The Sixties Scoop started as early as “1951 and lasted until the1980s”(Live and Learn). The events that took place have created a lifelong lasting trauma, that has scared many
Indigenous victims. The Sixties Scoop is Canada’s dark secret, and many Canadians do not know
about how the Canadian government stripped away thousands of Indigenous children from their
culture and homes. Some of the Indigenous victims never returned back to their culture, and a
big chunk of Indigenous culture is now forgotten as the result of the Sixties Scoop. The Sixties
Scoop was one of many ways to “assimilate” (The 60’s Scoop) Canada’s Indigenous people, and
make sure the Canadian government still had control over Indigenous people.
Canada’s Sixties Scoop “refers to the adoption of First Nation/Metis children in
Canada” (Dr. Raven Sinclair). Even though the adoptions took place from “1951 to the early
1980’s” it is called the Sixties Scoop “because the highest numbers of adoptions took place in the
decade of the 1960s” (Sinclair), the Scoop comes from “many instances, where children were
literally scooped from their homes and communities without the knowledge or consent of
families and bands” (Sinclair), getting the name of the Sixties Scoop. “In 1951, amendments to
the Indian Act gave the responsibility of child welfare to the provinces” (Live and Learn), with
this each province in Canada had a say with how they wanted to handle the welfare system
within their province. When the “Provincial agencies inherited several issues surrounding
children and child welfare in Indigenous communities, but they had no additional
resources” (Live and Learn). The result of this was that “Provincial agencies opted to remove
children from their homes thinking that it was the fastest and easiest way to address Indigenous
child welfare” (Live and Learn). When the Children were stolen from their homes they were placed “into non-indigenous, middle-class families across Canada and the United States, along with some cases, other countries as far as New Zealand” (Live and Learn). With most cases “making matters worse, siblings were often separated. Indigenous children were often brought up in entirely white environments” (Christopher Dart), which resulted in losing their Indigenous roots and culture. “Aside from losing touch with their families, the given one of the original goals of this practice was assimilation these children were largely placed with non-Indigenous families” (The 60’s Scoop). The scoop began when “the government began phasing out compulsory residential school education in the 1950s and 1960s as the public began to understand its devastating impacts on families” ( Erin Hanson), and the wrongful doings of the awful mistreatment that was going on in the residential schools and thought that “Aboriginal children could receive a better education if they were transitioned into the public school system” (Hanson). Indigenous people no longer have “residential schools to separate them from
their culture and their language. They had the Sixties Scoop” (Betty Ann Adam), which had the
same goal, and did exactly the same thing as residential schools.
The reasons for the government stealing Indigenous children from their homes was
because “In the 1960s, the child welfare system did not require, nor did it expect, social workers
to have specific training in dealing with children in Aboriginal communities” (Hanson). When
the social workers would go into the homes of Indigenous people they were “completely
unfamiliar with the culture or history of the Aboriginal communities they entered. What they
believed constituted proper care was generally based on middle-class Euro-Canadian
values” (Hanson). They would see when they “entered the homes of families subsisting on a
traditional Aboriginal diet of dried game, fish, and berries, and didn’t see fridges or cupboards
stocked in typical Euro-Canadian fashion, they assumed that the adults in the home were not
providing for their children” (Hanson). The social workers saw this as wrong as this was not the
way they had grown up in their western society, and in most cases in western society if the
cupboards where not filled with food then they saw this as the caregivers were not providing
enough for the children. “Additionally, upon seeing the social problems reserve communities
faced, such as poverty, unemployment, and addiction, some social workers felt a duty to protect
the local children” (Hanson), for in their own opinion their surroundings were not safe to raise a
child and that the families were not able to provide. However in “many cases, Aboriginal parents
who were living in poverty but otherwise providing caring homes had their children, were still
taken from them with little or no warning and absolutely no consent” (Hanson), mostly just
based off of the social workers being judgemental of Indigenous culture and their way of living.
Instead of putting money and resources into Indigenous communities to improve the issue, “the
Provincial government went with the cheapest response to take the children from the reserves
and place them with non-Indigenous families” (Apihtawikosisan). The government thought that
the “child would be better off in a foster home than with their own families who loved
them” (Patrick Johnson). The children lost their culture, language, traditions, etc, resulting in the
same effect as residential schools had on Indigenous children, but was seen as a better way to
deal with the children.
