A mass grave containing the remains of 215 children found at a former residential school set up to forcibly assimilate indigenous people in Canada has shone a spotlight on the ‘cultural genocide’ policies of the early government.
The Indian Act of 12 April 1876 aimed amongst other things to eliminate First Nations culture in favour of assimilation into Euro-Canadian society. Further amendments led to the establishment of compulsory boarding schools run by the government and RC Church whose aim was to separate the children of indigenous parents from their families. The children were often not allowed to speak their language or to practise their culture, and many were mistreated and abused.
The first such school was opened in 1 December 1883 at the behest of the first prime minister of Canada, John A Macdonald, who had tasked an Irish lawyer, journalist, politician Nicholas Flood Davin to make recommendations. His Report on Industrial Schools for Indians and Half-Breeds led to the creation of a network of such schools which over a hundred years incarcerated around 150,000 children. By the 1930s about 30 percent of Indigenous children were attending residential schools.
The Indian Act, 12 April 1876 Ottawa, has an innovative Aries Sun trine Uranus but is also ruthless and cruel with a Pluto Mars conjunction and Mars Venus opposition Jupiter Moon square Saturn. Mars in aspect to both Pluto and Saturn does suggest brutality.
The first Industrial school, 1 December 1883, has hardship and deprivation written all over it – with a Saturn Pluto conjunction in Gemini opposition Sun.
Nicholas Flood Davin, 13 January 1840, the architect of the scheme, was a Sun Capricorn with an unpleasantly hard-hearted Pluto trine Saturn, sextile Mars – so in tune with the Indian Act.
John A Macdonald, 10 January 1885, Glasgow, was another Sun Capricorn conjunct Mars trine Neptune and Pluto respectively with a pushily confident Jupiter square Pluto. He is credited for his key role in the formation of Canada though heavily criticised for his indigenous peoples’ policies.
My non-astro thoughts:
Outraged disbelief at the Roman Catholic Church for their reprehensible behaviour here and in Ireland and elsewhere and wishing plague and pestilence on them for their hypocrisy.
The early Canadian whites’ attitude isn’t much different from the colonialists in Africa and Australia; and in modern day with the Chinese in Tibet or with indoctrinating the Uighurs, and North Korea. It’s a fascist one-note policy – you’re one of us or you don’t exist. But that has probably been true of most, though not all, civilizations at all times. The invading force wants to put its mark on the territory it has taken over.
Colonial attitudes are coming under attack, quite rightly for their brutality in some areas. But it is too blinkered to see it all as a ‘privileged white’ issue. Superpowers have good and bad sides – Genghis Khan created his great Mongol Empire on the back of appalling genocides but practised religious tolerance when he was established. Mali in west Africa which became a centre for Islamic learning at its height in the 13th century ran on widescale slavery.
It’s too easy to beat ourselves up about historical sins from the recent past but taking a wider perspective indicates it’s as much about the human condition over millenia as anything else.
Add On: The Canada chart describes a tough-minded and adventurous national temperament. The Saturn in Scorpio opposition Pluto in Taurus gives grit, perseverance and endurance though isn’t awash with sentiment. Mars opposing Jupiter hints at a risk-taking mentality; and the Sun Uranus in Cancer in the 4th give a strong but rebellious sense of identity. The Sun Uranus squares Neptune on the Aries Ascendant softening the national image, wreathing it in a smokescreen of niceness.
This First Nation atrocity may turn out – as ever – to be a short-lived outrage that gets swept under the carpet after a few judicious words of apology – but two things seem pertinent in the near future. The Lunar and Solar Eclipses are rattling up the Canada Solar Arc Midheaven, Solar Arc Sun Uranus and the natal Venus in Gemini this year and the Eclipses will also impact the Saturn opposition Pluto in 2022 so there is a sense of change in the air, or at least change that will be precipitated by crisis.
At the same time tr Uranus will conjunct the Canada Pluto opposition Saturn, as indeed will tr Saturn in Aquarius, throughout 2022 which suggests a radical upheaval internally, against a fair amount of resistance and with some deprivation and hardship. Eclipses hitting the Canada Saturn in 2022 can bring chickens home to roost and exact a price for past mistakes.
