One quarter of Canadians have no faith in Aboriginal people

APTN reports that the Canadian Race Relations Foundation found in a survey that one quarter of Canadians have low to no faith in Aboriginal people.

"It examined the perception Canadians have toward Aboriginal people, especially since the Idle No More movement sparked in December." APTN

Wab Kinew at TRU's Storytellers Gala

Aboriginal journalist, musician and director of Indigenous Inclusion of Aboriginals at the University of Winnipeg, Wab Kinew spoke at the Storytellers Gala hosted by Thompson Rivers University's Aboriginal Collective March 14, 2013.

Courtney Dickson, roving editor at The Omega, TRUs independent student newspaper wrote about Wab Kinew's presentation in her article posted in theomega.ca.

Is Interest in Idle No More Dwindling

Idle no more originally started to protest omnibus bills C-38 and C-45 has changed to include a number of Aboriginal centric issues.  Including opposition to bill C-27 First Nations Transparency Act, First Nations Education Reform and Mi'kmaq Framework Agreements. They have also posted the Ally Bill of Responsibilities by Dr. Lynn Gehl on their official website that in part asserts that the needs of the supporters of Indigenous people are secondary and must take a backseat to Indigenous people.

As Idle no more shifts away from its original focus and issues statements filled with political rhetoric, traffic to its website has seen a steady decline.

A search on Alexa.com an Internet traffic monitoring site shows that Idle no more's official website has seen a large decrease in traffic.

Daily global Internet users has decreased by -69.77% in the last month from its three month high of +4000% which equals 0.00037% of Internet users to 0.00017% this month. (statistical data from March 14, 2013, refer to Alexa.com for current stats)

This equals a traffic rank of 794,177 which is a rank lower than the previous 402,344.  Indicating a significant drop in visitors to their website.

The decline of Idle no more was acknowledged by Phil Fontaine a former Chief of the Assembly of First Nations at a talk at the University of Winnipeg and reported in an article by the CBC where he suggests that Idle no more must change their direction to restart their movement.

Krystalline Krause in her article Activist Communique: Idle No More still breathing. March 5, 2013. from Rabble.ca said right wing media has declared Idle no more dead however the movement is still alive. March 20 to 22, 2013 have been declared as Global Days of Action for Idle no more.

However, with the change in focus and media wrangling it appears that the environment has been forgotten.  Federal changes to environmental laws have not changed.  The issues surrounding the omnibus bills have not gone away.  But, people's interest and it appears the interest of Idle no more have moved on to other things.

Perhaps March will see a grassroots movement return to its own roots.

Solidarity with Mi'kmaq, "1 in 4 inmates in federal penitentiaries today are of Aboriginal ancestry" and Sharon McIvor speaks at TRU.

Idle No More releases a statement declaring solidarity with Mi'kmaq First Nations protesters Shelley Young and Jean Sock who have been on hunger strike since March 1, 2013 in opposition to Framework Agreements between Mi'kmaq Chiefs and the Federal Government that will abolish Treaty rights.
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The Office of the Correctional Investigator tables its report on Aboriginal people and their relationship with the Justice and Correctional system and titled, Spirit Matters: Aboriginal People and the Corrections and Conditional Release Act.

“Close to one-in-four inmates in federal penitentiaries today are of Aboriginal ancestry," said the Correctional Investigator, Mr. Howard Sapers. 

The report found.

Today, 21% of the federal inmate population claims Aboriginal ancestry. The gap between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal offenders continues to widen on nearly every indicator of correctional performance:

• Aboriginal offenders serve disproportionately more of their sentence behind bars before first release.
• Aboriginal offenders are under-represented in community supervision populations and over-represented in maximum security institutions.
• Aboriginal offenders are more likely to return to prison on revocation of parole.
• Aboriginal offenders are disproportionately involved in institutional security incidents, use of force interventions, segregation placements and self-injurious behaviour.

From Executive Summary section xiii. 
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Sharon McIvor a lawyer from Merrit, BC talks at Thompson Rivers University about Historical and Current Perspectives on the Status of First Nations Women at the Arts and Education building to a audience of about 30 people.

Topics discussed:

'82 Canadian Constitution and Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
'89 McIvor v Canada - regarding the Indian Act and Aboriginal women losing status until '85.
Bill -C-3 Gender equity in Indian Registration Act
Matrimonial property on Reserves.
McIvor's role with Federal Correction services and the Task Force on Federally Sentenced Women.
Missing and Murdered Aboriginal Women and the relationship between Aboriginal Women and the Police.