Just Say No To Truth and Reconciliation

Contending with the T&R Counter-Analysis

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By

James Pew

The Truth and Reconciliation ninety-four calls to action might as well be ninety-four ducks floating on a pond. I couldn’t care less whatever they are quacking on about. I have far better things to concern myself with. Like Jim McMurtry, if I hear a land acknowledgement, I will walk out. I am so fed up with the anti-Anglo T&R propaganda, that I honestly can't describe how liberating it feels to write my authentic feelings about it.

I truly do not believe that Truth and Reconciliation has the faintest hope in hell of ever producing anything productive for Canada, nor for the indigenous people we are meant to be reconciling with. What is far more likely to happen, in fact, what might be impossible to prevent from happening, is an unmitigated disaster and the worst state of indigenous-non-indigenous relations that has ever existed in this country. Indeed, considering the misplaced retribution that so far has resulted in over one hundred Christian churches burned and vandalized since the false claim of 215 murdered indigenous kids in Kamloops, it could be argued that this unfortunate reality has already come about.

I’m sorry, sort of. I wish this wasn’t my opinion, and I wish I were wrong (I would be glad if I was). However, I feel duty-bound to give the straight goods to the people who take the time to read my thoughts. You are all getting the full, unadulterated, no-holds-barred, straight-as-an-arrow goods. And that will never change. It was Oscar Wilde who warned us to couch the truth, even of our opinions I presume, in humor or the likelihood of facing an unhappy circumstance involving an angry mob goes up dramatically. I must admit, speaking from my own first-hand experience, that revealing the truth of one’s opinions in Canada today, with or without humor, does not generally make things easier for one. On the contrary, it often complicates things greatly and adds burdens that otherwise would not be added. It does however, provide a clear and clean conscience when one knows that nothing remains hidden within – except the private stuff which of course is none of anyone’s damn business. I digress. The discomfort and burdensomeness of my contrarian exploits in letters, is worth the relief it provides from an otherwise wearisome conscience. And knowing that so many good readers seem to agree with bits and pieces here and there, or seem to enjoy going through my diatribes, it is a delight as much as it is a crucial and urgent catharsis for me to compose sketches of personal ruminations and outline my attitudes on various irksome subjects (like Truth and Reconciliation).

However, at the risk of repeating myself, it is not at all easy to be the reconciliation stick-in-the-mud that I am. I can’t imagine things are easy for Jim McMurtry either, and I know they’ve put Frances Widdowson and many other brave contrarians through hell. But dammit, I just do not feel Truth and Reconciliation. And I do not believe in it. I know too much. Details about this exalted process, and indigenous politics generally, that do not square with fairness, good-sense, or decency. And other more alarming details that smack of corruption, illiberalism, and even conspiracy – albeit often a somewhat emergent, not necessarily centrally coordinated web of processes that to my eye appear to function in much the same way as a deliberate conspiracy.

Facts and evidence, and inconvenient details – many of which are documented in Grave Error (the best-selling book which includes a chapter from me and others found on the “bingo” card below) – have thoroughly dismantled the accepted truth. That is to say, the narrative truth of Truth & Reconciliation – which is little more than a counterfactual storyline unfortunately believed by many to be fact. But it does not withstand even a cursory critical examination. Importantly, there are many other far more well-known and better qualified critics of Truth and Reconciliation than mean old James. While they may not be full-on nay-saying stick-in-the-mud types when it comes to all things reconciliation, like I am, they have in aggregate, over a number of years, produced a compelling counter-analysis to the narrative truth of this beleaguered reconciliation gimmick. If the most moderate among us – who still have at least an elementary grasp on critical thinking – were to contend with the body of this T & R counter-analysis, they would also not be able to continue with the blind support of what is in practice, and has been from its inception, not at all what it claims to be. Not even close. 

Truth and Reconciliation should be renamed to something more reflective of what it actually is: Lies and Reparations. All at tax-payers expense of course. But that should come as no surprise, everything to do with indigenous people in Canada –at least the status indigenous people who live on reserves – is paid for by Canadian taxpayers. That’s right, Canadian taxpayers not only have to work hard to feed, clothe and house their own families, but they have to work doubly hard to also feed, clothe, house and beyond for far too many status indigenous Canadians, who “can’t” provide for their families because of the so-called on-going intergenerational trauma claimed to be caused by colonialism and Indian Residential Schools. If this obvious unfairness were not bad enough, matters are made worse when those who are receiving these outrageously generous tax-payer raised handouts, are also expecting to be compensated for perceived, and endless, past injustices – many of which are modern inventions, or gross exaggerations of past wrongs, designed to capitalize on what Tom Flanagan has called a system of “reparations by stealth.”

