I hadn’t reported on the proposal to change the name of Cornwallis Junior High because I was on vacation, in Germany, when the proposal was put forward, and so wasn’t in a position to interview people. I did, however, follow the story on local news sites, and was pleased to see the school board unanimously approve the change. But I was immensely surprised to come back home and find wide disapproval of the change. It makes me sad, to be honest.
The issue is straight-forward: children, of all ethnicities, are attending or interacting with (via sports teams, for example) a school named in honour of a person who promoted racially based genocide. This is simply wrong. It’s wrong to subject Mi’kmaq children to this—honouring the murderer of their forebears is necessarily an emotional and, yes, oppressive act; it undermines their self-worth and expectations that they can fairly and fully lead successful lives in a society dominated by Europeans. But it’s also unfair to subject children of European extraction to attending/visiting a school named in honour of a mass murderer; white kids implicitly learning to celebrate the genocide of natives will not likely be agents of fairness and democratic values—and their own lives are lesser for it.
It was reasonable and right for the Mi’kmaq community to bring this issue forward. They are a large community, who have suffered a series of historic wrongs, arguably right into the present, and they asked for a small act, not of redress, but of simple acknowledgement of past wrongs done onto them. It really comes down to this: why not change the name? Are we willing to acknowledge that a community says with good cause it is negatively impacted and we can readily address their concern, or not? Are we kind, or not?
Unfortunately, “kindness” doesn’t characterize the response from many people. I don’t know how to characterize it other than a visceral reaction; a seemingly unlimited number of thoughtless objections are barfed up, assertions really, of unchallengeable fact, often said with a sort of wizened attitude of “this is how the world really works, you children.”
There are many different objections, but I’ll start with an exchange I had with a friend, someone whose opinion I respect on many issues. On this, he wrote:
Consider what is in a name… like the name of a ship. Through all of history we take the names of ships very seriously, not because of the name itself or where it came from—because some ships have silly and misguided names–but because the name represented the spiritual and physical effort of the builders and the claim of right that each created thing has to exist.
Like a ship, this school was built through the dedicated efforts of men and women now gone. The lines on their faces and hands can only now be seen in the chiseled stone and cracked concrete of the school. The name, which they chose thoughtfully, represents their beliefs at that time and place of beautiful celebration which we still share and their good-hearted understanding of the world along with their hope for the children of the future.
In this spirit they named the school without anything but purity of effort and hopefulness for a better future… [clipped]The name the builders gave this ship of learning dedicated to generations of children is not just lost on the rocks of an ancient rancor—equaled and surpassed in so much of history—but sullied such that when my little 12 year old boy went to “his” school this morning it was with head hung low. Was it guilt he was feeling? Is that what we want? Or maybe just sadness from a young crewmember for a ship that has lost its name.
My response, admittedly written with some anger, was this:
The Mi’kmaq of course were not part of that community of wise elders who considered the name of the school 60 years ago. They had been excluded from any position of power to affect anything even as remotely trivial as naming a school, and their kids were hauled off to torture chambers pretending to be schools, out in the countryside, away from sensitive urban eyes.
Now, however, they have gained at least the pretense of being democratic actors in a fair society. The kids have grown up and their own kids are taught side-by-side with the kids of Europeans. But every day, they’ll enter that building (or play against he sports teams from that building) honoured with the name of the man who started the long road of oppression and dispossession. The message is clear: yea, we have to pretend that we’re all equals, but we know who you *really* are, and we’re not going to let you forget it. And if you dare to challenge it, if you dare object that we can’t celebrate your genocide, the lost of your culture, the triumph of our culture as superior to your savagery, well, you’re anti-democratic, you have a warped view of history, you’re petty, you hate tradition, you have no respect. You’re a dirty fucking Indian.
Those opposed to the name change are in denial. They either do not see, or discount as unimportant, the crux of the issue, which is the dispossession of an entire people of their land, their language, their governments, their culture, which started with Cornwallis, the very first Englishman to step foot in Chebucto, and who put a bounty on the scalps of the people who owned this place.
And to claim some sort of historical “objectivity” by saying, as Rick Howe does, that “in those days wars were nasty affairs with atrocities committed by all sides” is not objective, but rather a perverse reading of history. The Mi’kmaq and Europeans did not meet on some vacant island in the middle of the Atlantic and decide to pointlessly murder each other. The Mi’kmaq did not invite Europeans to come here to conduct biological warfare against natives or put a bounty on their scalps. Rather, Europeans came here for their own geopolitical reasons of empire, and were happy to slaughter whoever stood in their way in order to control the land and all its products. The objection, repeated dozens of times on Twitter, that “the Mi’kmaq killed Europeans too!” is a suggestion that the natives weren’t behaving kindly enough to the people slaughtering them and stealing their land. Any resistance to genocide is considered bad behaviour, still more proof that the natives are subhuman beings and deserved everything they got. This argument is, in a word, racist.
We see this exemplified by a historian quoted in the Chronicle-Herald:
Canadian historian Jack Granatstein, interviewed by The Canadian Press on Thursday, agreed with Fisher’s stance.
“People, who by our standards today, are seen as viciously anti-Indian, in the 1700s were seen as great patriotic soldiers who made it safe for whites to live in Nova Scotia,” he said.
“You can’t apply today’s standards to people of the past. That just gets silly.”
But why should whites have had a right to “live safely” in 18th century Nova Scotia? More to the point, why should whites have had the right to murder the occupants of the land, steal their land and resources, break their economies, and throw the survivors into quasi prison camps?
Am I “applying today’s standards”? Well, given today’s apparent right of “whites” to drop freedom bombs, to displace millions of people, to torture, to force economic restructuring, etc, on any off-hue populace in the world, I’d say that standards haven’t much changed.
Then there’s the chin-stroking assertion, said with authoritative cynicism posing as wisdom, that “the victors write history,” and so who is anyone to object to the Cornwallis name on schools? Yea, I guess we can back ourselves out of any responsibility to affect positive change by sighing and saying, “and so it goes,” but the refusal to claim agency, to be responsible citizens, to give two shits about the people in our community, is to be an asshole. To be sure, history is full of horrors; we can either do something to acknowledge that, to name that, to change that, or not. We can strive for a better, more respectful, more peaceful, more just world, or not. How we act, or don’t act, defines what kind of people we are. Are we kind or not?
I’m struck by the difference between the local reaction to the Cornwallis name change and the frank and thoughtful acknowledgement of the historic wrongs wrought by the German people I witnessed in Berlin. You simply cannot miss the weight of history on the German people. For example, there’s the impressive honesty of the Topography of Terror museum and the reflective Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe occupies a prominent block just steps away from the Reichstag and Brandenberg Tor. My German friends, born long after the fall of the Nazis, speak of their part of the collective responsibility to atone for their history, a sentiment I heard repeated many, many times during my short stay.
Here in Halifax, however, the suggestion that we simply not honour a genocidal agent of imperialism is met with disdainful reaction, and absurd process issues: We can’t change the name to everything, so we can’t change the name of anything; Where does it stop—do we have to change the name of anything anyone objects to?
Here’s a suggestion: How ‘bout we in the white community work through those issues in a spirit of kindness and cooperation with the Mi’kmaq community, give pause and deep thought to how we have benefitted from historic wrongs, and how we have a responsibility to create a better world, instead of smugly accepting our position of privilege as the natural, inviolable state of things.
Related Stories
Halifax votes to keep honouring Edward Cornwallis
This article appears in Jun 23-29, 2011.
Tim, you’re full of shit.
