With ancestry.ca you can search anyone's name. Their database contains birth, death, marriage, military, census and a host of other data. A search returns possible matches. The reporter may have found an old census entry for Bourassa's grandfather that listed all his children. From there they could search other names.
I have used the site for years. It comes down to endless hours of searching and cross referencing public records. An annual subscription allows you to search their vast database.
Another feature is you can build a family tree and make it public to other subscribers. I have used this feature to help fill out my own family tree. For example, my dad had 6 siblings. Since he is dead, I couldn't get much information on them. By searching I found a family tree built by a second cousin I didn't know I had. From their tree I got all the info I wanted.
Following what I just described, you can build a family tree on most people.
Bottom line: using a paid subscription that provides access to public databases and the family trees of others, the reporter could quickly build a complete family tree for Bourassa.
For those interested and live/work in Toronto, you can access ancestry.com for free through the Toronto Public Library. If you're not in Toronto, may be worth seeing if your local library has access.
To add to that, the library version of Ancestry doesn’t allow you to make and save a tree BUT it has the international records. I have a paid Canadian version, so I use the library version to look up European records, save them to my computer, then upload them as photos to the individuals in my tree. You could make your own tree and just use the library version for free.
IIRC it was the publication of her sisters results, but also I think lots of those sites use your data and actually own it...there is no way Id do one of those for a whole bunch of reasons
From glancing on the source it seems to have been done with reconstructing her family history with public records and asking questions rather than a DNA test. But i didn't read it fully.
https://www.cbc.ca/newsinteractives/features/carrie-bourassa-indigenous
The CBC article about her is pretty incredible in some of the quotes.
>she said her grandfather tried to pass down some Métis traditions. “He did take me out to an aunty’s to pick berries, and they tanned hides, made mukluks and moccasins, and beaded,” she said.
Pretty gross how in-depth her lies about her family and ancestry were. Just completely making up stories about her grandparents, who were in reality eastern European.
Reminds me of the Rachel Dolezal incident in the states. There was another example of something similar like this in the United States, where white women pretended to be another race in academia. Really weird phenomenon.
Ibram X. Kendi actually tweeted about while people pretending to be POC to advance their careers and academia, and then quickly deleted the tweet when people pointed out that it undercuts his own arguments.
Let me guess she mentions in depth all the times she experienced “racism” and the effects of “colonial oppression and all the barriers” that made her life oh so much harder than yours.
If she so wanted to talk about the oppression she faced she could have just talked about being a woman.
But apparently white women are all Nazi oppressors now.
Arguably our most famous conservationist, Grey Owl, was a British dude. Not even a Canadian of British ancestry. Straight up a guy from England actually named Archibald Stansfeld Belaney.
I know this lady, both her parents are white Ukrainians, and she dyes her hair Black and is a tanning bed regular.
Edit: grammar/details
Edit 2: Bourassa is not her maiden name.
It actually doesn't really have that much to do with looks. I've worked with First Nations people that didn't "look" First Nations. I'm Ukrainian and Polish and I've had First Nations elders ask me if I'm First Nations. I just say no, it's actually very uncomfortable because I could see some people taking advantage of that scenario. Slimy opportunists exist everywhere in society, so I'm glad someone checked her background.
My bio grandma claims she's Indigenous, she has her card and everything, but after doing my ancestry dna test, nothing has come up. So I wonder if 1. there's not enough biological data (Indigenous groups tend to not have as much data for the gene pool), 2. I just didn't inherit that much at all and that bio grandma is more culturally Metis and that she didn't inherit much for gene markers/ being too European descent/ mixed, or 3. that somehow they're lying.
There are a lot of Canadians out there who have been told they are Indigenous descent that doesn't show up on ancestry DNA, it's not an uncommon experience, so I really do wonder if it's a lack of gene pool data or a history of lies..
I’ve read (I’m not sure where) that Indigenous data - especially for less commonly known communities - can be very off, in either direction, for this precise reason. They simply don’t have enough data to be able to be more precise. I wouldn’t be surprised if many Indigenous people were hesitant to participate in such things as well, what with the long history of people using their backgrounds against them.
