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	More Than Apologies By Paula Simons Edmonton Journal June 16, 2008 http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/story.html?id=be88bf1c-6b2b-4d1c-81f6-23e0a94d39ee By now, the story of the damages done by the residential schools is all too well-known. Over decades, thousands of children were taken from their parents and communities and raised in church-run boarding schools. The avowed intent of the schools was to prepare Indian children for life in a white world, to teach them English, to give them an education, to provide them with a marketable trade, and, of course, to convert them to Christianity. In many cases, let it be said, the people who oversaw the schools had the best of intentions. But their actions were often disastrous. Children were ripped from their families, their culture and their language, thrust headlong into a terrifying, disorienting foreign world. And frequently, the schools themselves were anything but idyllic centres of learning. Children were beaten for speaking their native languages. They were often malnourished. Epidemics such as measles and tuberculosis killed many. Others -- a disturbing number -- were victims of sexual abuse at the hands of the very people who were supposed to be their trusted mentors. Some children probably did thrive and learn in residential school. Some undoubtedly looked back on their school days with genuine fondness. Others, far too many, were not so lucky. But as we, as a nation, apologize to those who suffered at residential school -- and their children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren -- let us be mindful of the self-same righteous blindness that led to the residential school debacle in the first place. If I may be most politically incorrect, most unseemingly blunt -- I'm especially thrilled that Stephen Harper apologized for the sins and failures of the residential school system, because I think it's time we stopped obsessing about the failings of the past, time we got a little of that elusive, much-vaunted "closure" and dedicated ourselves a little more to dealing with the problems of the present. How will future generations judge us? No, we don't have residential schools anymore. But every year, we apprehend a distressing number of aboriginal children and place them in government care. Right now, in the Edmonton region alone, there are approximately 1,900 First Nations and Métis children in the care of Children's Services, placed with foster families or in group homes. Aboriginal children make up almost 60 per cent of children in government care in the Edmonton area, even though aboriginal people make up about five per cent of the population. Decades after the last residential school closed, our mainstream culture is still hopelessly clumsy at dealing with that reality. Why are so many aboriginal families in crisis? The easy and fashionable answer is to cast most of the blame on the residential schools themselves. But while I in no way wish to minimize the cultural dislocation and family estrangement fostered by the schools, it's a simplistic cop-out to still be blaming all the problems of the present on the trauma of the past. It's too easy for the struggling native parents of today to blame their own mistakes and failures and addictions on the fact that their grandparents went to residential school. And it's too easy for the rest of us to shrug our shoulders, to assume we can't solve the problems of today, because there's no way of curing the harm done by residential schools. It's too easy for us to minimize the racism and economic and social injustices that continue in 2008, by turning the residential school system into a convenient all-purpose scapegoat. The constant focus on the past neatly absolves us all, aboriginal and non-aboriginal, of responsibility for dealing with today's disasters. It turns today's aboriginal Canadians into passive victims. Indeed, I'd argue it engenders a culture of victimhood and dependency that helps no one, but instead perpetuates social inequality. Cast forever in our cultural narrative as victims and losers, too many aboriginal people, caught in a cycle of self-fulfilling prophesy, wrongly assume they can aspire to no better. Now arguably, until we acknowledge the horrors of the past, we can't get healing or justice or closure. But I'd love to see our First Nations and federal and provincial leaders devote a little more time, effort, money and emotional energy to averting the horrors of the moment. The aboriginal children of today's Canada need more than earnest apologies. They need good schools, good public health care, good social services, good job opportunities. They need families -- biological or foster -- that love them. They need justice. Most of all, they need to see a future for themselves as equal citizens of this country, a future that fills them with hope, not dread and discouragement. They need a reason to graduate, a reason to stay clean and sober, a reason to stay off the streets and out of jail, a reason to live up to all their human potential. As the sorry saga of the residential schools shows, the road to hell is often paved with good intentions. In our well-intentioned efforts to atone for the sins of our fathers, let's be sure we're not just rolling out another layer of sulphuric asphalt. Paula Simons writes for the Edmonton Journal.
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