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Source: Kelowna Daily Courier
Date: October 6, 2004.
Letter to the Editor
I hesitate to enter the discussion about Indian residential schools (it is loaded with misinformation and questions of political correctness). But the article by reporter Don Plant in the Courier’s Oct. 1 edition shows it is time for more truth and less fiction on this subject.
There is probably little doubt that there was (what we would call today) physical abuse in these schools. But at the time, corporal punishment and the threat of it was standard practice in all school systems as a means of achieving discipline - remember the dreaded strap? There may also have been some sexual abuse in the residences and this is inexcusable. But the recall of these memories increased greatly after the Mount Cashel scandal in Newfoundland and the monetary settlements that came from it.
Plant’s article quotes a so-called sexual abuse therapist saying: “Children were pulled off cattle trucks after they were ripped out of the arms of family members and repeatedly raped by priests. It’s beyond description. It’s Canada¹s holocaust.”
I don’t believe that a responsible professional would make such a statement. If she had, I would have called her naive and hysterical. Many Indian children looked forward to the annual school terms at the residential schools. Far from being ripped from the arms of family, many were actually freed for that period from sordid conditions, abuse and plain neglect on the reserves. The myth that some now promote, that everyone who attended the schools is a victim or a survivor is just nonsense.
I know of a non-Indian family who lived in a remote part of the B.C. Coast, who tried repeatedly (and unsuccessfully) to have the government permit their children to attend one of the Indian residential schools. They felt their children were entitled to the good education, the new clothes and the free medical and dental services that the Indian children from the same area enjoyed. No reports or even rumours of abuse reached their ears.
The residential school system was part of the policy of paternalism that our governments adopted toward the Native Indians in the 19th and early 20th centuries. There were many things wrong with that policy and no doubt, the residential school system was not perfect. And yes, there was probably unnecessary abuse. But those who operated the schools should be given credit for the great good they did and the lasting benefits they provided to several generations of Native Indian children.
K. Campbell,
Kelowna
Date: October 6, 2004.
Letter to the Editor
I hesitate to enter the discussion about Indian residential schools (it is loaded with misinformation and questions of political correctness). But the article by reporter Don Plant in the Courier’s Oct. 1 edition shows it is time for more truth and less fiction on this subject.
There is probably little doubt that there was (what we would call today) physical abuse in these schools. But at the time, corporal punishment and the threat of it was standard practice in all school systems as a means of achieving discipline - remember the dreaded strap? There may also have been some sexual abuse in the residences and this is inexcusable. But the recall of these memories increased greatly after the Mount Cashel scandal in Newfoundland and the monetary settlements that came from it.
Plant’s article quotes a so-called sexual abuse therapist saying: “Children were pulled off cattle trucks after they were ripped out of the arms of family members and repeatedly raped by priests. It’s beyond description. It’s Canada¹s holocaust.”
I don’t believe that a responsible professional would make such a statement. If she had, I would have called her naive and hysterical. Many Indian children looked forward to the annual school terms at the residential schools. Far from being ripped from the arms of family, many were actually freed for that period from sordid conditions, abuse and plain neglect on the reserves. The myth that some now promote, that everyone who attended the schools is a victim or a survivor is just nonsense.
I know of a non-Indian family who lived in a remote part of the B.C. Coast, who tried repeatedly (and unsuccessfully) to have the government permit their children to attend one of the Indian residential schools. They felt their children were entitled to the good education, the new clothes and the free medical and dental services that the Indian children from the same area enjoyed. No reports or even rumours of abuse reached their ears.
The residential school system was part of the policy of paternalism that our governments adopted toward the Native Indians in the 19th and early 20th centuries. There were many things wrong with that policy and no doubt, the residential school system was not perfect. And yes, there was probably unnecessary abuse. But those who operated the schools should be given credit for the great good they did and the lasting benefits they provided to several generations of Native Indian children.
K. Campbell,
Kelowna
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