Wirelessly posted (BlackBerry8310/4.2.2 Profile/MIDP-2.0 Configuration/CLDC-1.1 VendorID/107)

That isn't an appropriate comparison to make.

Anyway, the state can actually treat people the same - you just have to draw a line between what the state does and where people are free to think and do for themselves.

Much of the way aboriginal people are treated by the government stems from

a. Treaty rights.
b. Statute.
c. History.
d. the courts

You (the government) can't take away their treaty rights, nor can you change the history of interaction between Europeans and Aboriginals. The only thing that might be changed is Statute Law and the treatment of natives by the court system - subject, of course, to the context of history and treaty rights.

Past issues aside - until they learn to stand on their own two feet, they will never pull themselves out of the situation they find themselves in. No amount of hand wringing will resolve this.

For example. I act for a fair few Chinese and Indian (in the "UK" sense of the definition) clients. Rightly or wrongly, they perceive First Nations as being a bunch of drunken, lazy, free loaders. When sufficient enough of these immigrants get to the stage where they can affect National Politics, I foresee that the First Nations will suffer immeasurably. Not everyone sees the situation as a white man versus red man historical problem.

I note a huge difference between how "sophisticated" liberals and ordinary grunts on the ground perceive the issue. I also note that B.C. residents feel very differently about such issues than the rest of Canada. I know that this is a sweeping generalisation and it is based purely on my experience.

I cannot imagine that the well documented stand offs in Ontario would be allowed against any other group (see the Hutterite position re driving licences in Alberta) It is this type of inequality that seems to grate most.

I didn't cause the current problems, nor do I know how to resolve them. But, as time goes on, I fail to see how what happened in the past can be used to move forward.

I think you'll find that governments are generally very adept at taking away peoples rights

Anything made up by people can be changed - we aren't talking about fundamental laws of physics here. Treaties are just stuff written down on paper somewhere - if there was a will to change it, it could be done.

Exactly. Treaties are not set in stone. Overtime they can be changed, ignored or just deemed invalid or whatever else the people of the time choose.

I do find the Natives in Canada are more vocal then their US counterparts but maybe it just makes the news here more.

You are right, of course - and usually in the name of safety, security, or the common good!

Well the treaties are written and in many cases were between the indvidiual native band (or group of bands) and the Crown (Queen Victoria). These treaty rights might as well be set in stone, and the courts more often than not, uphold them to the fullest extent. However, provincial governments strive to water these rights down deeming them to be in conflict with the needs of the province.

Re: natives in Canada and US

They do not recognize a border and can freely pass from the US to Canada, serve in weach others military, live in either country, and in fact many reserves actually straddle the border.

Always found it weird that you never seem to come across them at all, any where - unless of course you were driving through Capilano/Squamish tribe area down by the bridge in N Van. Never had work colleagues or friends of friends who were native. Really separate group.

Completely agree. I work in the Alberta oil sands projects and there is a requirement to employ 'local content', i.e. a minimum amount of the work must go to aboriginal people. But the fact is, that it doesn't amount to much more than tree clearance, or trucking, or catering. It's really low-grade, non-sustainable work. Where are the aboriginal engineering graduates, for example?

It’s an issue that can and will be treated on a short term basis

Many in office and in academia have figured out that a lot of reservations are declining, small populations and the desire for the successful to get out.
Those that want to return the native way as said by DBD33 are in denial about reality, those that have figured out, its be assimilated or die. Have already moved on and are productive members of society, and you don’t have to go too far is you look hard enough..

Those that are left will go the same way as many other small isolated communities, the government will eventually send somebody around to switch of the lights , disconnect the wires and sell on the land

Why fix an old problem when time will solve the probelm

The worse they get, the faster the 'survivors’ will leave!

A more appropriate phrase might be adapt or die. I don't think living in the modern world means anyone needs to lose their cultural identity entirely.

Which, basically, is genocide. I kind of hoped we had got beyond this.

1948 United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (CPPCG). Article 2 of this convention defines genocide as "any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: killing members of the group; causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life, calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; [and] forcibly transferring children of the group to another group."[1]

You don't need to lose it, but you do need to progress

And as such I firmly believe the native groups on reservations will disappear and in my lifetime

those that 'survive' depending on their memories of their culture may choose to keep part of that identity (may the better educated) many more I believe will just dump it and be assimilated, the rest will be cast on the scrap heap with a culturally based chip on their shoulder and add to the small inner city gang/ghetto areas

I've worked with an aboriginal programmer on and off for twenty years. He's exceptional in having left the res and is active in band politics now; he has a foundation to provide education to native youth who want to move on. Socially, alas, he's a bit stereotypical.

Washing your hands may be convenient but it does little to help anyone move forward.

A wrong has clearly been done, and unless and until that wrong is rigthed (word??) there is no future unless you adopt MikeUK's "ultimate solution".