Copyright © 2000 NLThomas
All Rights Reserved

MNN, Saskatchewan - Should we be surprised that native people are being killed by cops in Saskatchewan? What is the connection between the farmers who occupied the Saskatchewan legislature to protest being pushed out of business and the killing of indigenous people? Both are victims of the hierarchical structure that turns people into objects that the system can play with in order to justify its existence.

Dave Scott, Saskatoon Police Chief, has suspended two senior constables and ordered a homicide investigation after finding two aboriginal men frozen to death near a power station on the southwest edge of the city.

One was dressed only in a t-shirt, jeans and socks which means they did not walk there. Also being investigated is the allegation of a third aboriginal man who had been taken south of the Queen Elizabeth power plant by two policemen, ejected from the police cruiser in sub-zero weather and told to walk back to the city. The three men were between 20 and 25 years of age. How often is this happening?

There is something really sick and wrong with law and order forces that do this. Are people going to sit back and do nothing? The cops are judging the indigenous people and taking the law into their own hands. "Here are these native people shooting drugs while we, the policemen, are behaving according to the system". Who is behaving in an aberrant way? It is the police! Why are they attacking and killing native people who are having difficulties tying their lives together, confused and shooting drugs?

Native people are presently overcoming the atrocities of colonialism. Yet natives continue to be portrayed as social misfits, which idea is being instilled into people at an early age. The non-natives then act on this stereotyping later on in their lives. The picture they see is out of balance. The cops see these misfits and think, "Who cares if they die?"

The one man who survived should be seen as a hero for taking the risk to report what happened. Police chief Scott should be congratulated for ordering a homicide investigation of his officers. The policemen should be pitied for being victims of ignorance.

Kahn-Tineta Horn, President of the Canadian Alliance in Solidarity with the Native Peoples, said, "We would like our people to be stronger and learn to be critical of the dominant society. Maybe taking drugs is an inarticulated way of saying "You can't touch me".

The dominant system has to learn about treating people equally, which is in the Charter of Rights. Isn't a dominant system dominating another contrary to equality? It is not good enough to punish the police officers for doing things wrong. This is using force on someone who used force. The ultimate message sent out is to use force to continue to dominate. What should be investigated is what is fundamentally wrong with the system so that the police could not see their own inhumanity, could not look at these young boys as people. The fact that they were doing drugs speaks for itself. Why couldn't the police officers see the emotional problems of these young men as they would their own brother or child? What is wrong with these police officers that they drift into these behaviours which is so far removed from treating someone as an equal?

For example the farmers who have problems are doing hunger strikes at the Saskatchewan legislature. The legislature locks them out and removes them. Something is seriously wrong. Instead of giving a voice to people who have problems, they try to dominate them.

When are the politicians and the legislature going to start defending the people from the bureaucrats and the cops?