Residential Schools - Tumblr Posts
I don’t know what to fucking say anymore.
I’m tired. I’m hurt. I’m sad. And angry, like, really FUCKING angry.
They were children, they were only kids. And they found 215 of their corpses buried near those goddamn schools. It shouldn’t even be called a school.
As an indigenous person, this is fucking heartbreaking. But it’s not like it’s new. Shit like this has been happening and will continue happen unless we do something about it.
Sign a petition
Support indigenous artists/creators/actors
Educate yourself on residential schools and the generational trauma that we endure
Just PLEASE for the love of god talk about this.
We can’t keep letting shit like this slide. That was only one school where they found those kids. Imagine how many more have mass graves on the premises. This isn’t just “a dark chapter in our country’s history” this was and still is the whole fucking book. There are people in my community who have lived through the horrors of residential schools and many more that live with the trauma it brought.
The link below me is a petition to call for a national day of mourning for the kids who didn’t make it home to their families.
Please sign and share it. Remember these kids and the horrors they went through because we should NEVER forget this atrocity.
To help survivors:
https://www.irsss.ca/donate
https://legacyofhope.ca/english/get-involved/donate/
https://www.orangeshirtday.org/donations.html
https://fncaringsociety.com/donate
The Lost and Damaged Souls of Residential schools.
215 souls have been lost for so long, only now have they been found. These souls have been lost for years in a place that many have suffered and many still do suffer.
I only know the stories that I have been told by my family and by publications that have been made by survivors. But even this second-hand knowledge doesn’t stop my heart from aching with grief and despair for these lost souls.
The Residential schools were made to erase my people. For my culture and history to be forgotten to the sands of time.
But we have survived but at great cost.
So many souls of those who went to these schools have never been recovered and their names lost to the sands of time.
And those who have survived these schools suffer every day with the memories of what happened to them behind the walls of a place that was made to make them forget their identity and their culture.
We have found 215 souls but, how many more souls are still missing? How many children have these schools claimed?
Far too many.
It doesn't matter if they have passed or if they survived they are all victims of something horrific. Something that many people want to forget. And push aside as though it never happened.
But what does that solve?
Nothing.
Nothing will be solved, people will still be hurting. And more may be hurt because this is a pain that is passed down for generations.
It is generational trauma. A trauma that is so great that it affects other generations.
I want people to understand that there are so many victims out there. Many that have been forgotten about, forgotten to the point only the Creator and mother Earth remembers them, for they have lost their names to the sands of time.
And others that have survived but can’t get over their pain because it was so traumatic to them and affects their daily lives and the lives of those around them.
I want people to understand that we can’t get over it. How can we get over this pain? How can we forget these tragedies? How do we get over something that has destroyed so many lives?
I just want peace for all those souls, whether they be alive or have passed away. I want them to have some peace in knowing that we haven’t forgotten about them and the horrors of Residential schools.
First Generation.
I am the first generation who hadn’t been to a Residential school.
This may be shocking but it’s a reality that I have to live with.
I am proud to not have lived through the horrors.
But I am also not proud of this fact as well because I have family members who had to live through it.
Because my grandmother and my father and many other family members when to Residential schools.
My heart is full of sorrow and resentment.
Sorrow for those who have gone to residential schools whether they have passed or are still alive.
Resentment towards those who presided over the residential schools.
I know that those who are responsible won’t say sorry because it was all in the past and that they never practiced such behaviour.
However, I’m the first generation to not go to a residential school.
And I am not the only one, but I am one of many who are the first generation who hasn’t attended a Residential school.
I am afraid that this fact will be overlooked because it may not seem important to people.
But there is nothing I can do, but accept the fact that this is my reality.
And I don’t want it to change but I want people to acknowledge that all this happened recently.
Let us not forget those who have been lost to Residential schools and those who have survived and those generations who are lucky to not experience the pain of Residential schools.
I dream of the lost.
Warning this talks about Residential schools and how I feel about the Canadian government and how I feel about how they have responded to Truth and Reconciliation.
I dream of those how have been lost. Lost for decades, in horrible places long forgotten by those today.
I don’t know why, but they always seem to be in my mind and my heart. It’s hard to admit that I have these dreams because it seems no one cares.
I see the faces of children crying out for help, crying to be found, crying to be remembered.
But I know that they fall on deaf ears. Their pain and their heartache is pushed aside and forgotten.
I feel their pain, it’s like a war is going on inside my head. I want to scream, I want to cry out.
“Why don't you remember us?”
“Why must you place us in the shadows of other tragedies?”
“Is it because of my skin?”
“Is it because of my culture?”
“Tell me, please just tell me?”
My heart feels heavy with woe and I know there is no cure.
Because of those people who have denied us. Who have denied the truth.
Many fail to reconcile with us and in turn, we can not heal from this generational pain, that has been put us in.
It is because of people who continue to deny the truth.
It’s one of the many reasons we cannot heal.
The other is the Government, which claims that they will reconcile.
But have they?
