By Luke Stewart
On 27 February 2011, over one hundred Six Nations solidarity activists gathered to hold a truth and reconciliation rally and celebrate the fifth anniversary of the reclamation of Kanonhstaton (the Douglas Creek Estates) by people of the Six Nations on 28 February 2006. Coinciding with the solidarity celebration was the counter “truth and reconciliation”[1] rally held by Canadian Advocates for Charter Equality (CANACE).
In the week leading up to the fifth year anniversary of the reclamation of Kanonhstaton (Douglas Creek Estates) by Six Nations activists, a lot of smoke was blown by Gary McHale and Mark Vandermaas about the failure of the “rule of law” in Caledonia and their demands for an apology by the Ontario Provincial Police (OPP), the Ontario Government, and the Six Nations Band Council. On 23 February 2010, McHale announced at a press conference at Queen’s Park that CANACE and the Caledonia Victim’s Project’s intention of erecting an “apology monument” on the road allowance across from Kanonhstaton. The press release announcing the 27 February 2010 “truth and reconciliation” rally stated:
Our purpose is to reach out to those responsible for what happened in Haldimand County with a message of hope – that healing and reconciliation will begin once they have acknowledged their role in victimizing innocents [of Caledonia] (which included native victims as well as non-natives) and have promised that it will not be allowed to happen again.[2]
The irony of this message of “hope” was not lost on most. In response, the Six Nations Solidarity Network (6NSN) organized their own truth and reconciliation rally all throughout the month of February with people of Six Nations. Through inverting the telescope, McHale would like us to believe that the provincial, federal, and Six Nations Band Council’s tri-apology for the past five years of Caledonia resident’s “victimization” and the breakdown of the “rule of law” will end the conflict. It is clear that goals of McHale, et al., are to end what they call “race based policing” or “two tier policing” as if this will somehow bring truth and reconciliation to the people of Six Nations. The dream of equality is surely a noble one, however, if you fail to accept the simple fact that in modern day Canada, as well as in Canada’s historical past, not everyone is treated equally, there will be no basis for healing, truth, or reconciliation.
This essay will outline the smoke that has been blown around by the McHale, et al., during February 2011 and assess its effectiveness at bringing about a real truth and reconciliation process. At the outset, I should make clear my biases. First, I am an Anglo-Saxon, middle class kid from Brantford, Ontario. I have been a beneficiary of the theft and misappropriation of Six Nations lands and of the capitalist economy that was set up without their, or any other indigenous peoples’, consent. As a settler, I have come to understand that I must take responsibility for my history and begin a truth and reconciliation process with those from whom I have benefited. To some of you, this may sound like I am just a “guilty” white guy. However, it is my belief that one of the first steps in the process of truth and reconciliation is an understanding of mistakes that have been committed and how to right those mistakes. Second, I am an organizer with the Six Nations Solidarity Network.
The actual rally was covered by Tallula Marigold in “Six Nations, Caledonia Residents and Activists Come Together to Support Land Reclamation: Can’t Spell ‘Solidarity’ without ‘Solid’”[3] in the Toronto Media Co-op as well as video coverage of the rally by Niki Thorne also on the Toronto Media Co-Op.[4] There was also mainstream media coverage of the event that was woefully inadequate and is one of the main reasons for writing this article.[5]
It should also be noted that this is not the first time that McHale, et al., have organized a rally that was confronted by members of the Six Nations Solidarity Network. In 2009 leaders of CANACE played leading roles in trying to establish the “Caledonia Militia” and on March 21st, 2010 they called an “anti-racist” rally on the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination to bring attention to the “race-based policing” that discriminates against white people.[6]Anti-racist and Six Nations solidarity activists organized to denounce the escalation of racism and colonial violence on both occasions.[7]
The Rule of Law, Lawlessness, and Lawbreakers
There is a lot of talk about “law-breakers,” “the rule of law,” “lawlessness,” etc. For instance, on 28 February 2010, the official anniversary of the reclamation of Kanonhstaton, Conservative opposition leader Tim Hudak (Niagara West-Glanbrook) referred to the Six Nations occupiers as “lawbreaking militants” and “lawbreakers” in question period at Queen’s Park.[8] The simple question is: who are the lawbreakers and who are acting lawlessly? If McHale, Blatchford, et al. are serious about the “rule of law” they must surely know that the Haldimand Proclamation of 1784 is part of the “rule of law” in Canada. The reclamation of the Douglas Creek Estates is just that –reclamation of the law. It also seems that the OPP, the Province, and the Federal government treated this as a land claim despite Blatchford’s arguments otherwise in Helpless: Caledonia’s Nightmare of Fear and Anarchy, and How the Law Failed Us All.
