Roland Chrisjohn:
What if the Holocaust had never stopped?
What if no liberating armies invaded the territory stormed over by the draconian State? No compassionate throng broke down the doors to dungeons to free those imprisoned within? No collective outcry of humanity arose as stories of the State’s abuses were recounted? And no Court of World Opinion seized the State’s leaders and held them in judgment as their misdeeds were chronicled? What if none of this happened?
What if, instead, with the passage of time the World came to accept the State’s actions as the rightful and lawful policies of a sovereign nation having to deal with creatures that were less than fully human?
What if the Holocaust had never stopped, so that, for the State’s victims, there was no vindication, no validation, no justice, but instead the dawning realization that this was how things were going to be? What if those who resisted were crushed, so that others, tired of resisting, simply prayed that the ‘next’ adjustment to what remained of their ways of life would be the one that, somehow, they would be able to learn to live with? What if some learned to hate who they were, or to deny it out of fear, while others embraced the State’s image of them, emulating as far as possible the State’s principles and accepting its judgment about their own families, friends, and neighbors? And what if others could find no option other than to accept the slow, lingering death the State had mapped out for them, or even to speed themselves along to their State-desired end?
What if?
Then, you would have Canada’s treatment of the North American Aboriginal population in general, and the Indian Residential School Experience in particular.
Canada's aboriginals are survivors of genocide. They are still a colonized population. It isn't history. It isn't in the past. They are still living the effects today.
From Praxis Media's Hoping Against Hope: The Struggle Against Colonialism in Canada Listen to the first episode, read transcript here, read a review or purchase the series.
5 comments:
Interesting post RJ. I considered Canada enlightened in its treatmanr of native Americans in comparison to the US.
Sorry to disappoint, TC, but we have major issues with our aboriginal populations up here. Amnesty International has chastized us. We have people in our country who live under third world conditions - no clean water, extreme poverty, with skyrocketing levels of suicide, child abuse, and more. It's very sad.
Listen to the audio (from which i took the excerpt.
Another excellent resource is The Dominion, an independent Canadian magazine.
South Africa studied Canada's treatment of first nations, particularly the reservation system, when setting up apartheid.
When I first heard that, that was my awakening to the sense of what Canada had done (is still doing?) to its aboriginal population.
Great post Jenny. The tragedy continues yet most Canadians refuse to acknowledge it. Instead we convince ourselves that it is somehow "their" fault that they have been locked into a cycle of poverty, suffering and second class treatment. As a nation, we should be ashamed.
Thanks for the enlightenment, Folks. While I claim some expertise on our side of the border, to our media in the US, Canada might as well not exist, so I come here and to Dawg's to learn.
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