Ah yes… I have to step in one more time!!!
the “niceness” of Canada.
I have been fascinated with the origin of the word “nice” since a larger than life friend of mine stated that one day she was going to write a book called, “The Anaesthesia of Niceness”.
It’s origin means “ignorant” and “foolish”. It also came to mean cowardice, sloth, wantonness, extravagance!! Somehow, over time, it diluted and then became this neutral, fits in everywhere word. Still, I think the “myth” of the word is there, hidden. I don’t trust “nice” one bit, actually!
So here we are…. Pluto transiting through our 10th house since 2008.. our public identity, our avocation! And now all these other hits that Marjorie has pointed out!
Our Neptune on the ascendant is a double-edged sword. Puts US into illusions about ourselves, but also, Canada seems to hold an illusion for people from OTHER countries!.. we are “nice”, “civilized”, “above that sort of thing”. It is time for US to dig deeper, get real.. and use that Neptune in it’s highest form.
And.. it is also time for others to see Canada more clearly… and hopefully not harshly judgmental.
Like I have mentioned before, having a strong Neptune in a public house astrologically is both a challenge and a gift. Certainly for just a person! A country? This will take some time.. as is true for ALL countries!
And again… I do think we will take this on now.
There ARE vigils happening across the country. Many, many non-Indigenous Canadians have been.. and are now.. deeply upset by the Kamloops tragedy. And by the tragic First Nation history. We will participate and support and challenge our government to take action at this time.
Some years ago I was interested in the attitudes that supported euthanasia. In the western world it was greatly supported by politicians, the medical profession and people like Marie Stopes, who played a great part in introducing birth control in the UK. She not only believed in euthanasia for anyone with any disease, she believed that many should be put down at birth if not before. This was at a time when abortion was illegal.
She was an absolutely hateful person and tried to prevent her son from marrying a blind woman he had fallen in love with. Anyway I had always assumed that Canada was above this sort of thing. I guess I was being naive. Imagine my surprise on reading about the forced sterilisation of those unfortunate enough to come into the-powers-that-be sights.
It wasn’t just the mentally handicapped, absolutely anyone for any reason . I mean imagine being sterilised for getting bad grades in school or for having a large family or being homeless. And this went on into the 60s and 70s.
This was something you would read about happening in India, not a nice country like Canada. For a long time I thought there must have been some mistake, because I wanted to believe that Canada was the only civilised country in North America.
So that mass grave isn’t that shocking. They just substituted euthanasia for genocide. The shocking thing is that we have become inurred to the whole thing. Like it is perfectly reasonable to allow an abortion to be performed at 39 weeks because the baby had a cleft palate or some correctable problem or that The Liverpool Pathway that denies those dying basic things like food and water, is somehow considered civilised instead of of what it is: an agonising experience. I wouldn’t want anyone I loved dying that way!
Today we live in a world where the police in America act as though they are the KKK, where children get massacred in school every day of the week. Where heads of state hang their heads in shame and state “…that something must be done!” While doing absolutely nothing about it.
While I don’t know much about Trudeau, and have only had the opinion that he seemed to look in the mirror way too often. Perhaps the Canadian people need to make clear that they won’t tolerate such treatment as was suffered by those poor children any more.
As for the Catholic Church, I don’t hold out much hope. It wasn’t just paedophilia that runs rampant, but the attitudes of the past . For centuries boys with beautiful voices were castrated in order to keep male soprano voice going. The last one to be castrated was done in the second World War on the orders of the pope. So I don’t think anything will really change, it will just go underground.
I suppose if I were a Canadian I would want to hold a vigil that stretched across Canada leaving nobody in any doubt that Canadians won’t allow this sort of thing to happen again. Because no child should suffer in such a way ever again. The past can’t be changed, but we can make sure it is never repeated again.
Absolutely fantastic add-on Marjorie!!
I’ve studied astrology for decades…. but not much about eclipses.
