# Many hundreds of unmarked graves of Indigenous children discovered at Canadian residential schools **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [June 5, 2021, 2:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/many-hundreds-of-unmarked-graves-of-indigenous-children-discovered-at-canadian-residential-schools/943674 "2021-06-05T14:04:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2021, 8:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/many-hundreds-of-unmarked-graves-of-indigenous-children-discovered-at-canadian-residential-schools/943674/21 "2021-06-05T20:57:31Z")
Note that in Alaska, at least for a while, the US government had a somewhat more enlightened method. My grandparents were sent to Alaska to teach the native Eskimo\*- in their own tribal areas. Yes, they were taught english, Reading, writing and also what was then (in the 1920’s or so) proper hygiene and western medicine (one had to be a nurse). - the _Alaskan_ Eskimo have no issue with that term, while some of the Canadian tribes despise it. ---
**Author:** ![PastTense](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pasttense/32/14550_2.png) [@PastTense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PastTense)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2021, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/many-hundreds-of-unmarked-graves-of-indigenous-children-discovered-at-canadian-residential-schools/943674/22 "2021-06-05T21:28:19Z")
> [@thorny\_locust](#): > > I don’t believe that those people “meant well”, whatever the time was. Well think of the kids going to the school: if they saw 200 graves of the school’s students they may very well get very fearful that they are also going to die there. ---
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2021, 10:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/many-hundreds-of-unmarked-graves-of-indigenous-children-discovered-at-canadian-residential-schools/943674/23 "2021-06-05T22:12:45Z")
> [@PastTense](#): > > Well think of the kids going to the school: if they saw 200 graves of the school’s students they may very well get very fearful that they are also going to die there. That doesn’t explain not sending the bodies home to families. And survivors report stories of unmarked graves; which doesn’t sound in the least like they weren’t fearful. And were children in the wider Christian society generally buried in unmarked graves so as not to scare the others? ---
**Author:** ![Banquet\_Bear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/banquet_bear/32/373_2.png) [@Banquet\_Bear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Banquet_Bear)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2021, 10:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/many-hundreds-of-unmarked-graves-of-indigenous-children-discovered-at-canadian-residential-schools/943674/24 "2021-06-05T22:52:06Z")
> [@PastTense](#): > > Well think of the kids going to the school: if they saw 200 graves of the school’s students they may very well get very fearful that they are also going to die there. …and they had every right to have that fear. > [@CBC](#): > > But the stories from the survivors proved to be horrendous. One of the most common stories that we heard were from survivors who talked about the children who died in the schools and whose deaths they witnessed. Just as often, we heard about the loneliness and separation from their family — how they lost so much. > > One aspect of residential schools that really proved to be quite shocking to me personally, was the stories that we began to gather of the children who died in the schools. Of the children who died, sometimes deliberately, it was at the hands of others who were there, and in such large numbers. > > Survivors talked about children who suddenly went missing. Some talked about children who went missing into mass burial sites. Some survivors talked about infants who were born to young girls at the residential schools, infants who had been fathered by priests, were taken away from them and deliberately killed — sometimes thrown into furnaces, we were told. > **[Former senator says Canadians should brace for more discoveries like Kamloops...](https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/sinclair-kamloops-residential-remains-1.6049525)** > > Canadians should prepare themselves for the discovery of sites similar to that of the former residential school in Kamloops, B.C., where the remains of 215 children were found, former senator Murray Sinclair said in a statement Tuesday. > [@"A Reimer](#): > > There are only 2 reasons to have been shocked & outraged about the news of 215 Indigenous children found in a mass grave at the former Kamloops Indian Residential School: (1) personal trauma related to residential schools, mass graves and/or genocide was triggered … /1 > > Or (2) this is the first time you are realizing that Canada is the perpetrator of residential schools, mass graves and genocide. If you are in the latter group and in a position of power, in a post Truth and Reconciliation Commission Canada there is no excuse for you. /2 > > Throughout the testimony and the reports to the TRC there is clear evidence of thousands of murdered children. It was so prevalent in testimony that Volume 4 of the TRC report dedicates all 273 pages to Missing Children and Unmarked Burials. /3 > > 1000s of people gave 10,000s of pages of testimony. Retriggering this extreme trauma came at a high price to themselves, their families and their communities. It was possible because many others suffered to tell their stories to get the public attention that led to the TRC. /4 > > The TRC follows on royal commissions, white papers, research and investigative reports that detail the grossly disproportionate burden that Indigenous people carry of poverty, incarceration, police-involved shootings, toxic drug deaths, homelessness /5 > The last residential school closed in 1997. As someone pointed out on Twitter, the TV show _Friends_ was still on the air. This isn’t ancient history. Here is the TRC final report. > **[TRC Website - NCTR](https://nctr.ca/about/history-of-the-trc/trc-website/)** > > The TRC website has been archived using the Wayback Machine software. You can view the archived version by clicking here. The Wayback Machine is an archive system for websites. The archived TRC website will work like a normal website, however, it is... Physical genocide. Biological genocide. Cultural genocide. **“In its dealing with Aboriginal people, Canada did all these things.”** ---
