Your elementary school
or
The last gasp
Perhaps we have heard the very last from those who think the residential school system had a good side.
There was never any good side to the idea that indigenous children should be taken from their families.
The problem started with the racist attitudes and genocidal intentions of John A. Macdonald.
His private diaries give a glimpse into a mind that was warped by his beliefs.
The Canadian government followed these policies for many many decades.
Canadian laws were intended to suppress, marginalize and destroy indigenous people.
Propaganda was created and pushed, "Everyone has a bit of Indian blood." is an example.
It isn't true and it never was true but it serves to diminish the distinction of ancestry, making it unimportant.
Places like Thunder Bay are still trying to remove these attitudes from their institutions.
It is more difficult when high profile people continue to peddle the lie that there was some good done.
If your elementary school had 215 children's bodies buried in the schoolyard, you would have a problem.
The people in charge of the school were given honours, they were advancing the Canadian plan.
The Canadian plan and Canadian law had a single intention, diminishing and destroying indigenes.
Those who articulated that view may have been caught up in the times but that offers no excuse.
It has taken a long time to get to where we are right now.
The Truth and Reconciliation Commission likely had no idea we would end up here.
Now the real reconciliation can start to begin, the graves will be unmasked, the truth is clear.
There will be many more graves discovered, more honours taken away from the architects of the system.
It is abhorrent today and it was abhorrent then, that is the correct way to view these events.
And celebrating the people who created this system is wrong, no matter what role they played.
Ryerson, Langevin, Macdonald, all were wrong then and they are still wrong today.
Our histories should unmask our shame and elevate our strength.
What was found in Kamloops was shameful for Canada.
Mr. Trudeau is making progress that has not been made in a very long time.
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