Being White, Rich and Male

I am a rich white male, I have so much privilege and don’t ever use it for good, or really acknowledge. I go through out my life never having to explain why I would want or do something. I do not have to worry about people being racist or having opportunities. I have so many options that I do not realize on a daily basis and that many people in the world around me will never be able to do.
I did not choose to be white or male, but that is how I was born. I know I do not make sense to some of my friends. As a white person I never have to worry about racism. I will never have some one not hire me because of my race. I will not be rejected as an applicant or an apartment because of the colour of my skin. I also will not feel scared in many situations that other will feel. I am a talk male who could fend of an attack that others would not be able to. I do not feel fear when I walk through a park or on a street by myself.
I am not rich by North American Standards; I would be apart of the middle class. In world standards I am wealthy beyond wealthy. I have the luxury to travel to BC to visit my sister, without having to really having to give something up to save for the trip. I am able to go to university, and not worry about my financial situation. I was able to get most of the things that I wanted as a child (not toy guns). I never had to really worry about having food on the table, not having enough to eat. The hungriest I have ever gotten was doing 40 hour famine, that would be a walk in the park for some people in Canada, not to mention the world.
I do not go around my life looking at all the ways in which I am privileged, I do some times…

Where I Want to go in the World

Well I want to go everywhere in the World, quite literally, but I know that a person could not do that and that there would be huge environmental impacts of that kind of travel. And there would also be mega costs involved. So I will describe three places where I would like to travel. The mud volcano near Sidoarjo Indonesia, Centralia and Palmerston Pennsylvania. If you do a quick search for these three things you will find a common characteristic. They were all 'natural' disasters that where created by us humans.

The mud volcano was created when an oil company was drilling for oil and made a little mistake. Well there was no oil but water and the pipe was not casted in steel the whole way down. This caused the water to mix with the mudstone and explode to the surface. This little volcano has destroyed an area the size of Central Park. And you can see it using Google Maps, although it is not quite up to date. This volcano has enough water that some say it will be going for quite a while. There have been no engineering solutions either.

Centralia used to be a community but now it is down to just a few. Most of them have gone away because the ground is literally on fire. Yup the ground is on fire. Centralia is located in an area where the ground is filled with coal, which caught fire and continues to burn. The ground is falling away because there is no longer the coal to support the ground. The fire has been going on for 45 years, and it will keep on going. Both of these incidents are because our society needs so many fossil fuels to keep it alive.

The last place I want to visit is Palmerston, Pennsylvania. It sounds like a wonderful community, but some areas of the hill will not grow anything at all. You can see it on Google Maps, it is just a grey area to the south-east. This was created with the pollution from a Zinc Plant. There has been many government funds given to the area to fix the after math but it is still present. There are two sides fighting over what they should do for the town; one says it is just fine the, other side says that the ground should be replaced. To make it more interesting people are moving there because it is a cheep location close to major markets.

Yes I know that these places do not make the beauty of the natural world, or mark how great humans can be. But we should always remind ourselves that we can destroy the world with out even really realizing it. Also we have destroyed certain areas so we can not even use them any more. National Geographic and A Walk in the Wood by Bill Bryson inspired me to write about this.

First Nations

The situation of the first nations in Canada needs to be addressed. I know that any idea that I put forward for a solution would be wrong, why because I am white. I know this is hard for white people to understand, but being white has many privileges and we do not recognize them ever. Every day we are put in a place of privilege because of the way that we look
Even though I can’t give unbiased solutions to the issue of how first nations fit into Canadian society, I will still give some ideas. Should we take all of the money that we spend on them away, keep the status quo or change drastically?
We should not take the money that we given them away, how would they survive on nothing. Yes we do give them money, but where would they find jobs with out help. They are unable to really raise funds because many reserves they do not own their land. This means that they cannot sell there house or use it as collateral.
Should we keep the status quo, no this is a terrible idea but it appears that is what our governments are doing. Not doing anything is making everybody mad, the first nations and others as well. How many protests does it have to take before the government takes action.
So that leaves the option take action on the first nations issue. There are many solutions out there which works for both everybody. Sure they are not perfect, can you ever really have a perfect world? But I am sure that if we put in place agreements with the first nations we will go a long way to helping our cultures to coexist peacefully.

First Nation Self Government

Of course these are my Western White ideas. Because I am not an overt racist but none of us can be completely void of any biases. The first nations need new agreements all across the country, there have been some positive ones occurring. The Tswwassen and Maa-nulth final agreements have all happened in the last year. There is also the Nisga’a agreement, Nunavut and ones in Labrador. These have all created controversy, mostly from people who do not understand the situation fully.
One of the examples that I believe should be spread through out Canada, is self government. This would create first nation governments through out Canada. They would have a few more powers than the local municipalities, they would enfranchise them and give them self determination. There would be controversy because only first nations would be able to vote in elections for these governments. If you would let everybody who wanted to vote for the government it would not be a government that would truly represent the local first nations.
I think this is the way that all future agreements should go. The first nations should be able to have control over a wide range of issues that they deal with locally. Health care, environment, schooling, culture, language are all examples. The first nations should also not get all of these powers at once; this would allow a smooth transition, allowing all of the governments phase into the new order.

First Nation Representation in Federal Government

As most of you know the only representation that first nations is through regular MPs or MPPs who represent a whole riding that they are apart of. This means that they do not have people to represent their issues. It is true that they have more representation in a democratic society, but it is still not a large amount of control. I am not focusing on local government representation because I have talked about that elsewhere. I think Canada needs to follow the example of New Zealand, which has Maori MPs in government. Maori vote in the election of local candidates as well as Maori seats which only they can vote for.
I know this goes against many peoples belief that we are all have the same amount of voice in what direction the country goes. I feel that the first nations need a large voice because they are one of the founding nations of Canada. The French already have lots of input into the direction of Canada because they have many seats in Parliament.
If Canada gets around to fixing the senate, why not add some seat for the first nations. If you follow the basic frame work of the attempted changes in the 1990s each of the provinces would have 10 seat and the territories could have 3 each. The first nations could have three senate seats where they could only vote for. There could be one for each of the different ‘groups’; Inuit, First Nations and Métis. Some would say that three seats would not do a whole lot, but I would contradict. If there was a common first nations party which would win each of those seats, and won at least one in each of the territories. This would allow them to have 6 votes out of 112 votes in the house, over 5% of the vote.
This would not drastically change the political landscape; the part would vote on issues as a bloc and would work with whatever party was in power. It would allow them to have a great voice in the country that they helped create.

Looking Up

When was the last time that you looked up at the sky and wondered where our place in the world is? For me it was the second week of class and I was walking to my night class. It was a beautiful night, not completely clear but almost; the bright yellow moon was rising full through the trees. The snow on the ground glowed and the clouds left in the sky looked white.
Nights like that make me wonder what is our purpose in the universe. I know on this planet we are the ones ‘in charge’. What is out in the beautiful universe, will it some day change our mind, our own lives that are so small.