Good Ole White Folks

Amazingly (for lack of a more negative word) all the issues Aboriginals face are from one root problem: White people. With the arrival of European settlers searching for free land to conquer and expand came extreme heartache for the Native people already living in Canada. The history of how the Europeans treated the Aboriginals can be described in four words: colonization, segregation, assimilation, and discrimination.

source: National Resources Canada

To see a timeline look at my prezi on the history of Canada and how we treated the
Aboriginal people: shortest history timeline ever

With the creation of the reserves, the forced European ideals, the stripping of the Aboriginal culture, and the residential schools that tore up communities it is no wonder they are facing issues today. Aboriginals were told that there way of life was uncivilized and outdated. They were told that everything they had been doing for the past thousand years was wrong and had to be changed. This still creates problems today as Aboriginals feel unwanted and put astray with their identity crumbled. How can we better ourselves when we don't even know who we are? The residential schools enforced the European ideas and caused great suffering throughout the communities. Children were taken from their families and stripped of their identities and cultures. Residential school is also the reason for a lot of the alcoholism with Aboriginal people. With their children taken from them the adults resulted to drinking to waste away the days missing them. Or, if they themselves went to residential schools they drink to forget the suffering they went through while in the residential schools.  Alcoholism leads to violence and sometimes death. Loss of identity leads to crime and gangs, so does poverty and poor living conditions. Everything is the aftermath of the arrival of the Europeans. A chain reaction has progressed and grown like a snowball rolling down a hill at an uncontrollable pace. Every action has a reaction.
See this diagram to show one way of looking at the cycle: The Cycle of Destruction

Another Cause for a lot of grief is the absence of fathers in the Aboriginal community. As I mentioned in the last post, a lot of children are brought up by either foster parents or grandparents. This talk show explains the issue of absent fathers. Aboriginal Fathers
Without a father or support system the children turn to other people, like gang members, or end up lost with nowhere to turn. These youth are at risk to drop out of school, turn to drugs or alcohol, and commit crimes.