[Firebot]

Originally Posted by redforever

The stories of the survivors of residential schools in Canada are documented in the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

They speak of their life before being taken away to residential schools, how they were taken away, and what it was actually like to live in the residential schools...in many cases they were known as a number, not even their name.

While very hard to read in most cases, I think the least we can do as Canadians is listen to their stories.

https://ehprnh2mwo3.exactdn.com/wp-c...nglish_Web.pdf

The word abuse is in there 140 times, sexual 56 times, beat 64 times, strapped 40 times, slap 16 times just to give the idea of the heavy and consistent abuse despite it being only 259 pages long, but you could write hundreds of thousands of pages.

I saw my brother with his face held to a hot steaming pipe and then getting burned
on the arm by the supervisor. And I took my brother, tried to get him out of there.
And I saw my cousin get beat up to the point where he was getting kicked where he
couldn’t even walk and then it was my turn. I got beat so bad that I wet my pants.
Fears I lived with day and night to the point where at nighttime when you want to
go to the bathroom you can’t because there is someone sitting there with a stick or a
strap ready to beat on you if you try to go to that bathroom. And the only choice we
had was to pee in our beds. at’s not a nice feeling to have to sleep in that kind of a
bed.484

This one from Kamloops

And from the beatings, because I didn’t cry, they went berserk; you know the two
nuns. ey would just start beating you and lose control and hurl you against the
wall, throw you on the oor, kick you, punch you and just laid you; they couldn’t stop.
You know, they were insane, yeah. And they were not able to control themselves at
all.

I used to count. One girl got strapped forty-ve times, I was counting, yeah, and then
it came to my turn, I got a beating, and I wouldn’t cry. I just let her beat me and beat
me, and I wouldn’t cry. I just let her do that because, well, sometimes I would pretend I’m crying just so she’ll stop, but then other times I just didn’t cry, ’cause I knew
I was talking, maybe it was my fault, so I just let her beat me, and then next one, then
after we’d go to bed.486

And I remember after that evening, he took me into his office, and there was about
five or six of us boys in there, and he started touching us boys. Some would leave, and
some would come back, some would leave and come back when we’re watching tv
in, in the back of his office. He had a couch in there, and a tv. And we’d all get ready
to go to bed, and he made me stay back. And at that time, I didn’t know what was
gonna happen. I was sitting there, and I was wondering how come I had to stay back,
and I was watching tv there, and then he start touching me, and between my legs,
and he pulled my, my pyjamas down. And the experience that I went through of him
raping me, and I cried, and I yelled, but it didn’t do any good, ’cause he shoved the
rag in my mouth, and he was much stronger than me, he held me down, and the pain
and the yelling that I was screaming why are you doing that to me, there was no one
to help me. I felt helpless. And after he finished doing what he did to me, he sent me
back to my room, and I was in so much pain I couldn’t even hardly walk, and I could
feel this warm feeling running down the back of my leg on my pyjamas and on my
shorts. And I went to the washroom. I tried to clean myself up. This was blood

And then after church, there was a little canteen in the church, and the priest would
sell us candies. Well, after they got to know us, they started making us touch their
penis for candy. So not only were we going to church to pray, and go to catechism,
but we were also going to church ’cause they were giving us candy for touching them.
We didn’t have money

Again, we only are hearing the stories of the survivors who didn't get buried, not everyone were as 'good boys and good girls'. Not every child survived the beatings and abuse.

It's thoroughly disgusting.