Tradition, Modernity or Both? TVO, The Agenda Thursday, November 27 Canada's First Nations: Tradition, Modernity or Both? Aboriginal identity at a crossroad: 1.2 million strong and growing, but with more than half of Canada's First Nations now living off-reserve, can the traditional way of life be maintained? Live from the Munk Centre for International Studies. For guest information and background resources, check: www.tvo.org/theagenda (Episode Video, blog, etc)

Suffice it to say ... "Aboriginal people have a special connection to the land? What's this? I've never heard of this. I don't have a connection to the land?" Spoken testily by Frances Widdowson on this episode of The Agenda. Can you believe that this woman co-authored a book telling Indigenous Peoples of Canada that they should just disappear? And she clearly doesn't even have a clue who they are, what their legal rights are, what Canada's legal responsibilities are ... nothing! She is by far the most ignorant 'academic' I have ever come across. Apparently her 'knowledge base' allows her to pronounce judgment on Indigenous Peoples and her judgment is ... wait for it ... They should all assimilate with other Canadians and for heaven's sake, stop trying to neolithicly live off the land! Oh yes she's qualified to make those judgments ... just as qualified as any other criminal who is publicly inciting genocide. (See Article 3 c http://www.unhchr.ch/html/menu3/b/p_genoci.htm) Frances Widdowson needs to read the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, and the UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. Or at least she could read Indian and Northern Affairs website for some basic information about the Indigenous Peoples she would dissolve and disperse. "Aboriginal rights: Rights that some Aboriginal peoples of Canada hold as a result of their ancestors' long-standing use and occupancy of the land. The rights of certain Aboriginal peoples to hunt, trap and fish on ancestral lands are examples of Aboriginal rights. Aboriginal rights vary from group to group depending on the customs, practices and traditions that have formed part of their distinctive cultures. " Indigenous Peoples of Canada have the right to exist. Frances Widdowson would deny that. Frances Widdowson is a sorely misguided toady of the corporate establishment, with fascist fantasies. And see ... http://donutsdesires.blogspot.com/2008/11/life-underneath-concrete.html