No Blessings For Them

Blessed be the child stolen…..

blessed be the child beaten…..

blessed be the child raped…..

blessed be the child murdered…..

muttered prayers

words spoken

revoked

said you did

true thoughts

yours alone

or

symbolic of further hatred…..

966 bodies found.

In total in the last month on two separate residential school grounds.

In two separate provinces.

And this is the beginning.

Children.

I cannot even fathom how depraved and indifferent a person has to be to perpetrate crimes on this scale never mind that this was condoned.

By organized religion.

The catholic faith is not the only one  to be running those schools protestants did too; we just are not hearing from that circle quite yet.

Seems to me an inordinate amount of pedophiles and abusers found their way into the priest and nun life.

I realize as I am writing that I have yet to provide a description of Residential Schools.

Residential schools were government-sponsored religious schools that were established to assimilate Indigenous children into Euro-Canadian culture. Although the first residential facilities were established in New France, the term usually refers to schools established after 1880. Residential schools were created by Christian churches and the Canadian government as an attempt to both educate and convert Indigenous youth and to assimilate them into Canadian society.

https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/residential-schools

New France=Quebec

They were to convert and assimilate Indigenous youth.

Assimilate?

At first I was a little confused because truthfully the Indigenous were not the ones who should have been converting and assimilating; they were here first.

Europeans came second.

They should have been the one to make the changes.

But those men had one thing going for them in their superiority; they were white and had god on their side.

A little like slave owners who used the bible to justify their right to own human beings.

Cultural assimilation is what they were going for.

Cultural assimilation is the process by which a person or a group’s language and/or culture come to resemble those of another group.  Full assimilation occurs when new members of a society become indistinguishable from members of the other group.

There is a horror building that this country is going to have to account for.

We are going to have to sit and hear.

Not listen.

Actually hear what is being said.

We are going to have to face the atrocities.

We are going to have to take responsibility.

We are going to have to move forward stronger and together as one to grow and heal.

We are going to have to acknowledge and celebrate the Indigenous cultures in all their glory.

It is time for those Canadians who say this is not our problem not our time to sit down and shut up.

Listen.

Learn.

Be a part of the solution and not the problem.

©June 25/21

Picture is my own

Willful Ignorance

I can no longer remain willfully ignorant.

No longer can I close my eyes and see myself through rose colored glasses.

This week my country was again devastated; this time by the act of premeditated murder of a Muslim family.

A 9 year old boy is the sole survivor.

A 21 year old white male has been arrested and charged with 4 counts of first degree murder and one charge of attempted murder.

And all because they were not the same color?

Because they did not worship a white god?

Add in the fact that while getting items out the car one of my neighbors walked by followed shortly thereafter by a man wearing sunglasses carrying a knapsack.

I took note of him.

He was Indigenous.

I came into the apartment and put my groceries away internally interrogating myself.

Had I noticed him because he was new to the neighborhood and appeared to be following said neighbor or had I noticed because he was Indigenous?

Am I being overly sensitive with myself now?

I do not think so.

I have preconceived notions that were ingrained in me through childhood.

Through articles read.

Fear inducing.

And now I am working to overcome this.

I need to overcome this.

When I woke this morning one of the headlines I encountered had to do with the family I speak of in the beginning.

A video shared on Tik Tok and appearing to be taken from within a home near where the family was killed showing three individuals walking down the road and someone jokingly saying where is so and so when you need him. (I refuse to name an individual so evil and disgusting)

Followed by laughter.

I cannot even.

Children murdered and lives of families destroyed to ‘get the Indian out of them.’

A family murdered and the life of a 9 year old boy forever changed because someone was so afraid of their differences?

Nothing I write will make a difference.

Nothing I can say will make anything right.

But I cannot denounce the evil and abuses that are a part and parcel of the lives of others who are not the same color as me or worship a different god (I worship no god I suppose that makes me a target too) or live a different lifestyle if I am not willing to confront my own prejudices.

©June 12/21

Picture is my own