Canada Day 2021

There are times when I feel disgusted with the human race and embarrassed to be human. Today is one of those days.

 

With the discovery of another 182 unmarked graves at Cranbook,  B.C, residential school, I feel sick, horrified and profoundly sad. How did this happen and why did the perpetrators get away with it?!! Why did those with knowledge of what was going on turn a blind eye and look the other way?

 

Being raised in the 70’s in London, ON, I didn’t know very many indigenious children. But what I do vividly remember is that they were teased for being different (as anyone that was different was) and being called an “Indian giver” when I gave away an expensive toy that my mother demanded I get back. I remember feeling that this was wrong and that there was a definite negative connotation associated with Indians. Why was that?? Who started the “Indian giver” slur?

I am SO ashamed of what our ancestors did. What right did we have to force our culture and religious beliefs on indigenous communities? Who decided that we had the right to take their children to residential schools and teach them to be “Canadian”? In retrospect, maybe things should have been the other way around. Perhaps we are the ones who needed to be taught about their beliefs and how to appreciate and preserve the earth. But as always, fear and lack of understanding breeded contempt.

 

 

With Canada Day approaching, I question whether it is really appropriate to celebrate and pay tribute to our country’s 153rd birthday. While this day commemorates the anniversary of the Constitution Act of 1867, perhaps we need to step back and think about celebrating the First Nations of Canada and the Indigenous people who lived here before Canada was born and who provided the foundation on which our country was built.

 

 

With genuine work and healing, I hope we all again can one day feel proud to be Canadian.

 

Angela Baltkois

CEO and Founder
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