Ottawa plans to announce new stat holiday

[Raymond Luxury Yacht]

It's important to acknowledge it, and I wouldn't complain about an extra stat.  No one should be made to feel guilty about our government's past mistakes, it's good to recognize it, and try to help the people who need a hand.

[Ghostsof1915]

9 minutes ago, Tortorella's Rant said:

March doesn't have one either. I always find myself coming to a crawl between Family Day and Easter in April. Alternatively I could use sick days or vaca days, but I like to save those for later.

Depends on the year, doesn't Easter happen at times in late March?

[Tortorella's Rant]

1 minute ago, Ghostsof1915 said:

Depends on the year, doesn't Easter happen at times in late March?

Uh, I guess. It did this year? Anyway, it's like 7 weeks between long weekends. 

[otherwise]

6 hours ago, VanGnome said:

Fair enough, but why specifically include the reason being the "declaration of cultural genocide" seems far too apologetic. Why not simply say we want to federally recognize and celebrate the rich cultural history of the aboriginal peoples.

The apologetic, white guilt narrative for me taints what should be an outstandingly positive move forward of reconciliation between the federal government and aboriginal leaders.

Because that's what it's called. Because little kids were taken from their families, with the goal of destroying their cultural beliefs, language and traditions, many suffered abuse and trauma. This practice continued for several generations. White people did this. The effects of this and other racist policies are still being felt today. Acknowledgement and education of all Canadians is needed.

 

6 hours ago, DADDYROCK said:

Our Government and the Catholic Church should be ashamed of themselves for what they did to our first nations peoples,the states is pulling the same outrageous type of behavior with taking children away from parents at the borders.

 

So if we can learn from history and talk about it openly, it is good for mankind in general and maybe these types of behaviors will never be repeated.

agree, though it wasn't only the Catholic Church that was involved, other churches were too, and if I'm not mistaken all others came to some sort of financial compensation and apology package in the late 90's- early 2000's.  EXCEPT the Catholic Church who has not admitted wrong doing, apologized or really done anything about it. Like many of their other scandals around the world.

1 hour ago, Lancaster said:

Instead of having a day to just constantly remind ourselves of the poor decisions of the past, why not just simply have the new holiday as a celebration of Aboriginal cultures, achievements, etc?

 

Better to use this opportunity for looking into the future rather than just focusing on the past.  

I think it can be an opportunity to learn the mistakes of the past, but to also celebrate the cultural diversity of indigenous people.

[Duds]

This is 100% a political move. JT will have the majority of the workforce in favour of another stat, he can add another feather to his social justice cap, and if the conservatives oppose this he can call them racist. 

[JM_]

10 hours ago, Duds said:

This is 100% a political move. JT will have the majority of the workforce in favour of another stat, he can add another feather to his social justice cap, and if the conservatives oppose this he can call them racist. 

except the truth and reconciliation commission on residential schools started and was conducted under Harper and this new holiday was one of its recommendations. So unless Stephen Harper is now considered a soy eating leftie I think the political part is shared. 

[Russ]

I guess I shouldn't complain about another day for my boss to pay me that I won't work but I just find it a bad way to add it in.  I understand that it may help push the understanding of the situation by having a national holiday for the event to try and promote it but it just feels like a weird way to do it in my opinion.  I guess if you just dedicated a day or week it would be pushed aside and forgotten easily.

[Toews]

4 minutes ago, Russ said:

I guess I shouldn't complain about another day for my boss to pay me that I won't work but I just find it a bad way to add it in.  I understand that it may help push the understanding of the situation by having a national holiday for the event to try and promote it but it just feels like a weird way to do it in my opinion.  I guess if you just dedicated a day or week it would be pushed aside and forgotten easily.

Personally I think it might have made more sense to have a Indigenous history month similar to Black history month. Canadians need to learn the atrocities that our governments committed in the past, to describe this as "White Guilt" is absurd. Canada is now home to people of all different backgrounds and cultures and they all need to learn about how this country was built and came about. We as Canadians have a shared responsibility towards those of us who have suffered as a result of this country's past. It was inspiring to me to see so many Canadians come together to support the victims of the Humboldt Broncos tragedy and the Fort McMurray wildfire. We only become stronger as a country when we come together to take care of our most vulnerable.