Please help! Is it impossible to ever get a relationship with my views and character?

[Love'sReject]

I lost all empathy when you admitted to totally disrespecting the aboriginal people. Not cool, bro. As a fellow geek like yourself, I thought maybe you were all right. Turns out, you're really not. And by the way, nice novels you're writing here; your pompous attitude just reeks of "Confederacy of Dunces."

[HeartIsAching]

Notice that he displays the same either/or, on/off thinking you do about women, LR?

[bcgirl]

As for your aboriginal beliefs, I don't think thats such a rasist view point and I don't think that every other Canadian would take offense to that. The Canadian system sucks in the way they are treating the aboriginals, keeping them in reserves keeps them poor And unable to get out of that poverty cycle...I state my beliefs but am not called racist or a creep. I think that the way you are talking or the fact that you need to apologize about potentially offending someone or so terrified to not come across as a pervert, creep etc. is what is the main problem.

[Wakeup]

Canada does not "keep them on reserves nor does it keep them poor" Native Canadians have access to full funding from the government for university education if they choose to partake of that benefit. They can leave the reserve any time they like. It's not like they're interred in some barbed wire camp that they can't leave if they want to. Yes many have a problem with alcohol and drug abuse but they also have full funding to help them with rehab and getting their selves straightened out. Yes they are poor and often on welfare but there are just as many that have gotten the education offered to them and have moved off the reserve and living quite well. It's all up to them how well (or sad) they end up. Are things perfect for Cdn Aboriginals.. No.. but they are not without the means to overcome if they choose.

Just wanted to clear up that erroneous image that was painted.

[surfhb2]

Id rather be Aboriginal in Canada then black in US

[IndiReloaded]

Canada does not "keep them on reserves nor does it keep them poor" Native Canadians have access to full funding from the government for university education if they choose to partake of that benefit. They can leave the reserve any time they like. It's not like they're interred in some barbed wire camp that they can't leave if they want to. Yes many have a problem with alcohol and drug abuse but they also have full funding to help them with rehab and getting their selves straightened out. Yes they are poor and often on welfare but there are just as many that have gotten the education offered to them and have moved off the reserve and living quite well. It's all up to them how well (or sad) they end up. Are things perfect for Cdn Aboriginals.. No.. but they are not without the means to overcome if they choose.

Just wanted to clear up that erroneous image that was painted.

Wow Wakeup, you just demonstrated how ignorant you are about aboriginal issues. The issue is meaningful access, not merely access. No, they aren't interred, but then again, how do you make a westernized education system relevant to first nations people?

Sorry to point you out on this, but this happens to be an important issue for my profession and region. Your uninformed opinions go up my nose sometimes.

[IndiReloaded]

Id rather be Aboriginal in Canada then black in US

Depends where. East/west coasts of US are rather egalitarian. Aboriginals in my region are respected but not treated 'equally' I would say. Part of this is b/c our first nations choose themselves to stand apart, but at least part of that is a lack of true welcome from our western (and here in BC, eastern) cultures.

[Resessions]

Christ, you're boring the hell out of me with this novella of a post you have created. I'm going to say that the woman probably aren't finding you creepy but rather boring. Next time you meet someone you would like to take out in a date try something fun because I figure the women are thinking the museum was just a bad choice. Find something fun and liven up some.

[John Steed]

Canada does not "keep them on reserves nor does it keep them poor" Native Canadians have access to full funding from the government for university education if they choose to partake of that benefit. They can leave the reserve any time they like. It's not like they're interred in some barbed wire camp that they can't leave if they want to. Yes many have a problem with alcohol and drug abuse but they also have full funding to help them with rehab and getting their selves straightened out. Yes they are poor and often on welfare but there are just as many that have gotten the education offered to them and have moved off the reserve and living quite well. It's all up to them how well (or sad) they end up. Are things perfect for Cdn Aboriginals.. No.. but they are not without the means to overcome if they choose.
Just wanted to clear up that erroneous image that was painted.

I very much agree with you! This is exactly what I think, and I believe you are absolutely correct and have most accurately assessed the situation! Allow me to express my complete support of your view!

I lost all empathy when you admitted to totally disrespecting the aboriginal people. Not cool, bro. As a fellow geek like yourself, I thought maybe you were all right. Turns out, you're really not. And by the way, nice novels you're writing here; your pompous attitude just reeks of "Confederacy of Dunces."

