"What's this about good neighbors?"

Brantford's city councillors put on quite a show on April 4. Their whining performance might have elicited sympathy from viewers unacquainted with the background issues of the sewer line project but, speaking for myself, I say it looks good on them. Any wastage of time or resources should be blamed on those bumbling bureaucrats who initiated this unnecessary, illegal, immoral project in the first place.

During that meeting we were informed that Brantford has always been a good neighbor to us Six Nations people. But would a good neighbor make a secret "deal" against our interests? Would a good neighbor continue to allow unmonitored and untreated poisons to contaminate Ohsweken's water supply? Would a good neighbor continue to claim and collect taxes on Six Nations' lands? Etc., etc.

We were also informed that their patience is wearing thin and that it may be time for them to adopt a militant attitude against us. In this respect not much has changed. Historically, when natives have tried to protect their land, they were called savages, renegades or radicals and threatened with violence. (Today, even if we do manage to regain some lost land, we become, according to Mabel Dougherty, "land grabbers" of all things!) Today, if we make use of our treaties to take animals for subsistence, we become trespassers and poachers. Or, if we continue to believe in our religious concept of the Earth as our mother, and try to protect her accordingly, we are called pagans. If anyone's patience is running thin, it should be ours. And now, for them to threaten to call in the storm troopers - well, at least we know where we stand.

Over the years Brantford has benefited greatly from her relationship with Six Nations people. How many acres of our land have they freely enjoyed the use of? How many tens of millions of our dollars have been spent in how many of her business establishments? Now, for trying to protect what little land we have left, she threatens violence against us. Good neighbor indeed!

There is quite an effective economic exercise called a boycott. This is where a group of people flex their collective financial muscles and refuse to spend money in a given store or town. Since the Six Nations stand for peace, a boycott against Brantford business establishments would probably be the best non-violent way for us to let the "suits" in Brantford know that our patience has limits as well.

Brantford's city councillors should realize their sewer line project puts them in a no win situation. They lose more respect and credibility every time they open their mouths and, even though they get approval from the (illegal) Six Nations band council, they still must reckon with the Confederacy people (BSAR, glebe lands, remember?)

As for their problem with democracy, I don't know where their roots lead back to, but that's how we do things on this continent and have done for many thousands of years.