Today marks one year since hundreds of unmarked graves of
Indigenous children were detected at the Kamloops residential
school. Since then, thousands of more graves have been
discovered all over Northern Turtle Island. These graves were
detected using ground penetrating radar technology, and is
considered quite accurate. There are also accounts
of living survivors, and the Truth and Reconciliation
Report published in 2015 has an entire Chapter on unmarked
graves. I feel the need to go into some of these specific
details, as there is some information being spread around
about these discoveries being a hoax and “false news”.
In 1910, a Canadian Indian Affairs agent by the name of Duncan
Scott Campbell wrote the following in response to requests
that the government address the high rates of death among
Indigenous children at residential schools.
“It is readily acknowledged that Indian children lose their
natural resistance to illness by habituating so closely in the
residential schools and that they die at a much higher rate
than in their villages. But this does not justify a change in
the policy of this Department which is geared towards a Final
Solution of our Indian Problem.”
It’s true that many graves have not yet been exhumed, yet
there is enough evidence to support the fact that mass graves
do exist. The broad implications of the colonial systems on
these lands, and the ongoing inter-generational effects of
residential schools is still being felt today, and will effect
communities for many generations to come.
Early reports of the grave discoveries were reported as "mass
graves", rather than "unmarked graves", and this has been used
to discredit all of the discoveries and fuel conspiracy
theories and denialist claims. But the truth is that even
before these findings were widely reported internationally,
there were already records of thousands of children having
died in the schools. Denying the claims altogether can create
a convenient escape route for those not wanting to acknowledge
the darkness of how these lands were settled.
Having this all brought up to the surface is very painful for
a lot of people and we as non-Indigenous people need to be
very sensitive in how we address these sensitive topics. The
narratives have been so jaded in favour of governments,
religious organizations, corporations and non-Indigenous
settlers for so long, and it’s natural that there will be some
backlash. It’s time to let Indigenous people speak and be
heard, and be acknowledged - and to be supported in whatever
ways they need in order to heal and to become strong.
I have so much to learn myself. I recently got schooled by a
young Indigenous woman (in a kind and educational way) and I
realized that I still have so much racism baked into myself.
It didn’t feel very good, and in the weeks following I went
through waves of defensiveness, humility, self-righteousness,
confusion, guilt, grief - and then back to humility again. I
realized that there were still parts of me that naively wanted
to believe that “Canada” isn’t as bad as it actually is.
Reconciling these dark parts of myself and my ancestry is a
continual process of humbling, learning, listening, and taking
action.
I’ve also been in such deep grief lately and so focused on
what’s going on in Ukraine that I lost perspective on the
space that I inhabit on these lands. Personal grief dredges up
the sludge from my soul and shows me parts of myself that are
unhealed. There can be a temptation to avoid accountability or
make excuses, and I’m trying really hard not to do that. There
can also be a temptation to use my neurodiversity as an excuse
to avoid being real with uncomfortable aspects of myself, and
that’s also something I have to keep in check as I go through
various personal growth wormholes.
**
Can you imagine how the greater White society of Canada would
react if hundreds of unmarked graves of White children were
detected on Indigenous reservations? I’m pretty sure that the
military would be sent in and there would be mass arrests,
interrogations and incarcerations. In Australia, the false
pretence of child sexual abuse was used to enact the
Internevtion program, yet no abuse cases were ever found, and
the world has been mostly silent about that. There's a double
standard, and a huge power imbalance within the four major
colonial enterprises of the world: Canada, America, Australia
and New Zealand.
In so-called Canada there have been widespread accounts of the
abuses that were enacted in residential schools and many court
cases, yet very little real justice has been served. The
government has made proclamations and apologies to the media,
yet behind closed doors continues to fight Indigenous people
in the courts, and the struggle for accountability from church
and state for the systematic genocide that took place on these
lands goes on and on.
**
I went down to the big parliament building here in Victoria
thinking that there might be some kind of event to honour the
children, and I instead encountered a very loud and obnoxious
so-called “Freedom” rally. I decided to check it out anyway
out of morbid curiosity, and I gingerly loitered around the
fringes of the mob. I noticed an ancient evergreen tree
looming over the expansive lawn, creeping over the busy
tourist bedecked sidewalk. It was an impressively huge Ent of
a thing, and some young children were climbing around
underneath of it in defiance of a fence and signs indicating
the area wasn’t to be disturbed. I had brought some items to
place on a shrine for the children who never came home,
thinking there might be one somewhere, but there wasn’t. I
decided to have my own event under the canopy of the massive
tree.
I hung around on the sidelines for a while until the children
moved on, and then I hopped the gate and stood under one of
the huge sweeping branches of the giant tree. I suddenly felt
quite invisible so I started casting a circle with a stick I
picked up off of the ground, and I was undisturbed throughout
my ceremony.
Part of the ritual structure I follow involves honouring the
ancestors of the land, and sometimes I have long conversations
with them and ask them what they would like from me or just
say hey sorry I'm not honouring you as much as I should be.
