Dear Editor,
Indian residential schools were a disgrace, in principle and practice. I have no desire to debate that. My issue is the integrity of the reporting that has surrounded the discovery of the Kamloops residential school gravesites.
First of all, nearly every media outlet initially reported that the band had discovered a “mass grave.” This is pure fiction. The band chief said there were “215 potential sites.” She never mentioned a mass grave, yet it was reported as such locally, nationally and even internationally, which is why the story got such traction.
Secondly, media outlets are reporting that all the graves contain children. This may or may not be true. The chief said they “could” contain children. Her exact words were: “What was shared with us [from the company that did the study] was there’s 215 sites, potential sites, that could very well be children...”
Thirdly, the chief stressed that these were the “initial findings of what the potential could be. They are very preliminary.” She said the band had not yet received a written report, which means there is no way for reporters to review the methodology and verify the findings, as sketchy as they are.
Fourthly, the chief refused to identify the company that did the study. This is a key fact that most media outlets failed to report. How do we know it is a competent and trustworthy firm?
The bottom line is that reporters took oral comments from an undisclosed source and reported them as fact, then used those comments as a platform for all sorts of inference and conjecture as to who is in those graves and how they got there.
Historical review is important. We must identify our mistakes before we can learn from them. But we should move forward on facts, not unverifiable comments from undisclosed sources, and certainly not on unbridled media conjecture.
David Baines
RICHMOND
