The 6,000 people who told their stories to the TRC had all attended residential schools in the post war years when binge drinking virtually captured most western and northern indigenous communities. Particularly from the late 1950s through the 1970s entire communities succumbed to binge drinking. This meant that thousands of children were living in completely dysfunctional homes. Sexual abuse and other pathologies are inevitable in such an environment. By the 1960s many of the residential schools were mainly used as placements for these extremely damaged children. The children from stable homes were housed in dormitories with these damaged children. Sexual abuse was the result. There was a great deal of sexual abuse in the schools, but as historian Jim Miller says, it was student on student abuse. There is no evidence that the number of pedophile priests and teachers was any higher in residential schools than at any other schools. The TRC spent zero time on examining the child welfare factor at residential schools. This is scandalous, because it is impossible to understand residential schools without understanding the child welfare factors
The biggest swindle in the world against the poor unknowing tax payers in Canada these billions of $ did not come out of the Liberals pockets no no they picked our pockets instead, Time for the big reveal just how many graves have been dug up? How many child homicides have you found?
Once again the tax payer funded and paid fully out of OUR pockets for all those ground survey crews, millions of our $ wasted and for what just so you can go on lying about alleged homicides so I say put up or shut up. We are all fed up with your whining, moaning and groaning with zero proof of anything.
Just a point of clarification, Michelle. So what you are saying is that Res Schools were not intentionally designed by John A MacDonald, the inspiration for Adolph Eichman, to be murder schools to solve the Indian problem; that babies were not burned in ovens, children were not thrown out windows and down stairs and not buried at midnight in the Kamloops apple orchard by six year old children. I fear that Stephen King would be sorely disappointed to hear this. Well, as Mark Twain once famously said:
What I usually get when I tell people there's no evidence other than second-hand or often changing anecdotal stories to support these narratives, they generally say, "well prove these things did not happen." However, that's not the point. I can't prove, for example, that the Sasquatch and the Loch Ness Monster do not exist. It's up to those making the claims to prove - with evidence - that they're true. Otherwise anything may be claimed as true.
The genocide narrative is now deep within the collective psyche of Canadians. Today, for example, a group of us were discussing the subject of fascism when one lady mentioned "all the dead bodies of children that they found in graves outside Kamloops residential school," to show how our history is not too much different from the Germans in WW2. This lady was a former professional counsellor and social worker, and she believed the narrative. In fact, no bodies of any kind have been found, but the narrative is absorbed and has become part of the myth of Canada as a nation founded on white supremacy and genocide. I encounter these views frequently, whenever such historical subjects come up.
Hi Jack. I hope you set her straight. To be silent is to be just as bad as the pathetic MPs who sat on their hands while they voted to declare Canada a genocidal nation. A pathetic bunch of people. I have more respect for Lynn Beyak who spoke up in the Senate about much good done in the Res. Schools and was personally abused by the likes of a Murray Sinclair.
I have had some very intense discussions with people over this, and invariably they are shocked, and do not believe me, for example, when I say no actual bodies have been recovered, or they believe that by asking questions or raising counter-narrative points about this issue, I am anti-Indigenous and have malicious intent. Some, who don't have as much passion about the issue, are looking more at the details and are now expressing some skepticism. The schools were very flawed as were most boarding schools back in those days, and were based on cultural and religious assimilation, and often poorly run, however, there's no forensic evidence at this time of any murders, kidnappings, etc.
Many of the children who were moved from their Reserves and placed in Residential Schools should thank the government for saving their lives. The same is true today; thousands of little kids have to be taken from homes on the Reserve and placed in foster homes to protect them. This is also true of the 'white' community. It is a sad ,sad symbol of society in general.
These social problems will continue to exist as long as we divide people. The Reserve system is a great divider; other main dividers are race, language, religion, education and wealth to name a few. Even Champlain realized back in the early 1600s that the natives he encountered in North America needed to be integrated into the more advanced European ways rather than living lives of separation in a primitive land.
Our current government is afraid of the Indians and think they can only maintain a form of peace by spending huge amounts of our tax dollars on the Indians. But it hasn't stopped them from blocking trains and roads and burning buildings to get their way. Sooner or later wiser minds will have to apply the thinking of a Champlain to find sensible ways to get along with all people who share this marvellous land.