This is fascinating.
I really do need to get the books out.. and comb your site…
Clearly they are important!
For Canada.. not only this tragedy of the discovery of the 215 bodies of indigenous children. There is the oil and gas (and tar sands) demise in Alberta, the purchase of a pipeline by the Liberal government that is a turkey it seems, the Fairie Creek protests to protect one of the last old growth forests here on Vancouver Island, the climate crisis of the north – opening water that we thought belonged to Canada for other countries to lay claim to, etc. etc. It looks like there is more to come!
Thanks for the comment about Mr. Singh, PC. It’s easy to throw barbs from the outside. I’ve been on Boards and committees, trying to find solutions that diverse factions can agree on. Canada is a huge country with VERY diverse regions.. each with power. Our federal government.. whoever is in power.. has to walk a careful path and there are now easy answers.
I LOVE Canada’s Moon in Gemini because, at it’s best, we talk and discuss… and stand in paradox…. and try. We have “countries” within countries.. Quebec, Nunavut…. we identify as hyphenated… Indio-Canadian, German-Canadian, Chinese-Canadian. Ages ago, MP Lloyd Axworthy wrote that this could be one of Canada’s best gift to the world…. to stand in paradox, to hold tensions, to find the answer including “this” and “that”, somehow.
Won’t this be an interesting time for Canadians!
and for any who are interested….
Elizabeth May (former leader of the Green Party in Canada), puts out a weekly email…
“Good Sunday Morning”
She is brilliant and her weekly articles tell you a lot about what’s really going on in some aspect of Canadian politics. Her next posting this Sunday will definitely be about the Kamloops tragedy.
She was my MP for a number of years and her Town Hall Meetings were a breath of fresh air.
Informative, well-researched, unflappable… She is a politician who has so much integrity and intelligence.
enjoy!
Jagmeet Singh, a member of the Canadian House of Commons just posted this on his Twitter 19hrs ago:
‘Today in Canadian Parliament I asked Justin Trudeau to end legal actions against Indigenous kids and survivors of genocidal residential schools.
He refused to commit.’
That’s the kind of leadership that is just the shittiest imaginable; all smiles and amiable personality when a camera is around but truly couldn’t give a rats toss about it unless your a corporation lobbying criminal amounts of money at him because deep down he’s just a vapid, sociopathic prostitute. Christ, I’m pissed and I’m not even Canadian or indigenous!
A pinch of salt is always helpful with the leader of the NDP. I often find myself questioning the sincerity of Jagmeet Singh. He’s quick to jump on a bandwagon with precious little follow-up.
He famously wears bespoke suits and a Rolex on his wrist, while admonishing Canadians about their privilege.
Thanks for the heads up, PC. Obviously as I’m not Canadian i’m none too familiar with whose who in the government environment there. I’m bamboozled enough with my lot here in the UK, lol 🙂
Thanks for the add-on, Marjorie. I really hope the First Nations get their long overdue apologies and their closures, genuine support to rebuild their homes, families, and local economies, and to finally heal and flourish like the rest of get to take for granted.
Hello Marjorie .. and all.
Thanks so much for your unpacking the astrology of this event. I appreciate the dates you have chosen to use. I wonder…. is there something in the Canadian birth chart that is bringing this out into the open.
Ever since Pluto crossed the MC of the Canadian chart, I have had this sense that it is time for us to “grow up”…. like we were young teen and are now a young adult. Our Neptunian presentation of the “pristine north”.. wild and free… green and abundant…. bears and whales and eagles…. it’s not the truth. The Olympics in Vancouver put on such a show of all this natural Beauty. And identity that needs updating.. and maturity.
I do love this country… as I’ve said before.. I’m first generation from European refugee parents. THEY loved this country! And yet.. I grew up in the prairies surrounded by vehement racism against the First Nation people. My family of immigrants were no exception. When you are at the bottom.. you find someone lower than you. Even as a child, I was baffled by this. THEY were imprisoned and killed for being the wrong people so why would they do that to others???
But there you go….
