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

[Soloist]

Moral of the story, research before you post.

[mike]

If you look back in this thread, I researched that. The NY Post used that language. The people it quoted did not. The NY Post linked to another NY Post article that cited an article in The Guardian. The Guardian published a retraction on that article, saying "mass graves" was not accurate. The NY Post doesn't seem to have published a retraction.

So I think I would blame the NY Post and other media for this. The people they refer to don't seem to be making that claim.

Sometimes you do find sensationalism in the media ...

Well, yeah... So I guess there's our answer. Isn't it something how the media can do that and take no blame whatsoever for what happens? The New York Times can just say "Mass Grave of Indigenous Children reported" which is perfectly accurate because somebody somewhere did report it and they were just passing on that fact, and they have nothing to retract, yet their proliferation of that claim gives it wings in a big way. What are the results? Mysteriously the churches start burning.

I'm actually not sure how much blame to place on the people or institutions who do this. I mean, they deserve some blame, but ultimately it is the fault of the actual criminals who go out and commit violence. I don't really know how you go after these people or institutions but they can at least be exposed for what they do, at a minimum.

[ohio jones]

It bothered me from the day this story broke how they purposely used incorrect but inflammatory words. And if they didn't do it on purpose, they need to be educated better.

Maybe the journalists need to be hauled off to a residential school and reeducated.

[Ken]

If you look back in this thread, I researched that. The NY Post used that language. The people it quoted did not. The NY Post linked to another NY Post article that cited an article in The Guardian. The Guardian published a retraction on that article, saying "mass graves" was not accurate. The NY Post doesn't seem to have published a retraction.

So I think I would blame the NY Post and other media for this. The people they refer to don't seem to be making that claim.

Sometimes you do find sensationalism in the media ...

Well, yeah... So I guess there's our answer. Isn't it something how the media can do that and take no blame whatsoever for what happens? The New York Times can just say "Mass Grave of Indigenous Children reported" which is perfectly accurate because somebody somewhere did report it and they were just passing on that fact, and they have nothing to retract, yet their proliferation of that claim gives it wings in a big way. What are the results? Mysteriously the churches start burning.

I'm actually not sure how much blame to place on the people or institutions who do this. I mean, they deserve some blame, but ultimately it is the fault of the actual criminals who go out and commit violence. I don't really know how you go after these people or institutions but they can at least be exposed for what they do, at a minimum.

You are really talking about a much wider phenomenon with this comment. And there are frankly many many examples of the same phenomenon in other contexts.

Take the 2020 election. A lot of media sources and politicians endlessly repeated the false narrative that the election was "stolen" despite the utter lack of any evidence to support such claims and the fact that every specific example cited fell apart in the light of day with the slightest bit of scrutiny. Yet such false claims caused enormous damage including leading to the events of 1/6.

[Josh]

I'm actually not sure how much blame to place on the people or institutions who do this. I mean, they deserve some blame, but ultimately it is the fault of the actual criminals who go out and commit violence. I don't really know how you go after these people or institutions but they can at least be exposed for what they do, at a minimum.

I strongly agree that it's the fault of the people doing bad things. Not "society's fault" or a newspaper's fault for inciting them. A similar scenario is that many places MLK Jr gave speeches, there were also riots. Yet I think it would be rather absurd to blame MLK Jr for riots, when the content of his speeches was trying to encourage peace, not rioting.

With that said, in my own personal life and conduct... I prefer not to do and say things that will get other people riled up, particularly in violent ways. I'd rather say peaceful things that encourage nonviolence. So I do take personal responsibility not to incite others to do bad things.

But we could get a lot farther as a society if we started blaming things like rape and murder on, well, rapists and murderers. Or arson. Instead of "it's society's fault" or "poverty's fault" or "well, they grew up without a dad".

[mike]

If you look back in this thread, I researched that. The NY Post used that language. The people it quoted did not. The NY Post linked to another NY Post article that cited an article in The Guardian. The Guardian published a retraction on that article, saying "mass graves" was not accurate. The NY Post doesn't seem to have published a retraction.

So I think I would blame the NY Post and other media for this. The people they refer to don't seem to be making that claim.

Sometimes you do find sensationalism in the media ...

Well, yeah... So I guess there's our answer. Isn't it something how the media can do that and take no blame whatsoever for what happens? The New York Times can just say "Mass Grave of Indigenous Children reported" which is perfectly accurate because somebody somewhere did report it and they were just passing on that fact, and they have nothing to retract, yet their proliferation of that claim gives it wings in a big way. What are the results? Mysteriously the churches start burning.

