Celebrating Canada's 150th: February

This month I've got another nonfiction title: Seven Fallen Feathers: Racism, Death and Hard Truths in a Northern City by Tanya Talaga

Book Summary: In 1966, twelve-year-old Chanie Wenjack froze to death on the railway tracks after running away from residential school. An inquest was called and four recommendations were made to prevent another tragedy. None of those recommendations were applied.

More than a quarter of a century later, from 2000 to 2011, seven Indigenous high school students died in Thunder Bay, Ontario. The seven were hundreds of miles away from their families, forced to leave home and live in a foreign and unwelcoming city. Five were found dead in the rivers surrounding Lake Superior, below a sacred Indigenous site. Jordan Wabasse, a gentle boy and star hockey player, disappeared into the minus twenty degrees Celsius night. The body of celebrated artist Norval Morrisseau’s grandson, Kyle, was pulled from a river, as was Curran Strang’s. Robyn Harper died in her boarding-house hallway and Paul Panacheese inexplicably collapsed on his kitchen floor. Reggie Bushie’s death finally prompted an inquest, seven years after the discovery of Jethro Anderson, the first boy whose body was found in the water.

Using a sweeping narrative focusing on the lives of the students, award-winning investigative journalist Tanya Talaga delves into the history of this small northern city that has come to manifest Canada’s long struggle with human rights violations against Indigenous communities. - from amazon.ca

My thoughts: This books was a gut-wrenching, heart-breaking reality check showing how racism is still very much alive and thriving in Canada today.   Tanya Talaga is a journalist with roots in Northern Ontario and working in Toronto.  She travels to Thunder Bay with a story in mind - wondering how to mobilize local First Nations so that they participate in federal elections - and discovers that her interview attempts fall flat on an audience who simply want to talk about the local high school students who've drowned in the river.  Local First Nations leaders are trying to raise alarm bells, and no one's listening.  Initially, Talaga is skeptical too.  But she promises to listen, do her research and if there's a story here, she promises to tell it. 

What she shares are the lives of 7 young people who died in mysterious, unexplained and poorly investigated ways.  She shares the stories of their families, who have to live with heartbreak and unanswered questions.  She shared the pain of northern communities who have been hurt, ignored, side-lined and forgotten - not just once or twice, but for generations.  

I would consider this book a must-read for all Canadians.  Genuine reconciliation requires knowledge and compassion, and then action. Several times, this book points out in very clear ways the role of an uncaring public: if we're not interested and don't care, then racists can get away with racist attitudes, remarks and actions; then police services can get away with hasty, inconclusive answers; then politicians can get away with big talk and small action. 

All of these young people were living far away from their communities, family and friends - essentially, they were orphans.  And rather than caring for the vulnerable: the young, the orphans and the poor, the city of Thunder Bay, Ontarians and Canadians turned a blind eye to their suffering and the deaths and preferred easy answers over hard truths.  Now, Tanya Talaga is calling on us all to really see these young people and their families.  To look and not turn away.  And the truth is a painful one that requires action.