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وَمَا خَلَقْتُ الْجِنَّ وَالإِنسَ إِلاَّ لِيَعْبُدُونِ [Qur'an, 51:56]

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Resist 2010: Eight Reasons to Oppose the 2010 Winter Olympics (VIDEO)

February 18, 2010 By Sarah Leave a Comment


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With the 2010 Winter Olympic Games officially kicking off this past weekend, it’s important to look past all the glitz and glamour being portrayed in the mainstream media and get right down to the behind-the-scenes corruption, deceit, and destruction taking place in Vancouver.

The Olympics are not about the human spirit and have little to do with athletic excellency; they are a multi-billion dollar industry backed by powerful elites, real estate, construction, hotel, tourism and television corporations, working hand in hand with their partners in crime: government officials & members of the International Olympic Committee (IOC).

The video below is an excellent short film (appx. 15 mins.) focusing on the negative impacts of the 2010 Olympic Games being held in Vancouver, and the ongoing resistance by Indigenous, human rights, and other social movements. The film gives 10 reasons why we should all resist and oppose the 2010 Winter Olympics (and all Olympics for that matter):

  1. Colonialism & Fascism
  2. No Olympics on Stolen Land
  3. Ecological Destruction
  4. Homelessness
  5. Criminalization of the Poor
  6. Impact on Women
  7. 2010 Police State
  8. Public Debt
  9. Olympic Corruption
  10. Corporate Invasion

 

[vimeo 4872922 “Resist 2010” on vimeo]

So there you have it! Eight reason why you should oppose the staged, glitzy, sensationalized show that is the 2010 Olympics. Even if you don’t turn off the TV because say, you really enjoy watching athletes compete on ice, at least keep in mind the information you learned from this video. Maybe the next time the Olympics roll around, you may have a change of heart.

N.B. Oh and try no to get too excited about all the “snow” you see in Vancouver. They actually had to ship the stuff in by the truck-load from nearby areas because there wasn’t enough snow in Vancouver! You see how they’re spending tax payer dollars!?!

For more information, please visit: no2010.com



Filed Under: In the News Tagged With: boycott, first nations, olympics, protest, vancouver

“Killing the Indian in the Child”

February 13, 2010 By Sarah 1 Comment

 

LostToGenocide

Last night we attended a REEL Activism event at Bloor St. United Church where we watched a short film and heard a talk/discussion with activist Margaret Sumadh, member of Christian Peacemaker Teams, about the impact of Canadian residential schools on Aboriginal survivors. Being an American-born citizen who only moved to Canada just over one year ago, there’s so much of this country’s history that I’m completely unaware of. I must say, having only recently learned about this dark legacy of Canada’s not-so-distant past, I was shocked, angered, and appalled at what I saw and heard last night; these feelings were multiplied by the fact that in the audience with us were survivors and children of survivors of these awful schools, meant to “kill the Indian in the child.”

The Canadian Indian residential school system, founded in the 19th century, was created for the sole purpose of forcing the assimilation of the Aboriginal (First Nations) peoples into western, “civilized” Canadian society. Basically, this system of schools, which was jointly-controlled by the churches and the federal government, believed that indigenous children needed to be “civilized” in order to assimilate into modern, western, Canadian society. They aimed to achieve this goal by forcibly taking young children (as young as 6 years old) from their homes and placing them in residential schools until they were at least 16 years of age; supposedly, they were to return to their homes during the summers, but many didn’t see their families for years at a time.

Residential School

The children in these schools were forced to learn English, dress like their Canadian counterparts, and convert to Christianity. They were prohibited from speaking their native languages and subjected to corporal punishment if they spoke anything other than English and French or were caught practicing non-Christian faiths; ultimately leading to the cultural genocide of an entire people. Students were also forced into manual labour in order to maintain the already severely underfunded facilities.

 

Map of Residential Schools in Canada
Map of Residential Schools in Canada

During the 1950’s there were 76 residential schools in all but three provinces in Canada. By 1969, the federal government had taken sole control of the residential school system, and by the 1990’s it was finally revealed that several students were subjected to severe physical, mental, and sexual abuse by teachers and other school officials. The last residential school in Canada was finally closed down in 1996. Several court cases led to monetary payments to survivors from the federal government, and in 2008 the Canadian government issued a formal apology to the survivors, their families, and the entire First Nations community. But was this apology too little too late?

Of course it was! An entire people’s culture, traditions, their very identity was stolen from them, wiped away from their mental history books! That doesn’t even include the hundreds of children who died while enrolled in these schools. When these young children were sent back home after they’d been “civilized” they were like strangers in their own homes. They had been changed into completely different people with no connections to their families, their culture, or their heritage. They had lost all ability to speak their native language, no doubt breaking the communication and traditional knowledge sharing between parents and their children. These residential schools had ultimately broken the very fabric of their society, and purposely so.

 

Thomas Moore before and after residential school
Thomas Moore before and after residential school

 

Tom Torlino before and after residential school
Tom Torlino before and after residential school


Furthermore, these schools also had grave psychological effects on the Native youth. At these schools, from a very tender age, children were taught that their native culture and identity was inferior and not worth preserving. They were told they were a dirty, uncivilized, backwards people and that in order to function in society they had to denounce everything they knew to be true about themselves and adopt a new, bright, forward-thinking identity, ie: European/Western way of life. Youth ultimately were taught to resent their culture and heritage and to embrace the European outlook, culture and belief system.

Residential School Students
Residential School Students

Today, Aboriginal people want recognition of what was done to their communities as a result of the residential school system. They have asked for and received official apologies from the Anglican, United, and Catholic churches in Canada, which operated the residential schools. But there is still a long and painful road ahead before the First Nations people receive the reparations and justice they deserve and so badly need. Unfortunately, this information (like much of North America’s dirty past) is not taught in public schools, so it’s completely absent from peoples’ consciousness. Nor is this given anywhere near the amount of necessary media attention it deserves; but then again, what important social and political topics are?

But the truth of the matter is that the issue of genocide of the Aboriginal people is not something that happened in the past and is now over; no, these people are still fighting and will continue to fight for their land rights, their sovereignty, and their natural resources which to this day, are still being stolen, polluted, or in one way or another, colonized for Euro-Canadian imperialistic gains.

To learn more about this untold story of the genocide of the Aboriginal peoples, please visit Hidden From History: The Canadian Holocaust.

Below is the trailer of a full-length award-winning documentary on the planned extermination and genocide of the Aboriginal people by the churches and state in Canada. The film is told through the eyes of survivors of this genocide, and a former minister who tried to hold his church accountable for its crimes. The full-length film can be seen here: Unrepentant.


[youtube j8HB5cbKHDU Unrepentant]

Tomorrow, February 14th in Toronto, we will be marching in the 5th Annual Rally for our Missing Sisters in solidarity with and to commemorate the over 500 Indigenous women who have been murdered or gone missing over the past 30 years. We’re demonstrating against the complicity of the state in the ongoing genocide of Indigenous women and the impunity of state institutions and actors (police, RCMP, coroners’ offices and the courts) that prevents justice for all Indigenous Peoples. Stay tuned for a report and pictures from that event!

Finally, the REEL Activism event that took place last night is a monthly event put on by the church. Next month’s REEL Activism will feature yours truly in a Report back from the Gaza Freedom March in Cairo. The event announcement can be seen here: Gaza Freedom March: A REEL Activism Event. I will be creating and showing a short film about the events that took place in Cairo and give a talk about the political implications of the movement. Stay tuned for more info on that as well!

Filed Under: History, Politics Tagged With: aboriginal, apartheid, canada, extermination, first nations, genocide, residential schools

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