Between 1830 and 1998, Canadian governments and churches separated more than 150,000 native children from their parents and placed them in mandatory boarding schools. Children were forced by the schools to cut their hair, forget about their cultural heritage and traditions, and were banned from speaking their native languages. There were reports of sexual and physical abuse, and some of the children even committed suicide. Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission found that this effort amounted to “a cultural genocide." Over the last month, Canadians have discovered hundreds of unmarked graves belonging to children who may have died at the schools due to disease or neglect; some were even been killed. It is estimated that close to 4,100 children vanished from the schools nationwide, but numbers could be even closer to 10,000. In this episode, Drew and Alex discuss this atrocity, what it looks like for a nation like Canada to reconcile with its past, and why the United States needs to do the same. They also discuss recent Catholic Church burnings around Canada that are a reaction to the discovery of these unmarked graves. Is justice served with an eye for an eye?
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