Short of us all packing up and moving to Europe, where presumably we can find some sort of ancient forebears and lay claim to some legitimacy that it is our land, this is home. All of North America has the same issue – it was colonized by others from away. We cannot realistically walk away and make things better for the natives. Things happened 260 years ago that may not have been correct by today’s standards. But that is the problem – judging centuries-old realities by modern-day mores. You cannot do it.
Cornwallis dealt with the realities of 1750 in the way he was told and taught. So did the natives. I do not feel one bit of guilt over what happened, and do not have any trouble with acknowledging the founder of our community, any more than I have trouble with visiting MicMac Mall and acknowledging the native ancestry of the area either without feeling anger over what their ancestors may have done to mine.
The German analogy is a poor choice. Prior to Hitler, the Jews and non-Jews in Germany worked side by side, paid taxes or the equivalent thereof, and shared a society and values. Then a movement happened that turned one group against the other for a time and dealt with the Jews in a brutal and inhumane manner. That is indeed worthy of guilt and atonement. This is not that.
Appeasement and revisionism never works. If there is anger or guilt over centuries-old actions, then it is necessary to deal with it. But you don’t do that by scrubbing names out of history of those who are now deemed to be bad people according to our current standards.
My mantra this week has been “we need more history, not less.” Essentially, I have been arguing that a better strategy to renaming is to fill our historic city with more historical interpretation. How many people know, for example, when the traverse across the grounds of the Halifax Memorial Library, that they are walking across the original poor house location, complete with graves? How many people are aware that the city was rimmed by a series of five forts (all below Citadel Hill) and that a rough palisade enclosed the city below Citadel Hill, from the corner of Barrington and Spring Garden, up to Brunswick and then to where the Delta Halifax stands? How many people who come to the Saint Mary’s campus know that they are on the former estate of Enos Collins? Or that Dalhousie was founded, in part, based upon spoils of the War of 1812? Although I am opposed to the wholesale renaming of spaces or communities, I am perfectly OK with the renaming of the school. I think here we can separate a decision to name a school (itself bound in a particular process of historical selection) from denuding our city of history.
A final observation. I think people in Halifax are ambivalent about the past and history. We like history and historical themes (as long as they can be marketed to tourists or commodified in other ways). But there is also a strong tradition in Halifax of desiring to be ‘modern’ or ‘forward-thinking’ and to shed the burden of history. So, the historic waterfront arches were removed to modernize the waterfront, poor but historic communities (one white, one black) were destroyed in the name of urban progress/renewal, and the city was almost cut off from the water by an ill-conceived harbourfront drive. And our built heritage and neighbourhoods are under constant pressure. Our relationship to the past is complex. Our responses to our history need to be equally complex.
Well said Tim. You articulated much of what I’ve been thinking. The “vacant island in the middle of the Atlantic” part is my favourite.
You miss, perhaps, an important point. What was done in the past was done because it could be done. The immigrants had the power. They had the technology. With this, in combination with immunity to their own diseases and a culturally derived certainty of the superiority of their ways, they felt confident in the rightness of their actions. God was obviously on their side because He made their ascendance possible. Aside from any politically correct notions of how things should have been or should be now there is another issue that is relevant to the winds of fortune. The Caucasian people are no longer the undisputed masters of the world. All those many hundreds of millions of people of Asia and India, not to forget the first peoples of this continent will, for the foreseeable future, have greater wealth and power than Whites. It would be fitting as a matter of precedent to repair our relations with other races lest the examples we had set become the justification for our own displacement. What all peoples want is to get along, be respected and be left alone. This is the legacy we should be seeking and the example we should set for our descendants to emulate. Name the school after a librarian and celebrate local culture that is relevant to a school.
Well said, Tim.
~
And due to the abuse of the Irish during the potato famine, I want everything named Victoria removed.
Victoria Park
Victoria General Hospital
Victoria Road
Can you get on that, Tim?
You’re way off on this one TIM. Remember scalping was a method used by the Natives and in fact it was due to Natives scalping white settlers in Dartmouth precipitated this. Cornwallis just fought fire with fire and won. If he hadn’t, none of would be here. It was 1749 not 2011, different times. What is it about people who want to hide history. It fucking happened and you didn’t do it, I didn’t do it nor did Mr Paul do it. It’s over and in a phrase I hate “It was what it was”. To the victors go the spoils and we were the victors. Cornwallis wasn’t the only General to deal with the Natives (and France, let’s not forget that little war) in a less than stellar way. The French, Spanish, Portegeuse, Scandinavians (remember Lief Ericsson and Nfld) all fought Natives and the natives fought back. There were atrocities by all sides, none were innocent.
I for one will not apologize for the actions of those who went before me. Nor will I rewrite history.
Edward Cornwallis HAS NOT been removed from history, nor has any bit of history been rewritten, Cornwallis has been removed from the name of a school! dumbasses.
Now on to the subject of reparations……
I see people in denial everywhere, and what makes it so frustrating, is that most of them appear to be intelligent. That is the ultimate contradicition.
I agree 110% with your views in your article Tim, especially the part of what is at the core of the outrage against this name change.
@racism=violence
So do you support my wish to have Victoria removed from all naming in HRM?
Rename it Benjamin Netanyahu Jr. High. (Heh heh, that oughtta hold those P.C. S.O.B.s)
Kirk Arsenault is a waste of space, a one trick pony. Never speaks at school board meetings. Kept his mouth shut when the board was considering school closure. The racist idea of seperate seats for blacks and Aboriginals is mad, thank you to Tory Jane Purves.
LMAO @ Bro Tim!!!!!
Natives were scalping whites in Dartmouth back then? I’d like you to source this.
Cornwallis fought fire-with-fire and won? Right. You don’t fight fire-with-fire by attacking first and being the aggressor. By comparison using your logic here, The Taliban fought fire-with-fire on 9/11 by crashing into The Twin Towers in NYC.
“The French, Spanish, Portegeuse, Scandinavians (remember Lief Ericsson and Nfld) all fought Natives and the natives fought back.”
-Duh. Resistance and self-defence are rights. The Europeans attacked first and The Mi’kmaq rithfully defended themselves. I’m sure if you were the victim of assault you’d fight back too. Typical white folks playing the victim after getting beaten!
“Nor will I rewrite history.”
-You already did with your post.
“The German analogy is a poor choice. Prior to Hitler, the Jews and non-Jews in Germany worked side by side, paid taxes or the equivalent thereof, and shared a society and values. Then a movement happened that turned one group against the other for a time and dealt with the Jews in a brutal and inhumane manner. That is indeed worthy of guilt and atonement. This is not that.”
-It’s a poor choice only because you think it is and cannot handle truth. The fact is that Mi’kmaq made attempts to co-exist with The English only to have the latter turn on the former constantly. Taxes have nothing to do with any of this, but if you must bring it up I’ll offer this: The Jews chose to live in Germany where taxes were common. Here, there were no such things and your ancestors chose to invade and Mi’kmaq refused to adopt European ideologies.
This whole backlash about the name-change is typical of Whites playing the ultimate victim in everything. It happens whenever minorities or groups of colour resist or defend themselves against aggression. It seems to be okay to be aggressors initially but when the minorities fight back they’re immediately portrayed as the bad people.
The answer is simple: if you don’t like it feel free to go back to wherever you came from. It’s not like you were ever invited anyway.
The Mi’kmaq attacked a group cutting trees after deciding the founding of Halifax without negotiation was a violation of a treaty agreement and killed four men, scalping two. Cornwallis then put the bounty on native scalps, matching the price which the natives were paid by the French for bringing them British ones. BroTim is full of shit, but he’s not wrong about the scalping.
Google is your friend.