**Author:** ![Dr\_Paprika](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr_paprika/32/3042_2.png) [@Dr\_Paprika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr_Paprika)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2021, 11:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/many-hundreds-of-unmarked-graves-of-indigenous-children-discovered-at-canadian-residential-schools/943674/25 "2021-06-05T23:17:08Z")
This represents the worst of Canada. Although I do not think it is always wise to judge past figures using contemporary values, the fact is this is wrongheaded enough to significantly stain the reputations of figures like Langevin, Ryerson and Sir John A. I had sometimes wondered if the word “genocide” was overly melodramatic. It is now clear it is not - this was not just a cultural genocide. And it is very sad indeed. It is clear the government has not made sufficient progress on the Calls to Action of the Reconciliation Committee. > **[‘He was just a child’: dead of Indigenous residential schools haunt Canada](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jun/05/canada-indigenous-residential-schools-first-nations-children)** > > Generations of First Nations children were abducted to institutions to solve the country’s ‘Indian problem’. Thousands never returned ---
**Author:** ![slash2k](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@slash2k](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slash2k)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2021, 12:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/many-hundreds-of-unmarked-graves-of-indigenous-children-discovered-at-canadian-residential-schools/943674/26 "2021-06-06T00:07:26Z")
> [@thorny\_locust](#): > > That doesn’t explain not sending the bodies home to families. > > And survivors report stories of unmarked graves; which doesn’t sound in the least like they weren’t fearful. > > And were children in the wider Christian society generally buried in unmarked graves so as not to scare the others? There is a long history of not bothering to mark the graves of people who don’t matter much, with the definition of “don’t matter much” depending on the times and situations. For example, I live not too far away from the site of the former Topeka State Hospital (founded in 1872 as the Kansas State Insane Asylum). On the grounds is a [cemetery](https://www.kshs.org/p/topeka-state-hospital-cemetery/11317) for deceased patients, in use at least up through the 1950s. More than 1100 people are buried there, of whom maybe a dozen have tombstones. For all of them, the names are known, they were mostly adults, and the majority were white, but their grave is simply listed as something like “269 feet west of the marker for row 2.” They were adjudged mentally ill, so their families rarely wanted their remains and they weren’t considered “worth” a tombstone. Pauper’s cemeteries, prison cemeteries, and others catering to societal outcasts are likewise full of unmarked graves. [Hart Island](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hart_Island_(Bronx)) in New York City has probably a million graves; most are in mass graves, being primarily paupers, the homeless, people whose family didn’t claim them, stillborn infants, etc. ---
**Author:** ![velomont](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/8491ac/32.png) [@velomont](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/velomont)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2021, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/many-hundreds-of-unmarked-graves-of-indigenous-children-discovered-at-canadian-residential-schools/943674/27 "2021-06-06T00:34:40Z")
> [@thorny\_locust](#): > > many of whom knew little or nothing about these schools before. As a Canadian I would be flabbergasted if many did not know about residential schools. And even if that was the case we (Canadians) should regard the Catholic Church with suspicion as sexual abuse allegations have been prominent since the '90s (or earlier) in Catholic orphanages and associated schools and churches since then. Our governments and the non-indigenous population have paid lip-service to this, have been ignoring it, and been apologists for the Catholic church. It’s not a situation of “making it worse than it is” because it is but one part of a global child abuse scandal conducted and hidden by the Catholic Church. It is tragically intertwined with our (Canada’s) treatment of those from whom we stole half a continent and have continued to treat like crap (think of unhealthy water systems and murdered and missing Indian and children). And I completely agree with DWMarch about SWAT teams. Back in 2008 or 2009 I commented to a CBC article that the UN should coordinate a global legal take-over of all Catholic properties and deal with that church as police would deal with Enron or any other large multi-national. CBC moderators wouldn’t post it btw. And it continues. Our PM said today 'As a Catholic, I am deeply disappointed by the position that the Catholic Church has taken now and over the past many years". Seriously? Religion’s