We Don't `Get' Native Despair

My heart goes out to the Pauchay family and the people of Yellow Quill because I know these deaths will contribute another layer of guilt and despair to the community's internalization of its social problems, deepening the sense of helplessness and despair. Some mourners will turn back to alcohol and drugs to escape from reality. Others, a growing number, will not drink at all. What's little known in Canada is that many aboriginal people have been taking responsibility for the addiction epidemic that came upon them when their losses grew too great to bear. A healthy and inspiring addiction recovery movement has been underway for more than three decades. Today, a greater number of aboriginal people abstain completely from alcohol than other Canadians and many of them are helping family and friends do the same. Aboriginal communities just have more problem drinkers. So, let's stop throwing stones at aboriginal communities for their drinking problems and try to figure out where the problem drinkers are coming from. We're so busy blaming aboriginal addicts that we can't see how our personal actions and political policies contribute to the self-destructive behaviour that is creating so much misery. The same conditions that led to the deaths of the Pauchay girls will persist once the media attention ends because most Canadians just don't get it. What we don't get is that racism is at the root of the problem. . . . http://www.thestar.com/comment/article/301882

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