Google doesn’t make you smoorter or eduooglecated.
Plus the French didn’t deal in guineas and British Pounds so that claim is bogus. And if it is true then maybe that’s what the violators get for breaking the law at the time.
Raid on Dartmouth (1749)The Mi’kmaq saw the founding of Halifax without negogiation as a violation of earlier agreements with the British. On 24 September, 1749 the Mi’kmaq formally declared their hostility to the British plans for settlement without more formal negogiations.[5] On September 30, 1749, about forty Mi’kmaq attacked six men who were in Dartmouth cutting trees. Four of them were killed on the spot, one was taken prisoner and one escaped.[6] Two of the men were scalped and the heads of the others were cut off. The attack was on the saw mill which was under the command of Major Gilman. Six of his men had been sent to cut wood. Four were killed and one was carried off. The other excaped and gave the alarm. A detachment of rangers was sent after the raiding party and cut off the heads of two Mi’kmaq and scapled one.[7] This raid was the first of eight against Dartmouth.
The result of the raid, on October 2, 1749, Cornwallis offered a bounty on the head of every Mi’kmaq. He set the amount at the same rate that the Mi’kmaq received from the French for British scalps. As well, to carry out this task, two companies of rangers raised, one led by Major Gilman and the other by Captain William Clapham. These two companies served along side that of John Gorham’s company. The three companies scoured the land around Halifax looking for Mi’kmaq.[8]
[edit] Raid on Dartmouth (1750)In July 1750, the Mi’kmaq killed and scalped 7 men who were at work in Dartmouth.[9] In August of 1750, 353 people arrived on the Alderney and began the town of Dartmouth. The town was laid out in the autumn of that year.[10] The following month, on September 30, 1750, Dartmouth was attacked again by the Mi’kmaq and five more residents were killed.[11]
In October 1750 a group of about eight men went out “to take their diversion; and as they were fowling, they were attacked by the Indians, who took the whole prisoners; scalped … [one] with a large knife, which they wear for that purpose, and threw him into the sea …”[12]
[edit] Raid on Dartmouth (1751 March)The next year, on March 26, 1751, the Mi’kmaq attacked again, killing fifteen settlers and wounding seven, three of which would later die of their wounds. They took six captives, and the regulars who pursued the Mi’kmaq fell into an ambush in which they lost a sergeant killed.[13]
Two days later, on March 28, 1751, Mi’kmaq abducted another three settlers.[13]
[edit] Dartmouth Massacre (1751 May)Main article: Raid on Dartmouth
Three months later, on May 13, 1751, Broussard led sixty Mi’kmaq and Acadians to attack Dartmouth again, in what would be known as the “Dartmouth Massacre”.[14] Broussard and the others killed twenty settlers – mutilating men, women, children and babies – and took more prisoner.[15] A sergeant was also killed and his body mutilated. They destroyed the buildings. The British returned to Halifax with the scalp of one Mi’kmaq warrior, however, they reported that they killed six Mi’kmaq warriors.[16]
During the French and Indian War, in the spring of 1759, there was another Mi’kmaq attack on Fort Clarence, in which five soldiers were killed. [17]
Oddly enough I think people back then just may have been capable of performing currency exchanges and/or barter.
@Matthew Luthor; If you feel that strongly about removing any reference to “Victoria”, make your case and good luck.
All responses to European attacks which happened first.
I think the term Tim is looking for is “blood guilt.” That’s the medieval concept that the wrongs done by one’s ancestors carries through to their descendants. It’s bunk, of course, but it enjoys a great deal of popularity amongst those who reject the Western (read capitalist) project.
For hard lefties like Tim, individuals are nothing more then collective identities. It doesn’t matter that “the whites” and Mik’maq of today are not the whites and Mik’maq of yesteryear. It doesn’t matter that aboriginals wouldn’t have shared Tim’s Euro-centric views of property and land ownership. It doesn’t matter that the past was different than the present. Like the permanently guilty Germans, the Western “whites” in this story are ALWAYS and FOREVER oppressors, and non-Western “other” will be ALWAYS and FOREVER victims.
Sorry, I don’t buy it. I am an individual, free-born, in my own country. I carry no guilt for that which occurred centuries before I was born.
Donairious – when we all leave you can go back to your tents, horses,canoes and drums. You’ll be just like the lost tribes up the Amazon – stuck in the Stone Age and oblivious to the modern world.
Let’s be honest, your drums and vocal sounds have little to offer compared with the sounds from other cultures.
Western culture is a fusion of knowledge from all over the world and the intermingling has brought great benefit to hundreds of millions across the globe in all fields of endeavour.
Time for you to join the rest of the world. Living in desolate areas without employment and lacking examples of how to do better is a terrible life, to pretend otherwise is foolish and a waste of human capital.
“Western culture is a fusion of knowledge from all over the world and the intermingling has brought great benefit to hundreds of millions across the globe in all fields of endeavour. “
more like stolen from all over the world.
hbr – ‘more like stolen from all over the world’…. a stupid statement which shows great ignorance.
Read about music and listen and you will hear many influences.
Or read ‘Civilization’ by Kenneth Clark
Or read about the Greeks, the Romans, Babylon, the Silk Road.
Educate yourself, Halifax has more library space per capita than most places in the world.
Tim mentions the arguments that have been ‘barfed’ up so far. I don’t think they are barf. But, even if it is I’m willing to return to the vomit one more time. Just for the sake of thorough discussion.
Certainly supporting Tim’s position is the easy way in public. Consider, given the structure of Mr. Paul’s argument, how cruel and unreasonable anyone who might ask to stay with the Cornwallis name would appear in a media sound bite or if they didn’t have the luxury of time to fully articulate their position. It makes my heart sink a little to read how quickly the Cornwallis ‘discussion’ becomes subject to Godwin’s Law (the hyperbolic Reductio ad Hitlerum – comparing a person to Hitler to make a point). Playing the Nazi Card on top of the Race Card makes discussion very difficult indeed. It’s popularly said that comparing people to Hitler is an easy way to get a strong point across to the less enlightened. Everyone knows who Adolf Hitler was. And everyone knows that Hitler was very, very bad. Therefore, if person really, REALLY, doesn’t like something or someone, he or she may angrily say something to the effect of, “This is exactly the same kind of thing that Hitler used to do!” It’s not helpful. It leaves very little further room for discussion. : )
1/ So far people have said this is a false dilemma and there are other various logical fallacies employed by Mr. Paul (the author of this current Cornwallis discussion). But not all winning arguments are logical. His appeal to passion is very powerful. Recognizing his argument is an old testament style appeal it’s worth considering the traditional argument against punishing the child for the “Sins of the Father’ from Ezekiel 18:20. At very least this shows this is not a new dilemma.
2/ People – particularly the Cornwallis school’s SAC (Student advisory committee) – are concerned about the importance of process. This has not been as elegant a process as we might wish it to be. The SAC was shut out by the board when they didn’t agree. All the details of history aside, this is the thing that is likely to cause the School Board the most problems. Process matters. Intensely to many. It’s interesting to compare this to the process the NS government offered when Mr. Paul asked them to change the name of the Cornwallis river. In a lot of back and forth they basically said that if there were an overwhelming and compelling public movement to change the name of the river then they would consider it. That was pretty much the end of that.
3/ People have quoted the basic research which at very least opens the possibility that Mr. Paul’s interpretation of events during Cornwallis’ three years in Halifax is not the conclusion a reasonable person would come to if presented with the facts. A legitimate reference summary (http://www.blupete.com/Hist/NovaScotiaBk1/…) gives a sense of this. I’ve been surprised to learn how well known all these specific details of mid-eighteenth century Halifax are. We live among the most diverse mind and manners of people – scholars all in their own way.