Truth and Reconciliation is an authoritarian thought-control process meant to shut down any critical analysis of indigenous politics. It is Orwellian like so many other government initiatives meant to teach Canadians “correct,” culturally sensitive, decolonized and fully indigenized thinking. Forget it. I don’t buy it, and I wouldn’t take it if it were offered free of charge. I don’t want to decolonize my thinking, I want to de-indigenize it. And as far as Canada goes – and the entire world for that matter – I definitely do not want to decolonize it. On the contrary, I would very much love to see the Western world remember its glorious history and traditions and fully assert its power and supreme authority over the world – which is full of terrorists and tyrants and evil villains. My unpopular, but obviously correct, opinion on this matter is simply that the non-Western world needs to be a distant number two at best. Western hegemony or bust. Or put slightly more cleverly, Recolonize not Decolonize! That is my mantra, and I couldn’t care less who it upsets. I do care, however, for those it resonates with (it means they are badass).

An excellent example of what Truth and Reconciliation looks like in the real world can be found in the remote city of Powell River, B.C. The local indigenous band of 1200 wants to compel a name change of the city (population 14,000), even though many citizens do not want the name changed. The band claims that Israel Wood Powell was an evil colonist and architect of Indian Residential Schools, but the facts tell a very different story. The band, and their woke supporters, don’t care about facts. What is important to them is that “settlers,” for the sake of Truth and Reconciliation, do not question indigenous people, and do all the things they are commanded to do by Indigenous people – yes, for the sake of reconciliation don’t even think of second guessing indigenous people, just do what they say, shut up and change the name of your cities, hand over your stolen land, pledge allegiance to the first inhabitants of turtle Island, renounce your colonial legacy, acknowledge that you are squatting on unceded territories, and on and on and on. 

The mess in Powell River has been expertly detailed by professor Frances Widdowson in a new essay for C2C journal. Her essay is exactly the type of reasoned and fact based analysis that I implore Canadians to contend with. I know that most would rather not think about these matters, or rather just go along and support reconciliation, which they see as supporting indigenous people. But who does it hurt when Canadians choose to go along to get along? Short answer: Everyone. But most acutely, the very people we are supposed to be so concerned with: the status indigenous people eking out a desperate existence on isolated reserves. A completely unsustainable way of life. If Canadian taxpayers refused to pay for it, it could not continue. Those relegated to inaccessible reserves would be relocated to economic centers where they would have a real chance at a modern life. But until then, our leaders are more likely to double down on their thought-control. The T&R counter-analysis is devastating and dangerous to far too many established interests. For the foreseeable future expect to see more efforts to intimidate, demonize and cancel critics of anything even loosely related to indigenous matters.

The thought-control ramp up and the move to criminalize critics of indigenous policy and/or Truth and Reconciliation, with an NDP private members bill concerning “residential school denialism,” are a sign that the counter-analysis is winning. Our opponents cannot match us with arguments. They do not have facts, evidence, or sound reason on their side, and they know it. The battle will rage, they will make their moves, the truth will prevail in the end, and all of those accused of residential school denialism will be vindicated as the course of history illustrates how completely correct we were/are, and how completely silly, idiotic, and in some cases, downright corrupt, our detractors were. I don’t doubt this for a second.

An activist/academic known to Woke Watch Canada readers as Clown Show Sean Carleton has saved me the trouble of putting together a list of some of the most important figures generating the T&R counter-analysis. Some names are missing from the “bingo card” below, most notably Nina Green and Michelle Stirling, but there are many others as well, and new voices are speaking out all the time. The truth is contagious, so of course more people, like B.C. lawyer Jim Heller, will want to be part of a legitimate truth movement that calls out countless leaders and elites - what could be juicer!? Also, it should go without saying that none of us are denialists of anything, we are truth-seekers who deal with material evidence, not feelings of moral superiority, like Clown Show Carleton et al.

Residential School Denialism bingo card from Clown Show Carleton, who was an expert in Comic Books before he got into denialism (which he definitely doesn’t do as a “grift”)

The whole denialism bingo card thing is silly. But does my ego ever love seeing my name listed among such brilliant truth-seeking warriors, like Barbara Kay, Conrad Black, Tom Flanagan, Brian Giesbrecht, Frances Widdowson, Hymie Rubenstein, Jim McMurtry, James McCrae, Terry Glavin and Jon Kay, and all of the others too! But also, I have not made secret my deep admiration for the Dorchester Review, it is always an honor to have writing published with that eminent historical journal, as it is an honour now to be found on the same side with them on this ridiculous bingo card. As mentioned previously, there is a lot more of us than this campy little bingo joke has laid claim to. Clown Show Carleton would need a pad of graph paper if he wanted to list every defiant Canadian truth-seeker in their own little square. Bingo doesn’t cut it Clown Show, we are legion.

And lastly, here is a funny X-post from Jon Kay, that illustrates how ridiculous Clown Show Carleton is:

X post from Jon Kay commenting on the ridiculousness that can only be Clown Show Carleton

Have a great Thanks Giving weekend everyone. Myself, and the other contributors to Woke Watch Canada will have more to say on Tuesday!

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Thanks for reading. For more from this author, read TDSB Betrays the Trust of Parents

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