(This video should make sense in a moment.)

Reader-submitted question: I was just wondering what your personal/political thoughts were on Harper’s recent comments about the north, and not wanting it to be a transient economy. I actually found his words heartening, rather than bone-chilling, for a change. One of the things I hated about Nunavut (I’m not sure what the situation’s like in the NWT or YT) is all of the “Eco-rapists,” as I’d call them: those there solely for the money, with no intentions of reinvesting or putting down roots in the community. The “Five-year-plan” was a far-too-common lifestyle for other Southerners I’d encounter there. Thus it’s refreshing to hear the PM say flat out that not enough aboriginals are holding the key positions in their own homes, and that this is a bad thing. What do you think about the situation and/or the prime minister’s take on it?

The situation is really, really complicated.

In general, I am not a huge fan of dumping government money on people. I much prefer investment in our economy, so, at least initially, an economic-development office is the sort of thing I’d support.

Decades of dumping government money on people have created communities of dependency and entitlement all across the north. This isn’t healthy. At the same time, people are dealing with the destruction of their cultures and traditional economies. That’s not healthy, either.

The federal government is not our friend. Thanks to the residential schools, we have entire generations of people who don’t know how to be parents.

As a continent, we do not have a particularly good track record dealing with aboriginal people. My ancestors (and Steve’s ancestors) murdered all of the aboriginal people they came across. The most generous thing I can say about that is that there were wars, and only one side had guns. They were pretty crappy guns, but they still were capable of murdering people and terrorising the people they didn’t manage to kill.

I see some parallels with Newfoundland’s history. This will not be a perfect analogy, so please forgive me for the things that don’t match.

The people of Newfoundland lived off the sea. They fished, and fished, and fished. They lived in tiny settlements, and they traded their fish to shopkeepers for all of the things they needed. The shopkeepers kept ledgers and tracked the fishermen’s debts. And yes, there were debts. You see, the shopkeepers set the prices. And the fishermen were never able to catch enough fish to pay off their debts. Funny how that worked.

After a few hundred years, the government decided to help. (JUST RUN.) It “helped” orphans by sending them to Mount Cashel. It made crappy deals for Newfoundland’s resources. It set up regulations that destroyed the fishery. It stood by as eco-weirdos crippled the sealing industry. It dumped money into communities so people wouldn’t have to work. It created make-work projects that were really just ways to qualify people for unemployment insurance. Well, that worked well, didn’t it?

The proud people of Newfoundland have been fighting their way back ever since. Each step has been a struggle. But they’re coming back.

I appreciate the prime minister’s announcement that a northern economic-development office will be set up. I hope it actually happens. I hope it actually helps people to eventually not need the office at all. We need to take responsibility for our own lives, for our own kids. We’ve been on the edges for far too long. And WE need to be the ones who do it, not people who are just planning to stay for a year or so.

Economic development will not make all of our problems go away. We have a desperate need for social supports, especially mental-health services and parenting supports. We also need to find a way to break through the cycle of dependency.

I wish I had all of the answers. I wish SOMEONE did. I don’t think anyone really knows how to solve our problems.

Still, I welcome any sort of support for our economy. I’m looking forward to seeing how it turns out.

Thanks for your question.