I was 20 in 1975, when I worked for the Court Reporting company who won the contract to cover the Mackenzie Valley Pipeline hearings in the NWT. At that point in my life I was a loyal and patriotic Canadian who thought my country was the best in the world. Imagine my and the rest of our young crews surprise to hear all about the Residential schools, the 60’s scoop. Something none of us had ever heard of. Trust me when I say we ALL had our eyes opened by the testimony these various peoples gave us. By the time the hearings were at an end, ALL OF US had become horrified at what had been done by our country and in our names. It influenced Justice Berger greatly as well as the rest of us.
For me who had always been a lover of history it was painful doing more research and discovering other issues like the removal of all Japanese or people of Japanese ancestry from the west coast of Canada into concentration camps in the interior of BC because they “could” be spies. Along with the loss of EVERYTHING they owned. At one time all the small fishing vessels on the coast of BC used to belong to Japanese fishermen. Those boats were taken from them without any compensation and sold for Pennie’s on the dollar to white Canadians. Same with their homes, and businesses.
And while they were incarcerated, forced to build their own camps and were responsible for building Highway 3 from Hope to Princeton .
Hell, Italian prisoners of war were treated FAR better than our own citizens, but then they were white!
Yeah...it's beyond horrific, and it changes the way you see the world forever.
I live only a short trip from one of the Japanese internment camps in my Province; I have it on my to-do list to travel and visit it at some point and write about the experience. I did a similar article after visiting the Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington D.C. a year or two ago.
Things are super busy right now, but someday. It's another chapter of our history that's too easily forgotten and should be held up into the light for those who just don't know.
I visited one up,in the Kelso area of BC and it brought me to tears. As one of my old English teachers used to say, “man’s inhumanity to man is what All our history is based on”! How right she was.
Just so you know, the provincial governments also ran residential schools for disabled children. These were also basically forced labor camps. The kids were starved, abused, neglected and parents were rarely, if ever, allowed to visit. Kids who died were buried in unmarked graves on the school grounds as well.
I only know about this because my mother brought me to see an orthopedic surgeon when I was a kid. He told her that I would be permanently crippled and retarded, and suggested that she put me in one such "boarding school", forget about me and have another baby. She didn't say anything. She just took my hand and walked out of there, never to return. I'm glad that she suspected that something was wrong!
I recently came across an article about the residential school that used to be in Barrie, Ontario. Some survivors had gotten together and commissioned a monument to place on the ground where about 300 children were found buried.
Those residential schools are gone, but there is still plenty of prejudice against disabled people in Canada, and most of us are still living in extreme poverty. The idea that all Canadians are nice and polite and that we have achieved equal rights is somewhat exaggerated. It's a work in progress.
Yup. Trust me, as another disabled Canadian, I've heard some shit.
We're far, far from perfect. That's part of why I started World-Weary: to point out how we can all make our various countries better by addressing the issues that stand.
Conservatives tend to ignore that everyone contributes to our economy as well as the wealthy.
The poor, the disabled, the part-time worker, the elderly, Indigenous people....everyone. If Yu ignore them and focus only on the privileged, you've reduced you're economy by a substantial percentage.
Out tax- funded social services is a multi million dollar economy, keeping it stable.
Excellent post! The very fact that reservations exist is testimony to the fact that our history is not something to be proud of. I had a big reckoning several years ago when I found out an ancestor of mine was an administrator at a residential school. I don’t know how to come to terms with that but I can keep listening and learning. Thank you for this opportunity to learn more.
As I talked about in this week's podcast, humans, or should I say, Homo Sapiens, are a seriously flawed species. They always have been and this is just another example of the cruel tribalism that is built into their DNA coding. Give a small group of them a little power and this is what you get. It's been this way all over the planet since Homo Sapiens emerged into the world and took over everything that the Neanderthals and Denisovans had created during the millions of years of their existences. They haven't changed one whit by 2025 and the species hasn't even made it past their first million year anniversary. We're already facing human induced global warming that will kill off a vast majority of the life on the planet as Mother Earth tries to rid itself of the pesky humans it created.
We only have to look at Gaza right now to see that the species just lacks the ability to correct its behavior.
If you want to get a real, in your face, idea of how cruel humans can be when given a little power, watch American Primevil on NetFlix. Or dig up and watch the old news videos of the American Army reserve soldiers when they were guarding Iraqi detainees at Abu Ghraib prison. Watch or listen to this weeks podcast, The Village Oak Tree, where I lay it all out for everyone.
I'm not trying to plug my podcast but to prove a point. Humans are flawed and there is no more trying to correct them. The Earth Mother has decided to slowly eradicate her mistake.
Thank you for this well written, informative post. You are so right that much more can be said. I do not, personally, feel guilt so much as empathy together with horror when I read about these atrocities. Since we cannot change the past, I feel it is important to acknowledge it so that we can do better in the present and future. I believe that the most important thing we can do is to work our butts off to bring about equality for ALL human beings.