I know Kamloops well… have many close friends there who were very involved with the RC church. One was a priest there for 18 years… a deeply, deeply good man with a big heart. I’ve sat at some of the Truth and Reconciliation meetings and sat in circles, listening to The Pain…. the pain, the pain, the pain.
I am glad that this is finally in the open.
This is a BIG moment for this country and I not only have a hope.. I really do think we are capable of finally moving forward in healing and reparations with our First Nation peoples.
and yes…. it has been known that these deaths and graves are there.
this is such a time of revealing the shadow… one thing after another.
It must be time!
Thank you Marjorie.
Today’s Vancouver Sun had a helpful article on the unmarked graves. A few quotes enclosed.
” It was never a secret that the sites of Indian Residential Schools abounded with the graves of dead children. Communities and survivors knew the bodies were there, as did any investigation or government commission that bothered to ask.”
“Efforts are often marred by spotty information or official apathy, but pushback has also come from survivors themselves. In 2008, Michael Cachagee, head of the National Residential School Survivors Society, openly criticized efforts to assemble a national catalogue of Indian Residential School cemeteries, saying it risked becoming an “exercise in genealogy.”
“The commission recommended a “national strategy for the documentation, maintenance, commemoration and protection of residential school cemeteries.” An initial working group formed to examine residential school deaths was denied a funding request of $1.5 million by the then-government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper, although in 2019 the federal government put $33.8 million toward an online registry of residential school cemeteries.”
It wasn’t just the Roman Catholic church that ran the residential schools here in Canada. “Roman Catholic, Anglican, United, Methodist and Presbyterian churches were the major denominations involved in the administration of the residential school system, according to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada (TRC).”
I have so many words inside me about this tragedy but I find myself at a loss for words at the same time. Anger is my dominant emotion at the moment but also sadness, frustration and a feeling of hopelessness about the situation. I’ve watched so many Canadian PMs make promises to the Indigenous people and then turn around and renege on their promises. They put on a show of solidarity when it’s camera time (the 2010 Olympics come to mind) and have a group dress in their ceremonial garb, do a smudging ceremony, etc. and when the cameras are put away, they are forgotten, pushed aside, taken to court, murdered – the list goes on.
I don’t want these children’s deaths to have been in vain. I’m hoping this will be the catalyst to finally bring everything to light and make the govt., the churches and the people take responsibility and keep moving forward to a better day for everyone. Hopeful here in BC.
Also from today’s Vancouver Sun: “Meanwhile this morning in Ottawa, Indigenous Services Minister Marc Miller says the Pope needs to issue an apology for the role the Catholic Church played in Canada’s residential school system.
A papal apology was one of the 94 recommendations made by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau personally asked the Pope to consider such a gesture during a visit to the Vatican in 2017.
The Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops announced in 2018 that the Pope could not personally apologize for residential schools, even though he has not shied away from recognizing injustices faced by Indigenous people around the world.”
Yes, the First Nations are completely singling out the Catholic Church for these crimes. In their ’94 Calls to Action (Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada)’ it states at number 58 under ‘Church Apologies And Reconciliation’:
‘We call upon the Pope to issue an apology to Survivors, their families, and communities for the Roman Catholic Church’s role in the spiritual, cultural, emotional, physical, and sexual abuse of First Nations, Inuit, and Métis children in Catholic-run residential schools. We call for that apology to be similar to the 2010 apology issued to Irish victims of abuse and to occur within one year of the issuing of this Report and to be delivered by the Pope in Canada.’
They asked for this in 2015/2016 ans still waiting. They will still be waiting when their own children are elders of their community. In Feb 2019 Pope Francis came under fire from campaigners and activists for survivors of clerical sexual abuse when he gave a defensive speech about child abuse within the church. From The Guardian:
‘Anne Barrett Doyle, the co-founder of Bishop Accountability, which tracks clergy sex abuse cases, described the speech as “recycled rhetoric”. “I am utterly stunned,” she told the Guardian. “The pope has undone the tiny bit of progress that possibly was achieved this week. He was defensive, rationalising that abuse happens in all sectors of society. Ironically and sadly, he exhibited no responsibility, no accountability and no transparency.”
