111 replies to this topic

[amor de cosmos]

More virtue signaling. Everyone will still call it Mt. Doug Park.

how is this name change any different from esquimalt, saanich, cowichan, toronto, or canada, which are all FN place names that we already use?

[Victoria Watcher]

PKOLS is fine. And we can pronounce it. Exotic names are cool.

[Nparker]

I care about Mt. Doug Park and that's why I will continue to call it by that name.

[Victoria Watcher]

Are you saying you haven’t enjoyed your visits to all the local First Nations parks here?

Edited by Victoria Watcher, 17 August 2022 - 07:08 AM.

[spanky123]

PKOLS is fine. And we can pronounce it. Exotic names are cool.

 

If changing the name of a mountain helps wrap up the reconciliation process then I am happy to have it done. The Pkols name has been associated with Mt Doug on plaques and maps now for decades.

Edited by spanky123, 17 August 2022 - 07:47 AM.

[Nparker]

If changing the name of a mountain helps wrap up the reconciliation process then I am happy to have it done....

Has there ever been an end game, or even any goals to meet in the reconciliation process?

[amor de cosmos]

^ you nailed it, it's an ongoing *process* that is likely to continue for a long while with no definite endgame. you could make your life easier by just getting over it:
 

9. The Government of Canada recognizes that reconciliation is an ongoing process that occurs in the context of evolving Indigenous-Crown relationships.

This Principle recognizes that reconciliation processes, including processes for negotiation and implementation of treaties, agreements and other constructive arrangements, will need to be innovative and flexible and build over time in the context of evolving Indigenous-Crown relationships. These relationships are to be guided by the recognition and implementation of rights.
 
Treaties, agreements, and other constructive arrangements should be capable of evolution over time. Moreover, they should provide predictability for the future as to how provisions may be changed or implemented and in what circumstances. Canada is open to flexibility, innovation, and diversity in the nature, form, and content of agreements and arrangements.
 
The Government of Canada also recognizes that it has an active role and responsibility in ensuring the cultural survival of Indigenous peoples as well as in protecting Aboriginal and treaty rights.
 
The Government of Canada will continue to collaborate with Indigenous peoples on changes to federal laws, regulations, and policies to realize the unfulfilled constitutional promise of s.35 of the Constitution Act, 1982.

https://www.justice....-principes.html

[Bernard]

The name Mount Doug will endure for some time but it will fade away.   Look to Haida Gwaii, that change was some years ago but it is now what most people I know call it.

 

Powell River Regional District is now qathet Regional District

Queen Charlotte City is now Daajing Giids, which happened on July 22 this year

The Salish Sea is a term I hear all the time even though there was nothing renamed just a larger sea rea described.

 

I would love it if we changed Victoria to Camosun

[Nparker]

....I would love it if we changed Victoria to Camosun

For what purpose? How is anyone really helped by these token gestures? Are you personally willing to cover the costs this type of virtue signalling would cause?

[Bernard]

For what purpose? How is anyone really helped by these token gestures? Are you personally willing to cover the costs this type of virtue signalling would cause?

Implement4ed over time the cost would not be much.    It is not virtue signalling, it is taking ownership of our history and stating who we are.    In the internet age Victoria is a shitty name for toruism and I suspect we would see an increase of tousism traffic because the name would not be the same as the #2 state in Australia.

 

It is when we ignore out history that the **** from the past does not get dealt with.   It also means we do not take pride in our past.    That alone makes it worthwhile

[Nparker]

How do you change everything about a city's name "over time"?

Does the past 160 years of local history have no importance? It can simply be written off? How does getting rid of the name "Victoria" show pride in our past?

I also think there are very few people who end up in Australia when they had planned to visit here. I suppose Paris, France should change its name so it doesn't lose any more visitors to that city in Texas. In any case, if people are that easily confused, it's probably best they don't travel at all.

[Bernard]

I am really sorry you feel that way.   I could go on a long argument with no end of facts to prove my point but my life really is too short for that.

