Week 5
Shame!
(Truth and Reconciliation Needs Action)
Shame!
(Truth and Reconciliation Needs Action)
A glaring theme from the videos we watched this week was the lack of action from the Canadian government on Truth and Reconciliation. Out of the 94 calls to action, as of 2023, only 13 have been addressed in the almost 10 years since they were introduced. This inaction is frustrating, but sadly not shocking to me. It feels like Canada’s signature at almost every level is moving at a dinosaur’s pace when it comes to social justice, and often never moving at all.
I remember during the earlier years of the pandemic when rates of homelessness shot up, and encampments became ubiquitous in Toronto public parks. All our government seemed intent on doing about this was to harass, criminalize, surveil, and displace unhoused people, a large number of whom are Indigenous to this land. Some friends of mine responded by forming the Encampment Support Network (ESN), whose mission was listening to, and advocating for, people living in encampments. The government KNOWS that unhoused people need housing, access to medical care, social programs, and practical support. Instead of addressing the root causes of homelessness and the housing crisis, they take the “out of sight, out of mind” approach of violently displacing those living in encampments via police, compounding the problem even further.
I see a lot of parallels to the slowness of the Canadian government when it comes to Truth and Reconciliation. The traumatized victims of residential schools are sick of hearing “we’re working on it.” What is the point of a response like that? Or of committees whose job is to collect stories of abuse from survivors? Yes, it is important to have these stories be collected and act as evidence of what really happened, but how does retraumatizing victims again and again help them in any way, when there is no concrete reconciliation to go along with it? No land back, and nothing more than empty apologies from government figureheads. Those in charge give these little breadcrumbs, as another way of pushing the issue under the rug, kicking the can down the road. The government KNOWS what Indigenous people want, because they say it loudly and clearly: LAND BACK. But this doesn’t seem to be an option for our greedy government. They are the ones with the power and privilege here, and they won’t do anything willingly that could actually take away any of that. It’s hard for me to imagine them actually donating land, or giving any significant amounts of financial compensation to victims. So how can anything get done?
As a Canadian born in Toronto, I am ashamed of my government. I am ashamed of their historic, and continued, oppression of Indigenous people. I am ashamed of their support of Israel’s war on Palestine. I am ashamed of their spinelessness when it comes to dismantling structural racism. This country loves to look the other way, but it is so clear that what is needed now is action and real change.
References:
Smoke, S., & Cooper, A. (2024, September 18). Watch - heard about the 94 calls to action? here’s what they are. CBC Kids News. https://www.cbc.ca/kidsnews/post/watch-heard-about-the-94-calls-to-action-heres-what-they-are.