a choice and any practicing Catholic is enabling child abuse. Our government has had years to deal with the residential schools issues, as well as other indigenous issues. Our govt has also resisted compensating survivors as indicated by one example "Ottawa also fought compensation claims for instances when St. Anne’s survivors were forced to eat their own vomit. St. Anne’s survivor[Edmund Metatawabin](http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/st-anne-s-residential-school-one-survivor-s-story-1.2467924), the former chief of Fort Albany First Nation, said he is aware of instances where survivors did not get compensation for suffering caused by the electric chair or for being forced to eat their own vomit." This could have and should have been resolved years ago and, with the exception of the recently discovered mass graves, this has not been a secret. I have also had numerous conversations with people about taking appropriate legal action against the church and heard, numerous times, “you can’t do that, it’s the church!” FFS, there’s nothing special about the church and a bloody, international take-down should be executed. ---
**Author:** ![slash2k](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@slash2k](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slash2k)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2021, 3:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/many-hundreds-of-unmarked-graves-of-indigenous-children-discovered-at-canadian-residential-schools/943674/28 "2021-06-06T03:00:08Z")
Does the Catholic Church actually have a _worse_ record than other institutions, though? They have a larger record, merely because they operated more schools and orphanages than anybody else, but Haut de la Garenne and the Dozier School stand as ample proof that secular authorities can be no better. ---
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2021, 4:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/many-hundreds-of-unmarked-graves-of-indigenous-children-discovered-at-canadian-residential-schools/943674/29 "2021-06-06T04:30:07Z")
> [@slash2k](#): > > There is a long history of not bothering to mark the graves of people who don’t matter much Are you saying that you think those children “don’t matter much”? They mattered at least as much as the people who decided that they didn’t matter. The fact that there’s a long history of people treating others as if they “don’t matter much” does not make it right. It’s still despicable. > [@slash2k](#): > > For example, I live not too far away from the site of the former Topeka State Hospital (founded in 1872 as the Kansas State Insane Asylum). On the grounds is a [cemetery](https://www.kshs.org/p/topeka-state-hospital-cemetery/11317) for deceased patients, in use at least up through the 1950s. More than 1100 people are buried there, of whom maybe a dozen have tombstones. Not too far from me, [they’re finally getting names on similar graves](https://www.ithaca.com/news/south_seneca/willard-cemetery-names-to-be-released/article_2e6300b4-7511-11e6-a1a5-0b8705ea5d57.html). Those people mattered, too. ---
**Author:** ![slash2k](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@slash2k](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slash2k)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2021, 5:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/many-hundreds-of-unmarked-graves-of-indigenous-children-discovered-at-canadian-residential-schools/943674/30 "2021-06-06T05:08:22Z")
> [@thorny\_locust](#): > > Are you saying that you think those children “don’t matter much”? They mattered at least as much as the people who decided that they didn’t matter. No, I am NOT saying they didn’t matter _to me_. (Thank you for clipping the rest of that sentence, which read in its entirety: “There is a long history of not bothering to mark the graves of people who don’t matter much, with the definition of ‘don’t matter much’ depending on the times and situations.”) I also did not say the long history made it right; it merely made what happened at Kamloops not unique. EVERY society has had its outcasts and forgotten people. However despicable you think it, the overwhelming majority of all the humans who have ever lived on earth have no grave marker; outside of North America, a permanent monument is not common even today. > [@thorny\_locust](#): > > Not too far from me, [they’re finally getting names on similar graves](https://www.ithaca.com/news/south_seneca/willard-cemetery-names-to-be-released/article_2e6300b4-7511-11e6-a1a5-0b8705ea5d57.html). Those people mattered, too. No, they’re working on releasing the names, for “possible future monuments that would inscribe the names.” Maybe those future plans will come to fruition, maybe they won’t. (Back in the day, before mental illness was well understood, it was fairly common for family to drop off relatives at the insane asylum and tell the neighbors that Sis or Aunt Mattie had died, it being considered deeply shameful to have family in the asylum. That is a major reason that pretty much every mental hospital with a long history has a large cemetery.) ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2021, 5:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/many-hundreds-of-unmarked-graves-of-indigenous-children-discovered-at-canadian-residential-schools/943674/31 "2021-06-06T05:50:08Z")
Until very recently (we’re talking months), I had no idea just how rampant the prejudice and discrimination against Canadian First Nations people continues to be, to this day. ---
