by Mark Milke
courtesy of the Aristotle Foundation for Public Policy
The effort by MP Leah Gazan to criminalize residential school views she labels “denialist” is a mistake. Gazan’s Bill C-413, if passed, would criminalize any statement that might be interpreted as “condoning, denying, downplaying or justifying the Indian residential school system in Canada through statements communicated other than in private conversation.”
Let’s start with examples of whose speech Gazan’s bill would criminalize, if repeated in the future: indigenous Canadians who have publicly “condoned,” or at least partly justified, residential schools.
In 1998, Rita Galloway, a teacher who grew up on the Pelican Lake First Nation in Saskatchewan and then-president of the First Nations Accountability Coalition, was interviewed about residential schools. She noted that she had “many friends and relatives who attended residential schools,” and argued, “Of course there were good and bad elements, but overall, their experiences were positive.”
In 2008, the late Richard Wagamese, an Ojibwe author and journalist, wrote in the Calgary Herald about the many abuses that took place at residential schools. He then straightforwardly argued that positive stories needed to be told, too, including his mother’s.
After praising her neat, clean home and cultured lawn on a reserve outside Kenora, Ontario, Wagamese noted how his 75-year-old mother “credits the residential school experience with teaching her domestic skills.” Critically, “My mother has never spoken to me of abuse or any catastrophic experience at the school.”
Wagamese argued the then-forthcoming Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) “needs to hear those kinds of stories, too,” and that telling “the good along with the bad” will “create a more balanced future for all of us.”
That’s not because such schools were perfect — or even optimal. As has been extensively documented, physical and sexual abuses occurred in some schools, and that is something that no one should downplay.
But it’s too easy to forget the limited choices that existed for 19th- and early 20th-century Canadians. As we do today, most people back then believed in the value of universal education. Many Canadians, indigenous and non-indigenous, lived in poverty, had rudimentary transportation links, limited job opportunities and thus limited possibilities for day schools in remote areas, such as reserves.
Imagine the outcry today if earlier generations of parishioners, parents (including Indigenous parents) and politicians mostly ignored remote reserves and failed to provide indigenous communities with educational opportunities. The same voices today who accept no nuance on residential schools would likely excoriate that choice to deny education to Indigenous children.
The choices in the 19th and 20th centuries were not between perfection and its opposite; they represent a trade-off between suboptimal choices. Understanding this requires nuance, which is in short supply these days.
As an example, consider the perspective of Manitoba school trustee Paul Coffey, a Metis man who made a presentation to the Mountain View School Division board meeting in Dauphin, Manitoba, about racism in April and was pilloried for it. His remarks included comments about residential schools. Coffey tried to argue that residential schools had good and bad aspects, but he was roundly criticized for his views.
In a July interview, Coffey again offered nuance about the schools, noting what much of the media missed in their initial firestorm coverage: “I said they were nice. I then also said they weren’t. I said treaties were nice and then they weren’t. I said even TRC is a good idea, until it isn’t.”
Criminalizing these stories and opinions would mean that these three indigenous voices, and many others, could face fines or jail time. This is precisely why speech, unless urging violence, should never be criminalized.
Another reason not to criminalize speech is because it makes it even more difficult to correct bad ideas and lingering injustices. An open society requires open discourse. It’s the only way errors can only be corrected. That disappears if one becomes subject to fines and imprisonment for thinking out loud, including when one is ultimately proved to be in error.
Gazan’s bill is the latest attempt by Canadian politicians to suppress views and conclusions with which they disagree. That suppression is illiberal and unhelpful. Mandating a single point of view damages the accumulation of knowledge that’s necessary for progress, prevents a useful dissection of why abuses occurred in residential schools and will prevent the open discrediting of wrongheaded positions.
No one person will be right every time. Open, public debate is critical to exposing errors and advancing human progress.
