Canada - Remains of children found at former residential schools in Canada, May 2021

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altojack said:
That's a shame, it's not available outside of Canada. I may be able to find it elsewhere tomorrow.

It's just gone midnight and if I don't get to bed I'll be turned into a pumpkin! Goodnight.
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Snippets..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ep7AW2K4Xww
Crimes against children at residential school: The truth about St. Anne's - The Fifth Estate
Mar 3, 2019
''St. Anne’s Indian Residential School in Northern Ontario was a place of horrific abuse and crimes against children that took place over decades. For years, records detailing the abuse were kept hidden — from survivors who needed them for their compensation claims. In Reconciliation Betrayed: The Horrors of St. Anne’s, we show how CBC News obtain thousands of those very documents which expose the fuller picture of the abuse than was previously acknowledged. '' To read more: https://www.cbc.ca/1.5039150
 
dotr said:
Snippets..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ep7AW2K4Xww
Crimes against children at residential school: The truth about St. Anne's - The Fifth Estate
Mar 3, 2019
''St. Anne’s Indian Residential School in Northern Ontario was a place of horrific abuse and crimes against children that took place over decades. For years, records detailing the abuse were kept hidden — from survivors who needed them for their compensation claims. In Reconciliation Betrayed: The Horrors of St. Anne’s, we show how CBC News obtain thousands of those very documents which expose the fuller picture of the abuse than was previously acknowledged. '' To read more: https://www.cbc.ca/1.5039150
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Thanks so much. Let me get a coffee before I start.

This is tearing me apart just to think what the poor families went through. Having their children taken away from them and then some never seeing them ever again.
 
Cryptic said:
I dont really see where the "misinformation" claim comes from.

I stated that a detailed statistical study needed to be conducted and that some of the missing may have ran away from both the schools and home.

You supplied evidence that a detailed statistical study has been done. I can accept the study and don't contest it.
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I wish I had worded my post to you differently because in re-reading it, I sound judgemental and harsh. I think possibly you may have been trying to find a kinder, reasonable explanation for the recent discoveries. Or you may not know of the history and how the children were taken by force from their families who very much wanted them. (I don’t mean to speak for you.)

Unfortunately, from my understanding based on the evidence, the truth is in keeping with what the Indigenous community has been saying for many years.

It’s just terrible and incredibly sad right now. And I’m not Indigenous. I cannot begin to understand what they must be feeling.
 
Cryptic said:
There are no indications of mass murder. The school operated from 1890 to 1974.

This included periods before vaccines, comprehensive free medical treatment, guaranteed nutrition programs etc. etc. It also included a periods of two world wars and a global economic depression. There was a far higher mortality rate for children between say, 1890 and 1940 than there was today.

Any mortality rate was going to be compounded by an economic depression which could well have resulted in long term nutritional deficits compounding any illnesses.

Likewise, though no fighting occurred during either world war in Canada, the wars mobilized large number of men and could well have resulted in rising food prices- which would endanger people on the margin far more than the wealthy.

In short, what needs to be examined is:

-Whether the average mortality rate at the school exceeded the mortality rate of the population as a whole for the years that the school operated?

- Likewise, if so, how much did the mortality rate exceed the general population?

- What was the child mortality rate during those years for poorer whites?

Those questions are going to need far greater research than what is in the article.
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I've followed along without commenting until this post. Everyone is aware that world wars, epidemics, poverty and a global depression affected everyone during this time period.

I walked through my village cemetery a couple of years ago to see the sheer impact the Spanish flu had on the population. Whole families wiped out within weeks. And in a village of 1000 people on Remembrance Day the number of flags that identified veterans of two world wars as well as the Korean War.

The point is, I could view those deaths because they have all been acknowledged with death certificates. They were known and their deaths acknowledged by family and friends. A place of remembrance marked their passing with loving tributes.

Where is the acknowledgement of these deaths? Who advised the families that their children had died? Were they even told that their children were no longer alive? They weren't acknowledged because they were deemed nothing more than a failure of the plan to "beat the Indian out of them". Please don't suggest that there is a rational reason for rubbing out of the existence of these children, regardless how they died.

John A MacDonald, Canada's first Prime Minister made this statement when he introduced the Indian Residential Schools and the rationale behind their locations. “When the school is on the reserve, the child lives with his parents who are savages; he is surrounded by savages … He is simply a savage who can read and write,” Macdonald told the House of Commons.