Behold! This is what I meant: you adamantly adhere to your views, or, I would argue, misconceptions, and, what is more essential to this point, consider those who disagree with you being unintelligent or evil. I am not disrespecting the aboriginals, on the contrary, I am wishing that they acquire an opportunity to fully realise their human individual potential, so that they can become as successful and accomplished people as many others on this planet had become. Those people who have constructed the false and ghostly notion of "identity", "tradition", "culture" and other rubbish are the ones who are disrespecting the aboriginal people, and deny them equality. Because they are first of all people, individuals, humans, and not "aboriginals", which is a constructed and fully invented term. All humans are first of all individuals, and they should be allowed all the fruits and freedoms which civilisation achieved. The ideas of "identity" and "pride" are just like nationalism, being precisely the same scheme used by, say, nazism (I hope we are all aware of how illogical and silly this was). As Shopenhauer proclaimed, only those people are proud of their nation, who have not achieved anything personally in life to be proud of. The politicians who maintain this identity myth should cease this malicious and ill causing propaganda, but should help the natives to assimilate, forget their primitive traditions, and become free. Identity is nothing but chains, which make the bearer thereof their slave.
Moreover, some aboriginal chiefs get form the federal budget salaries of more than 300 000 dollars per year, which is greater than the salaries of the premiers of the provinces.
The identity idea is produced by those "chiefs", aboriginal "leader" and various politicians who thus profit financially therefrom, whilst, instead of helping, enslaving the aboriginal population to poverty, primitive and depraved life, (the life, wherewith they had been stuck, due to unfortunate geographical and historical reason, for over 10 000 years, whilst the rest of the globe was developing and providing more and more freedom to the individuals) in other words to their concocted fairy tale of "traditional" life and "identity", which is in fact nothing but an unfortunate privation and lack. We should stop just providing them money for procuring this harm, and instead begin assimilating the aboriginals, and make them forget this delirious idea of "unique identity worth preserving", being nothing more than a product of left wing propaganda. I see absolutely no difference in assimilating the aboriginals and, say, improving the condition of the poor by giving them jobs and making them richer. Although by the same logic of the aboriginals the poor may say that "no, making us rich is evil, we desire to preserve our traditional identity of being poor and in need!" By defending "identity" and "tradition" you are the one disrespecting the aboriginals, because you claim the concocted myth of "identity" to be of greater importance than the lives of the individuals, of humans. You care about a constructed notion, but I care about individuals, about human beings.

how do you make a westernized education system relevant to first nations people?

How is it relevant to all people? How is it relevant to a person, a human individual, regardless of his or her ethnic background? How would you actually define "western education"? "Western" education is so far the education which has become the most popular and most useful all over thee globe because, first of all it is not "western" but, it is cosmopolitan. It includes in itself the ideas from all regions and schools of the civilised world. It uses, amongst many things, print, which was partially developed in China, it used algebra, which was developed by Avicenna in Persia, it uses physics and geometry, which were at first having been developing in ancient Egypt, and many more things. Of course it uses many notions which occurred in the West too, such as Newton's Laws, calculus, Shakespeare, etc. But this makes it not "western", for it is universal! And, wait, what kind of education have the aboriginals? The problem is that they have none! Most of the tribes have not even a written language. How can one study and comprehend things as medicine, mathematics, science, philosophy, etc., without a written language? Now, are you going to say that medicine, mathematics, etc., are strictly Western things? You might have just developed a new Nobel Prise worth theory, although as far as it stands to my knowledge, calculus and Newton's laws work both in Toronto and on the aboriginal reserves. Are medicine and heart surgery too a strictly "irrelevant western thing"? Are you saying the aboriginal people do not deserve being healed and cured from illnesses?
If you can see how medicine and health are relevant to the aboriginal people, you will see how "western" education is relevant too, for the former cannot be without the latter.

Wow Wakeup, you just demonstrated how ignorant you are about aboriginal issues. ... Your uninformed opinions go up my nose sometimes.

Quite a typical response from such opponents: instead of providing arguments and answering objections, they will continually reiterate how "ignorant" you are and how "ill informed" your opinions are. (Notice, the use of "opinion". Maybe the fact that 2+2=4 is only my subjective "uninformed" opinion too? Can you prove me wrong?)



But let us not diverge ourselves off-topic, lest a moderator closes this thread.

[HeartIsAching]

But let us not diverge ourselves off-topic, lest a moderator closes this thread.

For thread drift? Not here.

[Love'sReject]

I very much agree with you! This is exactly what I think, and I believe you are absolutely correct and have most accurately assessed the situation! Allow me to express my complete support of your view!


