada 150, she says. Not surprisingly.
“We get 50,000 hits on our website,” Powless says. So she hears and reads a lot of feedback. “Nobody is talking about Canada 150.
“People are more concerned that we still have to go to work on Aboriginal Day ( June 21).” Many feel it should be a day like Canada Day; a holiday from work.”
Like all communities, and families, Six Nations has its internal divisions and conflicts. For instance, the hereditary council (Haudenosaunee Confederacy Chiefs Council) and the Six Nations of the Grand River elected council have been known to disagree.
BUT IT SEEMS that even those on opposite sides on other issues agree about Canada 150, and their words on the subject harmonize with Powless’s.
Here is the elected council’s official policy on Canada 150, expressed through Chief Ava Hill:
“To the community of Six Nations, Canada 150 represents 150 years of colonization and the loss of our peoples’ identity, language and self-worth. To this day Six Nations is working tirelessly to empower its youth with awareness of who they are, helping them to regain knowledge of their culture and traditions.
“Taking into consideration the impact Six Nations participation in these events will have on current and future generations, the Elected Council has chosen not to support activities for the anniversary of Canada 150 and instead will be supporting Six Nations own activities which includes the celebration Six Nations 150th Fall Fair.”
The HCCC (hereditary council) is likewise taking a pass on the celebrations.
“We’re not marking it by any means,” says Hazel Hill. “We look at 150 years of oppression, cultural genocide and the imposition of laws that have ignored and disrespected the original inhabitants of this land.”
Hill is director of the Haudenosaunee Development Institute, a body of the HCCC. She says that Canada has no real treaty with the Haudenosaunee and so the HCCC doesn’t recognize the anniversary and distrusts Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s talk of reconciliation. She says the Haudenosaunee have not been able to have meetings with Trudeau and Indian Affairs department (Indigenous and Northern Affairs Canada) to discuss outstanding issues.
Powless says no events are planned for Canada 150 at Six Nations. “We have our own challenges. We don’t need birthday parties.”
But what about Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his supposed commitment to native issues?
“He has brought in the murdered and missing indigenous women’s commission (National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls), and he’s not held in as much disdain as Stephen Harper, but still he’s a Canadian politician.”
The real 150 celebration at Six Nations on the Grand River, it seems, will be the Fall Fair.
“We have our own challenges. We don’t need birthday parties.” LYNDA POWLESS EDITOR, TURTLE ISLAND NEWS SERVING SIX NATIONS GRAND RIVER TERRITORY