Canada's Food Guides were created by experimenting on Indigenous kids in these residential schools. Why them? Because they were expendable.
https://www.cbc.ca/radio/unreserved...us-children-shaped-nutrition-policy-1.5989785

One of WS recently identified John Doe's 'Septic Sam' has been identified as a FN individual who along with his brother and sister were part of the 60s Scoop. He entered the residential school system after the experiments ended but his autopsy still showed he had evidence of malnutrition. While you and I may have been listening to the Beach boys or the Beatles these kids were removed from their homes without ever having contact with their parents for years. And many never returned home.

It's disingenuous to suggest there are rational reasons why these children have no names. There is nothing rational about systemic racism.
 
"The treatment of children in Indian residential schools is a sad chapter in our history.

"In the 1870s, the federal government, partly in order to meet its obligation to educate aboriginal children, began to play a role in the development and administration of these schools.

"Two primary objectives of the residential schools system were to remove and isolate children from the influence of their homes, families, traditions and cultures, and to assimilate them into the dominant culture.

"These objectives were based on the assumption aboriginal cultures and spiritual beliefs were inferior and unequal. Indeed, some sought, as it was infamously said, `to kill the Indian in the child.' Today, we recognize that this policy of assimilation was wrong, has caused great harm, and has no place in our country...."

Read the complete text here, including references to children who died:
Text of Stephen Harper's residential schools apology

So, that official apology by Prime Minister Harper was made 13 years ago. It was televised and widely publicized, though immediately vanished from the front pages of the news, probably due to lack of interest.

My question is, why didn't anybody express their paroxyms of grief and agony at the time? Why was there virtually no lamentation or regret expressed by individuals in the white community other than, of all people, Stephen Harper?

Could it possibly be that, a mere 13 years ago, white people didn't give a damn about what had happened at residential schools?

I think it shows, we don't have to go very far back in time to see complete indifference, and for people now to be trying to play catch up by expressing overwrought emotions and acting horror-stricken seems to me, frankly hypocritical.

This was not some evil conspiracy of vicious nuns and nazi bureacrats. The white people in communities adjacent to reserves, the settlers who enjoyed the abundance of Canada's wealth and voted for the governments, who, for example, never asked at a school board meeting 'what about the native kids?', our grandparents, our parents, us, are the reason why this happened. I say stop pointing fingers and parading virtue, and give that some sober thought.
 
Satchie said:
"The treatment of children in Indian residential schools is a sad chapter in our history.

"In the 1870s, the federal government, partly in order to meet its obligation to educate aboriginal children, began to play a role in the development and administration of these schools.

"Two primary objectives of the residential schools system were to remove and isolate children from the influence of their homes, families, traditions and cultures, and to assimilate them into the dominant culture.

"These objectives were based on the assumption aboriginal cultures and spiritual beliefs were inferior and unequal. Indeed, some sought, as it was infamously said, `to kill the Indian in the child.' Today, we recognize that this policy of assimilation was wrong, has caused great harm, and has no place in our country...."

Read the complete text here, including references to children who died:
Text of Stephen Harper's residential schools apology

So, that official apology by Prime Minister Harper was made 13 years ago. It was televised and widely publicized, though immediately vanished from the front pages of the news, probably due to lack of interest.

My question is, why didn't anybody express their paroxyms of grief and agony at the time? Why was there virtually no lamentation or regret expressed by individuals in the white community other than, of all people, Stephen Harper?

Could it possibly be that, a mere 13 years ago, white people didn't give a damn about what had happened at residential schools?

I think it shows, we don't have to go very far back in time to see complete indifference, and for people now to be trying to play catch up by expressing overwrought emotions and acting horror-stricken seems to me, frankly hypocritical.

This was not some evil conspiracy of vicious nuns and nazi bureacrats. The white people in communities adjacent to reserves, the settlers who enjoyed the abundance of Canada's wealth and voted for the governments, who, for example, never asked at a school board meeting 'what about the native kids?', our grandparents, our parents, us, are the reason why this happened. I say stop pointing fingers and parading virtue, and give that some sober thought.
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how do you know there was 'virtually no lamentation or regret expressed by individuals in the white community'??
 
Satchie said:
"The treatment of children in Indian residential schools is a sad chapter in our history.

"In the 1870s, the federal government, partly in order to meet its obligation to educate aboriginal children, began to play a role in the development and administration of these schools.

"Two primary objectives of the residential schools system were to remove and isolate children from the influence of their homes, families, traditions and cultures, and to assimilate them into the dominant culture.

"These objectives were based on the assumption aboriginal cultures and spiritual beliefs were inferior and unequal. Indeed, some sought, as it was infamously said, `to kill the Indian in the child.' Today, we recognize that this policy of assimilation was wrong, has caused great harm, and has no place in our country...."