Behold! This is what I meant: you adamantly adhere to your views, or, I would argue, misconceptions, and, what is more essential to this point, consider those who disagree with you being unintelligent or evil. I am not disrespecting the aboriginals, on the contrary, I am wishing that they acquire an opportunity to fully realise their human individual potential, so that they can become as successful and accomplished people as many others on this planet had become. Those people who have constructed the false and ghostly notion of "identity", "tradition", "culture" and other rubbish are the ones who are disrespecting the aboriginal people, and deny them equality. Because they are first of all people, individuals, humans, and not "aboriginals", which is a constructed and fully invented term. All humans are first of all individuals, and they should be allowed all the fruits and freedoms which civilisation achieved. The ideas of "identity" and "pride" are just like nationalism, being precisely the same scheme used by, say, nazism (I hope we are all aware of how illogical and silly this was). As Shopenhauer proclaimed, only those people are proud of their nation, who have not achieved anything personally in life to be proud of. The politicians who maintain this identity myth should cease this malicious and ill causing propaganda, but should help the natives to assimilate, forget their primitive traditions, and become free. Identity is nothing but chains, which make the bearer thereof their slave.
Moreover, some aboriginal chiefs get form the federal budget salaries of more than 300 000 dollars per year, which is greater than the salaries of the premiers of the provinces.
The identity idea is produced by those "chiefs", aboriginal "leader" and various politicians who thus profit financially therefrom, whilst, instead of helping, enslaving the aboriginal population to poverty, primitive and depraved life, (the life, wherewith they had been stuck, due to unfortunate geographical and historical reason, for over 10 000 years, whilst the rest of the globe was developing and providing more and more freedom to the individuals) in other words to their concocted fairy tale of "traditional" life and "identity", which is in fact nothing but an unfortunate privation and lack. We should stop just providing them money for procuring this harm, and instead begin assimilating the aboriginals, and make them forget this delirious idea of "unique identity worth preserving", being nothing more than a product of left wing propaganda. I see absolutely no difference in assimilating the aboriginals and, say, improving the condition of the poor by giving them jobs and making them richer. Although by the same logic of the aboriginals the poor may say that "no, making us rich is evil, we desire to preserve our traditional identity of being poor and in need!" By defending "identity" and "tradition" you are the one disrespecting the aboriginals, because you claim the concocted myth of "identity" to be of greater importance than the lives of the individuals, of humans. You care about a constructed notion, but I care about individuals, about human beings.

But let us not diverge ourselves off-topic, lest a moderator closes this thread.

It's important to THEM. I say give them a choice, not impose cultural imperialism on them. Nice rant, by the way. If I had trouble sleeping before, now I think I've got my insomnia cure.

[John Steed]

A choice? But they have none! They have no means first to try a different life. If there would be a person, who will discover the world treasury of arts, sciences, poetry, philosophy, medicine, etc., and all the opportunities they can provide, and then after having attained the knowledge thereof at least so some extent, by say, becoming literate (learning at least one written language) and getting a university or at least a high school diploma, and only then say "No! I wish to go back to the wigwam and hunt beavers with a pointy stick!", (remember, firearms is not an aboriginal invention) then yes, I this will be a voluntary free decision. By having no knowledge of all this, they cannot choose, because they cannot compare. For a more detailed reply, please also see my addition to my previous message, which I produced after I have noticed your latest post.


If you are saying it is important to them, according to the same logic, you can defend the Nazis and all the awful things they were committing to people. You would have to declare then: "We, the Allies, have no right to impose our Western civilised values to the land of Hitler. What they are doing there we may perhaps detest, but it is important to THEM. Let them practice their own tradition, their own ideology in their country."
What would your argument be against this? Remember, for instance that
a) torture, of especially exquisite and perverted type, was always a part of aboriginal tradition It was not only used against the Europeans during the conflicts, but mainly against other tribes. Did you know that by the time the Europeans came to America there were at that point more than 400 different intertribal wars occurring? And torture was part of the culture of many tribes, it had a very ceremonial character, and was deemed as entertainment. A very popular one, was when a captive from a hostile tribe had his intestines tied to a tree, and was beat by sticks and made to run around that tree. What a wonderful tradition! It sure would be most racist and unethical to suppress this cultural expression!
b) slavery was a very popular practice, long time before the Europeans came. Many captives from hostile tribes were enslaved, and kept in most inhumane conditions. There were some tribes who did not practice slavery, but the majority of them did. This was part of their tradition too! Well, Lincoln was sure an imperialist oppressor by abolishing slavery! He should have made a proviso, that aboriginal people should be allowed to hold slaves, and to torture them. How nasty of him to oppress their culture...
c) women were in many tribes (although not in all) considered as almost non humans and denied any voice or rights in their tribes. Again, the feminist who liberated women and achieved equality, were in fact eurocentric oppressors. They imposed the evil western views of equality of women upon the whole of Canadian society. They should have also made a proviso that aboriginals should be allowed to beat their women with sticks.

For those who are interested I recommend, amongst many books I read on the subject, the one called The Wild Frontier by William Osborne.

