Aboriginal Statistician Says : “Canada does not need more people. Canada does not need a growing population.”
How many of you believe that Canadians, if asked in the 1970s or 1980s, would have consented to our current immigration policy? In my view, this arrangement would have been roundly rejected and with good reason.
To list a few concerns, people would have correctly predicted social and cultural disruption, worsened living standards and environmental destruction, but here we are. At this point, I’m genuinely confused as to why we continue to bring 300,000 to 350,000 people into the country each year.
To narrow this question even further, how many residents of Brampton, Markham or Surrey would have signed up to have their communities changed beyond recognition? The sprawl and cultural change is staggering. What’s unfolding in those areas is completely abnormal and looks rather like dispossession, and I should know.
As an Aboriginal, our nations stand to lose political and demographic influence with each year that passes. If our share of the population diminishes, so too will our voice. Perhaps my sample is too small, but it’s been my experience that new arrivals simply do not care about our history as a people.
This is in contrast to old-stock Canadians of European descent, many of whom seem aware that (a) we exist and we’re not a caricature or a monolith; (b) our history in this territory merits certain legal privileges; (c) our communities are impoverished and in disrepair; (d) governments of the past have wronged us; and (e) we’re still dismissed or sidelined. As for the final point, this thread will prove revealing.
Will I be dismissed for being insensitive, which I haven’t been. I’ve been candid. Or will my assessment — as a member of an indigenous North American tribe — be respected?
I’m genuinely worried that we Aboriginals will be further relegated, perhaps to the point of being a complete afterthought. This seems assured if Canada continues to be flooded demographically.
Why haven’t we been asked if we’d like more people within what was once ours? Why are we invoked as an excuse for further immigration? When white Canadians complain about excessive immigration, and rightly so, the common refrain is either: “you took this land and therefore we have a right to take this land” or “we’re all immigrants.”
We are NOT all immigrants! We Aboriginals have reached a compromise with the Europeans that settled and built Canada as a political institution, an imperfect one, but what about the Chinese, Indians and Arabs? How are we supposed to interface with these groups?
Putting aside Indigenous concerns, as per http://www.statcan.gc.ca/pub/91-209-x/2016001/article/14615-eng.htm — 5% of immigrants are over 65 and 15% are between 45 and 65. How is this to the broader benefit of Canadians? I can dive further into the details if prompted.
However immigration, as it’s currently practiced, is also suppressing wages, driving up housing prices and rents, worsening traffic congestion, placing incredible strain on public healthcare systems, stressing education systems through numbers and demands and, above all, destroying — totally FOULING — large sections of this country’s gorgeous land.
It’s extremely depressing to return to an area I once visited during childhood to discover that it’s been paved over and stuffed with crappy, mass-constructed housing developments. How is this remotely consistent with a desire to conserve this country’s natural wealth? Finally, considering projections in relation to automation, what possible argument exists for saturating an already oversaturated labour market?
I have a difficult enough time as it is finding stable employment in my field (statistician) and I can only imagine how bad things are for other positions. The combination of 350,000 annual residents and a revolving population of 500,000 TFWPs has ruined employment for young Canadians, the middle-class and the working-class. We need fewer people in a range of industries than before and this trend will continue.
Let me repeat : Canada does not need more people. Canada does not need a growing population.