In previous years the Pope stated that there were ‘2% of priests who were peadophiles’ – so it makes you wonder if he knows exactly who they are and still hasn’t forwarded their name to the police. However, that percentage has been disproven. The world average of peadophiles is around 4%. An Australian study found that more than 7% of priests are peadophiles if not higher and that’s the ones we know about! They also stated in their study that 7% was nearly double the world average and this should be sounding off alarm bells.
We won’t get an apology off this lot. If we do, it will be because he felt forced to so and he would only be paying lip-service. I’ve heard more Catholics and Christians wail and moan in huge absurd numbers about conspiracy theories and liberals who ‘rape babies and drink their blood in satantic rituals.’ But as soon as they are faced with yet another disgusting display of their priests and nuns going on a torture, rape and murder spree on innocent children, their silence, like the church’s, become absolutely deafening.
This isn’t a thing of history in Canada, unfortunately. There’s a great Canadaland podcast “Thunder Bay” I listened to because so much of my family went to the area (latest, a cousin spent a semester there as an exchange student about 15 years ago) that’s truly gut wrenching in describing how First Nation teenagers are flown in to Thunder Bay from remote Reserve Villages for high school, put to families boarding them for subsidies, not really caring and then simply disappear having succumbed to substance abuse and/or prostitution. The local police and justice system also has done very little to help.
Yes, I was watching some indigenous documentaries on Youtube recently and this was covered about Thunder Bay. Haven’t there been like 10 bodies of native people pulled out of the river there that might actually allude to murders rather than suicides? The people in their communities are frightened of sending their children to these schools but feel forced to do so. Why can’t the government allow them to have their own schools on their own lands? The police and the government have fallen very short in helping to resolve this and they just don’t really care.
Jo: Why can’t the government allow them to have their own schools on their own lands?
Because whites want these Natives to assimilate.
Jo: The police ……have fallen very short in helping to resolve this and they just don’t really care
The police exist to maintain the status quo.
Yeah, I kind of knew but was wanting to know from the government point of view what crap answer they had considering they don’t believe they are like the early government. They pay all the lip service in the world that they are helping these people, that they will continue to help. And yet the government’s actions show they are still stranding these groups of people. Shame the government don’t have the brass nuts to just say it out loud exactly what they are doing. And then find themselves in the position of being sued massively (and facing hate crime prison sentences) by the First Nation people!
The Swedish authorities also forcibly sterilised Romani women, and to this day keep records of Roma people, treating them as if they were potential terrorists. Swedish newspaper, Dagens Nyheter cited documents pertaining to the Swedish program, one of which stated “Grounds for recommending sterilisation: unmistakable Gypsy features, psychopathy, vagabond life.” What is even more disturbing is that the sterilisations were carried out under a government of the Social Democrats, the party that built Sweden’s welfare state. The forced sterilisation program was only ended in 1976.
@Virgoflake, Swedish were notarious forced sterilizers of all sorts of “unwanted” people, to a point that they had by far the highest per capita sterilization numbers. Their Institute of Racial Biology produced much of the *science” Nazis relied on and only was renamed Institute of Genetics in 1958.
Moreover, Sàmi children were forced to boarding schools all over Northern Scandinavia for decades. While mostly not as horrific as some boarding schools for Indigenous peoples, they still generally speaking forbade use of Sàmi languages.
Thank you Marjorie. It is indeed about the human condition, sadly.
There’s also the terrible story of the Stolen Generations in Australia, where between 1910 and 1970 between one in ten and one in three Aboriginal children were taken away from their parents. This began with mixed heritage children. It was “sold” as a way of “protecting” them. From Wikipedia, ‘Stolen Generations’:
“In 1909, the Protector of Aborigines in South Australia, William Garnet South, reportedly “lobbied for the power to remove Aboriginal children without a court hearing because the courts sometimes refused to accept that the children were neglected or destitute”. South argued that “all children of mixed descent should be treated as neglected”.[25] His lobbying reportedly played a part in the enactment of the Aborigines Act 1911. This designated his position as the legal guardian of every Aboriginal child in South Australia, not only the so-called “half-castes”.[25]”
Wasn’t there a film that focused on this? I think it might have been called Rabbit Proof Fence or something.