We have clearly put too much faith in the law. It should be remembered that Canadian courts have historically upheld racist laws. We simply need not look any further than the fact the Indian Act of 1876 is still in effect.[9] James Walker has written an excellent history of racism as it pertains to Canadian law in “Race,” Rights and the Law in the Supreme Court of Canada where he discusses the Chinese Head Tax, the disfranchisement of Chinese and Japanese immigrants in the late-nineteenth century, the Quong Wing Supreme Court decision of 1914 that codified racism as based on cultural differences into law, as well as the Gitxsan-Wet’suwet’en Nation v. British Columbia Supreme Court case in 1991 whereby Chief Justice Allan McEachern argued that indigenous oral tradition had no validity in Canadian courts because indigenous life before colonization had been “nasty, brutish, and short”.[10]
The Canadian (in)justice system has preyed on indigenous peoples. The incarcerations rates, as compared to the rest of the Canadian population, have reached a crisis point. The Office of the Correctional Investigator of Canada has even stated: “While Aboriginal peoples comprise of 2.7 percent of the adult Canadian population, approximately 18.5 percent of offenders now serving federal sentences are of First Nations, Métis and Inuit ancestry.”[11] Moreover, indigenous women represent over 30 percent of the prison population in women’s prisons.[12]
The Canadian Auto Workers (C.A.W.) – members of the Six Nations Solidarity Network – know all too well what happens when contracts are broken. The C.A.W. statement that was distributed at the rally stated:
We should never sweep under the carpet real past wrongs. We can’t settle genuine disputes by way of force and injunctions. Union members know all too well what it means to face an employer who refuses to bargain and who resorts to injunctions to impose its will without negotiation. This is why we the undersigned CAW Local Unions are here to say Negotiations YES! Injunctions NO! Solidarity with First Nations![13]
McHale, et al., claim they are “equality activists” and that they are dead set on ending what they call “race based” or “two tier” policing. Again, there is a simple question: why are there “two tiers,” if these “tiers” exist at all? In all of this smoke that is blowing around, it seems that McHale, et al., refuse to acknowledge why there is a split in the first place and how he is contributing to that split. According to the CANACE website:
WE BELIEVE that the ‘rule of law’ is the foundation of democracy, and that citizens should settle their differences without resorting to violence, terrorism and other lawlessness.
WE SUPPORT, promote and vigorously defend the belief that all people are equal before the law and that all people should be protected by the law.[14]
CANACE invokes the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Perhaps McHale grew too tired and did not make it to Section 25, where it clearly states:
25. The guarantee in this Charter of certain rights and freedoms shall not be construed so as to abrogate or derogate from any aboriginal, treaty or other rights or freedoms that pertain to the aboriginal peoples of Canada including
(a) any rights or freedoms that have been recognized by the Royal Proclamation of October7, 1763; and
(b) any rights or freedoms that now exist by way of land claims agreements or may be so
acquired.
Moreover, Section 35 of the Constitution Act of 1982 states:
35. (1) The existing aboriginal and treaty rights of the aboriginal peoples of Canada are
hereby recognized and affirmed.
(2) In this Act, “aboriginal peoples of Canada” includes the Indian, Inuit and Métis
peoples of Canada.
(3) For greater certainty, in subsection (1) “treaty rights” includes rights that now exist
by way of land claims agreements or may be so acquired.
(4) Notwithstanding any other provision of this Act, the aboriginal and treaty rights referred to in subsection (1) are guaranteed equally to male and female persons.
Calling on Church Leaders… What Happens When the Right Wing Misappropriates Martin Luther King, Jr.
