This post will be of interest to my Canadian readers, most of whom will now be aware of the fact that last week in the Canadian Parliament, the Prime Minister rose and offered a formal apology for the aboriginal residential school system that had been put in place - ironically enough in the same chambers of parliament over a century ago. The last schools closed down within the lifetime of all those reading this post.
I won’t go into that shameful part of our history and its aftermath because both the speech of the Prime Minister and the reply by Chief Phil Fontaine do a moving job of doing exactly that.
As I talked to you before on many occasions, on the matter of effective and engaging speeches, sometimes it is just the event itself that is so fraught with moment, that it supersedes the words and the oratorical skills of the speaker(s). That said, in the context of this occasion, I believe they rose to the task at hand admirably.
As to the value of such a speech - the value of a public national mea culpa - you just ask those who had been on the receiving end of state sanctioned destruction and inquire if such an apology is of value.
Put yourselves in their shoes for one minute. Some so-called authority figure shows up on your doorstep and tells you they are going to take your children away to educate them “properly”. What you won’t be told is that their language, their culture, and their confidence will be thoroughly destroyed. Well perhaps they won’t tell you that. Nor will they tell you that your children might well be in physical and sexual harm’s way. And as it turns out they were.
We are all implicated.
Now before you protest that’s just liberal guilt talking, that you can’t be faulted by the acts of your ancestors, you might want to have a little reconsider of that particular moral high ground.
My best friend articulated the matter thusly:
“I was glued to my TV during the apology from the House of Commons on Wednesday. I was watching for the nuances, the signs that what was being said was sincere, that the words were clearly attached to a commitment to healing and reconciliation.
It has taken too long for this gesture. There have been other apologies - the former federal government, through the Minister of Indian Affairs, our own church through the words of former Primate Michael Peers.
This time the words of contrition seemed to coincide with a national awareness, an accepting of the horror that took place and the inherited responsibility that comes with it, especially by Euro Canadians such as myself. This is not a popular position to take. Guilt by association - as some would call it - isn’t legitimate, the events had nothing to do with me, I would never have done those things and am therefore blameless in this matter.
Unfortunately life isn’t as simple as that. A heavy mantle lies on our shoulders precisely because it was our ancestors who perpetrated these deeds. One can’t on the one hand take all the glory of our forebears, the nation and community building, the wars fought and won, the faith defended, the jurisprudence and democratic institutions that were planted, the kindliness and caring that was instilled in our nature and national psyche, without also taking responsibility for actions which were repugnant, which evidenced institutional racism and the teaching of bigotry and intolerance in the name of God.
The legacy we have been handed includes much to be proud of and much to be ashamed of. It isn’t enough to merely build on our strengths, we also have to correct past mistakes.
The residential school system and the racial assumptions that flowed from it poisoned not just the generations who had to suffer the abuses directly - people who were never parented and those who were never allowed to parent - but the children of those, and their children too. The sickness continues, handed down from one generation to another as family shame and sickness often are.
People who have never seen a residential school continue to suffer. The sins of the father are visited on the children.
First Nations people have inherited a bad situation and so have the Euro Canadians. We’ll have to work together in order to free us all from this history.
It’s something we have in common, something that needs to be purged from both our consciences. Genuine acceptance of aboriginal peoples as equals by the police, before our courts, in our churches, schools, the housing and employment markets and right across society will evidence true acceptance of our white history and a believable desire to be forgiven for what we have done as a people. Official ceremonies and carefully chosen words are all very well and they are most certainly welcome, coming as they did from the elected representatives of the men and women who make up this country. But much more will be needed. Leaders must speak out strongly in order to encourage and sponsor change, to alter attitudes.
Hopefully this time the words will mark an honest turning point in how First Nations and Euro Canadians could see each other: brothers and sisters under the sun in this fine land, God’s chosen brought together in His love and for His purpose, embraced in heart and spirit, forever linked in a mutual fellowship as we work to honour the planet and its past and to play our own unique part in the creation story.
With hope that we may all overcome this and every barrier that separates us.”
The Speeches
Prime Minister Harper
Part I
Part II
National Chief Phil Fontaine Replies
June 15th, 2008
Comments:1 Comment Category: Essential Speechwriter
Native children are still subjected to abuse, physical, emotional and sexual; they are still being ripped from their parents; they are still being beaten down by unjust, inhumane government policies. Only this time, instead of going to residential schools in the fall, they are going to foster homes, forever. At least with residential schools, as horrific as it was for many, they could return occasionally. Foster care, for too many, means losing their entire family – never seeing, touching, hugging, holding, a daughter, son, brother, sister, grandfather, mother, grandmother, father.
