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SUNDAE
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A more complete history of the abuses endured by Native American children exists in the accounts of survivors of Canadian residential schools. Canada imported the U.S. boarding school model in the 1880s and maintained it well into the 1970sfour decades after the United States ended its stated policy of forced enrollment. Abuses in Canadian schools are much better documented because survivors of Canadian schools are more numerous, younger, and generally more willing to talk about their experiences.
A 2001 report by the Truth Commission into Genocide in Canada documents the responsibility of the Roman Catholic Church, the United Church of Canada, the Anglican Church of Canada, and the federal government in the deaths of more than 50,000 Native children in the Canadian residential school system.
The report says church officials killed children by beating, poisoning, electric shock, starvation, prolonged exposure to sub-zero cold while naked, and medical experimentation, including the removal of organs and radiation exposure. In 1928 Alberta passed legislation allowing school officials to forcibly sterilize Native girls; British Columbia followed suit in 1933. There is no accurate toll of forced sterilizations because hospital staff destroyed records in 1995 after police launched an investigation. But according to the testimony of a nurse in Alberta, doctors sterilized entire groups of Native children when they reached puberty. The report also says that Canadian clergy, police, and business and government officials rented out children from residential schools to pedophile rings.
This is horrible! As a Canadian I'm deeply ashamed of my government's apathy when it comes to addressing past abuses. Sometimes it takes years of litigation by native groups before they can get any semblence of recognition. And I have yet to hear an apology
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