GRSJ224/Discrimination Against First Nations Through Residential Schools

Introduction

State-Sponsored Discrimination - Residential Schools Program

In BC, the residential schools program was mandated by the federal government as a way to systemically eliminate Aboriginal culture in Canada. Prime Minister John A. MacDonald sent Nicholas Flood Davin to the United States to study how their government dealt with the indigenous cultures issues. His government then sanctioned the residential school program as a means to impose “cultural genocide” based on Davin’s 1879 report recommending emulating the American “industrial schools” program. The state wanted to “civilize” aboriginal peoples by cutting them off from their families, their tribes, and their cultural heritage. Children would be punished for speaking their native languages or practicing their native cultural traditions. The federal government’s reasoning was that if aboriginal children could be cut off from all native influences at an early age, they could be assimilated into the dominant Euro-Canadian society and trained to provide cheap, partly educated labour for white-owned farms, factories, and businesses.

History of BC’s Residential Schools

First established in the 1880s and made mandatory in 1920, residential schools in BC and other provinces became home to over 150,000 indigenous children before they were all eventually shut down. The last BC residential school closed in 1984, but the last school in Canada was not closed until ten years later, in 1996. During the nearly century of their existence in BC, the residential schools were operated by the Presbyterian, Anglican, Roman Catholic, Methodist, and United Churches. Many of the innocent children were led away from their families by force and sent to these hated residential schools, mostly shipped off to schools located far from their homes as an added measure to cut them off from their people and their support groups.

What Happened to the Indigenous Children at BC’s Residential Schools

At these residential schools, indigenous children would not only be taught rudimentary English, Math and other academic subjects to turn them into semi-skilled labourers, but would suffer from horrendous physical and sexual abuse at the hands of the individuals who were charged with caring for them. Hundreds of students died in BC residential schools, with virtually no notification to their families or investigation of the deaths by the authorities. It is part of Canada’s shame that these children suffered countless acts of abuse from the white adults who were supposed to protect them, but because they were voiceless minorities, their stories were left untold for too long.

Survivors of Residential Schools

Helpless Abuse Victims

Thousands of survivors continue to self-medicate with drugs and alcohol as a way to deal with past abuses, with many BC survivors calling the Downtown Eastside (DTES) home. Others have turned to a life of crime or prostitution as a result of their victimization. Like other innocent victims of child abuse (both physical and sexual), indigenous residential school survivors employ whatever coping mechanisms they can, since most victims had no access to proper social services to help them develop more positive ways to deal with their loss of childhood innocence at the hands of adults entrusted to protect them. They were helpless victims of Euro-Canadian colonialism and, as marginalized members of Canadian society, their victimization was not widely known for decades. What happened to indigenous children for generations is indicative of the way Euro-Canadian leaders and governments dealt unfairly and inhumanely with Canada’s First Nations people in general.

Those Who Rose Above Their Abusive Pasts

However, some survivors or children of survivors of residential schools in BC and other provinces have been able to rise above their abusive pasts and gain success in fields of literature, arts, politics, and sciences. For instance, successful Indigenous and Metis writers who either survived the residential schools or rose above the challenges of systemic racism against Canada’s aboriginal population include poets Maria Campbell, Gregory Scofield, Marilyn Dumont, Suzanne Fournier, Ernie Crey, Celia Haig-Brown, and Tomson Highway. Their experiences as indigenous children growing up either in residential schools or in white-dominated communities taught them what it feels like to grow up as second class citizens in their own lands. They and other indigenous writers are able to turn those awful childhood experiences into beautiful poems, short stories, and novels to help educate readers about what native peoples and their children endured and continue to struggle with as a result of Canada’s despicable ‘cultural genocide’ policies.

Reconciliation - Indigenous Leaders & Royal Commission’s Recommendations

It is thanks to the efforts of Indigenous leaders like Beverley Jacobs (President of Native Women’s Association of Canada), Kevin McKay (Chair of Nisga’a Lisims Government), and Phil Fontaine (then-leader of Association of Manitoba Chiefs in 1990) that the federal government was pressured to investigate the cultural genocide agenda and acknowledge the abuses that occurred at Canadian residential schools. The official federal investigation, known as the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples” was convened in 1991 and produced a 1996 report recommending a separate public inquiry into Canada’s residential schools history, a recommendation that was never followed up on by the government.

Government and Churches’ Response – Paying Off Victims

Instead, successive federal and provincial governments met with the various church leaders from the Anglican, Catholic, United, and Presbyterian churches who had operated those residential schools on behalf of the government. Together, they developed a comprehensive compensation package that would pay $10,000 for the first year (or partial year) of school attendance, plus $3,000 for every subsequent year spent at a residential school. In 2005, the federal government authorized the Common Experience Payment package to pay restitution to survivors of residential schools. By 2013, $1.6 billion (out of the authorized $1.9 billion compensation package) had been paid to 105,548 aboriginal and Metis residential school survivors.

Conclusion

However, money cannot make up for the lost years, terrible abuses, and destroyed lives which are the legacy of the residential schools. The residential schools were, for the most part, hidden from the general public for most of its history. It is, therefore, important that schools and universities across Canada educate students and the general public about residential schools and what happened behind closed doors.