Now, you have, logically the following options to remain consistent:
a) say that yes, the aboriginals should be allowed to do all these inhumane things. Then also you should admit that all other groups of people, like nazis and KKK should be allow to do what is important to THEM, and that we should not be allowed to impose our civilised values upon them.
b) say that we should not judge actions by whether something is important to THEM, but rather by another ethical principle, for instance, a universal principle (meaning it should apply to all individuals on Earth) that if an action harms or deprives others it should not be allowed. In this case I shall claim that then there are many other ill practices in the aboriginal "traditions" such as illiteracy, lack of knowledge of medicine, ignorance of science, enslavement of their children to poverty and ignorance, etc.
c) say that arbitrarily some parts of the culture should be allowed, other not. But this is arbitrary, and you will have no explication why one should allow one but not another action.

[John Steed]

I dont agree with this. I know a lot of top class business women, female doctors, historians etc. I myself studies psychology and sociology. There are also a lot of men who are not interested in any of the topics you mentioned so your theory makes no sense. ... I do get what your saying. All these stereotypes about men and women etc really wind me up too and I think a lot of people are afraid to just be themselves because the media has thought men to behave a certain way and thought women to do the same but I dont agree that women are less present in certain careers because they believe they have no place there. I think it all boils down to personal interest. We recieve the same education men do and we choose which topics we like.

Well, I very much wish this would be the case! Maybe after all it would be expedient to move to Ireland? : )
However, at least here, the stereotypes seem to be of immensely strong effect. Out of all the girls I have encountered, very few are interested in politics, business, philosophy, etc, compared to how many men I have encountered are. Moreover, in my philosophy department there is only one girl for very 10 males. In the political science classes I took, it is a bit better: about 1 girl per every 7 males (but she would be a very vehement left winger). History still better, I would say there is only twice as few females as there are males (yet still it is far from equal). Also I have read some statistics and advices from some dating sites, I saw charts showing that politics, economy, history, etc. are the least interesting topic for women (this is based on their own questionnaires). These topics, however, were shown to be much more popular amongst men.

[surfhb2]

Well, I very much wish this would be the case! Maybe after all it would be expedient to move to Ireland? : )
However, at least here, the stereotypes seem to be of immensely strong effect. Out of all the girls I have encountered, very few are interested in politics, business, philosophy, etc, compared to how many men I have encountered are. Moreover, in my philosophy department there is only one girl for very 10 males. In the political science classes I took, it is a bit better: about 1 girl per every 7 males (but she would be a very vehement left winger). History still better, I would say there is only twice as few females as there are males (yet still it is far from equal). Also I have read some statistics and advices from some dating sites, I saw charts showing that politics, economy, history, etc. are the least interesting topic for women (this is based on their own questionnaires). These topics, however, were shown to be much more popular amongst men.

Politics, economy, history are fine within an academic environment but were talking about a social one here. There are 100s of millions are parties being thrown throughout the world every weekend....youre not going to find many conversation being centered around these subjects for any period of time.

Dude! I think you're trying too hard to be cerebral or something and its coming off as immature....its freaking me out and I dont even know you much less give a fuuck. Imagine what its doing to your dates? Jeesh!

[michelle23]

Well, I very much wish this would be the case! Maybe after all it would be expedient to move to Ireland? : )
However, at least here, the stereotypes seem to be of immensely strong effect. Out of all the girls I have encountered, very few are interested in politics, business, philosophy, etc, compared to how many men I have encountered are. Moreover, in my philosophy department there is only one girl for very 10 males. In the political science classes I took, it is a bit better: about 1 girl per every 7 males (but she would be a very vehement left winger). History still better, I would say there is only twice as few females as there are males (yet still it is far from equal). Also I have read some statistics and advices from some dating sites, I saw charts showing that politics, economy, history, etc. are the least interesting topic for women (this is based on their own questionnaires). These topics, however, were shown to be much more popular amongst men.

Does it even matter? The reason I have no interest in politics or the government is because I think they are all narcissistic pricks who are just out for their own gain. Theyl keep targeting the lower and middle class and take nothing from themselves. Each new budget proves this. They were on the radio the other day bitching about targeting people who earn 100k or more and saying it should rise to at least 120 before the higher tax bracket. By the way the people earning 100k have not taken any hit yet. They continue to drive their fancy cars and have their minders/body guards etc while their are children losing their homes and starving so **** the government and **** politics. A pack of farmers running our country who dont have a clue. A duck would do a better job. That is why i have no interest and why I dont watch the news coz its depressing.

As for history-the only reason I didnt study history is because I did not like the teacher. However I do find it interesting and I enjoy visiting castles or museums etc etc

I think the main reason women do not take much of an interest in these topics is because politics is just full of power heads (normally-narcissistic males) and most women find maths or other subjects that require a lot of thinking boring. We prefer to debate and form our own opinions or theorys which is why we find learning facts boring.