When I see nuns and priests even their attire gives me the creeps. They must have done something to me in a past life because I have had no bad experiences with them! I do recall back in the late 70’s when I was about 5 a nun came into the class and it freaked me out (strangley, I didn’t even go to a religious school, so no idea why she turned up.) I thought I was going to get into trouble. But she got out her acoustic guitar and sat with the class and played Puff the Magic Dragon, lol!
I was exposed to nuns from the age of 10 to 17. Perhaps that’s what’s wrong with me. But one good thing was that being exposed to neurotic, sexually repressed, hypocritical, sometimes cruel, subservient (when there was a priest around), unfulfilled women finally knocked out any vestiges of orthodox religion in me. I remember reading a biography of John Lydon who was of Irish Catholic descent speaking about growing up in poverty in London in the 50s and about how he instinctively knew that those ‘men in black’ were sexual predators and so he refused to be part of the junior choir, since he knew of boys who were being molested. Any other organisation would have been shut down years ago. If there is such a thing as Satan, he’s dressed in the sheep’s clothing of a clergyman and carrying a bible.
I so agree, VF. I’m sorry you had to be subjected to that crap. Religion is like a parasite of the mind and sensibilities, isn’t it? It completely distorts what is considered rational behaviour.
I remember a few years back I sat up late and switched the channels over on my tv and started watching an Irish film called The Magdalene Sisters. That upset me so much it took about a week to shake it out of my nervous system, and that’s just watching a bloody film! I don’t think I could have survived such cold, brutal experiences. It’s one of those films you couldn’t watch twice.
The only other film that I cannot give a second view is a French film called Irreversible. It stars Vincent Cassell and Monica Belluci. There is a scene where she is brutally raped in an underpass and it’s so realistic it’s horrific. That got to me in a big way for about a month. At first I couldn’t underestand why the director would even want to film such a film! But a long time afterwards I thought about it and now actually think it’s a masterpiece because of it. There is nothing worse than watching something like that on film and being unmoved or hearing a bloke say, ‘I’m just nipping off to the bathroom!” To watch the brutal desecration of another person’s sovereignty at the hands of another should be enough to wake you up to the injustices of others. If films can educate people on this matter then thats another step in the right direction. But this subject matter can be very hard to digest.
Yes Jo, ‘The Magdalene Sisters’ is a harrowing film, and just that – I remember saying to my OH that I never wanted to see it again, it was so upsetting. What it does show is how through religion and other patriarchal structures designed to control women and children, women can collude with a system that disempowers and oppresses them and become ever more abusive against other women. This this is something you see all the time (eg women who voted for Trump, women supporting the RC church in Poland and it’s curb on women’s reproductive rights, etc).
‘Irreversible’ is one of those films that I know I should watch, but have yet to summon up the courage to do so, as I can’t endure the depiction of sexual violence on film. But I have read about the film and I know the director was trying to shine a light in the darkness and wake people up.
Returning to this page tonight I see we’ve underlined Marjorie’s remark about “the human condition”, and it is very distressing to see that. So many half-hidden horrors around the world.
I wondered if Neptune in Pisces might be connected to the surfacing of so much scandal, and the wider knowledge around the world of such dreadful events? Neptune is now in the last decan of Pisces, and is associated with religion – although I am not sure whether we could associate it on its own with organised religion? Neptune isn’t noted for it’s associations with structures and hierarchies. It is also associated with victims and the “underdog”. Perhaps the sextile with Pluto, a longstanding aspect, in Pisces – victims, and Capricorn – structure, may finally shine light on what’s under all those stones around the planet.
So far as the Magdalene Laundries are concerned, a friend of mine actually managed, aged 15, to escape successfully from one, with her baby. This was towards the latter part of the time these horrible places were still open. The last one closed in 1998!