On 24 February 2010, Gary McHale wrote a “Letter to Church Leaders” in which he called on Christian leaders to journey to Caledonia to participate in the “truth and reconciliation” rally. McHale argued: “The Church has a duty to speak out against discrimination, hatred and injustice. The Church has a role in bringing about healing and reconciliation as we are told we are ‘ambassadors of reconciliation’. We should not forget Dr. King Jr.’s words that it was the moderates that were the greatest stumbling block to equality and justice in Alabama”.[15]
It did so happen that Christian activists attended a truth and reconciliation rally. However, these Christians spoke in support of the people of Six Nations. For instance, Julián Gutiérrez Castaño from Colombia, and member of Christian Peacemaker Teams, stated:
I was invited to a rally responding to McHale’s so-called ‘Rally for Truth and Reconciliation’ in Caledonia. I also see that he and some of his people are trying to inaugurate a monument of apologies for the rightful reclamation of Kahnonstaton. When I first (mis)heard about the apology, I thought, ‘good, finally we are going to apologize to the people from Six Nations’, because they are the people who deserve an apology and the reasons can be easily found in the history of this place. If the apologies are not being made to them, this can not be a rally for Truth and Reconciliation. Rather, it would be a rally for ‘Lies and Violence’.[16]
Mr. Gutiérrez is not exaggerating. Throughout the letter – and in the subsequent press release for the “truth and reconciliation” rally –, McHale quoted Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail” at length. Again, the irony of McHale somehow equating this letter with that of King’s was lost on no one. But, what happens when the right wing whitewashes King and misappropriates his, and the civil rights movement’s, history in support of his cause and to unabashedly coerce Church leaders to endorse this spectacle? Perhaps in McHale’s selective quoting, he missed King’s reference to his support of decolonization movements around the world:
“Oppressed people cannot remain oppressed forever. The yearning for freedom eventually manifests itself, and that is what has happened to the American Negro. Something within has reminded him of his birthright of freedom, and something without has reminded him that it can be gained. Consciously or unconsciously, he has been caught up by the Zeitgeist, and with his black brothers of Africa and his brown and yellow brothers of Asia, South America and the Caribbean, the United States Negro is moving with a sense of great urgency toward the promised land of racial justice. If one recognizes this vital urge that has engulfed the Negro community, one should readily understand why public demonstrations are taking place. The Negro has many pent up resentments and latent frustrations, and he must release them. So let him march; let him make prayer pilgrimages to the city hall; let him go on freedom rides -and try to understand why he must do so. If his repressed emotions are not released in nonviolent ways, they will seek expression through violence; this is not a threat but a fact of history. So I have not said to my people: “Get rid of your discontent.” Rather, I have tried to say that this normal and healthy discontent can be channeled into the creative outlet of nonviolent direct action. And now this approach is being termed extremist. But though I was initially disappointed at being categorized as an extremist, as I continued to think about the matter I gradually gained a measure of satisfaction from the label. Was not Jesus an extremist for love: “Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you.” Was not Amos an extremist for justice: “Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an ever flowing stream.” Was not Paul an extremist for the Christian gospel: “I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus.” Was not Martin Luther an extremist: “Here I stand; I cannot do otherwise, so help me God.” And John Bunyan: “I will stay in jail to the end of my days before I make a butchery of my conscience.” And Abraham Lincoln: “This nation cannot survive half slave and half free.” And Thomas Jefferson: “We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal . . .” So the question is not whether we will be extremists, but what kind of extremists we will be. Will we be extremists for hate or for love? Will we be extremists for the preservation of injustice or for the extension of justice? In that dramatic scene on Calvary’s hill three men were crucified. We must never forget that all three were crucified for the same crime–the crime of extremism. Two were extremists for immorality, and thus fell below their environment. The other, Jesus Christ, was an extremist for love, truth and goodness, and thereby rose above his environment. Perhaps the South, the nation and the world are in dire need of creative extremists.”
