Excerpts from the transcript of an As It Happens podcast:
Later this month, the Federal Government will apologize for the mass slaughter of Inuit sled dogs in the 1950s and 1960s. More than a thousand dogs were shot and killed by the RCMP, employees of the Hudson's Bay Company and other government officials across Nunavik, the Inuit region of northern Quebec...PITA AATAMI: We've tried to look into why they decided to start shooting the dogs there was never a clear answer, but there was always questions about safety and that some children had been mauled and killed by sled dogs. But these are not pets, these Eskimos sled dogs, they were used for their livelihood. Some could be very mean. And so at the same time, the stories when I started hearing about these killings, I was starting to ask, why did they shoot your dogs? They couldn't go back to their camps. They couldn't go back to their trap lines. They couldn't do anything anymore. So, then one woman that really caught my attention was a lady from [inaudible], which is next door to [inaudible]. She was talking about that when her husband's dogs were shot. They were living in a shack and they would just stare out the window, looking out the window. Couldn't go hunting any more. Couldn't go get any more wood from the tree line, Couldn't go get their ice, couldn't go out hunting anymore. It's like he lost a part of his life. So she was crying when she told us this, that the pain that people went through. And I had one lady as well from [inaudible] that talked about wanting to, telling the police, please save me one dog. They had nine dogs. And the policeman didn't listen to that lady, even though she said, leave me one dog. We're going to still need dogs. But the policeman didn't listen, shot all the dogs. Their livelihood was taken away. It's like they had to be in the community. Now they couldn't go out, do their hunting. Only a few people at that time could afford snow machines. And the snow machines that they were coming out were not reliable, were not reliable at all. So people still prefer the dogs to the skidoo at that time. And at a skidoo can get lost. But a dog can never get lost, even if they're going through a storm, they always bring them home no matter what. So they knew [inaudible] and that they were our livelihood. That was part of who we are.The Government of Quebec apologized for the slaughter in 2011 and gave former sled dog owners three million dollars in compensation. Ottawa hasn't offered any compensation until now.
This is all new to me, and I will defer to readers from Canada as to why this program was conducted back then. The government claim of dangerous dogs sounds phony for such a widespread campaign. To my cynical mind the slaughter of the dogs carries undertones of ethnic cleansing.
Comments and insights, please.
The article makes it sound an awful lot like why the buffalo were exterminated in America, which was to destroy the livelihoods of the indigenous people. The cruelty that European colonists exported around the world knows no bounds. And when I was a kid in grade school, I was taught to call this "manifest destiny". Manifest genocide is more like it.
ReplyDeleteIf you want to read about the slaughter of the buffaloes, go read Buffalo Bill's Dairy "The life of William F. Cody, Known as Buffalo Bill". He wrote it himself.
DeleteHere it is on the Library of Congress website: https://www.loc.gov/item/07019551/ Surprisingly, my local library has no copy. I found a copy in a used book store long time ago.
He keeps reporting about hunting parties where he's the star and casually mentions how he shot dozens if not hundreds of buffaloes a day. There must have been so many that there was no thought of their finite numbers.
I thought it was quite a fascinating read, just to see what his point of view was. You rarely get to read the words of someone of some time in history directly. It's quite readable.
Two copies in our library system - thank you. I think you were a reader here years ago when I wrote about the "buffalo chest" -
Deletehttps://tywkiwdbi.blogspot.com/2020/02/buffalo-chest-and-american-bison.html
I certainly was, but forgot or missed that image. Certainly fits in what I remember from Buffalo Bill....
DeleteAlthough, I'm sure your average current slaughterhouse could produce similar piles, if they weren't grinding all the bones up to get that last little bit of protein squeezed into a sausage.
Another interesting post.
DeleteUntil I had read the post about buffalo I had always wondered about how many arrows it would take to kill a buffalo and how long it would take. Especially after watching “Dances Wirth Wolves” and the scene where they fill Timmons full of arrows.
Control. Helpless without dogs, completely dependent for food, heat, life.
ReplyDeleteI remember cousins in Ontario talking about it but they were down in Hamilton and not where it was happening so they only knew what the government told them.
xoxoxoBruce
Similar to the flooding of Celilo Falls on the Columbia River with the completion of The Dalles Dam. The dam wasn't necessary for power generation, flood control, or navigation but it did extinguish the most important indigenous salmon fishery in the northwest (North America?) at a time when the government's policy toward indigenous people was one of assimilation. See also, federally run boarding schools for indigenous children. "Kill the Indian, save the man," whatever the proffered reasoning.
ReplyDeleteThe horrors visited upon humans and animals by whoever happens to have the power to do so. It's mind blowing. And seemingly endless.
ReplyDelete