I think that your internal squabbles are meant to act as promotional material
anyway I am happy to see any talent judges display emotions and do not see it to be
a weakness certainly I am no believer in objectivity since we must experience
through the filter of ourselves
I think that welcoming contestants is an important part of your job of course
people have bad days but being rich and famous does not mean that people
should have bad manners
people are really putting themselves on the line when they enter a talent contest
when they audition it is not just an audition but it is something that reaches into
the deepest parts of ourselves and touches us
dioch yn fawr
pc

part i
The colonialist comment by Crit_Reasoning is problematic though not at all surprising

Treaties are made between states or nations — this includes 'first' nations who
have had sovereignty since time immemorial [millennia before the first white
person came to our shores] yet we have had that sovereignty denied and subsumed
by a white national interest and now a multiculturalist one

the state of canada makes treaties with european countries with the usa and with first nations it does not make treaties with national immigrant or national ethnic bodies nor with other landed peoples agencies associations or corporate entities Canada makes treaties with first NATIONs because its jurisdiction and sovereignty over the lands it has claimed through its acts and its legislation are in question if they were not in question the state would make no move to enter into expensive and prolonged legal agreements and discussions

For first nations in canada treaties are all about losing land as onondaga chief Oren Lyons said at a harvard conference in 1997 to his 'native american' relations in the audience "my brothers, I hear you call yourselves 'Native Americans' I ask you 'how can you have a treaty with yourself'? Indeed how can they be both Native and Americans - on both sides of the treaty (treaty between nations though I'm sure that many racist Canadians prefer to call us tribes or groups or bands so as to not acknowledge our ongoing sovereignty and self-determination)

Colonialism in canada has not gone away You are still here and all the multi-hued majoritarian population [not just white] that votes against First Nations rights and sovereignty are here as well You are making up the majority which is colonizing the First Peoples Canadian government gave First Nations the right to vote in
federal elections in 1960 as a way of weakening our sovereignty movements - before that time First Peoples had to give up their Indian Status in order to vote federally that is they had to unbecome Indians and become Canadians now we seem to be dual citizens like Italian Canadians who live here and are Canadian citizens but who can also vote in national elections in Italy because they're also Italian citizens except this is our only homeland

Did you know that First Nations are not conquered peoples in canada? There was no conquest! Are you still with me? There was never any conquering of the First Nations – our oppression was enacted through racist policies and it was through strength of numbers that the people of Canada together with [mother!] Britain enacted the British (British?) North American Act of 1867 creating the white state of Canada Show me where one First Nations leader signed that Act! Show me 500 First Nations leaders who signed it! You are assuming sovereignty through past and on-going genocide of the First Nations and by privileging whiteness and other aspects of colonialist eurocentricity

You say that Canada has never subjected 'other countries' to colonialism -- can you not make the mental/reasoning shift from 'other countries' to 'other nations' to 'first nations' What is your idea of 'a country'? and we do not live inside Canada's borders firstly the borders are in dispute that is precisely what land claims are about Canada's jurisdiction is in dispute secondly the borders are the impositions of the colonizer the occupier Canada has invaded and subsumed the First Nations and acted out genocide against us since first contact Would you want genocide (strength of arms and might is right) against the First Peoples to stand as your witness to legitimize the Canadian state’s claim of its own sovereignty?
kukwstum c&r

part ii
The colonialist comment by Crit_Reasoning is problematic though not at all surprising

You seem to be making the eurocentric assumption that the terra nullius bull of 1095 and the doctrine of discovery of 1452 and the papal bull inter caetera of 1493 by catholic popes allowing 'christians' to invade nonchristian lands and invade kill or enslave and conquer the residents is legitimate - is that because whiteness prevails because European hegemonies and protocols are 'truth manifest' for the invader how is a racist document made by a white man a thousand years ago over the sovereignty of half a world of people half a world away valid - was it because he was white that he is right
or perhaps because he practiced the right religion perhaps you would like to also invoke the 1479 treaty of alcacovas sanctioned by a 1481 papal bull too if you stacked all of the racist (sexist etc) papal bulls over the centuries together you could probably climb up to the moon I’m sure that enough of our forests were clearcut and pulped that there would be lots of paper left over for future bulls and masts and mastheads

We are not "groups" now you are racializing us and at the same time demeaning and ignoring us we are nations and have always been such we have always been nations in ways that are different from the nation(alism)s of western europe but we have always been sovereign and self-affirming self-governing - it is the Canadian state through its capitalist elite its imperialist elite (under the camouflage of democratic rhetoric) that maintains that we are not sovereign Who took our sovereignty away! Was it taken away on paper? How do you assume we 'lost' it? Do you have some documents that show that we lost our sovereignty? In the same way that the province of 'British' Columbia held on to the racist assumption (until the 1990s) that the First Peoples within 'its' borders had either had aboriginal title (i.e. national title) extinguished on contact (by a whiteman representing a white monarch and white government) or that we never had aboriginal title to the land in the first place --- ever! so we are to have lost our sovereignty through retroactive legislation or imperial command! neat trick I bet chriss angel doesn’t even have one of those up his sleeve

