In the first section (70 pages) the native Cree, born in 1977, follows a common path into a life of violence, abuse, theft, prostitution, alcoholism, and debauchery as his single mother moves from the reserve in northern Manitoba, to Winnipeg, Brandon, Dawson Creek, Spirit River, and, Terrace B.C. By the time he turned 17, he had served time, and become a house guard for the Manitoba Warriors, a criminal gang that even intimidated the Hells Angels.
There is a lot of perhaps justified finger-pointing at the colonists who disrupted the lives of the Natives, confined them to Reservations, and separated families by forcing children to attend abusive residential schools and unashamedly practiced systemic racism. But there is no recognition that the much later programs to reeducate aboriginals in their former cultures, though often lead by aboriginals, were usually funded by federal white politicians, albeit belatedly and under pressure. Throughout the book, there is abundant very foul language, which, to me, usually indicates a paucity of linguistic skills.
The fight over the Alberta tar sands provides some devastating data about how destructive they are. They have replaced 170 square kilometres of arboreal forest with toxic liquid waste that leaches 11 million litres into the Athabasca River every year. The author and many other Native leaders are leading the legal battle to put a stop to this, claiming violation of hunting and fishing rights.
His religion combines sweat lodges and Sundance lodges, ritual sacrifice, some vague belief in an after-life, at least occasional use of psychedelic drugs, and ancestor worship. He continued to drink, use cocaine and other drugs long after he was an ambassador change. These contradictions seem to combine with a strange form of Mormonism into which he was baptized, and is so puzzling to me as to become meaningless.
The Aboriginal culture is presented largely as a unity, while the reality is that there is frequent violent discord that continues, and infighting undermines their important message.
“Uncle Alex got two years in Stony Mountain for doing the right thing.”
“One of the mysteries of creation is how closely saving the world and saving yourself are linked.”
There is no doubt that his intentions are good. But the anger is all-consuming, and it seems at times that he protests for the sake of protest, without thinking through the consequences.
6/10
Thanks, Goodreads.
The Passionate Reader 