Could it be the last sweeping degrees of Pluto in Capricorn exposing what corrupted structures do to the unfortunate classes in the corrupted power system itself? It’s almost like Pluto is saying, ‘Oh, you think this is nearly finished? No. Now deal with the groups of people you are all guilty of hiding away from the power structures you helped build by your own ignorance ‘
I think if this never came out while all these other structures were toppling under Pluto in Capricorn there would be no justice in this world.
The moral arc of the universe is long and always bends towards justice – Martin Luther King
VF: But one good thing was that being exposed to neurotic, sexually repressed, hypocritical, sometimes cruel, subservient (when there was a priest around), unfulfilled women finally knocked out any vestiges of orthodox religion in me.
So that’s why my mom wanted to become a nun. It all makes sense now.
Thanks for doing this, Marjorie.
Can you imagine having a family and then the government and church step in to take your children away because they have ruled you inherently useless by virtue of being indigenous? And then not seeing your children for many years, maybe until their teens where they have been subjected to torture, starvation/malnutrition, rape, and murder as we are seeing now? This went on for 5-6 generations and has devastated their communities. Because these people are not treated or even protected like their white counterparts they have to endure many hardships like;
* higher numbers of suicide and alcoholism than the national average brought on by the traumas of residential schooling
* being forced to live in appalling living conditions that our own governments would never allow white people to live in
* indigenous women and children are 12 times more likely to be raped and murdered than white women (and many happen where pipelines are being laid, so alludes to the workers doing these crimes there)
* their purpertrators often walk away scot-free from court after a trial
* in the US they are killed by policemen in higher numbers than african-americans
* every promise given to the indigenous people by the government has been broken not once, twice, or ten times but every single time running into hundreds of broken promises. I’m sure this is the case with every other country that has aboriginal inhabitants too
And the list keeps getting longer. Relatives knew these children were buried at the Kamloops property just as they believe many more are buried in all the other schools across Canada (and no doubt everywhere else across the planet!). They were denied by the government to look for them and so took it upon themselves to look for these missing children. I hope and pray that RIGHT NOW is the perfect moment for them to expose this evil and open up the long overdue discourse in how we treat non-white people.
There are universal calls to overturn every residential school for more bodies so I think this is going to get even more uglier and pushed into the mainstream consciousness to be addressed. Stories are coming out that in those schools the older boys in the dorms would sleep closer to the doors each night so the priests wouldn’t pray on the younger ones to rape and that they would take them instead!
The Pope has never really condemned the residential schooling system and has stayed silent on the Kamloops matter. The church has issued a typical, ‘oh this is terrible’ statement about the gruesome discovery but have, predictably, taken zero accountability for their role in this mess. The priests and nuns who worked at these schools now live in retired luxury in Quebec and Ontario and will be protected by all accounts. I so wish more religious people would wake up and see the church for what it really is; a network for peadophiles and torturers. There are way too many being found guilty now for it to be something that happens ‘over there in the corner somewhere.’ It’s bursting at the seems with such miscreants.
Of course the church will never condone this. ‘According to Survival International, there are nearly one million tribal and Indigenous children across Asia, Africa, and South America who are currently attending institutions that bear a striking resemblance to Canada’s residential schools.’ Why would they speak out when they have a constant fresh supply of children at their disposal to rape, torture and murder? Both the Vatican and these residential schools need razing to the ground and these ‘Men and Women of God’ need to be put in a prison cell 24 hours a day. They are such dangerous people.
Same here in America for the native Americans. The majority were finally abolished in 1978 when 3 young Native American children tried to go back home and died in a snowstorm.
Let us not forget the Japanese American detention camps during World War 2 or the Immigrant Deportation camps that were created und Trump and are an abomination.
Sometime I cannot even begin to understand people’s inhumanity or its need for superiority. Seriously it breaks my heart….
Danish Inuit children from Greenland were also taken from their parents for “social experiment” around the 1950’s. This really is a time of seeing how those in power make decisions to those who are unprotected and the dreadful damage incurred.