It was only through a series of court decisions that forced the BC government to recognize that aboriginal title might not have been extinguished (by white solutions) thus the flurry of land claims It should in fact be the government that is initiating the land claims because no first nation in BC signed any documents giving their land to the state and at the same time giving up their title (the validity of the douglas treaties of vancouver island are in dispute including the understandings and coerced situatedness of the presumed signatories and even the signatures themselves) even negotiating for aboriginal (national) title is itself acknowledgement that first nations are nations we are negotiating with the federal government nation to nation we are the only ‘groups’ ‘in canada’ to do this our relationalities with provincial governments have to do with how various mandates of the canadian constitution were distributed or assigned ab orgine

If you had made any effort to inform yourself of the fact of the genocidal initiatives made against— and the military and economic support given by—successive canadian governments (including the current one) vis à vis the indigenous peoples (first NATIONs) of the caribbean central america mexico and south america as well as indigenous peoples worldwide then you would not have reshaped reconstituted your ignorance of canada’s imperialist aims and initiatives into willful dissemblance

I'm assuming that you are an adult and have made some effort in your life to inform yourself and gain some measure of context and knowledge for your ideas about the world — perhaps you might start with The Black Book of Canadian Foreign Policy- by Yves Engler (Red and Fernwood copublication, 2009) then look at the works of noam chomsky and eduardo galeano Perhaps while you’re at it you could look into the extensive sacred books of the newcomers and point out where their gods messiahs or prophets gave them the right to enact genocide on the first nations of the world

kukwstum c&r

part i

The colonialist comment by Crit_Reasoning is problematic though not at all surprising

Treaties are made between states or nations — this includes 'first' nations who
have had sovereignty since time immemorial [millennia before the first white
person came to our shores] yet we have had that sovereignty denied and subsumed
by a white national interest and now a multiculturalist one

the state of canada makes treaties with european countries with the usa and with first nations it does not make treaties with national immigrant or national ethnic bodies nor with other landed peoples agencies associations or corporate entities Canada makes treaties with first NATIONs because its jurisdiction and sovereignty over the lands it has claimed through its acts and its legislation are in question if they were not in question the state would make no move to enter into expensive and prolonged legal agreements and discussions

For first nations in canada treaties are all about losing land as onondaga chief Oren Lyons said at a harvard conference in 1997 to his 'native american' relations in the audience "my brothers, I hear you call yourselves 'Native Americans' I ask you 'how can you have a treaty with yourself'? Indeed how can they be both Native and Americans - on both sides of the treaty (treaty between nations though I'm sure that many racist Canadians prefer to call us tribes or groups or bands so as to not acknowledge our ongoing sovereignty and self-determination)

Colonialism in canada has not gone away You are still here and all the multi-hued majoritarian population [not just white] that votes against First Nations rights and sovereignty are here as well You are making up the majority which is colonizing the First Peoples Canadian government gave First Nations the right to vote in
federal elections in 1960 as a way of weakening our sovereignty movements - before that time First Peoples had to give up their Indian Status in order to vote federally that is they had to unbecome Indians and become Canadians now we seem to be dual citizens like Italian Canadians who live here and are Canadian citizens but who can also vote in national elections in Italy because they're also Italian citizens except this is our only homeland

Did you know that First Nations are not conquered peoples in canada? There was no conquest! Are you still with me? There was never any conquering of the First Nations – our oppression was enacted through racist policies and it was through strength of numbers that the people of Canada together with [mother!] Britain enacted the British (British?) North American Act of 1867 creating the white state of Canada Show me where one First Nations leader signed that Act! Show me 500 First Nations leaders who signed it! You are assuming sovereignty through past and on-going genocide of the First Nations and by privileging whiteness and other aspects of colonialist eurocentricity

You say that Canada has never subjected 'other countries' to colonialism -- can you not make the mental/reasoning shift from 'other countries' to 'other nations' to 'first nations' What is your idea of 'a country'? and we do not live inside Canada's borders firstly the borders are in dispute that is precisely what land claims are about Canada's jurisdiction is in dispute secondly the borders are the impositions of the colonizer the occupier Canada has invaded and subsumed the First Nations and acted out genocide against us since first contact Would you want genocide (strength of arms and might is right) against the First Peoples to stand as your witness to legitimize the Canadian state’s claim of its own sovereignty?
kukwstum c&r