I was 20 in 1975, when I worked for the Court Reporting company who won the contract to cover the Mackenzie Valley Pipeline hearings in the NWT. At that point in my life I was a loyal and patriotic Canadian who thought my country was the best in the world. Imagine my and the rest of our young crews surprise to hear all about the Residential schools, the 60’s scoop. Something none of us had ever heard of. Trust me when I say we ALL had our eyes opened by the testimony these various peoples gave us. By the time the hearings were at an end, ALL OF US had become horrified at what had been done by our country and in our names. It influenced Justice Berger greatly as well as the rest of us.
For me who had always been a lover of history it was painful doing more research and discovering other issues like the removal of all Japanese or people of Japanese ancestry from the west coast of Canada into concentration camps in the interior of BC because they “could” be spies. Along with the loss of EVERYTHING they owned. At one time all the small fishing vessels on the coast of BC used to belong to Japanese fishermen. Those boats were taken from them without any compensation and sold for Pennie’s on the dollar to white Canadians. Same with their homes, and businesses.
And while they were incarcerated, forced to build their own camps and were responsible for building Highway 3 from Hope to Princeton .
Hell, Italian prisoners of war were treated FAR better than our own citizens, but then they were white!
Yeah...it's beyond horrific, and it changes the way you see the world forever.
I live only a short trip from one of the Japanese internment camps in my Province; I have it on my to-do list to travel and visit it at some point and write about the experience. I did a similar article after visiting the Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington D.C. a year or two ago.
Things are super busy right now, but someday. It's another chapter of our history that's too easily forgotten and should be held up into the light for those who just don't know.
I visited one up,in the Kelso area of BC and it brought me to tears. As one of my old English teachers used to say, “man’s inhumanity to man is what All our history is based on”! How right she was.
Just so you know, the provincial governments also ran residential schools for disabled children. These were also basically forced labor camps. The kids were starved, abused, neglected and parents were rarely, if ever, allowed to visit. Kids who died were buried in unmarked graves on the school grounds as well.
I only know about this because my mother brought me to see an orthopedic surgeon when I was a kid. He told her that I would be permanently crippled and retarded, and suggested that she put me in one such "boarding school", forget about me and have another baby. She didn't say anything. She just took my hand and walked out of there, never to return. I'm glad that she suspected that something was wrong!
I recently came across an article about the residential school that used to be in Barrie, Ontario. Some survivors had gotten together and commissioned a monument to place on the ground where about 300 children were found buried.
Those residential schools are gone, but there is still plenty of prejudice against disabled people in Canada, and most of us are still living in extreme poverty. The idea that all Canadians are nice and polite and that we have achieved equal rights is somewhat exaggerated. It's a work in progress.
Yup. Trust me, as another disabled Canadian, I've heard some shit.
We're far, far from perfect. That's part of why I started World-Weary: to point out how we can all make our various countries better by addressing the issues that stand.
Conservatives tend to ignore that everyone contributes to our economy as well as the wealthy.
The poor, the disabled, the part-time worker, the elderly, Indigenous people....everyone. If Yu ignore them and focus only on the privileged, you've reduced you're economy by a substantial percentage.
Out tax- funded social services is a multi million dollar economy, keeping it stable.
Our Embarrassment for far, far too long 💔🥺😞🇨🇦
Excellent post! The very fact that reservations exist is testimony to the fact that our history is not something to be proud of. I had a big reckoning several years ago when I found out an ancestor of mine was an administrator at a residential school. I don’t know how to come to terms with that but I can keep listening and learning. Thank you for this opportunity to learn more.
As I talked about in this week's podcast, humans, or should I say, Homo Sapiens, are a seriously flawed species. They always have been and this is just another example of the cruel tribalism that is built into their DNA coding. Give a small group of them a little power and this is what you get. It's been this way all over the planet since Homo Sapiens emerged into the world and took over everything that the Neanderthals and Denisovans had created during the millions of years of their existences. They haven't changed one whit by 2025 and the species hasn't even made it past their first million year anniversary. We're already facing human induced global warming that will kill off a vast majority of the life on the planet as Mother Earth tries to rid itself of the pesky humans it created.
We only have to look at Gaza right now to see that the species just lacks the ability to correct its behavior.
If you want to get a real, in your face, idea of how cruel humans can be when given a little power, watch American Primevil on NetFlix. Or dig up and watch the old news videos of the American Army reserve soldiers when they were guarding Iraqi detainees at Abu Ghraib prison. Watch or listen to this weeks podcast, The Village Oak Tree, where I lay it all out for everyone.
I'm not trying to plug my podcast but to prove a point. Humans are flawed and there is no more trying to correct them. The Earth Mother has decided to slowly eradicate her mistake.
Canada wants no more genocides. We want ALL our cultures celebrated. Unity makes us stronger.
Thank you for this well written, informative post. You are so right that much more can be said. I do not, personally, feel guilt so much as empathy together with horror when I read about these atrocities. Since we cannot change the past, I feel it is important to acknowledge it so that we can do better in the present and future. I believe that the most important thing we can do is to work our butts off to bring about equality for ALL human beings.