I never ask for anything from the godds and spirits of these
lands, only from my own ancestral godds.
There are many members of the so-called “Freedom” fighters who
have roots in various alt-right organizations, including some
with neo-Nazi affiliations; so I decided to call upon some of
the Norse gods and ask them to set these misguided meatheads
all straight (or queer) about how the Norse and Germanic
peoples have begat millions of mixed race children, Odin and
Loki are two-spirited, and Thor is a pussy whipped
cross-dresser (and while I'm at it: the entire cosmos of the
Norse world and everything in it was created out of the body
of a hermaphrodite called Ymir).
I really appreciate times in the past where I attended public
rituals with some really groovy witches from Reclaiming who
would often plunk themselves in the middle of a busy park and
honour a Sabbath while teenagers played volleyball in the
background, or families had little picnics in the vicinity. I
was quite self-conscious about it all at first, yet here I was
doing my sacred business while hundreds of yahoos yelled and
waved their gigantic Canadian flags all around me.
The rally attendants were making quite a spectacle, and there
was a level of fanaticism that was unnerving; yet they really
didn’t seem like bad people. And they had something that a lot
of the social and environmental rallies are sorely lacking: a
sense of camaraderie with each other. A lot of the attendees
seemed like salt of the earth, give you the shirt off their
back kinds of people who were just horribly misguided by
misinformation. The orations that I did hear were painfully
bad and juvenile, and seemed on the level of a Grade 5 book
report written at the last minute after getting sugar high on
too many jube jubes. And the crowd was just gobbling it right
up.
I spend so much of my time in isolation indulging in my own
special interests, that when I step out into the mainstream of
society it’s usually a shocking and harrowing experience. I
felt myself dissociating from the physical realm because the
whole thing was too fucking surreal.
**
Growing up in wacky lefty towns in the West Kootenays and in
East Vancouver, often around Commercial Drive, I’ve been
exposed to anti-vaxxers and conspiracy theorists for my entire
life. And I also spent time hanging out with some radical
right wingers and Neo-Nazis at times as well, both in
Vancouver, and in Europe when I hung out in the black metal
scene. It’s interesting how the radical right and the radical
left seem to have a strange symbiosis with each other, and are
equally self-righteous and arrogant in their own special ways.
And that's been culminated within the so-called “Freedom”
movement, which has attracted Nazi extremists and New Age
hippies alike.
Thankfully, my parents never went down that wormhole. I
remember getting vaccinated as a young person, and I’ve had
many many vaccinations before travelling internationally. Not
getting polio is awesome.
**
No one at the Freedom rally seemed to be interested in the
human rights of Indigenous people on these lands, or women’s
reproductive rights; or freedom for the people of Tigray,
Yemen, Iraq, Palestine, Ukraine, Xinjiang, Tibet, Sri Lanka,
Myanmar, Taiwan or Sudan. Millions of people in the world are
starving and being displaced and genocided, and the brave
Freedom Fighters of so-called Canada are holding rallys
because they don’t want to be vaccinated? Meanwhile, some
third world countries are so desperate for the vaccine that
they’ve started violating the patent to make their own??
And really, the biggest health crisis right now on these lands
I inhabit is not COVID, it’s fentanyl. That has been the case
for about 10 years now. Opiates have always been a huge issue
here on the West Coast, but fentanyl and carfentanyl (and now
benzofentanyl) have taken things to the extreme. The opiate
crisis is systemic and interconnected with unfair distribution
of wealth, lack of housing, lack of mental health support,
inter-generational trauma and lack of community. And
Indigenous people are disproportionately affected by addiction
and overdoses.
Civilization builds itself up onto the backs of the poor and
the dispossessed, and all kinds of issues arise out of that.
One of my friends from the Carnegie
Centre once told me that studies were done showing that the
quality of life for everyone benefits from a more equal
society, not just those living in poverty.
Maybe we should focus on getting everyone on the planet
shelter, food, clean drinking water, access to health care and
education, i.e real freedom? There are actually enough
resources in the world to do that. The biggest problem of the
earth isn’t population density, it’s unfair distribution of
wealth. Greed and ignorance reign supreme.
Perhaps the reason why so many people are latching onto the
whole freedom rally thing is because it’s ‘low hanging fruit’,
so to speak? Diving into the real issues that we’re facing on
this planet can be really brutal and overwhelming. Working
towards changing this corrupt system and supporting those who
are truly dispossessed and lacking in basic freedoms requires
a lot of hard work, dedication and self-sacrifice. It burns
you out.
Having an adult temper tantrum and parading around in monster
trucks like mega douches from an 80’s teen movie is a far more
accessible way of venting the frustrations of human existence
than the soul-busting work that will enact real change for the
benefit of all of humanity.
**
I’m still not sure how to deal with the people in my life
who’ve gone down the COVID conspiracy spiral. There are quite
a few of them, and people often see me as an open-minded
listening ear, and think that I’ll understand them somehow.