The affects of the Sixties Scoop had an lifetime impact not only on the children who were stolen from their homes, but their families too. For “these children they lost their names, their languages, and a connection to their heritage. Sadly, many were also abused and made to feel ashamed of who they were” (Dart). As a result “the child had no sense of well being and were given a life full of this traumatic loss that impacted them deeply” (Rachel Shablin). Starting from a loss of culture and continuing on to a loss of identity, that they are still trying to deal with today as adults. “Some of the program’s administrators believed that if the children were removed from their homes early enough, they wouldn’t “imprint” as Indigenous people” (Dart), however no one can just erase where someone comes from, for that part of them will always be with them if they remember it or not. Unfortunately for some affected by the trauma could not handle the traumatic loss of their “Indigenous identity being taken during the Sixties Scoop which resulted in many suicides, use of drugs, alcohol abuse, unemployment, and mental disorders” (Shablin). For many of the Indigenous children affected by the Sixties Scoop they “felt like they had lived their life a lie, because they did not know of their true identity until later on in life” (Johnson). This also had an impact on the families of the children as well. For “many women reported being pressured by doctors, nurses and social workers to give up their children shortly after birth. Women who voluntarily handed over their children would often be told that the arrangement was only temporary until they could get back on their feet. When these mothers attempted to bring their children home, they would find out the children had already been adopted” (Dart). This would be heartbreaking for the mothers, for they would work so hard to have a better life so that they could be reunited with their children, only to find out that their child is no longer theirs to have, or love. Never mind the heartbreak that they would go through in the first place of giving up their child at the start, but they made that choice so they could work on giving their child the life they deserve.
Patrick Johnson put out a report in 1983 that exposed the secrets of the Sixties Scoop. He explored the ideas of “mass apprehension of Aboriginal children from their homes and reserves and into Canadian and American child welfare systems” (Johnson). He also addresses “the term scooping and how it dramatically accelerated the Indigenous children welfare systems” (Johnson), and people started to rethink the idea of what they were doing to the Indigenous children and Indigenous culture. In 1985 the report “No Quiet Place” by Justice Edwin Kimelman talked about similar issues with the sixties scoop and had a huge impact on the people and the Indigenous Welfare system. Kimelman stated that “the structure of the system did not have a good production of a meaningful substantive issues” (Edwin Kimelman). “The two men’s reports helped put an end to the sixties scoop in 1990 but it took 11132 Indigenous children” (Shablin), to be put in new homes for the government to see their wrong. “The two men’s reports led to changes in the child welfare policies. At the start of the sixties scoop the children were put into non Indigenous families however the government changed their mind to let the children first be given to extended families and then another Indigenous family” ( Sinclair). This was a huge change for the better for the children for they were no longer stripped from their cultures, and traditions and could learn and grow up in their culture. This saved a lot of children from having that traumatic loss that impacted them for life, and the culture of the Indigenous grew from almost being lost from the years of lost culture from the residential schools and the scooping. “In 1990 more changes happened with the federal government and the Indigenous welfare system, the government created the First Nations Child and Family Service program or known as FNCFS which gave locals the power to administer child and family services according to provincial and territorial legislation” (Sinclair). “The Superior Court judge of Ontario, heard opening arguments for a lawsuit to be filed against the federal government by the survivors of the Sixties Scoop on August 23, 2016. The claim was first introduced in 2009 but failed to bring any action. They were asking for 1.3 billion dollars in damages or 85000 dollars for each affected individual” (Sinclair), “With this they wanted Prime Minster Justin Trudeau to issue a formal apology on behalf of the federal government during the time of the Sixties Scoop, like the one was was issued by the Manitoba government apology in 2015” (The 60’s Scoop). “The next year on February 1st 2017 the Canadian government said they were ready to negotiate the settlement to 1.3 billion dollars, however on February 14th of the same year the Ontario Superior Court judge Edward Belobaba ruled in the favour of the victims and said that the government was not taking the right steps towards forgiveness. Later that year on October sixth, 2017, the federal government came to an agreement of 800 million dollars which individuals are expected to receive $25,000-$50,000 each depending on how many claimants come forward and are approved. A minimum of $50 million will be used to create a Foundation that will provide counselling and healing to class members.” (Klein Lawyers LLP).
The Sixties scoop can arguably be the historical event that had the biggest impact on shaping first nations culture in Canada today. The impact is immense and almost immeasurable. This long period in Canadian History created a whole new way of living for many First Nations and has had a powerful effect on the First Nations way of living for many generations. The Governments in this country need to step up and be responsible for what past governments have created. Indigenous people deserve respect and apologies to help them continue on their long journey of healing. The hope being that Indigenous people healing can begin to heal a country that was scarred by this awful chain of events.
Bibliography
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