4/ What should we say to Mi’kmaq children who go to Cornwallis? Shouldn’t we teach them the same valuable lesson we should teach all children. Every child must learn about the races and people of the world and the rich variety of the world’s cultures. They must know something of the history of men and nations. They must learn that there are many people in the world who differ from them profoundly in habits, history, ideas, and ways of life. They must perceive these differences not as occasions for uneasiness or hostility but as challenges to their capacity for understanding. This is what I learned in school. By rote at first, but eventually in my heart. My Scottish ancestors were not so keen on the English Army during this period either. I’ve been to Culloden. I know the very spot my ancestors fell.
5/ Tim believes that we should frame the question to be about whether it is appropriate for a public school in the 21st century to be honouring or celebrating Cornwallis by using his name. He surely wants only to do what is right and good and fair. I am not surprised in the slightest that Mr. Paul’s call for justice and righting wrongs appealed to his sense of good and right.
So where does it leave us? What I’ve been trying to do is frame the issue a little differently. My issue statement would be this: Now that the deed has been done ( and done with good intentions that have served well for over 60 years) is it appropriate to change the name of a school dedicated to the man who founded Halifax?
You see, had Cornwallis not founded Halifax he surely would not have had a school named after him – or street or church or river. By all accounts he was an otherwise undistinguished civil servant and soldier. It is this august event – the founding of Halifax – that was and is being celebrated.
The man – whatever else he got up to in his life or faults and foibles he may have had – founded our city. That’s a fact and it’s a fact that Mr. Paul would like us to remember in shame. The not-so-subtle undercurrent of Mr. Paul’s long held position is that it is the founding of Halifax and the events around 1749 to 1752 that are evil and illegitimate and it is of that that we should be forever ashamed and offering appeasement. Certainly the changing of the name of this school will not appease Mr. Paul but will be used as a precedent for further tarnishing of the Cornwallis name and the city’s very right to exist.
I don’t hold that view. Halifax was founded. It was founded by Cornwallis. The school was dedicated to that. Plain and simple. To read any more in to it – aside from in intellectual discussions like this one – is a classic confusion of correlation and causality. It should certainly not be poured on the poor students and community of the school. It’s unhelpful and divisive in the extreme and I fault Mr. Paul for that.
I believe we should stay true to the school’s more noble and glorious purpose – education. This is where the opportunity lies; not in changing the name of the school but by facing the Mr. Paul’s of the world head on.
I’ve been reading about this lately. I’m swayed by Admiral HG Rickover’s thoughts on this and I’m quoting him a lot recently. “To learn some kind of critical or intellectual method – that’s the most important part of education. It has been said that we live in the age of an information explosion. But we are also in the middle of a misinformation explosion. With the proliferation of mass communications media, we are surrounded by hawkers, pitchman, hard and soft sells, persuaders hidden and overt. Bombarded daily with millions of words by print and electronic media, we all have to have some kind of critical method by means of which we decide whom and what to believe, and to what degree.
How is propaganda evaluated? It cannot always be analyzed by scientific method, since propaganda statements are rarely capable of proof; but it can be approached with a scientific attitude. Some kind of discipline in the orientations of science is necessary to inculcate a critical attitude towards words, our own as well as those of others, so that our lives may be governed by skepticism and respect for fact that characterize the rational mind.”
That’s what the school can offer.
It will be interesting to see how this age old debate plays out in Halifax – or whatever we’re going to call it – in the 21st century. One thing that is kind of funny is how closely this Halifax story parallels The Simpsons story and crisis about the founding of Springfield.
“A noble spirit embiggens the smallest man.”
Jebidiah Springfield
Mr. Chisholm, even without Tim’s reference/comparison to Hitler, I agree with him. Colonial invaders do what colonial invaders do, they conquer and take what they want without compromise. If you resist they destroy. History has documented this.
Now I will quote you, “Every child must learn about the races and people of the world and the rich variety of the world’s cultures. They must know something of the history of men and nations. They must learn that there are many people in the world who differ from them profoundly in habits, history, ideas, and ways of life.”
You are obviously a very articulate and intelligent man, but in case you didn’t notice, the only references to other races of people that was taught in school, especially when you were in school, was to depict the peoples of colour as being inferior to the white race. This my friend is the basis of the idealogy of “white supremacy”. Cornwallis did what he did as a member of this so called superior race, his views on the “savages” and “negroes” were through the eyes of a racist white man. And he acted accordingly.
I admire your positive outlook on how people should know about all these other races and value what they may have to offer. Honestly do you believe what your preaching? You live in a very racist city/province. All you have to do is read the comment sections at the Herald and other media sources to realize these lessons allegedly taught in school have fallen short of their goal, I know when i was in school these lessons were not taught, in fact just the opposite.
The amount of intolerance and denial that exist here is rampant and blatant. Evident by the very fact that very few immigrants exist here today, most leave for other cities, because this city is NOT a tolerance place. You sir, are blinded by the very glasses that you view your world through.
Thanks for the notes Person of Colour, and for taking the time to read and consider mine. I’ll keep thinking about it and think more about what you’ve said.
You are right, I am optimistic in this regard, I have a hope that anonymous comment sections aren’t perfectly representative of the mind and manners of civil society in Nova Scotia. I deal with a lot of people in my work – all kinds of people – and I don’t see the kind of… well, whatever you want to call it in the comments sections… in daily life. Though I know we’ve seen the kind of things you mention in the margins.
Preaching? This issue inspired me to speak out and I did my best. I was trying to mount a worthwhile rebuttal to Tim’s thoughtful and passionate article. And I do believe the things I’ve written. But we’re always learning right?
I think we will see Nova Scotia competing for immigrants in the next 20 years in a whole new way as our population ages and thins. My suspicion is that this will change the landscape. We’ll see.
jw
As an Acadian, I DEMAND Fort Lawrence and Lawrencetown be renamed. Their namesake, Charles Lawrence, oversaw the expulsion of the Acadians.
That seems analogous. If we knew the history of all people’s perfectly we could do this all day until no place names remain in the world.
That’s a ligit argument, but kind of too easy because we’re not talking about all the wrongs in the world, just this one, and you have to start somewhere.
Still, I think it’s a strong point.
Tim, this has to be one of the worst constructed articles I have ever read on the coast.
A lot of you really need to read up on the concepts of white privilege and appropriation.
Whilst you are at it remove every Union Jack in Canada, change every reference to Victoria, tell Wills & Kate to piss off (cuz’ the English Royal Family as an institution has a lot of blood on their hands) and don’t look to closely at our Fathers of Confederation. Let’s also consider the issue of crimes against women, gays, Irish, etc. and there will be a very long list of name changes to follow.
Leave the name Cornwallis. It’s a reminder of what was and that we need to work for a better future.
Supposedly the Union Jack no longer flies over Her Majesty’s correctional facilities or British airports because the Cross of St. George is considered to be a Crusader symbol and therefore “offensive” to a steadily increasing amount of people who are clients of both.
Mr. Chisholm, i enjoy reading your post as they are well articulated. But let’s not forget you speak from a position of white privledge and therefore it is understandable that you may lose sight of this fact.
Ahhhh “white privledge”.
The trap card of every first year university student.
Disagree with someone, but are too lazy to argue your point, “WHITE PRIVILAGE!”
Caught short in a discussion, “WHITE PRIVILAGE!”
Thoughtful posting about relativity in history, “WHITE PRIVILAGE!”
I can spout catch phrases too!
“CASH ON DELIVERY!”
