The Myth of Canada’s Indigenous Garden of Eden

Indigenous youth need education, skills, and opportunity, not obsolete mythology

Young dancers dressed in regalia participate in the 32nd annual Squamish Nation Youth Powwow in West Vancouver on July 14, 2019. Given a real leg up, Indigenous youth could prosper and escape Canada’s ever-growing Indigenous underclass. The Canadian Press/Darryl Dyck

Commentary

Many Canadians harbour foundational misconceptions about marginalized Indigenous communities and ignore the grim future for next generations. For multigenerational welfare families in remote settlements and urban slums, the gap has never been wider between the marginalized Indigenous underclass and the government’s much-vaunted middle class. Except for a privileged minority, by standard measures of societal dysfunctionality, the gap the government undertook to close widens exponentially.