Read the complete text here, including references to children who died:
Text of Stephen Harper's residential schools apology

So, that official apology by Prime Minister Harper was made 13 years ago. It was televised and widely publicized, though immediately vanished from the front pages of the news, probably due to lack of interest.

My question is, why didn't anybody express their paroxyms of grief and agony at the time? Why was there virtually no lamentation or regret expressed by individuals in the white community other than, of all people, Stephen Harper?

Could it possibly be that, a mere 13 years ago, white people didn't give a damn about what had happened at residential schools?

I think it shows, we don't have to go very far back in time to see complete indifference, and for people now to be trying to play catch up by expressing overwrought emotions and acting horror-stricken seems to me, frankly hypocritical.

This was not some evil conspiracy of vicious nuns and nazi bureacrats. The white people in communities adjacent to reserves, the settlers who enjoyed the abundance of Canada's wealth and voted for the governments, who, for example, never asked at a school board meeting 'what about the native kids?', our grandparents, our parents, us, are the reason why this happened. I say stop pointing fingers and parading virtue, and give that some sober thought.
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I can only speak fo myself, but you don’t know me or my personal history to know if I’m ‘parading virtue’ or only pointing fingers away from myself.

You wrote: ‘This was not some evil conspiracy of vicious nuns and nazi bureacrats.’ From what I understand it actually was. Only there were also vicious priests and a host of people who turned the other way. And yes, like you said, the community as well. But if you notice it took ground-penetrating radar and a host of specialists to find these graves because the truth was so well hidden.
 
Lexiintoronto said:
I can only speak fo myself, but you don’t know me or my personal history to know if I’m ‘parading virtue’ or only pointing fingers away from myself.

You wrote: ‘This was not some evil conspiracy of vicious nuns and nazi bureacrats.’ From what I understand it actually was. Only there were also vicious priests and a host of people who turned the other way. And yes, like you said, the community as well. But if you notice it took ground-penetrating radar and a host of specialists to find these graves because the truth was so well hidden.
Click to expand...

Jumping off your post as I wholeheartedly agree with what you wrote.

May I add - to have 3 locations (known at the moment) with hundreds of unmarked graves is a conspiracy of silence imo. Co-ordinated silence. Silence by the Canadian government of the day and the church. Coincidence or otherwise is not an option. There are names to go with this silence and cover up. Those names need to be conveyed.

I am as ashamed as one could possibly be that this happened. We were not listening as a country. We turned a blind eye as it was convenient at the time.

We cannot be silent or in denial or make excuses any longer.

All jmo.
 
Woodland said:
Jumping off your post as I wholeheartedly agree with what you wrote.

May I add - to have 3 locations (known at the moment) with hundreds of unmarked graves is a conspiracy of silence imo. Co-ordinated silence. Silence by the Canadian government of the day and the church. Coincidence or otherwise is not an option. There are names to go with this silence and cover up. Those names need to be conveyed.

I am as ashamed as one could possibly be that this happened. We were not listening as a country. We turned a blind eye as it was convenient at the time.

We cannot be silent or in denial or make excuses any longer.

All jmo.
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I believe it was much darker than merely turning a blind eye to it. The non-native population endorsed the process of removing First Nations kids from their communities and sending them to Residential Schools. No one thought to question the process. No one wondered why First Nations communities couldn't have their own local schools like every non-native community. Removing First Nations kids from their homes was generally accepted as the best practice.

And First Nations people could do nothing about it. They couldn't bring their case to court. The Canadian government added specific pieces of discriminatory legislation in the Indian Act that made it illegal for Aboriginal people to organize politically or to hire legal counsel.

I'm glad all of this is finally touching the hearts of the Canadian people. We need to hear the stories and confront the truth.
 
JDG said:
Over $3billion has, so far, been paid out to 28,000 survivors.

source: CBC article
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Here’s the link to the source: https://www.google.ca/amp/s/www.cbc.ca/amp/1.5946103


ETA: A quote from the article:
While the compensation process is now over, the report does speak of the need to continue the "healing journeys" of survivors, their families and communities. There is also a need to address the impacts on contemporary Canadian society as a whole, it says.

"The ongoing effects of residential schools are revealed in the low levels of educational attainment and high rates of unemployment, under-employment, poor health, poverty and suicides among children of survivors," the report states.

"It is shown in the disproportionate number of Indigenous children apprehended by child welfare agencies and involvement of Indigenous people in the criminal justice system."
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LadyL said:
Where did you check?
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"The Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples". (Couldn't they come up with a non-colonialist title?)

http://data2.archives.ca/e/e448/e011188230-01.pdf.

The whole document is worth reading, but you might start at pg 309 if you are specifically looking for historical attitudes toward residential schools. It's one of the most thorough documents, but there certainly are others.
 
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