“NO SHIRT, NO SHOES, NO SERVICE!”
Thanks again person of colour. I hear what you are saying.
In my long note I had a go at pointing out that my relatives, people I identify with very closely in my family, were being slaughtered and driven from our ancestral lands in Scotland at the exact same time all this was happening in Nova Scotia. We lost our language and our land – everything.
My family lived in a place called Glen Affric until the English army came and killed most everyone and drove the remaining from the land to make way for sheep. Still today it is an area so breathtakingly beautiful, but so empty that it makes me weep.
Have look if you’re interested…
http://www.google.ca/search?q=glen+affric&…
Of course none of this changes your main point. You can see from my name and my picture; I am white… about as white as it gets I’d say.
We’re all work in progress.
jw
@Matthew Luthor, try and contain yourself, your true self is showing. Did you think us people of colour were just gonna lie down and take it, hell no. change comes slow, very slow, but it does come.
Mr. Chisholm, I am familiar with Scotland and it’s history of oppression under the British, William Wallace and others, same with Ireland, heck one of my best friends is Irish, a jew at that. In fact I have alot of white friends. Nonetheless your families home town is a beautiful spot, I see the scottish stole the name from Africa and tried to hide it.
(-:
“People Should Know When They Are Conquered” Quintus-“Gladiator” – only in Canada certain conditions apply. I bet if Cornwallis knew then what is happening today he would’ve made Culloden seem like a fucking picnic and we would all be better off financially as we wouldn’t be taxed to support this shite.
Cornwallis helped found Halifax, being a major jerk doesn’t take that away from him, hes a part of Halifax’s history if we like it or not, if anything looking back at him is a reminder of how far we’ve come. Anyone wronged by him is long since dead. Anyone who can honestly feel offended, I mean generally offended by something being named after him is no better morally than that man. Because in their own way they are propagating ignorance, and that is the mother of ALL hatred in the world. Holding on to hatred of the past is just as bad as creating it new. And thats a damn shame. And I pity anyone who has that thin a skin.
I’m new to Halifax, and as such don’t know much about the history other than the big clock tower is old and important and what I’ve read here. I’ve also recently discovered, that although I’m of very white and English decent mostly, on of my great great grandmothers was a Mi’kmaq, and I still have distant relatives in Conne River in Newfoundland supposedly. I throw this in merely for fun factoid, it in no way means I’m knowledgeable about first nations culture, I wish I was.
That being said.
I think the fact that although on paper Native Americans have had the same rights as all of us for some time, due to severe social problems that exist in their culture due to European “intervention,” we’ll call it for now, as well as superiority issues present in white culture, it has been a struggle to grasp a piece of this democracy. To a large part of the Mi’kmaq people I’m sure they care little about the naming of a school. However to the leaders of the community, historians, and social rights activists, it means a great deal.
I also think that the argument for not renaming because we need to teach about the history is moot, because then it just becomes the story “and that’s why we changed the name of OUR school to something we can all relate to.”
This wasn’t very well thought out, but you get the idea…
@person of colour
Are John Wesley Chisholm’s view less valid because he speaks from a position of “white privilege”? If they are, aren’t you just substituting racist feelings for logic or reasoning?
The problem is that you rely on an untrue dichotomy–shared by so many who’ve taken lessons in ethno-cultural grievance. You said: “Colonial invaders do what colonial invaders do, they conquer and take what they want without compromise” History has documented this.” Actually, it hasn’t. Native North Americans (and Africans, for that matter) were not merely passive or reactive actors in the colonial project. Local rulers made alliances and treaties, and had their own collective and individual goals in their relations with Europeans. The relationship between the Mi’kmaq and the French is a particularly good example–they too were an invading power, but were not resisted by the original “owners”. Why? Because it was in the interests of the Mik’maq to coexist with the French. Elsewhere in what would become Canada, the British enjoyed excellent relations with aboriginals (like the Mohawk), who sometimes suffered mightily at the hands of the French and their aborignal allies. Most of all, the appearance of the Metis people would tend to suggest that something more than imperialist conquest was going on.
Does this mean there wasn’t racism? That the Mik’maq got what they deserved? Of course not–what it means is that human relations weren’t simple. They still aren’t. But the notion that aboriginal people can be seen as wholly removed from the colonial project, as nothing more than victims awaiting slaughter, is not only untrue, it is an insult to those people.
Thanks for your excellent piece Tim. I also find the argument that “Cornwallis was a man of his time” to be ridiculous. Hitler lost so history vilifies him; Andrew Jackson succeeded in his enforced death-march relocation of the Cherokee and he ends up on the American 20-dollar bill. Human rights are timeless and universal, and bad behaviour is bad behaviour in any century. There are more than enough great Nova Scotians to give names to all our schools. Let’s relegate this monster Cornwallis to the history textbooks where he belongs.
Beancounter, actually in the context of a public forum, John Wesley Chisholm’s views are more valid than mine, since he has the advantage of white privilege.
I am willing to believe that whatever arrangements, treaties that were made between the first nations people and the europeans were made to the advantage of the europeans and not the aboriginals. Why would someone feel the need to have to make treaties with someone over land that was already theirs to begin with, they had everything they needed, tempted with shiny objects, faced with extermination, one may agree to many things to survive.
“John Wesley Chisholm’s views are more valid than mine, since he has the advantage of white privilege.”
Wow, really?
Something is no more valid if present by an evil, soul-sucking white, or a blessed, noble person of colour.
Valid is valid, and true is true.
Now if society chooses to assign more weight or pay attention to one point of view over another, that is not a measure of validity.
Get your victim statements correct.
Sorry, person of colour. If it wasn’t for John’s picture or your choice of handle, we would have no sense of who has more ‘privilege.’ Just comments on a board, to be judged by their own merit. In fact, rather then address his opinon head on, you seem very eager to trot out the largely mythical concept of ‘white privilege’ as a way to reduce the value of his ideas. In your calculation, how much should we mark someone’s opinion down by if they happen to be white? 20%? 25%? Call it the white privilege adjustment factor. As I said below, I think there’s a word for people who judge someone by the colour of their skin and not what they do or say.
On the other issue, I’m afraid you don’t know much about the colonial period. You’ve fallen for the ‘noble savage’ con–spread in the 20th and 21st centuries by cultural Marxists and their fellow travellers. First, you use the term “theirs.” Do you believe aboriginals had a possessive concept of land prior to European arrival? Would they, in the 17th and 18th century, have said “this here is my land–no trespassing”? In a word, no. Second, you apparently buy the idea that aboriginals existed in some sort of paradise, and only made treaties with whitey in order to avoid destruction. Nonsense. In the period we’re talking about, they often made deals for the same reasons everybody makes deals–self interest. You trot out the old beads line–but what about guns? What about alliances against enemy tribes? Does it make your head hurt to admit that aboriginals made deals with whitey in order to beat their traditional enemies?
Feelings and emotion do not validate poor argument. You accuse John of seeing the world through tinted glasses. He’s not the only one.
@ Tom Mason
You said “human rights are timeless and universal.” Why do you think so? And who’s definition of human rights?
So I’m supposed to feel guilty for being white? Good luck with that you commie pinko hippy.
no the name must remain..at least have people,including the natives.learn about the founding father of halifax…burying the name just covers up this history,purifies it,makes it alluring…just deal with the name,and move on..rewriting or sanitizing history cheapins the true aspect of what the europeans and the natives did to each other over 250 years ago..both did evil things to each other,but to blame just one side for this is idiotic ,self serving and divisive …maybe we should ban the name of the indian chef who scalped over fifteen british men in the five years prior to Cornwallis’ decree…how silly revisionist history is!!!!!