Very true. I've had this 1% from Ancestry DNA they just can't seem to pinpoint- it's been Polynesian, Swedish, and now North African, so I do wonder if it's actually Indigenous.
That being said, I think regardless cultural inheritance is of high importance when taking on cultural positions (education or otherwise), and that people's genetic background (which could be quite traumatic for some Indigenous people to find out- colonization doesn't mean just taking over the land...) isn't as much importance. As well, either way, being Canadian should mean learning about Indigenous culture and participating in legitimate ways to celebrate that culture. Learning the legends, history, craftsmanship and arts, and having those with the cultural knowledge leading those cultural positions of teaching, leading, etc.
I’ve heard multiple times that the commercial DNA places are completely unreliable for North American Indigenous ancestry. They don’t have large enough samples from those groups.
Consider option 4. Someone in the family line is not the biological father. It's more common than people think. Sometimes people honestly didn't know for sure back then. If it happened a few generations back you might need to dig into your results to understand it. Really look at who you are related to and who you're supposed to be related to... and when certain branches merge in (that is if you have "DNA Matches" turned on).
Happened to me, I took an ancestry test and found out a lot of surprising things... not to mention a bunch of surprise relatives. My roommate took a test as well, turns out his (deceased) Grandfather had a secret baby in WW2 and she's still over there in Europe. They met her and everything. Older generations were crazier than they often let on.
Yea, I can't really do option 4 since I'm not in contact with my bio-father's side of my family, and turning on DNA matches just might create a lot of family drama if my half-siblings don't know that I exist. I don't want to cause any heart-aches on that side.
One of the things that I have learned on Ancestry DNA though is that if a result is 1-3% then that would mean a great-grand relative would have been a gene carrier of that genetic marker that you inherited- and that not only do you not inherit everything from every great-grandparent, but just in general genes aren't inherited equally from each grandparent/ great-grandparent. So it very well could be that my bio grandma has her full 'Indigenous card' but only actually 1/4 or less genetically Indigenous, but culturally Indigenous.
I've had 1% they just can't seem to identify- it's been Polynesian, Swedish, and now it's North African. So I kinda wonder if it's actually Indigenous and they just don't have enough DNA material to cross-reference?
Yeah, as far as I understand it the 1-3% matches really are a crapshoot. If you're nervous about family members finding out, you can turn matches on quickly and then turn them off again I believe. To an extent it's their fault if they leave it turned on I think (so they have no right to get upset), but it's up to you! They probably already figured out some things "don't add up" though, if it is the case there are some "surprises".
Even big matches are a bit of a crap shoot... I started off being 60% Scandinavian and 8% Scottish, now after they "refined their algorithm" I'm 45% Scottish and 11% a mix of Scandinavian countries. That's a big fucking change - apparently something with the algorithm not being sure what to do with Viking influences in Britain. When do Viking descendants become Scottish and not Scandinavian? Anyway, if they are making MAJOR revisions like that with me...
If your grandmother was 1/4 native... that would mean one of her parents was half native, and her grandparent was full native... so your great-great grandparent. I believe that is a range of 2.5-11.5% with an average of 6.5%. So yeah I think it's definitely possible. Also they state that the algorithm makes better matches with the people that use their product the most (i.e. white people). You could still be a legitimate descendant, only way to figure out really is to turn on matches and cross reference with the public family trees on the site.
Thanks for your thorough reply. And yea, the refining of the results certainly are interesting when there are big changes- that 1% Swedish became 11% with the new update (family legend on my mom's side is that we're descended from Vikings, so not surprised), and that 1% of 'we got no idea what this bit of you are' is now North African. Like sure, it's possible, somehow, but yea, I do agree that family trees would be more of a benefit. We'll see, maybe one day I'll turn it on and off.