While McHale continues to look through his inverted telescope, not only does he discount and delegitimize the struggles and colonization of the people of Six Nations, but also those of African Americans in the United States.[17] In this passage, it is quite clear that MLK supported the decolonization movements around the world. Moreover, by the time of his assassination King had developed a comprehensive critique of American imperialism and capitalism as it pertained to the slaughter of Vietnamese, Laotians, and Cambodians at the expense of the working poor and African American communities in the United States.[18] Blatchford extensively quotes McHale about his reverence for King in Helpless. Again, McHale largely misrepresents King and the struggle for African American independence in the United States.[19]
Who is Helping Who: Blatchford’s Helpless: Caledonia’s Nightmare of Fear and Anarchy, and How The Law Failed All of Us
In the press release, the press conference, and the “Letter to Church Leaders” McHale continually referred to the “shocking” account portrayed about the Caledonia conflict written by Christie Blatchford in Helpless: Caledonia’s Nightmare of Fear and Anarchy, and How The Law Failed All of Us. “Shocking” is the correct word, although Blatchford’s self-proclaimed “hack journalism” is more aptly referred to as sensationalism. Considering that Blatchford was given most of the material for the events depicted in the book from McHale and Vandermaas, Blatchford conveniently acts as a megaphone for the aims of CANACE and the Caledonia Victims Project (inserting her own critique of the OPP and former commissioner Julian Fantino).
But are we to believe that the “narrow slice” Blatchford presents of the conflict is intended to counteract the failure of the mainstream media to adequately report what happened in Caledonia during those tumultuous days in 2006? If you go to Blatchford’s public talks, it is quite apparent, explicitly in fact, that Blatchford wants to send a clarion call to Canadians that this could happen to them and that they should not be afraid to stand up to these “native land occupiers”. At least this was the message at her University of Waterloo talk on 7 December 2010. Indeed, Blatchford on 16 November 2010 at the Chedoke Presbyterian Church in Hamilton stated:
What happened there [in Caledonia] is not a local disgrace, but a national one. And the occupation wasn’t covered very well by the national press. Furthermore, what happened there could happen almost anywhere else in Canada and has indeed happened in varying degrees. And it’s not just a problem for land developers, but a fisheries problem, and a forest industry problem, and an oil and gas problem, and, really, increasingly, a problem for all of us. And all of that is why I wrote the book.[20]
Blatchford states that her book is not about “Aboriginal” land claims, about residential schools, or about the reserve system. Rather, Blatchford contends: “…Helpless is about what happened to the rule of law – the dry legal term for the noble arrangement a civilized society makes with its citizens, rendering us all equal before and bound by the same laws – in that town [,Caledonia,] and environs.”[21] Considering that Blatchford claims that her book is about the failure of the OPP to protect the residents of Caledonia and the breakdown of the “rule of law”, I suggest we need to look very closely at Blatchford’s comments at her speaking engagements, and in print, as she states, very clearly and very openly, her intentions.
Subsequently, during a peaceful picket at the Hamilton speaking engagement, Blatchford called members of Practical Solidarity – members of the Six Nations Solidarity Network – “idiots” for referring to her as promoting racist ideas.[22] Moreover, when referring to Six Nations solidarity activists as “pro-native”[23] in her column about the “truth and reconciliation” rally, we are left to believe that the opposite, representing McHale et al., is anti-native. Considering the history of indigenous-settler relations, considering the history of the misuse of the components of difference and power[24] in Canadian history with not just indigenous peoples, but all peoples of colour, is it so outlandish to presume that Blatchford is in fact promoting racism? In the above quote where Blatchford is speaking to the various reasons, or “problem” areas, that are affected by possible native land reclamations or land occupations, why is native self-determination the “problem”? Why aren’t our policies, as reflected in government policies, land sales, and ‘resource management’, the problem?
While Blatchford herself may say, as she did to Hamilton Spectator writer Daniel Nolan, “I’m not a racist […] My book is not racist and they are idiots”[25] in reference to those solidarity activists in Hamilton, we must distinguish between racism in intention and motivation from that of effect and consequence. By looking at Blatchford’s public statements and her printed words, I think a case can be made that the effect and consequence of her words, both spoken and in print, are to help continue the racist policies that have subjugated the indigenous peoples within the claimed boundaries of Canada.