 

If you haver some real points about why restoring the original name is a bad idea or why using names that have no real connection to this place I am all ears.

 

If anyone wants to understand why I dropped off of here, your post is a core reason for it.

 

I have tried to bring interesting information and facts to the forum.  I have tried to debate topics civily.   I know I can be pedantic, I own that.

 

I would really appreciate if you would put the minimum of effort into your responses and not just go for some glib negative put down.

 

I really do want to take part in this community because there are a lot of people with interesting thoughts ideas.   I have no desire to deal with knee jerk negativity.   

 

I will see how it goes for the next few weeks, but if your response is the norm, I am gone.

[lanforod]

Tourism conflicts with Australia as a factor in the name is a poor argument for why to do it. There are many cities and places named Victoria around the world. We don’t even have a claim to the only capital city named Victoria.
I’m ambivalent to changing the name, especially if it doesn’t include at least a core amalgamation.

[lanforod]

I do think it’s a considerably larger endeavour to do it than most realize as well. Plus the downstream effect of names like UVic.

[LJ]

Implement4ed over time the cost would not be much.    It is not virtue signalling, it is taking ownership of our history and stating who we are.    In the internet age Victoria is a shitty name for toruism and I suspect we would see an increase of tousism traffic because the name would not be the same as the #2 state in Australia.

 

It is when we ignore out history that the **** from the past does not get dealt with.   It also means we do not take pride in our past.    That alone makes it worthwhile

Taking ownership of our history and stating who we are - is done by naming things after people who accomplished something and built the city into what it was. Not just Victoria but street names etc. as well. Sure indigenous people were here before us, but they built nothing, fought and warred with each other, owned slaves etc. If you want to name a particular area/neighbourhood after a tribe that lived there, I'm fine with that. But they never built a street or a city or an industry, so leave the rest alone.

[Mike K.]

Hold on, who are “we?” Are the council candidates running for council “us,” then, if half of them originated from some place else, but now want to represent “us?” Rebecca Mersereau is heading back to New Brunswick, she says. Is she “us,” then? Or not? Was she ever “us?”

Changing the city’s name doesn’t change who I am. I am not the product or item of a “place.” “We” are a society of people who were born here, or moved here. And I’d wager most of the collective “us” were not born here, and a whole lot of us chose to move here in adulthood, and many from here left. What does that make “us?”

What are we talking about again?

[Spy Black]

I'm pretty supportive of First Nations in general, and have long believed that their history can be quite capably intertwined with that of "settler" history ... all to create a very accurate map and timeline as to how we got to where we are today.

Append the name "Mount Douglas" to whatever you want (append, not change), but I'll call it Mount Douglas until the day I die.

Not to thumb my nose at First Nations historical references to the mountain, but because I was born and raised in Gordon Head, and hiked, played, watched sports car races up the road to the lookout, and ultimately participated in the Victoria Motorcycle Clubs hill climb on ... wait for it ... Mount Douglas.

 

I guess in the background it's always important to recall that, in the entirety of the CRD, there is a population of around 4000 First Nations residents.

This is in an overall regional population of around 400,000 people.

 

So the "reconciliation" efforts across the board (in our region) are for the benefit of approximately 1% of our entire population here in the CRD.

 

If you picked any other special interest group that represented only 1% of the population, folks would laugh you out of the room if as much money, political focus, and misguided efforts were spent on them as are spent on First Nations issues.

 

So Mount Doug it remains, and the sign with the First Nations name on it will be viewed with great interest by me (as I'm sure it will be by many others), and I'll take note that local First Nations have historically called Mount Douglas something else other than Mount Douglas ... and yet I (and I suspect many others) will simply continue to call it Mount Doug.

And that's all just fine with me.

