Back in 2021, the country was shaken by the gruesome accusation – presented as “fact” – that the graves of 215 children buried at a former Kamloops, BC residential school were apparently discovered.
The media went into overdrive to dismantle Canada’s international reputation and rebrand our great country as a racist, genocidal, imperialist former-dictatorship, guilty of unspeakable crimes against humanity.
Of course, as you now know, none of it was true. Or at least there is no hard evidence to verify any of these horrendous accusations.
At the time, every single member of the legacy media went along with the story, happy to exaggerate the claims to drum up hatred towards Canada and further the agony and pain among Canada’s First Nations.
Even the independent media were silent, no one dared to publicly question the narrative that “unmarked graves had been discovered.”
As a result, in the summer of 2021, churches throughout Western Canada were vandalized or burnt down, Canada Day celebrations across the country were cancelled, and the Prime Minister even created a new national holiday for Truth and Reconciliation.
Phrases like “mass graves” and “murdered children” were repeatedly uttered by legacy media journalists and politicians.
As Winston Churchill once said, a lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on.
As a journalist, I believe that before we accept the very worst accusations against our country, we need to carefully study the facts, and in this case, we had our work cut out for us.
Even as my own editors urged caution, I reported on the facts on the ground.
True North was the first media outlet in the world to question the “unmarked graves” narrative. Not only does our initial reporting still stand, we have been vindicated.
With caution and sensitivity, we accurately pointed out that no bodies were discovered or unearthed, that the numbers reported in the media were mere speculative and estimates that were seemingly overblown, and that many of the alleged unmarked graves in question were, in fact, previously marked graves in known cemeteries which serviced the broader rural (non-First Nations) communities.
We pointed out that no research had been made public, and that despite the reckless irresponsible media hyperbole, no First Nation made the accusation of a “mass grave.”
In the weeks and months that followed, we continued to report and update the True North audience of new developments in the story, and many media outlets gradually and reluctantly followed in our footsteps.
By May 2022, a small handful of Canadian journalists and many international outlets had caught wind of the facts on the ground, and how they differed from the hysterical news coverage.
The New York Post called it “the biggest fake news story in Canada” and former New York Times editor Bari Weiss called it “The Great Canadian Mass Graves Hoax.”
This week, we have even more proof to validate our reporting.
After two long years of the absolute worst accusations imaginable – the idea that Canadian priests and nuns in Catholic and Anglican schools were murdering children, committing genocide and hiding the bodies in mass graves – the verdict is in.
The results of an excavation of a church in Pine Creek, Manitoba, which was formerly part of a residential school operating from 1890 to 1969, were made public.
No human remains were found.
This isn’t the only residential school excavation that has concluded with the finding of no human remains.
In August 2021, a team of researchers in Shubenacadie, Nova Scotia conducted an excavation at the site of the former Shubenacadie Residential School in search of clandestine burials – but to no avail. Nothing was found.
Further, in October of 2021, an excavation was conducted for unmarked graves on the site of former Camsell Hospital in Edmonton. Once again, no human remains were found.
You probably haven’t even heard about these excavations.
That’s because while every legacy news agency in Canada reported that Pine Creek began its search for unmarked graves, none of them reported on the findings.
That’s right. The good news is that no children were killed or buried – but that’s a non-story, according to the gatekeepers in the legacy media.