Mr. Bousquet, I found your argument interesting, but I feel that you’re essentially attacking low-hanging fruit. If you and the Coast are truly passionate about removing icons of genocide from the city, then I direct you to another icon of World War II. If you’re going to be intellectually honest about refusing to honour those who advocate mass murder, I would expect that you should be calling for the removal of the statue of Winston Churchill.
As a member of cabinet in the lead-up to the First World War, Churchill was one of those who pressed most fiercely for mobilization, and thus bears not a small amount of personal responsibility for the horrors of the war that resulted as a consequence. As a member of cabinet in 1919, Churchill advocated the use of poison gas against Iraqi insurgents. As Prime Minister of Britain, he was ultimately responsible for the most destructive air bombing campaign in human history, killing hundreds of thousands and rendering millions homeless. He was complicit in the development of nuclear weapons, and the hundreds of thousands of deaths that they were to cause.
The issue is straightforward. Whatever positive accomplishments Mr. Churchill may claim, there have been few human beings in history who bear so much responsibility for so much needless death and suffering. Mr. Bousquet, where is the outrage against Churchill? Where are the calls to have his statue removed from its public place of honour? Or are you satisfied to smugly attack a relatively obscure figure, little better or worse than other men of his time?
MRC “…there have been few human beings in history who bear so much responsibility for so much needless death and suffering.’
You appear to be very selective in your history rants.
Mao Tse Tung
Stalin
Both of whom make the Premier League of mass killings and leave Churchill somewhere down in a table comprised of fat bellied Dads having a kick about on a Sunday.
This makes a good case against real mass murderers :
http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/NOTE4.HTM
I particularly like this part : ” Democracies rarely repress their own citizens but authoritarian and totalitarian regimes do. According to one estimate (See Table 1), of the 110 million persons repressed by Marxist-Leninist regimes in the twentieth century, more than 90% were their own citizens. In democracies, less than 0.5% of victims were own citizens. It is statistics, such as these, that suggest some “generality” in Stalin’s behaviour. Empirical studies also suggest that totalitarian regimes generate more “violence” than democracies (Mulligan, Gil, Sala-I-Martin, 2004).
Table 1. Victims of repression, twentieth century (through 1993)
Type of government Total Own citizens Others
Democratic 2,028,000 159,000 1,858,000
Authoritarian 28,676,000 26,092,000 2,584,000
Totalitarian, non-Marxist-Leninist 27,691,000 1,265,000 26,425,000
Marxist-Leninist 110,286,000 101,929,000 8,357,000
Other (guerillas) 518,000 464,000 54,000
Source: Gunnar Heinsohn, Lexikon der Völkermorde (Hamburg: Rowolt, 1998: 53).
or this one : http://www.voxeu.org/index.php?q=node/1525
Yea Tim, I couldn’t have said it better. Who said I wanted Cornwallis removed from history books? I don’t, that would not be accurate history. I just want his name removed from hero status and history books rewritten to relay what he actually did.
By the way, scalping was used extensively by the British in Eastern North America. They managed to wipe out several First Nations from the face of Mother Earth using the Barbarism.
Some have questioned the satements I’ve made in We Were Not the Savages. The following is a statement that I have on the first page of the book, which is to state ‘this is your history”, I’m just putting it to paper.
“To begin this chronicle, I would like to explain the need for a Native American historical perspective, and also my use of certain historical references. The subjugation of the Northeastern North American Native American Nations by the English Crown was accomplished with the use of much barbarity. Not surprisingly, these actions have been studiously ignored or downplayed by most Caucasian male historians. However, their reluctance to enter into honest discussion and critically comment on the matter does not obscure the facts that the documents and journals left behind by colonial English and French scribes irrefutably prove: the blood of the citizens of the Mi’kmaq, Maliseet and their smaller sister Nations, located in what is today eastern Canada and the New England States of the United States of America, was spilled by the English to the point where many were left on the verge of extinction or had passed into it.
The same historical documents also prove beyond a reasonable doubt that supposedly “civilized” colonial English politicians and military personnel used means of terror against First Nations peoples which would repel truly civilized people. Thus, the reluctance of most Caucasian male scribes to discuss and put to paper the details of such behaviour is understandable. To do so is to question the very civility of those who perpetrated the atrocities. As a person who has no such reluctance to expose the crimes against humanity committed by the English, I wrote this book. It details a chronicle of man’s inhumanity to man which has few, if any, equals in human history.
When amassing the information that was needed to write about the English invasion of the territory of the Mi’kmaq, reams of information about the Tribe’s Amerindian allies also had to be digested. For data on the early stages of the invasion, I relied heavily upon doctorial dissertations by Caucasian male scholars and on documents, books and articles prepared by Caucasian male historians, politicians etc. From these I retrieved praise of the Mi’kmaq and other Amerindians, and also minute descriptions of the shocking racist behaviour of English colonial authorities. To assure as much accuracy as possible I compared their conclusions against one another and with many other original sources, and then formed my own conclusions from a Mi’kmaq perspective.
I used the research of these men as sources for two reasons. First and foremost, because of my ancestry, Eurocentric society would tend to discount, as biased and exaggerated, research on the subject presented by an “Indian.” But, I reasoned, how can they argue with the documents and findings of their own? Second, why do work that has already been done?”
Before a person gets into this debate he/she should educate themselves. Start by reading my book http://www.danielnpaul.com/WeWereNotTheSav…
Joeblow, I said that there have been few human beings in history who bear so much responsibility for so much needless death and suffering, not that there have been none bearing greater responsibility. You have named two that are responsible for more. There’s a third that’s easy to name. It would be easy to throw in names like Genghis Khan, Alexander the Great, and the various high ranking henchmen of the leaders with the most blood on their hands. Perhaps you can make a decent sized list with a hundred or more people. Even if you could, it would not change Churchill’s place on that list.
For all of his positive accomplishments, Churchill is directly responsible for human suffering and death on a scale far, far greater than Cornwallis planned, let alone accomplished.
Those who want Cornwallis’ honours removed on the basis of his murderous orders should do the logical thing, and campaign for Churchill’s statue to be removed, on the basis of the mass murder that he ordered.
I have read all that is here…
What a load of crap! First off; Kirk Arsenault did what he did because it was the “RIGHT” thing to do. How many times have I heard white people like some of you who commented here say” Those Packies are invading our land. We should send them all back to where they belong”. (This is just the latest slur). I find the comments about this issue to be repugnant. The Mi’kmaq people (Originally a peaceful and accepting people, who were described by the french as true Christians) (High praise from the French) were almost completely eradicated by the British government (Men Women, Children, the elderly, and sick too. No Mercy for Any of them). This is fact. The attacks on Dartmouth were a response by natives to a blatant invasion and theft of their land. Another fact. The idea that Native people had no concept of ownership is false. There were clearly marked boarders separating those first nations, that tell us that the first peoples had a very good sense of ownership. Small objects like tools or other things made in a village were shared by those villagers, but the land was kept by the people who belonged to it.
if you all cant take off your proverbial pointy white hats, and stop burning crosses on your lawns then I have no pity for your ascendants. They will have to face a growing group of minorities in the future that will eventually out number them. All those “niggers, packies, waps, kikes, chinks, japs, towel heads, and also those darned prairy niggers” (I am sorry if I left anyone out), will be the new majority, and the white kids (YOUR ascendants) as adults will only START to feel what your idiotic, self worshiping, irresponsible, cowardly words and actions will cause. Can we not evolve as a society?
