Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

A media-fueled social panic over unmarked graves

quillette.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

101–110 of 209 posts

Re: A media-fueled social panic over unmarked graves

#101

Post by pyuser583 »

cm2187 wrote: post #54
pyuser583 wrote: post #39

It’s funny because the narrative works just fine without the mass graves. A local paper (in the US) interviewed survivors/graduates on “Indian” schools. The administrators sent kids home as soon as they were sick. So there were no graveyards, even when lots of student were dying (Spanish flu).

Wait, the article is silent on the cause of death. Are you saying these deaths were just the result of some disease? Everything in the media treatment of these deaths implies mistreatment of the kids. If it was just a virus, particularly in the early days of medicine, this would be a scandal created out of thin air.

I’m saying that a child with either Spanish flu or a severe concussion would be sent home on a train, and be buried far from the school.

Re: A media-fueled social panic over unmarked graves

#102

Post by seoaeu »

anon291 wrote: post #83
seoaeu wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“ Perhaps they didn't know”?! You think the tribes knew about the atrocities and were ok with them?

I have no idea what the tribes knew or did not know. Do you? I am amazed at some people's abilities to read other's minds. As to the tribal leaders signing the documents. I can understand how the monetary promises given to them by the Canadian government would make them overlook the potential for atrocities yes; such things are well attested to in the history of humanity. But again, I have no idea. You asked me to sp…

The outrage is over the atrocities, and the people insinuating that those atrocities were somehow ok because some papers were signed beforehand

Asking questions like “did they know why they were signing?” or “was there going to be a war if they refused to sign?” seem entirely reasonable to me

Re: A media-fueled social panic over unmarked graves

#103

Post by muglug »

scarmig wrote: post #65
beached_whale wrote: post #49

[flagged]

Funnily enough, the "media bias fact checker" lists the NY Times as "High Credibility"[0] despite its sensationalized/false reporting about a "Mass Grave of Indigenous Children Reported in Canada."[1] [0] https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/new-york-times/ [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/28/world/canada/kamloops-mas...

There’s not a huge gap between a mass grave and a mass of unmarked graves. Both show a disregard for human life.

Quillette writers love to get on a high-horse about such discrepancies, while ignoring everything wrong with the right-wing media in America.

Re: A media-fueled social panic over unmarked graves

#106

Post by prvc »

tptacek wrote: post #66
Ajedi32 wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. How is that quote at all relevant to what's being discussed? 2. What does any of that have to do with Nazis? Your comment seems to be a complete non-sequitur.

The C.S. Lewis quote above (the one I replied to) is from Mere Christianity . As to whether the original quote is relevant to this Quillette story, your guess is as good as mine. Later I'm being coy, because I don't believe most people who deploy this quote have read Mere Christianity , which is ungracious of me (and technically a violation of our guidelines). So: to put it more directly: Lewis isn't asking people to…

Even after all that exegesis, your presumptive point remains obscure. The top-level comment is relevant because it happens to describe the malicious credulity of the journalism consumers who chose to believe the mass graves narrative.

Re: A media-fueled social panic over unmarked graves

#107

Post by jollybean »

matthewmacleod wrote: post #93

Quoted post unavailable.

Just the opposite, it's a high quality piece from a high quality site.

This comment, which offers no argument for illustrating why the piece is misleading or unfactual, only hurts your credibility.

I myself was deeply moved about the 'grave discovery' revelations in Canada, and after just a bit of investigation I was 'shocked' to discover that the narratives were misrepresentations to the point of lying.

A short compendium about some of the ruthless misrepresentation can be found here [1], where they highlight some issues in the press that, were these revelations to be made in any other field, would be existentially damaging to those involved.

The press clearly misrepresented the views of even many of the aboriginal leaders responsible for these investigations, and much worse.

It's damaging to the integrity of the CBC and some others.

[1] https://nationalpost.com/opinion/the-year-of-the-graves-how-...

Re: A media-fueled social panic over unmarked graves

#108

Post by weakfish »

jtbayly wrote: post #88
munk-a wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry, I had omitted sourcing in my original comment but here: > Dr. Jonathan Arden, the former Chief Medical Examiner of the District of Columbia was hired by Smith's widow as part of her lawsuit to have her husband's suicide ruled "in the line of duty". His report stated that the "acute, precipitating event that caused the death of Officer Smith was his occupational exposure to the traumatic events he suffered on J…

Quoted post unavailable.

Er… that’s quite a large jump in reasoning

Re: A media-fueled social panic over unmarked graves

#109

Post by tptacek »

prvc wrote: post #106
tptacek wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The C.S. Lewis quote above (the one I replied to) is from Mere Christianity . As to whether the original quote is relevant to this Quillette story, your guess is as good as mine. Later I'm being coy, because I don't believe most people who deploy this quote have read Mere Christianity , which is ungracious of me (and technically a violation of our guidelines). So: to put it more directly: Lewis isn't asking people to…

Even after all that exegesis, your presumptive point remains obscure. The top-level comment is relevant because it happens to describe the malicious credulity of the journalism consumers who chose to believe the mass graves narrative.

I don't think my point is obscure at all. It is, simply, that C.S. Lewis didn't write that quote to exhort people to skepticism of all wrongdoing; he was instead reminding people not to invent wrongdoing to impute to strangers by dint of them being "enemies". The quote, here, was ill used, as it so often is.

Again: when Lewis wrote this, he was talking about the Nazis, the authors of many of the worst crimes in history. Lewis was no Holocaust denier: he was acutely aware of --- and reminds his reader throughout Christian Behavior of --- the wrongdoings he's alluding to. It might be hard to find a more inapposite quote for this story.

I have no idea what happened in the residential schools in Canada, and no opinion about this particular article. But I do have an opinion about the abuse of C.S. Lewis on message boards.

Re: A media-fueled social panic over unmarked graves

#110

Post by ZeroGravitas »

reilly3000 wrote: post #52

[flagged]

Yeah, the final clause of this sentence reveals he knows what he's doing:

> No one, to my knowledge, has found any human remains—i.e., body parts or tissue from decaying corpses—either at Kamloops or any of the other former Residential Schools, through the use of GPR.

Very holocaust denial-like. Reminded me of the people who point out that the "lampshade made of human skin" stories, haven't been proved:

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/the-lampshad...

Post reply on HN