In order for this apology to truly be meaningful, the severing, by force, of parents from children, and children from parents and families, must be stopped, now. Over half the children in foster care are Natives. And as the statistics show, even today, foster care is a horrific, and horrifying, place for a child to be. Even if they are “good” foster homes, the damage done to a child by ripping them from their parents, and the damage done to parents and families when a child is ripped from them, is incalculable, irreparable.
Children who go through foster care are much more likely to end up physically and sexually abused, become addicted to drugs, drop out of school, be incarcerated, become homeless, and commit suicide. Yes, much more likely even than if they stay with their supposedly abusive Native families (this assumption - that Native children must be getting physically and / or sexually abused in their own homes in order for them to be removed to foster care - is just one more example of the deeply ingrained prejudice against Natives). The real statistics on the harm done by foster care are not even known, because the government fudges what it does let out, and the rest in remains a secret. For good reason.
If the government truly wants to help, it needs to do everything to enable families to stay together, rather than tearing them apart. Until this devastation of families is addressed, the problems will only grow worse, as generation after generation inherits the psychic wound that never heals, and, with every generation, only keeps getter deeper.
If the government owes Natives compensation for the past, for residential school abuse, and the suffering of parents and children who were torn from each other, then it certainly owes them something for the continuing devastation of families. That was then, and we may have some small excuse, even if it was only that it wasn’t directly “us.” But this is now, and it’s all of us, but government especially, who are allowing this genocide - and it absolutely fits the definition - of families to continue.
I’m not a Native, and I’m not a lawyer, and I’m not well off, by any means. But you can take my taxes any day to pay for this abomination. If I can pay for “carbon tax,” I sure as hell can pay for ruining hundreds of thousands of lives, and untold generations, for no good reason except to keep foster homes, adoption agencies, and Child Protection workers, and all the rest of the Kidnapped Native Children Industry, in business.
The next time you see a young Native wandering hopelessly, perhaps stoned on drugs, or high on alcohol, ask yourself: where did they come from - what, and who, so ruthlessly murdered their spirit. Chances are, it was the government’s “contractor:” foster care.
The government wants to absolve itself of responsibility, because it knows that it will be, eventually, held accountable by some small voice in the crowd, that grows louder, as the collective conscience gathers - it therefore classifies foster parents as “contractors,” rather than employees. Very sly indeed. Anticipating massive class action lawsuits, and attempting to nip them in the bud. That knowing, that sly planning ahead, the premeditation, to my mind, is infinitely more despicable than sending children to residential school decades ago, when we were all so much more unenlightened. It verges on pure evil. Total power to destroy, zero accountability.
The inhumanity and the brutality inflicted upon children and families continues, make no mistake about it. Until this is addressed, apologies are a kind of insult - a slap in the face - to the spirit of Natives, the intelligence of Natives, as well as all Canadians, who know, or should know, what crimes they, and their elected government, are perpetrating.
This time, let’s have the money go to the Natives, and especially to the ones who suffered the most – the children who grew up in – and are still held in – foster care; and the parents who were psychically murdered by this cruelty, for their pain is even more than the pain of a parent who has lost a child to natural causes. I dare anyone of you to ask any Native mother or father what they felt, what they still feel, when their flesh and blood is torn from them so cruelly, so coldly, by our very own judicial system. Ask any one of them, and no matter what the answer, it will always amount to the same: Having a child stolen from you condemns you to an endless aching of the heart. Ask yourself too, how many of these Native parents themselves have you seen, will you see, on the streets – stoned or drunk, doing anything to try to escape the pain from which there is no release but death.
The lawyers don’t need any more money – heaven knows they’ve made enough over the years. Let an honest one come forward, and take a fair wage. This suit will be won by the Plaintiffs, make no mistake, and Natives don’t need to make any corrupt contingency deals which only shaft them out of their fair share in the end. Then give what is owed to the ones who have suffered, the ones who are still suffering – if that includes the entire community, so be it. Only then, can we make an apology. Only then, can it be from the heart.
June 16th, 2008 at 1:14 pm