Broken statues will not break our Country. Failure to achieve reconciliation will. There was a time when I rejected the idea that we were settlers. How could my family be seen as settlers, when we were political refugees in Canada a country we always called our promised land?
There was a time when I was ignorant of what this country did to the people whose land we settled. They never declared war on us. But we conquered them. We had no right to crush their culture and language and children. Yet we did.
Please spare me colonialist cackle about legislation granting authority to loot and plunder. That's like saying it was once legal in the U-S to own slaves. Legislation written by the conqueror is simply a license to dehumanize others and take from them what doesn't belong to us.
I am not advocating for breaking statues or torching Churches. Only wish our governments hadn't broken up Indigenous families, torched their culture, and kidnapped their babies. Statues don't have nightmares. They don't bleed or grieve, or experience trauma for generations.
Maybe we should erect a monument on Parliament Hill with a confession to all the wrongs that Canadian governments inflicted on Indigenous Peoples. Not enough to discuss them in pasteurized parliamentary committees. They need to be Chiseled in Stone so that future
Canadian generations won't recite the tired & tawdry excuse, "We did not know" Let's complete the sentence. We did not know because we did not Listen to Indigenous Peoples telling us the Truth. We were willfully blind. "I once was lost but now am found. Was blind but now I see."
Just so we are crystal clear for those who attempt to insert words into other peoples mouths, you can have it on the record that I reject vandalism & arson. Without rule of law, Canada does not go forward. Sadly, in a previous time, I would never have to state that on the record.
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