What would Blatchford do if her community’s rights were being not just infringed upon, but her community’s whole way of life was being obliterated? Of course, Blatchford likes to refer to the democracy game[26] – abiding by the “rule of law” – whereby the courts will decide whether the government, land developers, fisheries, or the forestry industry have the right to obliterate your community. The trick is, a land claim takes thirty years in the courts and, currently, the Six Nations has twenty-nine outstanding land-claims. So, there is a simple question: would Blatchford wait if her community was under the knife? It seems to me that if we really want to believe in truth and reconciliation, indigenous self-determination needs to fit into the picture as a major, and not a minor, aspect to seeking real reconciliation.
Regarding the issues of land claims on The Michael Coren Show on 29 October 2010, Christie Blatchford stated that she “know[s] a little bit about it, I don’t pretend to know much else.”[27] Because there is a discrepancy between what the federal government, the Six Nations Band Council, and the traditional Haudenosaunee Confederacy state about the validity of the claim to the Douglas Creek Estates land dictates there are conflicting accounts and therefore the is a claim for the rightful owner of that land.
Furthermore, the simple fact that the Six Nations people have not been conquered, that they were are allies with the Crown, is central to this conflict. The federal government refuses to negotiate in good faith and the Six Nations have obeyed their treaty obligations. We – meaning the government of Canada through policies in our name – have put the people of Six Nations in a box through the vicious enactment, and continuation, of the Indian Act, the coup d’état on 24 October 1924 that deposed the traditional Haudenosaunee Confederacy that imposed the Band Council, and through the cultural genocide of the residential school systems. Considering these historical injustices, why should we be “shocked” when the people of Six Nations assert their right to self-determination? Blatchford, McHale, et al., would have us believe that this assertion of self-determination equates with the breakdown of the “rule of law”. There is a simple question: whose law and whose order? Because the people of Six Nations, and indigenous people within the claimed boundaries of Canada, were not privy to participating in the construction of Canadian laws, there is space for indigenous self-determination. And, after centuries of colonization, is it so impossible to imagine that in the process of self-determination it might get ugly and force the dominate society to question what is happening? Blatchford, McHale, et al., would have us believe that residents of Caledonia are the victims and have been “victimized” in this process. Of course, if you live in world looking through the inverted telescope, this would make sense.
Needless to say, events have calmed down in Caledonia since 2006 and a process of healing, truth, and reconciliation is indeed necessary. But for who, and by whom? McHale, et al., would have us believe that if only the provincial government, the OPP, and the Six Nations Band Council would apologize for the past five years this will somehow bring about “truth and reconciliation”. While I have little faith in the abilities of the provincial government to set the record straight, and help bring about healing, the exchange at Queen’s Park on 28 February 2010 between Conservative Opposition leader Tim Hudak and Liberal MPP Christopher Bentley is telling. The exchange says it all:
Mr. Tim Hudak: […]Surely you are sending the wrong kind of signal by having Ontario families pay the hydro bills into the homes that are occupied in the former subdivision known as Douglas Creek Estates. Law-abiding Ontario families cannot set a foot on this now provincially owned land. The lawbreakers remain on-site, and Ontario families are being forced by your government to pay the hydro bills.
Minister, will you stop the hydro—
The Speaker (Hon. Steve Peters): Thank you. Minister?
Hon. Christopher Bentley: The children in the two communities get it, and I don’t know why the Leader of the Opposition doesn’t. The children are exchanging art; they realize that the opportunities for them lie in building a stronger relationship. The children and the mayors of the communities get it; they’re working together.[28]
MPP Bentley is referring to the pen pal program between Emily C. General elementary school students and Six Nations students. The invaluable program was set up by Suzie Miller and offers an excellent example of building bridges between the two communities.[29] Furthermore, the Canadian Auto Workers (C.A.W.) statement that was distributed at the rally stated: “The people of Six Nations and the towns and villages of the Grand River all live closely connected lives, sharing schools, workplaces, friendships and families. The tensions caused by the land dispute need to be resolved for the benefit of all. What Six Nations want is a fair resolution of their land rights, questions of title, and compensation for lost rental revenues on lands that they agreed to lease.”[30]
Conclusion
In response to McHale’s “truth and reconciliation” rally on 27 February 2010 – and “Caledonia’s nightmare of fear and anarchy” more broadly –Blatchford writes: “From start to finish, this story is but a stain on the Canadian landscape, the lesson that anything – criminal conduct, lawlessness, state abuses – is tolerated if it is done in the name of aboriginal self-expression.”[31] In another statement that delegitimizing the rightful aspirations of the Six Nations for self-determination, Blatchford continues to demonstrate her main intentions. Self-expression is what you do when you dye your hair, when you write a song – not when you engage in the process of self-determination and when all you have done is follow your treaty obligations in the face of a lawless, criminal state and the continued screeds of self-proclaimed “hack journalists” and “equality activists”.