No, they haven’t they leave us and pretend that we do not have any problems but we do.
And no it's not just with Alcohol and drugs but with clean drinking water, and other basic needs that should be met.
But our Treaties and our desperate pleas go unanswered.
Why is this so?
Why are we forgotten?
I want to know but I know they have no answer that would satisfy me.
But the crying of the long-forgotten children keeps coming into my dreams.
I hear them and I see the tears in their eyes.
But I know their pleas with not be answered, for they are gone but to them, They are still alive and they are still suffering.
I know that it may seem crazy but I want them to have peace, for all children deserve to have peace.
It should not matter the colour of their skin that determines whether they are remembered or not.
We should remember all children, especially those who have never made it home.
content warning: residential schools //
as Orange Shirt Day / The National Day of Truth and Reconciliation nears [September 30] I want to give a bit of context to those internationally who might not know that this day is.
Orange Shirt Day was started by Phyllis Webstad and others in 2013. This is a day to reflect and promote reconciliation, as well as uplift and support the victims and communities impacted by the Canadian residential school system. This is also the origin of the Every Child Matters movement.
The National Day of Truth and Reconciliation, as it's known by the Canadian government, was only formed as an official national day in 2021 after 200 unmarked graves were discovered on the property of the former Kamloops indian residential school that same year. Currently there are estimated thousands of graves on residential school properties; many of which have not been properly addressed.
Kivalliq Hall was the last residential school in Canada and closed in 1997. This is not some far-off distant history thing, many people alive today were sent to residential schools as children.
If you want to give support, consider donating to the Indian Residential Schools Survivor Society, or Orange Shirt Day. The IRSSS does fantastic work, offering counselling and numerous support lines - including one for 24/7 crisis support. I'd also like to mention Reconciliation Canada, as they also do good work.
This is a small personal anecdote here, but I'd like to recommend checking out Indian Horse; a novel by the late Richard Wagamese that follows the life of a boy going through the residential school system. There is also a film adaptation by the same name. This book [and its film] offers valuable education on the dark history that is residential schools.
I'm always happy to have additional links and educational material added to my posts, so please do not hesitate to add onto this. thank you.
Song of the Day
"Call of the moose" Willy Mitchell, 1980 As you might know, September 30th is Truth and Reconciliation day (more commonly known as Orange Shirt Day), a national day in Canada dedicated to spreading awareness about the legacy of Residential schools on Indigenous people. Instead of just focusing on a song, I also wanted to briefly talk about the history of the sixties scoop and its influence on Indigenous American music and activism.
The process of Residential schooling in Canada existed well before the '60s, but the new processes of the sixties scoop began in 1951. It was a process where the provincial government had the power to take Indigenous children from their homes and communities and put them into the child welfare system. Despite the closing of residential schools, more and more children were being taken away from their families and adopted into middle-class white ones.
Even though Indigenous communities only made up a tiny portion of the total population, 40-70% of the children in these programs would be Aboriginal. In total, 20,000 children would be victims of these policies through the 60s and 70s.
These adoptions would have disastrous effects on their victims. Not only were sexual and physical abuse common problems but the victims were forcibly stripped of their culture and taught to hate themselves. The community panel report on the sixties scoop writes:
"The homes in which our children are placed ranged from those of caring, well-intentioned individuals, to places of slave labour and physical, emotional and sexual abuse. The violent effects of the most negative of these homes are tragic for its victims. Even the best of these homes are not healthy places for our children. Anglo-Canadian foster parents are not culturally equipped to create an environment in which a positive Aboriginal self-image can develop. In many cases, our children are taught to demean those things about themselves that are Aboriginal. Meanwhile, they are expected to emulate normal child development by imitating the role model behavior of their Anglo-Canadian foster or adoptive parents."
and to this day indigenous children in Canada are still disproportionately represented in foster care. Despite being 5% of the Total Canadian population, Indigenous children make up 53.8% of all children in foster care.
I would like to say that the one good thing that came out of this gruesome and horrible practice of state-sponsored child relocation was that there was a birth of culture from protest music, but there wasn't. In fact, Indigenous music has a long history of being erased and whitewashed from folk history.
From Buffy Saint-Marie pretending to be Indigenous to the systematic denial of first nations people from the Canadian mainstream music scene, the talented artists of the time were forcibly erased.
Which is why this album featuring Willy Mitchell is so important.
Willy Mitchell and The Desert River Band
This Album was compiled of incredibly rare, unheard folk and rock music of North American indigenous music in the 60s-80s. It is truly, a of a kind historical artifact and a testimony to the importance of archival work to combat cultural genocide. Please give the entire thing a listen if you have time. Call of the Moose is my favorite song on the album, written and performed by Willy Mitchell in the 80s. His Most interesting song might be 'Big Policeman' though, written about his experience of getting shot in the head by the police. He talks about it here:
"He comes there and as soon as I took off running, he had my two friends right there — he could have taken them. They stopped right there on the sidewalk. They watched him shootin’ at me. He missed me twice, and when I got to the tree line, he was on the edge of the road, at the snow bank. That’s where he fell, and the gun went off. But that was it — he took the gun out. He should never have taken that gun out. I spoke to many policemen. And judges, too. I spoke with lawyers about that. They all agreed. He wasn’t supposed to touch that gun. So why did I only get five hundred dollars for that? "
These problems talked about here, forced displacement, cultural assimilation, police violence, child exploitation, and erasure of these crimes, still exist in Canada. And so long as they still exist, it is imperative to keep talking about them. Never let the settler colonial government have peace; never let anyone be comfortable not remembering the depth of exploitation.
