Imagine human-like extraterrestrials came to Earth to escape their doomed planet. They want to live on Earth, they have technology beyond our belief and they outnumber us 10 to one.
They could zap us easily with ray guns, but they’d rather follow their laws and come up with an agreement – a treaty – so both they and the residents of Earth can live together.
That was the exercise that Lyndon Linklater, with the Office of the Treaty Commissioner, had the attendees of Cumberland College’s Friendship Forum do. The March 9 event in Melfort was attended by representatives of Melfort and Tisdale, the Métis Nation of Saskatchewan Region II, as well as the First Nations communities of James Smith, Chakastaypasin, Peter Chapman and Muskoday.
The participants tried to come up with an agreement that preserved Earth’s culture in the face of great change – like the abolishment of money, while trying to prevent the extraterrestrials from exploiting possible loopholes.
Linklater said that while there’s some embellishment in the exercise, it helps modern people understand what the treaty-making process was like in a fun way.
“I do that exercise just to give another perspective for people to understand what basically happened in the past,” he said. “It works quite effectively because what I’ve experienced is people actually feel and understand a lot more clearer what it must have been like in the past when these treaties occurred.”
The speaker said it’s the treaties that are the building blocks of modern Canada.
“The treaty is a relationship between the people who were living here and the people who came here,” he said. “That’s what the treaty’s all about; to work together, to respect one another and basically to build a new country together.”
The friendship forum is the second hosted by the college, with the first held in Nipawin last November. It was developed as a method for the college’s board to reach out to the communities in its region, find out about their needs, aspirations and dreams, and discuss ways the college can help to achieve them.
Tom Weegar, Cumberland College’s president, said he received favourable feedback from the first forum, but there’s more work to be done.
“If anything, we need to recognize that these are first steps. They’re about relationship building.”
The college is planning another forum in Prince Albert.
Linklater said he thought it was wonderful that Cumberland College is bringing everyone together to discuss issues that affected them all.
“I’m actually seeing a pattern develop nationally of institutions, organizations and agencies doing things like this to promote awareness and understanding – and I think it’s really good,” he said. “It’s like a ripple effect that has been going on for some time and it’s really good to see because it’s important to have education and awareness in the public because there’s a lot of stereotypes and myths that exist and the only way we can truly understand is we need to have facts presented to us.”
Linklater said the history of the treaties wasn’t something that was taught in school around 10 years ago and that he’s thankful he has a role in teaching that to the public.