[amor de cosmos]

not to split hairs but the name of the geographical feature known as mt doug will continue to be called mt doug as it is the canadian geological society that would have to change the name to make it official. this recent announcement was only about the district of saanich changing the name of a *park* within its jurisdiction. incidentally if it was previously "mt doug park", and PKOLS is the name of the mountain, shouldn't it be "PKOLS park" since it's the name of the park, and not the name of the mountain?
 
 
edit: some more that might be relevant here:
 

A proposal to change names of Alberta places would improve understanding of Indigenous culture and language without necessarily removing existing names, a Stoney Tribal Administration manager says.
 
The administration for three First Nation bands west of Calgary has applied to name a long list of well-known Alberta towns, cities and landmarks with traditional Indigenous names.
 
"We would certainly like to see more about Stoney Nakoda understanding about landscapes in general," Bill Snow told the Calgary Eyeopener on Wednesday morning. "This is really about the preservation of our language and culture."
 
*snip*
 
"I'm not suggesting that we take away all the existing names," Snow said. "I think what we're suggesting is that we add to what we already know about places, about landscapes."

https://www.cbc.ca/n...names-1.4403132
 

Final decisions on naming natural geographical features are made by the Alberta Historical Resources Foundation and the government.
 
Changing community names is up to the province, but requests that involve First Nations must be presented to Ottawa.
 
Kelland said it's possible for a natural location to have both an official and a traditional name.
 
In 1984, the province changed the name of Mount Laurie west of Calgary to also include its Stoney Nakoda traditional name Iyamnathka, which means flat-surfaced rock or mountain.

https://www.cbc.ca/n...names-1.4399941

Edited by amor de cosmos, 19 August 2022 - 08:11 AM.

[dasmo]

There is still the issue of the Queen. I mean, she herself is most directly responsible for our history both as an individual and as a family. I would like to see more effort to extract reconciliation from her and her family. Start with the legal process of signing over crown land to All the people of Canada with management by both the provincial government (now on behalf of the people) and the Nations. Expunging our country’s legal entanglements and symbolic relationship to that family would be true healing and a true condolence ceremony in the tradition of First Nations tradition. We could keep the Governor positions but replace them with First Nations clan mothers or make them elected positions instead of the Queen’s appointees. Remove the Queen as our Military commander and Chief and make that the position of the Prime Minister. Or an elected position such that our political structure can essentially stay intact. That’s the map to true reconciliation in this country. True decolonization. Holding teddy bears for photo ops is not.

[Bernard]

First Nations are a special interest group.   They are a government and society specifically protected by the 1982 constituting and the start of a seperate Canadian law begins with the Royal Proclamation of 1763 where ownership of the land was recognized.

 

Our history extends back tens of thousands of years or more.   The settler part is the tiniest part of that history.   

 

The history of BC and Canada has been treated in the past as if it started very recently, which never was the case.

 

Naming places for people really has only been a thing recently and was done a deliberate act to erase history.   PKOLS was always PKOLS and to allow that name to be used was unacceptable and so it was renamed.   Chaning the name back to its historical name rights a wrong from the past.

 

I know there are people who do not like changing names back to what they were.   I really am sorry that you feel that way.   I see it as the natural way forward to deal with the shitty past of the last five generations.  If reconciliation is to mean anything restoring the orginal names and removing names that reflect dead white people.   Naming geographic features after people is not common in the world.   It really only happened in colonial regimes or communist countries.

 

There is no downside to have names that are uniquely ours.   There is only one Kamloops but poor Prince George has to share its name with some young kid in England.

 

Ultimately this is happening and will continue to happen.   It will take 10 to 20 years for the original name to become the default for most people.   

 

At some point :Victoria, Sidney, Colwood, and Langford will be renamed.   If Langford were smart it would do it now because it is named from a truly odiious asshole that was run out of town in the early 1860s.  These names will change within the next decade or two.  It will happen because it is right to do so and the tide of history is flowing that way.   There will be a time when keeping Victoria as a name will lead to tourism boycotts.  Better to change now before it gets to that.