Leaving Wokes in charge of an investigation into Indian schools is a bit like leaving Goebbels' propaganda Reich ministry in charge of an investigation into 'The Jewish Problem'. The defamatory agenda, distorted narrative biases and lack of respect for intellectually honest, rigorous and evidence based discourse, is eerily similar.
This is the first time I’ve read that Richard Wagamese’s mother was only 16 (and the suggestion here seems to be that she was 16 at the time that Richard and his siblings were taken into care). Could it be that she was only 16 when she had her first child? If you have a source for this detail, please share, as I haven’t come across it myself. Richard’s most complete telling of his personal story (that I’ve seen) indicates that his older sister and brother took him and his younger brother to Minaki that winter. Here’s a paragraph that I think is worth sharing, relating to his toddlerhood (this is from a chapter he contributed to *Returning to Harmony* (2009), which can be read here: https://abcbookworld.com/article/article-15460/ (In the chapter as a whole, Wagamese is leaning hard into the IRS-as-cause-of-all-evil narrative, but still it’s telling …)
<< When I was a toddler, my left arm and shoulder were smashed. Left untreated, my arm hung backwards in its joint and, over time, it atrophied and withered. My siblings and I endured great tides of violence and abuse from the drunken adults. We were beaten, nearly drowned, and terrorized. We took to hiding in the bush and waited until the shouting, cursing, and drinking died away. Those nights were cold and terrifying. In the dim light of dawn, the eldest of us would sneak back into camp to get food and blankets. In the mid-winter of 1958, when I was almost three, the adults left my two brothers, sister, and me alone in the bush camp across the bay from the tiny railroad town of Minaki. It was February. The wind was blowing bitterly and the firewood ran out at the same time as the food. They were gone for days, drinking in Kenora sixty miles away. When it became apparent that we would freeze to death without wood, my eldest sister and brother hauled my brother, Charles, and me across the bay on a sled piled with furs. >>
Perhaps the older children were half siblings, not Marjorie Wagamese's own offspring.
Sounds like Wagamese was reading from an approved propaganda script, written by RoseAnne Archibald, scapegoating every cultural dysfunction of his race on Res Schools which he dramatically and hyperbolically claims, "scraped the indian off their insides". And the clincher, of course, is that attending Res school drove them all to drink. Really ???? What a creative dysfunctional imagination. You would think, after being rescued by the OPP, that he would express just a smidgen of gratitude for their assistance. It's time our politicians stopped playing Aunt Sally and cut off the funding to these ingratiates.
“Ingratitude is a crime more despicable than revenge, which is only returning evil for evil, while ingratitude returns evil for good.”
I’ve read a few of Wagamese’s books, as well as some of his shorter stuff, and he DOES express gratitude quite frequently. In the case of that chapter in Returning to Harmony, I’m going to give him the benefit of the doubt. I imagine he had to toe the narrative line to remain in good standing with his indigenous relatives, non-indigenous allies, and his readers generally – especially after “disgracing” himself a year earlier in his 2008 Calgary Herald piece by candidly telling the world that his mother insisted she had learned valuable things at residential school, and had not experienced abuse.
He had a rough life. I’m sure he would have liked to believe that all his trauma, and his relatives’ trauma, was due to the IRS, but whether or not he truly believed that, I guess we’ll never know.
When I was in high school some of the advanced Residential School Indian kids attended classes with us. I got to know one Cree boy quite well and we became friends. He would never go home for the holidays and he told me why....no wonder even if it was only half true. He told me the Res School was the best place he had ever lived. I think it was better than the public, high school I attended.The stories the TRC leaders tell are generally a pack of lies ......all about money.
The former students I talked with back in the seventies and eighties - who'd been to the schools in the fifties and sixties... had mixed stories, they spoke of random punishments, like being strapped for minor matters, said that were basically sent there to be free farm workers, the food was really bad, they could not associate with their brothers and sisters without being punished, etc. but indeed some of them came from very dysfunctional backgrounds to start with..and on the other hand the school had a basketball team and a dance troupe that toured southern B. C...other ex students were the sons of chiefs who were sent there by their families....the best first person reference I've seen re: Kamloops Residential school was the book "My Name Is Seepeetza." which was written in the seventies I believe and can be accessed online.