One thing that most of these conspiracy theorists turned
medical professionals share in common is that they exude a
certain air of arrogance, like as if they have discovered the
holy grail of knowledge, and the rest of us are poor misguided
peons. And interestingly, these so-called Freedom seekers seem
to get ultra sensitive when others exercise their freedom to
get vaccinated and continue wearing masks!
All that being said, I’m really really happy not to have to
wear masks anymore. It’s also been great not getting sick at
all for a couple of years, as it seems like the 3 vaccination
doses I’ve had the incredible privilege of receiving brought
my already high immunity levels up even higher.
I don’t believe that the vaccine alters a persons DNA. It’s
actually an RNA vaccine - totally different, and I've already
taken RNA vaccines in the past when I've taken flu shots and I
never had any issues. Check out this video to get a better
idea of what’s going on with the COVID vaccine.
Maybe part of the reason why misinformation and fantastical
theories spread like wildfire is because they’re a lot more
interesting than the bland facts of real science narrated by a
level headed person with a monotone voice?
When a person is feeling lonely, isolated, rejected and
misunderstood, I imagine it’s very appealing to enter into a
realm where they're part of a vast and complex network of
truth seekers who are at the helm of a new world, bravely
blazing a trail for the rest of humankind.
In the West here, most of us are extremely spoiled and
entitled, yet don’t really have much perspective on the world
because we distract ourselves perpetually with stressful/back
breaking jobs, social media/internet/TV, unhealthy food,
consumerism etc. We consume a huge percentage of the world’s
resources, despite representing a small portion of the
population, yet somehow we’re not generally happy. And people
often feel that small slights to their comforts and security
are a far greater threat than they actually are.
Vaccinations are pretty darn safe. They’re not perfect, people
occasionally die and occasionally get sick from them. But far
more people die and get sick from the diseases that the
vaccines are preventing.
But I’ve learned that no amount of logic or passion can
convince a person of these things. It’s like trying to explain
to my cousins in Alberta that fossil fuels are actually
causing a lot of harm ecologically and socially to the world
as a whole. They just can’t handle hearing it; their entire
identities have been built around oil money and the toys they
can buy with the money that they earn.
And now swaths of people have latched onto the wole COVID
conspiracy narrative, and it’s become like a new religion. And
like all organized religions, it seems like at the heart of
the whole thing is ignorance is fear.
It hurts to admit it, but I know that being antagonistic and
arguing doesn’t help change people’s minds. Getting angry and
defensive, as I often do, doesn’t help at all. When I feel
good inside of myself and am open minded and kind towards
others I notice that they return in kind.
Last year a man bought a used vehicle from me, and I ended up
buying a van at the same time. We traveled together in
his vehicle for a while to do all the switching of vehicles,
and I could sense right away that he was a decent and honest
person. He ended up telling me a lot about his life, and it
turned out he was a Trump supporter. I didn’t react to it when
he told me, I just listened to what he had to say, though I
made sure to mention that I was going to be heading the the
forest to do land activism the following week. He was curious
about it. And he ended up opening up to me about some stuff
going on with his relationship and how he often gets taken
advantage of because he’s so generous, which I was able to
relate to.
I'm not always able to have such pleasant interactions with
others. There was another man who I randomly met last year on
a remote hike and we decided to go an another hike together,
given that we both had the same rugged sense of adventure and
were both sober. Unfortunately, he turned out to be a
conservative Christian, and he got very irate with me when we
got in a discussion about Indigenous people. I had just come
from a re-occupation camp on St’at’imc lands and learned a lot
about how the community was struggling, and this young man
felt that he was some kind of an authority on how they were
meant to heal and move on, without having much of an
understanding of what they were even going through - and he
kept interrupting me and talking over me. He was also
anti-abortion, and then he was like, “the thing I don’t like
about Black Lives Matter is..”. And that’s where I stopped him
and was like dude your voice isn’t really needed in any of
those scenarios. I was like ya sure I have some
criticisms of BLM as well, but I let Black people speak to
those things, it’s just not my place. He started yelling
and got red in the face and was pointing his finger in my face
and waving his hands when he was talking. I was like dude
you gotta quit it with that shit. I just left and went
home and he sent me messages later on telling me I was a
“narcissist”, which was kind of funny as no one had ever
called me that before. He told me that his “other pagan women
friends” were “really open-minded” and “allowed him to express
his viewpoints without judging him”. I was like dude it
was about fucking time someone called you out.
Yet I really do think that if we had more sincere love and
acceptance of ourselves and others, people wouldn’t need to
disappear into bizarre parallel realities and fight imaginary
monsters in conspiracy wormholes. We could all come together
and fight the very real demons of the world that are hiding
away in office towers and opulent villas.
**
If you want to fight for freedom, support Indigenous people in
reclaiming true sovereignty. Or go fight Imperial Russia in
Ukraine. Or work towards addressing the systemic issues that
are contributing to the housing crisis and all of the brutal
overdoses. Try to realize how fucking lucky you are to breathe
clean air and shit into a toilet bowl of clean water, and not
have to wake up every morning out of a bomb shelter wondering
if your neighbours are alive or not.