Western Standard - August 01, 2024


CORY： ＂Myth of child burials at the Kamloops residential school site remain uninvestigated＂


Episode Stats


Length

4 minutes

Words per minute

213.0841

Word count

950

Sentence count

50

Harmful content

Hate speech

3

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

As many as 215 children were allegedly buried in an apple orchard at the site of the Kamloops Indian Residential School, but no bodies have been found. Why hasn't the site been excavated? Why won't the police even look?

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 And yes, we're going to talk about the Kamloops ongoing, ever ongoing, years now, residential school burials.
00:00:07.580 So last week, Joseph Quinnell wrote a column in the Western Standard, and he was asking folks to stop referring to the alleged burial of children at the Kamloops residential school site as a hoax.
00:00:18.040 I've got nothing but respect for Joseph. He's been an excellent voice on Indigenous policies in Canada, and I don't doubt he's going to continue to be.
00:00:24.700 In this case, though, I guess like the old saying goes, with all due respect, I can't disagree more strongly with him.
00:00:31.240 Perpetuating a hoax is far more damaging to Indigenous Canadians and the rest of us than appearing insensitive and calling it as it is.
00:00:39.800 Canada was turned upside down by the revelation that as many as 215 children had been killed and secretly buried in an apple orchard at the site of the Kamloops residential school.
00:00:48.200 Flags were put at half-mast for nearly six months, churches were burned to the ground, and apologies flew along with checks.
00:00:55.640 Now, we're over three years later, and nothing has been done to verify the claims.
00:01:00.880 The Kamloops band was given nearly $8 million tax dollars to follow up on the issue, yet they appear to have done little to nothing with it.
00:01:07.040 They won't disclose where the money went, and the myth of the hundreds of graves at the site continues, along with the associated pain and social damage caused by people who really believe hundreds of children were murdered and buried at that site.
00:01:18.540 Look, the RCMP clearly don't believe any bodies are on the site.
00:01:22.060 I mean, while there's been no end to the misinformation excuses made as to why there hasn't been any excavations, the reality is the RCMP has full authority to dig if they really believe it's a crime scene.
00:01:31.020 The allegations made that children were forced to bury their compatriots in the orchard as recently as the 1960s means.
00:01:38.400 Theoretically, the perpetrators could still be out there if indeed these incidents really happen.
00:01:43.100 The site isn't a separate nation, and the band doesn't have the ability to stop a murder investigation.
00:01:47.820 I mean, if that was the case, Native reserves could start quite the cottage industry as a site for murderers to bury their victims with the knowledge that the investigation would stop there. 0.99
00:01:56.100 The reason the RCMP won't follow up is that there's no evidence that a crime took place.
00:01:59.880 They don't think there's any bodies there.
00:02:02.120 Some folks are claiming the burials are sacred and must not be disturbed.
00:02:06.040 To be blunt, that's a load of crap.
00:02:08.200 Those same folks are insisting that tens of millions of dollars should be spent in Winnipeg to try and locate the bodies of a couple of murdered Indigenous women suspected to be buried in a landfill there.
00:02:17.500 So, is it sacred to recover these remains and return them to the family, or is it sacred to leave them in the spot?
00:02:22.880 It's whatever is convenient for these activists, and it's getting tiresome.
00:02:25.620 The issue of returning the remains to the families causes a conundrum to the folks perpetuating the hoax as well.
00:02:32.100 Not only have there been no bodies found, there's no children reported missing at the school.
00:02:36.820 While hundreds of children allegedly were buried in the orchard, apparently every one of them was an orphan.
00:02:41.460 No parents, no siblings, or cousins have reported kids missing.
00:02:44.660 Even if a body was found, who would we return it to?
00:02:47.440 More effort has been made to deter the investigation of these alleged burials than it has been made to get to the truth.
00:02:53.380 And these are the hallmarks of a hoax.
00:02:55.660 Instead of proving people who question the narrative wrong through forensic investigation of the supposed burial sites,
00:03:01.500 efforts have been made to illegalize the questions.
00:03:04.040 People are asking for the truth, who are asking for the truth, are being labeled as deniers.
00:03:08.420 And the government's been considering illegalizing denialism.
00:03:11.340 Nobody's denying that residential schools existed, and most people agree the schools were not pleasant places. 0.99
00:03:16.240 It's not unreasonable, though, to ask for evidence when the claim is made that hundreds of children were secretly killed and buried.
00:03:22.820 However, finding the truth at the Kamloops Residential School, I mean, it wouldn't be that expensive or complicated.
00:03:29.720 It would take nothing more than a day or two with some people using shovels.
00:03:32.800 If indeed bodies were found, then work could begin to find out who they are,
00:03:36.600 and to hold people responsible, and to return the remains, of course, to where they can be found.
00:03:40.640 Let's face it, though, and let's say it out loud, the reason the Kamloops band won't dig is they know there aren't any bodies there.
00:03:46.020 The gravy train would dry up.
00:03:48.000 While no children disappeared at the site, eight million tax dollars did.
00:03:51.580 In this case, things may be moving beyond calling the affair a hoax and actually moving into fraud territory.
00:03:56.540 I don't care if folks think it's insensitive to call the alleged Kamloops child burials a hoax.
00:04:02.040 More people should be calling it a hoax.
00:04:03.620 In fact, they should be shutting it from the rooftops until a real investigation happens.
00:04:07.100 Canada's indigenous population is socially challenged and angry enough as it is. 1.00
00:04:12.040 Allowing myths of murdered children to continue is only fostering more division and making things worse for everybody.
00:04:17.260 The truth needs to be exposed.
00:04:18.920 If you don't like it, dig a hole and prove me wrong.
00:04:21.900 Until then, I'm going to call it a hoax.
00:04:23.340 And with every day that investigations are delayed, I'm more and more confident I'm correct.