The Truth about Truth and Reconciliation Day

Truth and Reconciliation Report Call to Action # 80- We call upon the federal government, in collaboration with Aboriginal peoples, to establish, as a statutory holiday, a National Day for Truth and Reconciliation to honour Survivors, their families, and communities, and ensure that public commemoration of the history and legacy of residential schools remains a vital component of the reconciliation process.

On May 27th, 2021, on the grounds of the former Kamloops Indian Residential School, in Kamloops British Columbia,the remains of 215 children were discovered buried in unmarked graves. Through the use of ground penetrating radar, remains of Indigenous children, some as young as three years old were found and the Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc First Nation said that they were all undocumented deaths. This meant that for many families, they might now gain some measure of closure for the children who were taken away against their will by the Canadian Government and kept prisoner by the Catholic and Protestant Churches and never seen again.

This technology had mostly been used by geologists and archaeologists, but also by law enforcement. The decision to use GPR at Kamloops came after initial investigations by First Nations had identified unmarked graves. After Kamploops came several other mass graves across the country. From Battleford Saskatchewan to Fort Providence in the NorthWest Territories more remains were being found on a weekly basis. The Canadian government and different provincial governments have now been forced to spend millions on GPR searches at all former residential school sites in Canada.

I think by now most of the nation has been made aware of the atrocities of the Residential School System. Canada can no longer bury it’s past like the bodies of so many Indigenous children whose families never got to say goodbye. But for those of you who are still not up to date; the Residential School system in Canada was specificall designed as a method of cultural genocide perpetrated against the indigenous people of what you call Canada and what they refer to as Turtle Island. Children were forcibly removed from their families by the Government with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police acting as their storm troopers. While institutionalized, they were forbidden from speaking their own languages, severely punished for it if they did and forced to convert to Christianity. They were also subject to sexual and physical assault by both priests and teachers, had medical experiments performed on them and received little to no health care. Many of them were used as slave labour and many died trying to escape. Many non-Indigenous Canadians are horrified but view it as a part of Canada’s past that, regretfully happened, is but is just that, a part of the past. The last residential school closed its doors in 1996, a mere 25 years ago. Although the residential schools no longer exist, their legacy lives on in the child welfare system that routinely removes Indigenous children from their homes and places them with white foster families, many of whom are simply in it for the money. Then there is the fallout, intergenerational trauma passed down by survivors. People were so damaged that they passed it on to their children and so on down the line. This brings us to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and subsequent findings and report.

The Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada (TRC) was created through a legal settlement between Residential Schools Survivors, the Assembly of First Nations, Inuit representatives and the parties responsible for creation and operation of the schools: the federal government and the church bodies.The TRC’s mandate was to inform all Canadians about what happened in residential schools. The TRC documented the truth of Survivors, their families, communities and anyone personally affected by the residential school experience. This included First Nations, Inuit and Métis former residential school students, their families, communities, the churches, former school employees, government officials and other Canadians.

The TRC concluded its mandate in 2015 and transferred its records to the safekeeping of the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation (NCTR). https://nctr.ca/about/history-of-the-trc/truth-and-reconciliation-commission-of-canada/

From that report came 94 Calls to Action for the Government of Canada to implement. Six years later only 14 of those have been completed. Bear in mind that these are not huge asks on the part of the Indigenous people of Canada. However the Canadian Government has yet to do anything of substance. Truth and Reconciliation Day or Orange Shirt Day, is much more the result of the discovery of the bodies than it is complying with the recommendations and calls to action in the report. As a matter of fact, our Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, had been invited to attend events being held in Kamloops BC where the first graves were discovered, by the chief of the Tk’emlups Secwepemc First Nation but instead flew to Tofino to spend time with his family. This tells us once again what we already knew, that this government, like successive governments before it, are only interested in offering up platitudes and appearing to be doing something without actually doing anything. Hence; another federal holiday that hopes white people and other non-Indigenous people in Canada will take time to reflect. They won’t, by the way. They will just have a day off to do whatever they want and move on.

Personally, if I saw the government making good on all of the calls to action, ensuring that all Indigenous communities had clean drinking water, that they were actually preparing to give all First Nations self government and abolishing the Indian Act altogether, I might be inclined to believe that this day was something other than just performative allyship. I see no signs of any of those things. Trudeau Jr. has much better PR skills than his father did but they both have the same attitude towards the Indigenous population of this country, which is basically that they will never be worthy of full citizenship in this nation and that they are not capable of self government. When the elder Trudeau was faced with making an apology for forcefully interning Japanese Canadians during the 2nd world war, he basically said that it was a Pandora’s Box of; who’s worthy and who’s not and raised fears that people would be coming out of the woodwork for first, apologies and then money.

On the up side of things, I am seeing a strong movement from the Indigenous youth of this country when it comes to opposing the pipeline, logging and fishing rights and turning to the elders of their communities for wisdom and knowledge to guide them in these fights. There are so many young Indigenous men and women who have made a name for themselves as influencers on platforms like Indignous Tik Tok and Instagram. Technology is helping the cause in every way possible. Everyone has a phone and I am constantly seeing live streams from people such as Kanahus Manuel @kanahus.tattoos who has been keeping us up to date on the Tiny House Warriors actions. Or @decolonizemyself who is 2Spirit Cree and explores colonization, decolonization, healing and culture. Sherry Mckay @officialsherrymckay who is a Anishinaabe, comedian, influencer and tik tok star from Winnipeg, has a huge following and shares important messages, and engages in educating and discussing issues that impact Indigenous people. I would be remiss if I didn’t mention Snotty Nose Rez Kids, the Haisla, Vancouver based rap duo, have won and continue to win countless awards for their original brand of hip hop that aside from being great music is also activism.

The only conclusion I can draw from this is that, whether white colonial settlers and other Canadians will recognize them or not, this generation of young Indigenous men and women and lgbtq2S are standing up and being heard. They are taking the pain and bravery of their parents and grandparents generation and using it as fuel to blaze a path to the future for Indigenous people in Canada. They are not just on the frontlines putting themselves in harm’s way but they are also using the courts, the media and their voices to take back what is theirs.

So perhaps this last September 30 Orange Shirt day went by without much meaning for you, there is always next year. If you don’t know where to start to educate yourself there are a ton of resources online, all you need to do is look. But mostly if you want to help this day have meaning for you, do what I do; I simply imagine what it would be like if the police came and ripped my children from my arms. Would I die trying to protect them? Of course. Would my heart ever heal if I never saw them again? Never. Would I spend the rest of my life railing against a racist, dictatorial regime? Without a doubt. All you need to do is put yourself in their shoes. If you’re a parent you will know. Start there and maybe next year will have more meaning for you and you might eventually learn how to be an ally for Indigenous people. It’s not complicated, it’s not difficult, just try to imagine what it would be like, remember that you reside on stolen land and try to be a decent human being.