The 6,000 people who told their stories to the TRC had all attended residential schools in the post war years when binge drinking virtually captured most western and northern indigenous communities. Particularly from the late 1950s through the 1970s entire communities succumbed to binge drinking. This meant that thousands of children were living in completely dysfunctional homes. Sexual abuse and other pathologies are inevitable in such an environment. By the 1960s many of the residential schools were mainly used as placements for these extremely damaged children. The children from stable homes were housed in dormitories with these damaged children. Sexual abuse was the result. There was a great deal of sexual abuse in the schools, but as historian Jim Miller says, it was student on student abuse. There is no evidence that the number of pedophile priests and teachers was any higher in residential schools than at any other schools. The TRC spent zero time on examining the child welfare factor at residential schools. This is scandalous, because it is impossible to understand residential schools without understanding the child welfare factors
Fabulous article. Should be in every newspaper in Canada.
The biggest swindle in the world against the poor unknowing tax payers in Canada these billions of $ did not come out of the Liberals pockets no no they picked our pockets instead, Time for the big reveal just how many graves have been dug up? How many child homicides have you found?
Once again the tax payer funded and paid fully out of OUR pockets for all those ground survey crews, millions of our $ wasted and for what just so you can go on lying about alleged homicides so I say put up or shut up. We are all fed up with your whining, moaning and groaning with zero proof of anything.
Just a point of clarification, Michelle. So what you are saying is that Res Schools were not intentionally designed by John A MacDonald, the inspiration for Adolph Eichman, to be murder schools to solve the Indian problem; that babies were not burned in ovens, children were not thrown out windows and down stairs and not buried at midnight in the Kamloops apple orchard by six year old children. I fear that Stephen King would be sorely disappointed to hear this. Well, as Mark Twain once famously said:
"Never let truth get in the way of a good story"
What I usually get when I tell people there's no evidence other than second-hand or often changing anecdotal stories to support these narratives, they generally say, "well prove these things did not happen." However, that's not the point. I can't prove, for example, that the Sasquatch and the Loch Ness Monster do not exist. It's up to those making the claims to prove - with evidence - that they're true. Otherwise anything may be claimed as true.
Keep promoting the truth - cheers!
The genocide narrative is now deep within the collective psyche of Canadians. Today, for example, a group of us were discussing the subject of fascism when one lady mentioned "all the dead bodies of children that they found in graves outside Kamloops residential school," to show how our history is not too much different from the Germans in WW2. This lady was a former professional counsellor and social worker, and she believed the narrative. In fact, no bodies of any kind have been found, but the narrative is absorbed and has become part of the myth of Canada as a nation founded on white supremacy and genocide. I encounter these views frequently, whenever such historical subjects come up.
Hi Jack. I hope you set her straight. To be silent is to be just as bad as the pathetic MPs who sat on their hands while they voted to declare Canada a genocidal nation. A pathetic bunch of people. I have more respect for Lynn Beyak who spoke up in the Senate about much good done in the Res. Schools and was personally abused by the likes of a Murray Sinclair.
I have had some very intense discussions with people over this, and invariably they are shocked, and do not believe me, for example, when I say no actual bodies have been recovered, or they believe that by asking questions or raising counter-narrative points about this issue, I am anti-Indigenous and have malicious intent. Some, who don't have as much passion about the issue, are looking more at the details and are now expressing some skepticism. The schools were very flawed as were most boarding schools back in those days, and were based on cultural and religious assimilation, and often poorly run, however, there's no forensic evidence at this time of any murders, kidnappings, etc.
Many of the children who were moved from their Reserves and placed in Residential Schools should thank the government for saving their lives. The same is true today; thousands of little kids have to be taken from homes on the Reserve and placed in foster homes to protect them. This is also true of the 'white' community. It is a sad ,sad symbol of society in general.
These social problems will continue to exist as long as we divide people. The Reserve system is a great divider; other main dividers are race, language, religion, education and wealth to name a few. Even Champlain realized back in the early 1600s that the natives he encountered in North America needed to be integrated into the more advanced European ways rather than living lives of separation in a primitive land.
Our current government is afraid of the Indians and think they can only maintain a form of peace by spending huge amounts of our tax dollars on the Indians. But it hasn't stopped them from blocking trains and roads and burning buildings to get their way. Sooner or later wiser minds will have to apply the thinking of a Champlain to find sensible ways to get along with all people who share this marvellous land.