It is really interesting to read your comments. Most pulled from your asses. How angry you all were when a few Arabic people lashed out and murdered hundreds of North Americans. You were all ready to nuke the entire middle east. SHAME ON YOU! A freaking WAR was declared by WHITE governments and you are whining about the changing of a school name? Get a grip. it was YOUR ancestors who invaded, murdered, raped, and pillaged this land and it’s inhabitants. The natives welcomed the French as brothers, and saved them from scurvy long before they realized there would be more coming. The native did not start the act of scalping. NO WAY! and anyone who says different is a coward for trying to lay that blame on anyone other than the British, Dutch, and French. The Iroquois supported the English because they had no choice. They too would have suffered at the hands of the Europeans. The Iroquois sided with the English to save themselves from genocide. An act of desperation and survival, NOT to drive their enemies into extinction. To even suggest such a thing shows how ignorant you are about Iroquois culture, and their respect for their opponents. Just because a thing is written in a book does not make it truth, Nor does a thing spoken make it a lie.
The fact is…The white invaders came here with the mentality of a schoolyard bully. ‘We are bigger and have a bigger stick so you have to do what we say or else. By the way…gimme your lunch money.’ And like so many bullies that have grown up (That term I use loosely), some of them refuse to admit, even to themselves, that what their people did was terrible, and instead hide behind their own self inflicted ignorance.
I dont expect anyone to feel guilt from what Cornwallis did, but I would like to think that you all might be willing to have a bit of compassion and see how this will all effect the children both native and non native, and those children of the future. Our schools should be named after great educators, both academic and social. People who taught, (and some are still teaching), acceptance, and patience for our fellow human beings. Just as our arenas should be named after great athletes. I would suggest that we rename many things to honor those veterans who gave their very lives to ensure freedom for all people. Those unsung heroes. LETS ALL START SINGING ABOUT THEM. Why should we name things after pencil pushers and bureaucrats, kings and tyrants, who all to often and more than not are more interested in lining their own pockets than actually making a positive difference. A positive difference that Kirk Arsenault tried to make. The coward who claimed that Mr. Arsenault was not a good board member and that he seldom spoke at meetings, might consider that Mr. Arsenault might have chosen to speak only when he had something relevant to say that might add a positive approach to any issue the board was dealing with. Perhaps he doesn’t have a loud mouth or over grown ego that forces him to ramble on about topics and slow the bureaucratic process down. Halifax might have a truly selfless person in Mr. Arsenault. I for one am glad he decided to speak up on this topic. I noticed that person slurred Mr. Arsenault’s name but was too cowardly to identify themselves.
I also spent some time in Europe and I was moved and infinitely impressed by the German people’s willingness to face their past and heal the wounds created by it. It is not guilt that they feel, but compassion for the ascendants of the victims of THEIR holocaust. Is it really all that big a deal to change the name of a thing? No, it isn’t. It is those truly arrogant, cowardly, self inflated few who stand in they way of this healing process. Those few who are afraid that as soon as they admit to the atrocities caused by their own people, and do something about it, that they will have look in the mirror and actually feel guilt.
Don’t carry the guilt, please. Instead, I beg you all to try and accept the process of healing. To refuse this is to nurture the same ignorance and arrogance that those early Europeans carried with them as a badge of honor. Too many of you have either body bag mentalities, and refuse to act until it is too late, or you are simply full of false pride. Too many of you are hypocrites, and speak with…ahem…forked tongues.
I dont want anyone punished anymore. Lets teach what Cornwallis did, not honor it.
I challenge you all to find a Native community who honors the killing of whites by naming there schools after the perpetrators of those killings. Find a black community who honors any black person for bringing harm to anyone. Is it ok for the Muslim communities to erect buildings to honor Osama Bin laden? How about Osama Bin Laden Memorial Airport? Hows that sound? Or maybe the Hirohito Ship Building co.? Or even the Saddam Hussein Hospital for sick kids.
One of the wisest things I have ever heard was from the mouth of a black man who had every right to harbour resentment toward whites;
“…Cant we all just get along?”
Mark Dorey
PS: I am a human being first and formost, as I see all my colorful brothers and sisters, of all races, whites included.
“You can’t apply today’s standards to people of the past. That just gets silly.”
Like my late friend, Long Standing Bear Chief (Blackfoot), once replied when I foolishly made the same comment; “Didn’t those people have some kind of teaching from a holy book for the last 2000 years that forbid killing, lying, and stealing? I think that book also said something to the effect of ‘love thy neighbor.'”
Thank you Mr. Paul for taking the time to read and comment.
You’ve definitely entered the muddy trenches of public discourse here. I think you’ll agree it’s an exciting but very tough place. It is surely made better and more useful when people like yourself join the discussion.
My hope is that beyond the cross lights that flash in these discussions there are millions and millions of people who don’t judge who and what to believe, and to what degree, based on the societal group to which they or their ancestors belonged. That is the joy of the age of reason well applied and we can all hope that the coming century will be a renaissance of reason.
I believe reason, even more than our aesthetic experiences, is the tool that will best equip us to understand, appreciate and learn to live with the fellow inhabitants of our planet.
Thank you for your work and public service in generating this worthwhile discussion.
Re-naming the school is small potatoes in the overall scheme of things, I suspect that most people in and around the area will still refer to it as Cornwallis school.
I don’t believe there’s a race on this earth that does not have blood on it’s hands at some point in their history.
I would be alarmed if compensation were sought, as that would just confirm what a lot of people think most issues related to First Nations are about.
@ Mark Dorey:
I guess you haven’t heard that the modern definition of ‘racist’ is someone who’s winning an argument with a liberal. You might want to ask the Coast to remove your post–technically, there’s no exception to hate speech laws, even for fellow travellers of our human rights commissions.
Thank you so much for this article and for basing it on the notion of kindness. I speak in schools all the time on many subjects from race to sexual orientation but every talk I give has one dominant theme…kindness. And I’m comforted by the fact that for every person who speaks out with hate and unkindness there are hundreds of Nova Scotians, who may not be as likely to get fired up and write emails and posts, but who live their lives with, and teach their childen about, the concept of kindness.
Candy Palmater
Keep it real instead of faux real…it was never about keeping the whites safe, it was about keeping the English safe..the Acadiens and Scottish Gaels didnot feel safe at all with the English around just like the Natives…..so to say it was to keep whites safe is an ignorant comment to say by Granatstein
Person of colour: you are a victicrat to the bone…..there is so much I could say about your Ethnicity Class 101 mentality…but really cannot be bothered…other than to share that your comments about the other poster’s home land having stolen their name from Africa and tried to hide is as pathetic as it gets. In fact I find it to be quite racist as the English used to accuse the Scots of being nothing but thieves…perhaps you should get a library card, they are free and learn a wee bit of gaelic to see the origins of words in Scotland….
“Well given today’s apparent right of “whites” to drop freedom bombs, to displace millions of people, to torture, to force economic restructuring, etc, on any off populace in the world, I’d say that standards haven’t much changed.” Really Tim? Perhaps that’s one paragraph which should have been omitted out of this otherwise well written article.
History is history, it’s not objective. To place blame on one race and one particular individual for their transgressions is racism undo itself. In the past and currently, there are many non-white/half-white/yellow/red/black etc leaders who were probably more of a savage than Cornwallis ever was. Gadhafi, Mugabe, Bin Laden, Gbagbo, Karadzic, Glooscap, to name a few. I’m sure most of them have a school or a public institution in their name, which is sad, however their names will never be forgotten in history.
