No human remains found 2 years after claims of ‘mass graves’ in Canada

[MaxPC]

The original post with article link.

“The revelation that the story was likely untrue all along comes only after anti-Catholic criminals committed hundreds of acts of hatred and vandalism against Catholic churches over the false accusation. In addition, leading figures on the political and cultural left have made the unfounded story a central part of heated rhetoric against Catholics.”
“After two years of horror stories about the alleged mass graves of Indigenous children at residential schools across Canada, a series of recent excavations at suspected sites has turned up no human remains,” the New York Post reported Thursday.

The original article is a good reminder that there are those who lie to stir up persecution of a group, often a church group. It reminds me of this parable.

The Donkey said to the Tiger: “The grass is blue.” The Tiger replies: “No, the grass is green.” Their discussion heated up. So they submitted it to arbitration before the Lion, the King of the Jungle. Even Before reaching the clearing where the Lion king was sitting on his throne, the Donkey shouted out loud: “Your Majesty, the grass is blue, right?” The Lion responded: “Yes, you’re correct, the grass is blue.”

The Donkey continues: “The Tiger contradicts and annoys me, please punish him.” The Lion punishes the Tiger with 5 years of silence. The Donkey cheerfully went on his way repeating: “The grass is blue.”

The Tiger accepts his punishment, but asks the Lion: “Your Majesty, why have you punished me? Everyone knows the grass is green.” The Lion says: “Yes, you’re very true but you are being punished because a brave and intelligent creature like you wasted time arguing with a Donkey and, on top of that, bothered me with a silly question that doesn’t even deserve attention”

The worst way to waste your precious time is to argue with the fool and fanatic who is least bothered about truth or reality but believes only in his own beliefs and unrealistic illusions. Don’t involve yourselves in pointless arguments. There are people who, no matter how much evidence we present them, are not in the capacity to understand, and others are blinded by ego, hatred, as well as resentment. All they want is to be right even if they are not. When ignorance screams, intelligence is silent. Your peace and quiet are worth more.

Referencing this parable a relative of mine simply says, “I hear a jackass braying.” It is his signal that there is someone in the room behaving like the donkey in the parable.

[Szdfan]

I'm curious whether you would, if possible, use your influence to save me from my current arrogance and cause me to become more like you?

No. Arguments with people who are like me are boring.

Really. So this is just an amusement to you? OK.

Not at all. I think that if my primary intent was to convert you to my way of thinking, this is the wrong format to do that.

[NedFlanders]

The Canadian government isn't giving out $40 billion because of mass graves. That is a false canard.

The $40 billion child welfare settlement you are referring to had absolutely nothing to do with mass graves. In fact they aren't even mentioned anywhere in the settlement. $20 billion of it is compensation for historic discrimination, child removals, and illegal underfunding of child welfare spending for First Nations. The second $20 billion is for future long-term reform of the First Nations child welfare and education system. https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/first- ... -1.6302636 This is long-term spending that will be rolled out over many years.

And no, you couldn't remotely come close to ending hunger on the entire planet with $20 billion. You couldn't even end it here in the US for that amount. Just here in the US the SNAP (food stamp) program has an annual budget of $183 BILLION and there is still plenty of hunger here.

It’s like you are supporting me with your comments Ken. Half of all food in North America goes to waste. Money won’t fix that - wise stewardship would.
And $1000 might supply food for a family of ten in Canada for about two weeks. And the latest numbers in one third world country that CAM mentioned could feed a family that size for a year. Time to go back to school for math. Hehe

The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization estimated that there were 828 million hungry people in the world in 2022. And the causes of that hunger are immensely complex from war and famine and climate disasters to economic inequality. You are going to eliminate hunger worldwide with a budget of $20 billion? Right.

I think you fail to see opportunities and rather just give an attitude of no point so give up.
I think the awareness of the selfishness and waste of North American culture is worth noticing and not joining in. That helps us to have opportunity to help others, but it seems the intent of these things misses you.

[Ken]

If you would read again what I wrote, instead of projecting all kinds of other things into what I wrote, you should be able to understand that I am in no way condoning such a thing.

Also, FWIW, "freedom of religion" as a founding principle of this country needs a ton of caveats. "Individual" freedom of religion was certainly not a founding principle.

You wrote:

Maybe you think that it would have been better for the native people to retain their spirit worship, sun dances, and all the rest of their cultural trappings, but I cannot agree.

The point I am making is that in a free society, this would have been THEIR choice and THEIR decision. Not the government's.