Let us be blunt.
Leaving Wokes in charge of an investigation into Indian schools is a bit like leaving Goebbels' propaganda Reich ministry in charge of an investigation into 'The Jewish Problem'. The defamatory agenda, distorted narrative biases and lack of respect for intellectually honest, rigorous and evidence based discourse, is eerily similar.
This is the first time I’ve read that Richard Wagamese’s mother was only 16 (and the suggestion here seems to be that she was 16 at the time that Richard and his siblings were taken into care). Could it be that she was only 16 when she had her first child? If you have a source for this detail, please share, as I haven’t come across it myself. Richard’s most complete telling of his personal story (that I’ve seen) indicates that his older sister and brother took him and his younger brother to Minaki that winter. Here’s a paragraph that I think is worth sharing, relating to his toddlerhood (this is from a chapter he contributed to *Returning to Harmony* (2009), which can be read here: https://abcbookworld.com/article/article-15460/ (In the chapter as a whole, Wagamese is leaning hard into the IRS-as-cause-of-all-evil narrative, but still it’s telling …)
<< When I was a toddler, my left arm and shoulder were smashed. Left untreated, my arm hung backwards in its joint and, over time, it atrophied and withered. My siblings and I endured great tides of violence and abuse from the drunken adults. We were beaten, nearly drowned, and terrorized. We took to hiding in the bush and waited until the shouting, cursing, and drinking died away. Those nights were cold and terrifying. In the dim light of dawn, the eldest of us would sneak back into camp to get food and blankets. In the mid-winter of 1958, when I was almost three, the adults left my two brothers, sister, and me alone in the bush camp across the bay from the tiny railroad town of Minaki. It was February. The wind was blowing bitterly and the firewood ran out at the same time as the food. They were gone for days, drinking in Kenora sixty miles away. When it became apparent that we would freeze to death without wood, my eldest sister and brother hauled my brother, Charles, and me across the bay on a sled piled with furs. >>
Perhaps the older children were half siblings, not Marjorie Wagamese's own offspring.
Sounds like Wagamese was reading from an approved propaganda script, written by RoseAnne Archibald, scapegoating every cultural dysfunction of his race on Res Schools which he dramatically and hyperbolically claims, "scraped the indian off their insides". And the clincher, of course, is that attending Res school drove them all to drink. Really ???? What a creative dysfunctional imagination. You would think, after being rescued by the OPP, that he would express just a smidgen of gratitude for their assistance. It's time our politicians stopped playing Aunt Sally and cut off the funding to these ingratiates.
“Ingratitude is a crime more despicable than revenge, which is only returning evil for evil, while ingratitude returns evil for good.”
― William George Jordan
I’ve read a few of Wagamese’s books, as well as some of his shorter stuff, and he DOES express gratitude quite frequently. In the case of that chapter in Returning to Harmony, I’m going to give him the benefit of the doubt. I imagine he had to toe the narrative line to remain in good standing with his indigenous relatives, non-indigenous allies, and his readers generally – especially after “disgracing” himself a year earlier in his 2008 Calgary Herald piece by candidly telling the world that his mother insisted she had learned valuable things at residential school, and had not experienced abuse.
He had a rough life. I’m sure he would have liked to believe that all his trauma, and his relatives’ trauma, was due to the IRS, but whether or not he truly believed that, I guess we’ll never know.
When I was in high school some of the advanced Residential School Indian kids attended classes with us. I got to know one Cree boy quite well and we became friends. He would never go home for the holidays and he told me why....no wonder even if it was only half true. He told me the Res School was the best place he had ever lived. I think it was better than the public, high school I attended.The stories the TRC leaders tell are generally a pack of lies ......all about money.
The former students I talked with back in the seventies and eighties - who'd been to the schools in the fifties and sixties... had mixed stories, they spoke of random punishments, like being strapped for minor matters, said that were basically sent there to be free farm workers, the food was really bad, they could not associate with their brothers and sisters without being punished, etc. but indeed some of them came from very dysfunctional backgrounds to start with..and on the other hand the school had a basketball team and a dance troupe that toured southern B. C...other ex students were the sons of chiefs who were sent there by their families....the best first person reference I've seen re: Kamloops Residential school was the book "My Name Is Seepeetza." which was written in the seventies I believe and can be accessed online.