Every Child Matters
so can we start hunting down white liberals now or what
I really wish my northern neighbour would do the same for its Native people, or at least take some responsibility for its misdeeds for its other minorities (androcides included).
Hey remember when they found over 200 bodies of native children buried behind a residential school and the world cared for... what, a week?
They've counted about 6,000-7,000 now, for those of you who do still care
I don’t know what to fucking say anymore.
I’m tired. I’m hurt. I’m sad. And angry, like, really FUCKING angry.
They were children, they were only kids. And they found 215 of their corpses buried near those goddamn schools. It shouldn’t even be called a school.
As an indigenous person, this is fucking heartbreaking. But it’s not like it’s new. Shit like this has been happening and will continue happen unless we do something about it.
Sign a petition
Support indigenous artists/creators/actors
Educate yourself on residential schools and the generational trauma that we endure
Just PLEASE for the love of god talk about this.
We can’t keep letting shit like this slide. That was only one school where they found those kids. Imagine how many more have mass graves on the premises. This isn’t just “a dark chapter in our country’s history” this was and still is the whole fucking book. There are people in my community who have lived through the horrors of residential schools and many more that live with the trauma it brought.
The link below me is a petition to call for a national day of mourning for the kids who didn’t make it home to their families.
Please sign and share it. Remember these kids and the horrors they went through because we should NEVER forget this atrocity.
Yeah, there’s a reason why we don’t hear about it any more. “Estimates range” to infinity. Actual bodies found? 0. None. Not a single one that wasn’t already park of a known then forgotten graveyard. A Canadian atrocity in which there are no bones. Cultural genocide? Absolutely. Though tears are uncountable. Deaths for neglect and disease? All diligently marked down (sometimes multiple times because they were double reported as both “hey, this kid died of measles” and “here’s our year end count of deaths as per mandated regulations”. A single body anywhere in all of Canada that was discovered as a residential school and unexplained by the above reason? Nope. Ground penetrating radar results indicating a body that was easily fooled by root systems conducted in a fruit orchard as ‘preliminary testing’? About 215 actually.
https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/251871/no-remains-unearthed-yet-from-canada-residential-school-grave-sites
Hey remember when they found over 200 bodies of native children buried behind a residential school and the world cared for... what, a week?
They've counted about 6,000-7,000 now, for those of you who do still care
content warning: residential schools //
as Orange Shirt Day / The National Day of Truth and Reconciliation nears [September 30] I want to give a bit of context to those internationally who might not know that this day is.
Orange Shirt Day was started by Phyllis Webstad and others in 2013. This is a day to reflect and promote reconciliation, as well as uplift and support the victims and communities impacted by the Canadian residential school system. This is also the origin of the Every Child Matters movement.
The National Day of Truth and Reconciliation, as it's known by the Canadian government, was only formed as an official national day in 2021 after 200 unmarked graves were discovered on the property of the former Kamloops indian residential school that same year. Currently there are estimated thousands of graves on residential school properties; many of which have not been properly addressed.
Kivalliq Hall was the last residential school in Canada and closed in 1997. This is not some far-off distant history thing, many people alive today were sent to residential schools as children.
If you want to give support, consider donating to the Indian Residential Schools Survivor Society, or Orange Shirt Day. The IRSSS does fantastic work, offering counselling and numerous support lines - including one for 24/7 crisis support. I'd also like to mention Reconciliation Canada, as they also do good work.
This is a small personal anecdote here, but I'd like to recommend checking out Indian Horse; a novel by the late Richard Wagamese that follows the life of a boy going through the residential school system. There is also a film adaptation by the same name. This book [and its film] offers valuable education on the dark history that is residential schools.
I'm always happy to have additional links and educational material added to my posts, so please do not hesitate to add onto this. thank you.
In Vancouver, a Catholic Church was defaced in direct response to the discovery of the mass grave at the Kamloops Indian Residential School. Graffiti demanding that the church “Release the Records” called out the Oblates of Mary Immaculate, who both operate the church and operated the Kamloops Indian Residential School, as well as almost half of all residential schools across Canada.
In Six Nations territory, it was the Anglican Church who operated the Mohawk Institute Residential School from 1831-1970. On June 12, a suspected arson significantly damaged an Anglican church on the territory. While no one has publicly claimed the action, many community members assumed that the attack was connected the current scrutiny of churches and their role in residential schools.
- Canadian Tire Fire #3