**Author:** ![Banquet\_Bear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/banquet_bear/32/373_2.png) [@Banquet\_Bear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Banquet_Bear)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2021, 8:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/many-hundreds-of-unmarked-graves-of-indigenous-children-discovered-at-canadian-residential-schools/943674/32 "2021-06-06T08:11:46Z")
> [@slash2k](#): > > I also did not say the long history made it right; it merely made what happened at Kamloops **not unique**. EVERY society has had its **outcasts** and **forgotten people**. …nope. We aren’t talking about **outcasts** and we aren’t talking about **forgotten** people. We are talking about children who were stolen from families and communities, and those families and communities have **never ever** forgotten about them. They grieve for the children that were taken and never came home. Thousands disappeared into the system. The way you are characterizing this is completely inaccurate. ---
**Author:** ![Mark\_Finn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/34f0e0/32.png) [@Mark\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mark_Finn)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2021, 12:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/many-hundreds-of-unmarked-graves-of-indigenous-children-discovered-at-canadian-residential-schools/943674/33 "2021-06-06T12:22:38Z")
According to various sources, there were about 139 residential schools in Canada. 60% run by the RC Church. In addition - 15 were run by the United Church of Canada, and 11 by the Presbyterian Church of Canada. ---
**Author:** ![slash2k](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@slash2k](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slash2k)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2021, 12:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/many-hundreds-of-unmarked-graves-of-indigenous-children-discovered-at-canadian-residential-schools/943674/34 "2021-06-06T12:39:29Z")
No, it is NOT inaccurate. First Nations kids in the residential school system were as important and worthy of remembrance to Canadian society as New York homeless people are to residents of the Big Apple, or inmates of prisons and juvenile facilities and mental hospitals and orphanages , etc. That doesn’t mean they aren’t important to their families, but to the citizenry at large, absolutely they were forgotten. That’s the point: these kids were not treated in some unique fashion but instead like all of the other “out of sight, out of mind” people. ---
**Author:** ![Banquet\_Bear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/banquet_bear/32/373_2.png) [@Banquet\_Bear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Banquet_Bear)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2021, 1:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/many-hundreds-of-unmarked-graves-of-indigenous-children-discovered-at-canadian-residential-schools/943674/35 "2021-06-06T13:15:26Z")
> [@slash2k](#): > > No, it is NOT inaccurate. …yeah it is. It really fucking is. They weren’t outcasts. They were kids. They weren’t forgotten. They were **stolen**. Outcasts and forgotten were **your** words. > [@slash2k](#): > > That’s the point: these kids were not treated in some unique fashion but instead like all of the other “out of sight, out of mind” people. It was **genocide**. > [@](#): > > **Physical genocide** is the mass killing of the members of a targeted group, and **biological genocide** is the destruction of the group’s reproductive capacity. **Cultural genocide** > is the destruction of those structures and practices that allow the group to continue > as a group. States that engage in cultural genocide set out to destroy the political and > social institutions of the targeted group. Land is seized, and populations are forcibly > transferred and their movement is restricted. Languages are banned. Spiritual leaders are persecuted, spiritual practices are forbidden, and objects of spiritual value are > confiscated and destroyed. And, most significantly to the issue at hand, families are > disrupted to prevent the transmission of cultural values and identity from one generation to the next. > > In its dealing with Aboriginal people, **Canada did all these things** > **[TRC Website - NCTR](https://nctr.ca/about/history-of-the-trc/trc-website/)** > > The TRC website has been archived using the Wayback Machine software. You can view the archived version by clicking here. The Wayback Machine is an archive system for websites. The archived TRC website will work like a normal website, however, it is... ---
**Author:** ![bobot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bobot/32/21622_2.png) [@bobot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bobot)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2021, 2:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/many-hundreds-of-unmarked-graves-of-indigenous-children-discovered-at-canadian-residential-schools/943674/36 "2021-06-06T14:34:48Z")
“VATICAN CITY (AP) — Pope Francis on Sunday expressed his pain over the discovery in Canada of the remains of 215 Indigenous students of church-run boarding schools and pressed religious and political authorities to shed light on “this sad affair.” But he didn’t offer the apology sought by the Canadian prime minister. Francis, in remarks to faithful gathered in St. Peter’s Square, also called on the authorities to foster healing but made no reference to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s insistence, two days earlier, that the Vatican apologize and take responsibility.” > **[Pope voices 'pain' over Canadian deaths, doesn't apologize](https://apnews.com/article/europe-canada-religion-d9cd8969bbe1deec1ab1db47bbf1da9e)** > > VATICAN CITY (AP) — Pope Francis on Sunday expressed his pain over the discovery in Canada of the remains of 215 Indigenous students of church-run residential schools and pressed religious and political authorities to shed light on “this sad affair.”... ---