[1]In this essay I will refer to the CANACE and Caledonia Victims Project “truth and reconciliation” rally in quotations and the Six Nations Solidarity Network truth and reconciliation without quotation marks.
[2]Online: https://caledoniavictimsproject.wordpress.com/2011/02/05/joint-news-release-truth-reconciliation-rally-in-caledonia-feb-27th/
[3]Tallula Marigold, in “Six Nations, Caledonia Residents and Activists Come Together to Support Land Reclamation: Can’t Spell ‘Solidarity’ without ‘Solid’” Toronto Media Co-Op 1 March 2010, Online: http://www.mediacoop.ca/newsrelease/6489
[4]The video coverage can be seen here: http://toronto.mediacoop.ca/video/truth-and-reconciliation-rally-caledoniasix-nations-feb-27-2011/6509
[5]See: http://www.thespec.com/news/local/article/493886–tension-in-caledonia-on-eve-of-anniversary; http://www.570news.com/news/national/article/189921–aboriginal-occupation-rally-revives-tensions-in-caledonia; http://swo.ctv.ca/servlet/an/local/CTVNews/20110227/caledonia-rally-110227/20110227/?hub=SWOHome; http://www.moosefm.com/ckjn/; http://m.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/christie-blatchford/for-sheer-abuse-of-state-power-nothing-touches-caledonia/article1924465/?service=mobile
[6]See: http://voiceofcanada.wordpress.com/2010/03/02/join-merlyn-kinrades-anti-racism-rally-in-caledonia-on-march-2110/
[7]See: http://6nsolidarity.wordpress.com/2010/04/08/mchale-flees-dialogue-happens/; http://6nsolidarity.wordpress.com/2010/03/29/anti-racists-2-gary-mchale-canace-0/; http://3903fnswg.wordpress.com/2009/06/21/a-call-for-a-peaceful-protest-against-the-formation-of-an-anti-native; http://www.mediacoop.ca/story/3132
[8]Legislative Assembly of Ontario, Monday 28 February 2011, P. 4306. See Hansard Online: http://www.ontla.on.ca/house-proceedings/transcripts/files_pdf/28-FEB-2011_L086.pdf
[9]See: http://laws.justice.gc.ca/PDF/Statute/I/I-5.pdf
[10] See James Walker, “Race,” Rights and the Law in the Supreme Court of Canada(Waterloo: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 1997).
[11]See Office of Correctional Investigator webpage: http://www.oci-bec.gc.ca/rpt/annrpt/annrpt20052006info-eng.aspx
[12]See various prison statistics: http://www.vcn.bc.ca/august10/politics/facts_stats.html
[13]C.A.W. Locals 27, 1106, 1524, 1917, “Why We Are Here.”
[14]See: http://joincanace.wordpress.com/about-2/we-believe/
[15Gary McHale, “Letter to Church Leaders,” Online: http://voiceofcanada.wordpress.com/2011/02/24/letter-to-christian-leaders-re-truth-reconciliation-rally-in-caledonia/
[16]Quoted from Julián Gutiérrez Castaño’s speech on 27 February 2010. Online: http://6nsolidarity.wordpress.com/2011/03/03/christians-supporting-six-nations-struggles-for-peace-and-justice/
[17]There are many serious historical studies of the civil rights movement that place the African-Americans struggle for equality and justice in the United States in its proper historical context, see: Harvard Sitkoff, The Struggle for Black Equality (1993), Taylor Branch, At Canaan’s Edge: America in the King Years (2006), Clayborne Carson, In Struggle: SNCC and the Black Awakening of the 1960s (1981), Peniel E. Joseph, Waiting ‘Til The Midnight Hour: A Narrative History of Black Power in America (2006), Peniel E. Joseph, ed., The Black Power Movement: Rethinking the Civil Rights-Black Power Era (2006), Paul Alkebulan, Survival Pending Revolution: The History of the Black Panther Party (2007), Charles Payne, I’ve Got the Light of Freedom: the Organizing Tradition and the Mississippi Freedom Struggle (1995), Malcolm X, Autobiography (1992), David L. Lewis, W.E.B. DuBois: The Fight for Equality and the American Century (2000), Colin Grant, Negro with a Hat: The Rise and Fall of Marcus Garvey (2008), Penny Von Eschen, Race Against Empire: Black Americans and Anticolonialism, 1937-1957 (1997).