I'm actually not sure how much blame to place on the people or institutions who do this. I mean, they deserve some blame, but ultimately it is the fault of the actual criminals who go out and commit violence. I don't really know how you go after these people or institutions but they can at least be exposed for what they do, at a minimum.

You are really talking about a much wider phenomenon with this comment. And there are frankly many many examples of the same phenomenon in other contexts.

Take the 2020 election. A lot of media sources and politicians endlessly repeated the false narrative that the election was "stolen" despite the utter lack of any evidence to support such claims and the fact that every specific example cited fell apart in the light of day with the slightest bit of scrutiny. Yet such false claims caused enormous damage including leading to the events of 1/6.

I don't really disagree with that.

[ken_sylvania]

Do you now no longer believe there is any credible evidence of any mass graves at any schools?

I think most of the evidence of graves involves individual graves. There does seem to be some evidence of at least one mass grave, associated with pandemics.

Which one are you referring to?

In general, these graves simply haven't been excavated yet. We will know more when we know more.

Is that the same as saying no evidence?

[Sudsy]

[Signtist]

It bothered me from the day this story broke how they purposely used incorrect but inflammatory words. And if they didn't do it on purpose, they need to be educated better.

Maybe the journalists need to be hauled off to a residential school and reeducated.

I was this [] close to ending my post with "Preferably in a Residential school." I decided not to out of respect for the pain these schools did cause. And there was plenty. But then you said it for me!

[Szdfan]

Agreed, I think there's plenty of historical evidence to show just that. It wasn't ALL terrible - Pop Warner and Jim Thorpe seemed to have really gotten a lot out of the Carlisle School for example. It wasn't all good though either and it was definitely started with the intent purpose of educating the Indian out of the man.

I am not sure how representative his pedagogical philosophy was for everyone at the time. First of all, Henry R. Pratt was American, not Canadian, and he said he took his pedagogical inspiration from the Puritans. I doubt his pedagogical principles were shared by Catholics, Mennonites, and all sorts of others involved in the schools.

Also, he was genuinely concerned to see minorities learn and advance rather than languish in prisons. (His first schools were in prisons for Indians the army put him in charge of.) He was also opposed to segregation on the same principles and was the first to use the word ‘racism’. He probably was looked upon favorably by the progressives and, for his time, he probably was one.

So a couple of things can be true at the same time. It can be true that Pratt and others had good intentions, but that they also reflected the prejudices of their time and their attempt at being helpful and progressive harmed and traumatized native people seeking to assimilate them into white culture. If you believe that your own white, Christian culture is superior to native cultures (as Pratt clearly did), it's easy to harm the people you are trying to help, regardless of your intentions.

Regarding Canada, Paul Racher, former president of the Ontario Archeologist Society, argued that the term "genocide" was appropriate to describe the residential schools --

https://nationalpost.com/opinion/the-re ... -and-abuse

The harms visited upon students in the residential schools were not pulled from thin air by self-hating anti-patriots. They were meticulously collected by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), which interviewed over 6,500 witnesses during six years of hearings. Many of them had never talked openly about their experiences in the Indian Residential Schools before, yet their stories coalesced around certain themes, again and again. The TRC established that Indigenous children were routinely snatched from their parents, that they were confined to schools where they were physically, emotionally, and sexually abused, and that some thousands of them died. Many of the dead were laid to rest in graves that, for want of funds, adequate record keeping, or simple respect, were never properly documented.

The government of Canada delegated the running of the schools to Canada’s largest churches, who administered them with an eye to keeping expenses low. The TRC noted that vulnerable children were underfed, improperly clothed, and subject to predatory behaviour by administrators, staff, teachers, and some students, who, with virtually no oversight, could act with impunity. Few people cared what happened to an Indian child.

Early in the 20th Century, the Chief Medical Officer of the Departments of the Interior and Indian Affairs, Dr. Peter Bryce, noted staggeringly high mortality rates at Residential Schools, the result, he said, of poor conditions and inadequate sanitation. The government refused to publish his report or act on his concerns. Indigenous children continued to die of illnesses like tuberculosis at a rate far exceeding that of their white counterparts.

Racher notes that Stephen Harper apologized for the treatment native people at the residential schools in Parliament.

He also cites “Where Are the Children Buried,” a report to the TRC by Dr. Scott Hamilton of Lakehead University if anyone is interested in looking it up.