**Author:** ![FinsToTheLeft](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finstotheleft/32/2930_2.png) [@FinsToTheLeft](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinsToTheLeft)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2021, 2:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/many-hundreds-of-unmarked-graves-of-indigenous-children-discovered-at-canadian-residential-schools/943674/37 "2021-06-06T14:46:58Z")
> [@velomont](#): > > As a Canadian I would be flabbergasted if many did not know about residential schools. And even if that was the case we (Canadians) should regard the Catholic Church with suspicion as sexual abuse allegations have been prominent since the '90s (or earlier) in Catholic orphanages and associated schools and churches since then. I know about the residential schools **now** , but certainly did not growing up. This was not a part of what I was taught in History or Political Science through my university days in the early 90s even as stories of abuse in the Catholic Church circulated. ---
**Author:** ![slash2k](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@slash2k](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slash2k)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2021, 3:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/many-hundreds-of-unmarked-graves-of-indigenous-children-discovered-at-canadian-residential-schools/943674/38 "2021-06-06T15:00:24Z")
> [@Banquet\_Bear](#): > > …yeah it is. It really fucking is. They weren’t outcasts. They were kids. They weren’t forgotten. They were **stolen**. Did Canadian society, at large and in the aggregate, remember them and give them attention, yes or no? The answer is a firm and unequivocal NO. Ordinary Canadians, the people actually paying for this, were not thinking of destroying First Nations culture; they weren’t thinking of them at all. The kids were forgotten. They did not deserve that fate, any more than the homeless or foster kids or the mentally ill deserve to be forgotten either. They were anyway, and largely still are. ---
**Author:** ![Banquet\_Bear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/banquet_bear/32/373_2.png) [@Banquet\_Bear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Banquet_Bear)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2021, 3:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/many-hundreds-of-unmarked-graves-of-indigenous-children-discovered-at-canadian-residential-schools/943674/39 "2021-06-06T15:16:26Z")
> [@slash2k](#): > > Did Canadian society, at large and in the aggregate, remember them and give them attention, yes or no? > > The answer is a firm and unequivocal NO. Ordinary Canadians, the people actually paying for this, were not thinking of destroying First Nations culture; they weren’t thinking of them at all. The kids were forgotten. …you don’t think First Nations people should be considered “ordinary Canadians?” You don’t think they should be considered part of society at large? You think we should only view this from the colonialist lens? I’m not going to do that. The First Nations people aren’t doing that and the Canadian people shouldn’t do that. You don’t forget genocide. You just **pretend it didn’t happen**. The Truth and Reconciliation report happened in 2015. There aren’t any excuses. Stop gaslighting us. Stop minimizing what happened, stop pretending that this wasn’t unique because it was. ---
**Author:** ![slash2k](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@slash2k](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slash2k)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2021, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/many-hundreds-of-unmarked-graves-of-indigenous-children-discovered-at-canadian-residential-schools/943674/40 "2021-06-06T16:04:10Z")
> [@Banquet\_Bear](#): > > …you don’t think First Nations people should be considered “ordinary Canadians?” You don’t think they should be considered part of society at large? Part of society? Sure. The dominant or even typical part of society? No. First Nations people comprise less than five percent of the population of Canada today, and rather less than that at various points in the past. They have been a marginalized part of Canada for a very long time, and I don’t see the point of pretending that the majority of Canadians knew or cared about what happened on the reserves for most of the nation’s history. > [@Banquet\_Bear](#): > > Stop gaslighting us. Stop minimizing what happened, stop pretending that this wasn’t unique because it was. What, exactly, is unique about Canada’s residential system for First Nations? What separated it from, say, the [stolen generations of Aborigines](https://humanrights.gov.au/our-work/education/track-history-timeline-stolen-generations) in Australia, or the [Indian boarding schools](http://www.nativepartnership.org/site/PageServer?pagename=airc_hist_boardingschools) in the United States, or what is going on with [Romani children in Europe today](https://www.travellerstimes.org.uk/features/europes-silent-scandal-romani-children-state-care-institutions)? What happened in Kamloops is horrific, but proclaiming Canadians (or the Catholics) as uniquely evil is at best misguided. Similar programs and attitudes have existed (and in many cases still exist) in many societies, and understanding the how and why of a widespread phenomenon gives better hope of preventing it from happening again. That, however, requires acknowledging it has been widespread. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/many-hundreds-of-unmarked-graves-of-indigenous-children-discovered-at-canadian-residential-schools/943674.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/many-hundreds-of-unmarked-graves-of-indigenous-children-discovered-at-canadian-residential-schools/943674.md?page=3)