Vincent J. Curtis
17 Dec 20
President Donald Trump taught conservatives how to deal with cancel culture, and Erin O’Toole seems not to have absorbed the lesson. Hence, the Conservative Party is forced to witness its new leader in humiliating retreat from a perfectly reasonable position.
Education of children was a great liberal-progressive cause in the 19th century. When Canada was formed, education was made a major and exclusive responsibility of the provinces. When Canada acquired Rupert’s Land, the territory was not without population, and until provinces came into existence education was the responsibility of the federal government. Even after provinces were created, education of aboriginal children, which was considered a good thing, remained a federal responsibility in part because Indians were not British subjects.
It was also the liberal-progressive belief at the time that Indians would not long survive European settlement, and that if anything of them were to survive they needed to be integrated into British civilization. Education of children was considered both good in itself and a way of enabling the Indian race to integrate and survive. Yes, coercive policies to force integration were adopted, but we’re familiar with coercion.
These liberal-progressive beliefs persisted, and as late as 1969 Prime Minister Trudeau proposed abolishing Indian status altogether, and that policy wasn’t removed from the Liberal platform until 2014.
O’Toole gave a generous and sympathetic portrayal both of Langevin’s and Ryerson’s intentions, and of the Indian position that things went sideways from the start. The accusation of “cultural genocide” was considered over-the-top then, and remains so today, and the year zero fanatics of the commentariat who appear shocked at O’Toole’s portrait merely show how little of history they know.
Regrettably, O’Toole shamed himself and embarrassed his followers by caving to nonsensical criticism.
-30-
No comments:
Post a Comment