OTTAWA – A leading residential school expert is questioning the Conservative party’s decision to stick with a candidate accused of denying the history of residential schools.
In videos posted on social media, Aaron Gunn — the Conservative candidate in North Island-Powell River in British Columbia — has said Canada’s program of residential schools did not constitute an act of genocide and that the schools are “much-maligned.”
Sounds like a keeper.
When in February, Dallas Brodie, a British Columbia MLA, declared on X that the number of burials of missing children confirmed at the Kamloops Indian Residential School was “zero,” her fellow Conservative, Áʼa:líya Warbus, condemned her for “questioning the narratives of people who lived and survived … atrocities.” And the president of the Métis Nation of B.C., Walter Mineault, responded that the residential school experiences were “not objective truths for Métis people,” but their “lived experiences.”
This column is prompted by the refusal of the Powell River newspaper, the Powell River Peak, to publish an advertisement for a talk to be given on March 30 in Powell River by Frances Widdowson, a contributor to the excellent book “Grave Error.” It was an honour to have been asked to contribute a foreword to that book, which was a carefully researched collection of learned and impartial opinions about the controversy in 2021 over the so-called unmarked graves of Indigenous children near the Kamloops Indian Residential School. The excuse given in writing by the publisher of the Peak, Kelly Keil, on March 17 for refusing to advertise this event was that “Grave Error” “appears to centre around the denial of well-documented historical facts regarding residential schools, which contradicts the overwhelming evidence provided by survivors, historical records and independent inquiries.… Our advertising standards require that we do not publish content that promotes misinformation or undermines established historical facts. This is not an issue of limiting free expression but rather of ensuring that our platform is not used to spread content that distorts history and may cause harm, particularly to Indigenous communities.… We cannot in good conscience facilitate the promotion of material it denies documented historical atrocities.“
The Law Society of British Columbia (LSBC) has responded to a libel suit brought by one of its own lawyers, in a case involving claims that “bodies” were found at the Kamloops Indian Residential School (KIRS), by implying that he has committed that most pernicious of crimes: denialism.
The LSBC doesn’t outright accuse James Heller of denialism, but it certainly points the finger of suspicion his way.
‘How will the fact that his father was a senior administrator in the indigenous education industry affect Mark Carney’s view of the graves controversy?’
Canadian politicians should know by now that the subject of residential schools and unmarked graves is toxic, and cannot be discussed openly and honestly. And BC MLA Dallas Brodie, and BC Conservative leader John Rustad, just learned that the hard way.
Brodie tweeted out the simple fact that no graves have been found at Kamloops.
The “Blood Libel” is the false claim that Jewish rabbis killed Christian children and used their blood to make unleavened bread for their religious rituals. Although its origin is ancient, the ‘libel’ gained prominence in the 12th century during the First Crusade. It has never completely gone away. Even today, a version — that Jews are eating Palestinian children — circulates widely on middle eastern streets.
The libel has done incredible damage down through the centuries, resulting in pogroms, and even contributing to the Holocaust.
On February 12, Parks Canada announced the designation of the Kamloops, B.C. Indian Residential School as a national historic site but omitted any reference to the alleged graves containing 215 missing children in an adjoining apple orchard, according to Blacklocks Reporter.
This claim is misleading. The “215 missing children” refers to a May 27, Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc (legally known as the Kamloops Indian Band) press statement of seismic implications, literally and figuratively. A ground-penetrating radar survey of the area surrounding the city’s former Indian Residential School, the band claimed, had located the “remains of 215 children who were students” of the school.
An expert committee formed to help Indigenous communities find unmarked graves at former residential schools in Canada says the federal government has discontinued its funding.
“It’s a betrayal,” said founding member Crystal Gail Fraser, who is Gwich’in and grew up in Inuvik, N.W.T. “We are losing sight of our values around truth and reconciliation.”
The committee will be forced to cease operations when its current funding agreement expires on March 31, Fraser said.
“Sugarcane,” an award-winning Canadian documentary billed as an investigation into “ a pattern of infanticide” in a B.C. residential school, has been short-listed for a 2025 Academy Award. Unfortunately, the film fails to deliver on its premise, revealing no evidence for even a single infanticide at a residential school, let alone a “pattern.”
In media interviews, Sugarcane’s director and producer Emily Kassie recalls being “gut-pulled” to her project by the 2021 “discovery of unmarked graves” at the Kamloops residential school. Having seen a news story about a search for missing children by the Williams Lake First Nation at the nearby St. Joseph’s Mission residential school , which had been established in 1891 by the Oblates of Mary Immaculate, Kassie approached them. They were amenable to collaboration.
The film’s title refers to the “Sugar Cane” community near Williams Lake, B.C., home to the Williams Lake First Nation.
MURRAY HARBOUR, Prince Edward Island (LifeSiteNews) — A Prince Edward Island (PEI) councillor who was punished for denying the unproven claim of mass graves at residential schools is seeking a court review.
In a February 4 press release, the Canadian Constitution Foundation (CCF) announced they would defend PEI councillor John Robertson who was sanctioned by the town of Murray Harbour for placing a sign opposing the mass graves narrative on his lawn.
The Department of Canadian Heritage declined to comment on whether it would fund a proposed national shrine to commemorate 215 children allegedly buried at the former Kamloops Indian Residential School, despite millions in federal funding allocated for excavation efforts.
Blacklock’s Reporter says no remains have been recovered to date, according to public records.
According to Blacklock’s Reporter, Canada’s premier newsroom revealing machinations our federal government leaders would rather keep hidden, “Millions paid to a British Columbia First Nation to recover suspected children’s graves at an Indian Residential School were instead budgeted for publicists and consultants.”
The Department of Crown-Indigenous Relations even tried to conceal the financial records under the Access To Information Act.
Millions in federal funding intended to recover the remains of children at a former Indian Residential School in Kamloops,vwere instead allocated for consultants, publicists, and other administrative costs, according to newly revealed documents.
Blacklock’s Reporter says the Department of Crown-Indigenous Relations attempted to withhold these financial records under the Access to Information Act.
An investigation has detected 114 “unmarked burial features” on the former property of McIntosh Indian Residential School (IRS) in the Kenora district of northwestern Ontario, the Wiikwogaming Tiinahtiisiiwin Project Team said Thursday.
It’s one of multiple searches underway for missing children and unmarked burials at former residential school sites across Canada.
Readers trying to understand the many claims made about the number of children who died at residential schools can be forgiven for being confused about what they are being told. Various numbers, such as 3,201, 4,000, 6,000, and even 50,000 have been advanced by different people at different times.
So, what is the actual number of documented deaths of named children who died while attending a residential school?