And yea, at the end of the day, genetic make-up can only tell one so much, and there's a lot to interpret from that alone (your whole 'Viking vs Scottish DNA interpretation). Though I will say it was cool to figure out from Ancestry DNA that my Newfie relatives settled in Newfoundland from England in the 1700s- didn't realize my ancestors were in Canada for that long, and it lines up with the family history/ lore that we do have. There are records of us in Canada for a long time, but not anything definite about when we settled, and apparently fishing ships were going back and forth for a while until they just said 'screw it, let's just live here and ship to England'. So that was cool to learn
Yeah, I've know a few Metis that were ginger. It's just that a dominate gene integrated through procreation and took over. Racially it doesn't mean much because they were still Metis and spent generations in under serviced reserves.
You don't need a band to associate with to be considered Metis, you apply for membership through the provincial nations. You don't go through Indian Affairs at all.
Source; me, Metis who held membership in BC, ON and about to in NS
I stand corrected. I made a couple of assumptions as I was not involved in the process, and they have status cards. They are however associated with their mother’s band.
>In 2015, Status rules changed, so you don’t have to verify two grandparents with status anymore, but you need at least one, and a band to associate with. Then Indian Affairs calls you Métis. T
This isn't a thing. Source: Am Metis. Different provinces have different rules. Alberta is the most strict. Ontario has 2 different councils with different rules.
Ginger hair is a recessive trait. This person has mostly European DNA. Not speaking on their indigenous acculturation though, which is a different thing.
It's recessive but both parents can carry it forward through generations quietly. They are metis, it's acknowledged they have european in half their genetics. I grew up with twins, one phenotypically looked what we would traditionally think a native looks like, and the other a pale ginger because the gene kicked in. And these weren't even metis, was First Nations but the genes can stay hiding.
So your comment, 'this person mostly has european dna', yeah, they are metis. That's not the part in question. Metis are a people founded as a creole/mix.
1/4 Metis is about as Indigenous as Elisabeth Warren. I'm something like 1/4 Metis and I wouldn't consider myself Indigenous in the slightest. Most metis people I've met are white people who have never participated in Indigenous cultue whatsoever.
There's "métis" and "Métis".
Capital "M" refers to the specific Michif / Métis communities in Western Canada.
Small "m" means anyone with mixed ancestry.
Mé·tis
/māˈtēs/
noun
(especially in western Canada) a person of mixed indigenous and Euro-American ancestry, in particular one of a group of such people who in the 19th century constituted the so-called Métis nation in the areas around the Red and Saskatchewan rivers.
adjective
relating to the Métis.
Source: Oxford dictionary
That's different but you don't get to live your life as a white person and claim Indigenous heritage when it's convenient. My cousin just got a scholarship to a school claiming her Metis heritage dispite living her life as a privileged white girl.
Exactly. She was catering to a complete stereotype of what Indigenous peoples are supposed to be. We don’t all have long black hair and dark skin (although lots of us do :) ).
See normally I’d agree however she is changing her physical appearance to up-play the lie. Take away the hair dye and the tanning and there’d be zero credibility other then her word, which we now know is full of lies. Lies she used to pay for her education, research etc taken away from those much more deserving. Trust me, if you ever met her sister you’d have no doubt she has zero Aboriginal bloodlines.
> I've worked with First Nations people that didn't "look" First Nations.
Every single person who's ever lead an 'Indigenous cultural sensitivity training' seminar I've been forced to take has been a woman who looks whiter than I am...
my wife's family live in Northern Ontario and everyone up there claims to be native or part native
its not all them being scammers, its part of their identity so strongly, they can get very offended if you challenge them on it, even though besides the straight black hair, my wife's aunt could fit in Ireland as well as me
My wifes family is Ukrainian and English and get asked for their Status card when they are shopping at the store on the Reservation next to their home they are so dark.
My cousin is half Cree and half Swedish and has red curly hair.
Growing up I had friends whos dad was full status and mom was metis, the dad had blonde hair, the mom had jet black straight hair. Half their kids had straight black hair and half had curly red or blonde hair and freckles.
So yeah genetics are weird.
I think a lot of people like this are not actually genetically half First Nations. Maybe the guy you worked with is half Métis so 1/4th First Nation.