In any event, I'm not sure what sort of individual religious freedom you think was not a founding principle. For example, on the subject of individual religious freedom James Madison wrote:

That Religion or the duty we owe to our Creator, and the manner of discharging it, being under the direction of reason and conviction only, not of violence or compulsion, all men are equally entitled to the full and free exercise of it according to the dictates of Conscience.

This "religious freedom" was not intended to be extended to religions outside of the Judeo-Christian realm, a sort of "nominal Christianity". It is my understanding that the original founders did not really think outside of that "box". (And I'm not really sure about the Jewish part of that.) Your James Madison quote exemplifies that, in it's reference to "our Creator". Not that I want to have the larger culture taken over by people who have no belief in any creator, but that's what real "religious freedom" would entail.

This nation has always existed in tension between the highest ideals and the mundane reality. We still haven't fully achieved many of the ideals of our founding as reflected in the Declaration of Independence and other writings. But that doesn't mean such ideals don't exist and guide us.

[Szdfan]

The original article is a good reminder that there are those who lie to stir up persecution of a group, often a church group.

So even if the “mass grave” reporting in the media was incorrect, it doesn’t absolve the residence schools of what they did actually do, which is where this conversation went early on.

Not too surprising. For those of us who live in Canada, and talk to native descendants - I have only ever heard happy good first hand accounts of going to residential schools. Unfortunately many of them tell me most of their relatives are dead from alcohol and leaving the native culture through the residential schools was the best thing for them rather than the abuse and neglect on native reserves.

Two things can be true at the same time. The reporting about the graves was wrong AND residence schools were still part of a genocidal policy by the Canadian government to eradicate indigenous cultures by separating children from their parents and acculturating them.

[Szdfan]

I have several thoughts that might be relevant.
1. The institutions that did these things often still exist and staff who committed acts of violence and disregard for human life are still living and the survivors are still living, so it sounds very dismissive to assign this to the distant past.
2. Motive is important for assigning criminal intent but not so much for declaring exoneration. Institutions built with good intent can still cause harm.
3. Why was it ever considered acceptable for residential schools to have its own graveyard. This alone should be an indication something was amiss.
4. Christian culture has my entire life been on edge about government interference on many issues related to their children, yet many of the same people find it normative that the government should mandate placement of someone else's children to institutions.

In general, I think we could offer more sympathy to people who survived this.

These are all good points.

[Szdfan]

No. Arguments with people who are like me are boring.

Really. So this is just an amusement to you? OK.

Not at all. I think that if my primary intent was to convert you to my way of thinking, this is the wrong format to do that.

Also…I don’t save people. Salvation is the work of Jesus Christ. Putting myself in a position where I think I’m saving and rescuing people is an extremely unhealthy place that often causes more harm than it helps.

[ken_sylvania]

No. Arguments with people who are like me are boring.

Really. So this is just an amusement to you? OK.

Not at all. I think that if my primary intent was to convert you to my way of thinking, this is the wrong format to do that.

I'm truly curious what exactly you are trying to do then. If you believe what you've been saying here, then you think I'm wrong. But you don't want me to change my mind and believe like you, because then life would be boring. Are you wanting me to stay wrong?

[ken_sylvania]

Really. So this is just an amusement to you? OK.

Not at all. I think that if my primary intent was to convert you to my way of thinking, this is the wrong format to do that.

Also…I don’t save people. Salvation is the work of Jesus Christ. Putting myself in a position where I think I’m saving and rescuing people is an extremely unhealthy place that often causes more harm than it helps.

Jude 23 does not apply?

What term do you use for when you and your influence are instrumental one of your students deciding to allow God to work in their life and change them?

[Ken]

Missionaries who were part of colonialism brought with them the assumptions and racism of the culture they were a part of — mainly that white European culture was superior to the culture of the people they were colonializing and that their role wasn’t just to bring the Gospel of Jesus Christ, but also acculturation. Christian missionaries and institutions participated in the trauma of indigenous people in the Americas and around the world.

In point of fact, "acculturation" was not really the end objective when it comes to policy towards Native Americans in the 19th and early 20th Century. Acculturation was really just a means to an end, and that end was the opening up of vast stretches of Indian territory to White settlement and exploitation. Once you destroy a tribe by shipping off all the children to boarding schools on the other side of the country to be turned into White people and settled into mainstream American culture, you can then terminate their tribal status and sell off their former reservation lands for White settlement and mineral exploitation by mining companies.

This wasn't just policy from the 19th Century. It was official government policy up into the 1960s. And how you got things like this:



Indian boarding schools were actually a means to this end.