Over the Victoria Day long weekend using a ground-penetrating radar a mass grave of 215 children from the Tk'emlups te Secwépemc First Nations (and likely others from surrounding area) in Kamloops, BC ,on the property of one of the largest Residential Schools in our country of Canada was found. Our parliament had an apology in 2008 admitting to rape, beatings, death etc of Children from First Nations at the hands of these so called schools to the survivors. The last school closed in 1996 when I was only 13 years old and it was entirely legal to own a native child up to possibly even the 1960's with the Indian Act being in place. See the Indian Act for more info and a closer,more accurate timeline. It's horrifying and disgusting what they have done. What our, my ancestors have done and gone through. A lot of people don't know that I am part Native American, that I have even 1/6th Native heritage and that I feel this too. I know that I'll likely get that I'm white and I won't understand and maybe part of that is true , yes , because I have had privilege of being white. I accept that. However, that then makes it my responsibility to do better and make sure that things like this don't happen again. Ever! I know I'll get that "oh well my ancestors stood by the Natives and were kind to natives , they never owned one or beat them " etc., you don't know that. You don't because unless you have a time travel machine you can't say that. All you know is the now and what we have to go by of oral and written history which was and is controlled by the government or corporations and always has been by the people in power.
By saying things like this and not taking responsibility of your own actions and those of our forefathers we are participating in erasure and continuing the line of racism. We disgrace the elders. Keep in mind this was not very long ago. We also treat it like it's "history" , no this is the recent past. This is the now. Even my own heritage , it may be that they loved each other, but it may also be that somewhere down the line they were raped or forced or coerced. I will never know that for fact because I was not allowed to really speak to my elders. My grandmother tried to pass what she knew along as best she could. But bones, they don't lie.They tell the truths. This was a massive blow of mass grief. Families torn apart, not knowing who took their loved ones or if they would return. A culture nearly wiped out. Their languages, their oral traditions. Everything. We put what we can in museums and say "oh it was found" when really we stole it from right in front of them!
There was a poem I came across by one of the First Nations artists I follow, Susan Aglukark, that she posted on Facebook by another artist - it simply stated the fact that Mother earth held these little souls until they were ready to be found. That the Earth was what held and cared for them when no one else would. Until we were ready. This is a time of reckoning. We must all face the truth and stop shoving the dust of the past under the rug and let it go out into the world to be a part of us, to be a part of the earth and be known. We must accept that we are not perfect and that as a human race we must do better and we have a lot of work to do to get there!
There is no compensation for losing the life of a child and the torture and pain and suffering caused. No amount of money or physical material things could replace a life. This is fact. We should be giving them their freedom to engulf themselves in their culture, speak their language and teach their history to their children. We should learn it. We should have it in our schools. They were here first and even back then they did not claim this land as theirs. They accepted the settlers with open arms and white man stabbed them in the back literally and took and pillaged. This is not ours. What gives us the right to even say that it is? Nothing.
There is no other words to express my sorrow, my anger, my disappointment. I can only hope that we may learn from our mistakes and help our brothers and sisters heal.
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