With all due respect to the Mi’kmaq people, the renaming of Cornwallis Junior High sets a very negative and unintelligent precedent. How will future generations of non-natives ever learn of Cornwallis’ atrocities? History textbooks are great, but usually tell the story from the “white” point of view. When your 13 year old is attending Cornwallis Junior High and asks who he was, it is up to the educated parents to explain the truth of who the man was from all sides.
Why was my criticism of Mr. Bousquet’s fuck up on this topic that was on CBC’s The Current this morning deleted?
Why was my criticism of Mr. Bousquet’s fuck up on this topic that was on the radio this morning deleted?
Go ahead and rename it. I’m all for it. But I’m still waiting for a response regarding your comments on The Current yesterday, Mr. Bousquet.
You suggested that there is a significant number of Mi’kmaq children that attend or have attended Cornwallis Junior High School. That’s hilarious! My guess on that front would be either zero or that you could count them on one hand. You do know where the school is, don’t you?
How many white Cornwallis students or former students did you speak to in order to determine and proclaim that they don’t have a clue about what Edward Cornwallis did? I know several recent graduates of that school who know all about the issue. They can’t be the only ones.
Have you spoken to salon supply staff who posed with hair extensions and wigs around the statue of Cornwallis? If I were to guess, as I suspect you did, I’d say they knew exactly what they were doing and did it in a spirit of wry irony. Why else would they have chosen that particular location? You seemed to be suggesting that hairdressers couldn’t possibly be educated enough to know what a horrible faux pas they’d made.
How it is that you feel you can accurately describe the feelings and opinions of all residents of HRM. I assure you that most residents have never heard of you. If you imagine you have your finger on the pulse of this berg, that you represent me, you’re delusional and a pretty sad excuse for a journalist. Not to mention a bit of a snob.
I think at least Dan Paul and other advocates have educated those who didnot know otherwise about the role the white English played in harming Natives on their own native land. This poses a disturbing underlying question: why do so many not know this part of Canadian History…I find it apropos to change the name of the school to something that connotes education in a positive inspiring manner.
Perhaps if we leave it be the lesson is still learned in that one should be encouraged to get their education so you will never be so arrogant and ignorant to assume to have the right to harm another human being based on your own elite and narcissistic ethnic views of yourself.
Keeping Eddie there would be that reminder of what happens when you chose to be ignorant. He is an important part of history whether we like it or not ..we do not erase it… we just do not celebrate it putting him on a pedestal.
Keep on mind, the pigeons have been blunt critics for years long before Dan Paul 😉
I’m waaay ting……
“I’m waaay ting……”
Invite Tim to a duel, with pistols from the 1700’s and all.
I’d pay to see that, and then we could watch Sloane and Karsten go at it as well.
This is my second and last comment. Over the years many Mi’kmaq and other First Nation children have attended Cornwallis Jr. High, they had no choice, they had no transportation to go elsewhere, and it was school board policy for many years that a child had to attend school in the School District where he/she resided. A FACT: Not all First Nation Peoples live on reserve, in Nova Scotia the Halifax metro area has the largest Indigenous population, over five thousand.
It gives me chills to know that there are so many Caucasians out there who would swear on their Holy Book that they are not racist, yet they go all out to try to defend the indefensible, the attempted ethnic cleansing of this land of it’s Indigenous population, a People of colour! The killing of non-combatants is considered a war crime. The killing of children is infanticide, which is an unforgivable sin, and it is indefensible. Example, over two thousand years ago, while trying to prevent the appearance of a predicted Messiah, King Herod ordered the slaughter of all infant Jewish boys; he has never been forgiven for the horrendous crime and never should he be, nor should any of the other human monsters who have indulged in such barbarism.
Did the English authorities in London deem what Cornwallis did humane? The answer is no, but they tolerated it. In a memo to him about how his actions might cause all Tribes in North America to rise up in rebellion against the British they included this caution; “by filling the minds of bordering Indians with ideas of our cruelty”
Consider the following about a monster who is held a hero by his followers:
“Ratko Mladic was hauled before a judge Thursday — the first step in facing charges for international war crimes, including the slaughter of 8,000 Muslim men and boys in the Bosnian town of Srebrenica in 1995….
Mladic, 69, was one of the world’s most-wanted fugitives. He was the top commander of the Bosnian Serb army during Bosnia’s 1992-95 war, which killed more than 100,000 people and drove another 1.8 million from their homes. Thousands of Muslims and Croats were killed, tortured or driven out in a campaign to purge the region of non-Serbs.
He was accused by the UN International Criminal Tribunal in The Hague, Netherlands, of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes for the massacre of Muslims by Bosnian Serb forces in eastern Bosnia and the relentless four-year siege of Sarajevo….
Judge Fouad Riad of the UN tribunal said there was evidence against Mladic of “unimaginable savagery.”
“Thousands of men executed and buried in mass graves, hundreds of men buried alive, men and women mutilated and slaughtered, children killed before their mothers’ eyes, a grandfather forced to eat the liver of his own grandson,” Riad said during Mladic’s 1995 indictment in absentia.”
This is how his followers responded:
“The Serbian Radical Party called Mladic a “hero” and described his seizure as “one of the hardest moments in Serbian history.” The extreme-right group 1389 said the arrest was “treason.”
Hundreds of pro-Mladic demonstrators in the northern city of Novi Sad tried to break into the offices of the governing Democratic Party but were prevented by riot police. At least two people were reported injured.
They didn’t even wake us up,” said a resident who identified himself only as Zoran for fear of retaliation.
He and other residents of the village of 2,000 people insisted they had no idea Mladic was living in their midst — not that they would have minded.
“I’m furious,” Zoran said. “They arrested our hero.” “
To those who try to defend the indefensible. Give the before mentioned a lot of thought before you continue to insist that Cornwallis remain on a pedestal!
“This is my second and last comment. “
Mr. Paul, your wasting your breath and time attempting to enlighten the masses here. The difference between racism here and racism in the USA, is that here it is denied. People say that racism today is subtle, personally, i don’t think it’s that subtle at all, whether it be the racist policies, or the actual practices of employers/cities/government, or the delusional rants of those in the anonymous comment sections who fancy themselves as intelligent. Fact is, racism here in good ole nova scotia is firmly linked with denial. We are accused of playing the “race card”, when in fact the white man’s “denial card” trumps our so-called “race card”. The truth hurts. Mr. Paul, your comparsion to Mladic are undeniably accurate and relevant, but these people will argue against it. Deal with it folks, as much as it angers you, deal with it.
A quick trip to Dartmouth and you can see CCGS Edward Cornwallis back home from hosting Will & Kate in Summerside,PEI where they watched a lifesaving exercise from the helicopter deck and then chatted with the crew of the ship.
The ship is 25 years old which means it will be around here for at least another 10-15 years.
“The ship is 25 years old which means it will be around here for at least another 10-15 years.”
Perhaps a name change is in order.
onlymakessense – here is a few more names to get you worked up ;
http://www.cornwallischevrolet.com/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CFB_Cornwalli…
http://www.cornwallisreunion.ca/history.ht…
http://www.cornwallisreunion.ca/history.ht…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornwallis_Ri…
http://cornwallis.com/
http://www.cornwallisbaptist.ca/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornwallis_Is…)
http://www.gov.cornwallis.mb.ca/
Listen if we had to rename every monument dedicated to a racist pig, we’d have to name our edifices simple nouns like table, chair and red. As a native of Montreal, I can tell you that almost every one of our subway stops is named after an anti-Semites, including Lionel Groulx; the hub of the entire system.
What complete hogwash. This article doesn’t represent historical fact at all. But I guess that shouldn’t be a surprise as these days people just take what they want — and seldom the facts — and disregard what doesn’t fit their narrative.