[18] See for instance King’s speech denouncing the war in Vietnam at Ebenezer Baptist Church on 30 April 1967, Online: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b80Bsw0UG-U
[19] Christie Blatchford, Helpless: Caledonia’s Nightmare of Fear and Anarchy and How the Law Failed All of Us (Toronto: Doubleday Canada, 2010), 151-152.
[20] See a brief snippet of this talk in Hamilton online: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p2w4ez6be4Y
[21]Christie Blatchford, Helpless: Caledonia’s Nightmare of Fear and Anarchy and How the Law Failed All of Us (Toronto: Doubleday Canada, 2010), vii-viii.
[22]Daniel Nolan, “Blatchford, Protesters Clash at Book Signing,” The Hamilton Spectator,17 November 2010, A6. See also, Devon Ridge, “Blatchford Abuses Privilege as Journalist,” Toronto Media Co-op 16 November 2010, online: http://toronto.mediacoop.ca/story/blatchford-abuses-privilege-journalist/5181
[23]Christie Blatchford, “For Sheer Abuse of State Power, Nothing Touches Caledonia”, The Globe and Mail 1 March 2011, A5.
[24]According to “race” historian George Fredrickson in Racism: A Short History (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002), the two components of understanding racism are difference and power. Fredrickson argues that these two components originate “from a mindset that regards ‘them’ as different from ‘us’ in ways that are permanent and unbridgeable. This sense of difference provides a motive or rationale for using our power advantage to treat the ethnoracial Other in ways that we would regard as cruel or unjust if applied to members of our own group. The possible consequences of this nexus of attitude and action range from unofficial but pervasive social discrimination at one end of the spectrum to genocide at the other, with government-sanctioned segregation, colonial subjugation, exclusion, forced deportation (or ‘ethnic cleansing’), and enslavement among the other variations on the theme. In all manifestations of racism from the mildest to the most severe, what is being denied is the possibility that the racializers and the racialized can coexist in the same society, except perhaps on the basis of domination and subordination. Also rejected is any notion that individuals can obliterate ethnoracial differences by changing their identities”. Fredrickson, p. 9.
[25]Daniel Nolan, “Blatchford, Protesters Clash at Book Signing,” The Hamilton Spectator,17 November 2010, A6
[26]See Blatchford on both The Agenda http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AV0FDjw3fO8&feature=related and The Michael Coren Show http://www.ctstv.com/michaelcoren/index.php?vidID=20533
[27]See Christie Blatchford on The Michael Coren Show on 29 October 2010: http://www.ctstv.com/michaelcoren/index.php?vidID=20533. Also, Blatchford made these remarks at her public talks, such as at the University of Waterloo, as well as on the
[28]Legislative Assembly of Ontario, Monday 28 February 2011, P. 4306. See Hansard Online: http://www.ontla.on.ca/house-proceedings/transcripts/files_pdf/28-FEB-2011_L086.pdf
[29]See, for example, Jon Wells, “Bridge Over Troubled Water: Teacher’s Pen Pal Project a Valuable Lesson in Peace after Caledonia Strife” The Hamilton Spectator 26 February 2011, A1.
[30]C.A.W. Locals 27, 1106, 1524, 1917, “Why We Are Here.”
[31]Christie Blatchford, “For Sheer Abuse of State Power, Nothing Touches Caledonia”, The Globe and Mail 1 March 2011, A5.