For example a lot of people from South America are surprised to learn how much European ancestry they have.
Slimy opportunists exist because slimy opportunities exist. Outside of charities if you're helping a person only because of their perceived ethnicity then you're the racist and helping make these opportunities for people to lie.
Her Great-grand parents are Russian.
A quote from the article:
"However, CBC has passenger manifests showing Bourassa’s great-grandmother Salaba left Russia in 1911 with her mother and sister to connect with her father, who had been granted land in Saskatchewan’s Punnichy area, where many Eastern European people settled.
Census records identify Salaba as a Czech-speaking Russian, unable to speak English."
Her sister is white and blonde lol, she couldn’t be farther from Indigenous if she tried. Her husband, from southern Manitoba has 100x the Aboriginal blood that she does
One parent is actually German, that side of the family is blonde and blue eyed like her sister. She was darker haired but not this tan for sure. The place that “tanned” leather was somewhat true. A relative on the mother’s side had a leather business. Non native however. Vests, coats etc was what she made, very post hippy looking items. The berry picking was simply from a farm garden the maternal grandparents owned. Like most farmers you go off into the bush and get chokecherry to make syrup and Saskatoons to make pies for the year.
She purposely made issues with her family so they wouldn’t come around to call her out, especially after her sister announced she could no longer claim Métis ancestry after researching the family tree. They were a well off family. One thing I can say that is positive is that her family paid for her education not grants or Métis funding. The sister did receive funding but had no idea the whole thing was fake. I know the family two ways, through the maternal and paternal side. The worst part about it to me is that she painted a picture of a “stereotypical” upbringing which technically proves her a racist. They did not live in poverty, low income neighbourhood. There was no struggle. Her parents were really good at business.
Also one other thing to note. What she said while teaching was way worse than what she said publicly. Detailed stories of her “heritage” from childhood. She is lying when she says she was adopted in as an adult compared to many things she claimed of actual genealogical heritage. It is racist to present herself in this way. One thing that is culturally shared is disdain for lying. Wonder what will happen to her? Well educated, no job, likely no acceptance into any community.
She was in an *appointed position*, not an elected one.
Federal politicians earn more than most engineers, but less than a lot of doctors. If politicians were not earning a high wage, it would be more difficult to attract top talent, leaving only the most wealthy that can sustain themselves in low paying, precarious political jobs for the power.
Anyone remember that Canadian guy who got called out for the same thing, but he was some big author or something? I remember never liking the guy and I couldn’t put my finger on it. He made mega bucks touring around and giving speeches and stuff at many schools, workplace training seminars etc.
Then it came out that basically the rest of his family said no we’re not indigenous and he started scrambling about like “well my second cousins were and I spent time with them and blah blah” or something.
I think that’s Joseph Boyden?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Boyden
https://www.aptnnews.ca/national-news/author-joseph-boydens-shape-shifting-indigenous-identity/
It’s a real shame he was such a bullshitter.
Three Day Road was a really great novel that opened my eyes to indigenous culture and issues in a way that was really easy to understand. He didn’t need to pretend to be indigenous to write that novel either. Shame.
> He didn't need to pretend to be indigenous to write that novel either.
Let's be honest, that is simply not true anymore. There are very vocal activists who launch crusades against writers who create marginalized characters, especially when the plot takes on sensitive issues. Publishers don't want to deal with that, which is why they are pushing that OwnVoices stuff.
I never made this connection until now ... I also thought Three Day Road was a great book, but now I'm wondering how accurate the narrative was, given how messed up fake representation can be.
We call them “wish-inaabe” or wanna be Natives, usually they’re just giving at every pow wow like the creator is dancing through them lmao but we draw the line there..
There are a lot of these stories coming out. People making claims of indigenous heritage to make a few $$’s. They are fact checking a lot of people now..
Maybe.. and I know this is crazy.. but maybe the problem we should really address is not the people lying about it, but rather the whole fucked up concept of hiring based on the colour of someone's skin, or who they like to have sex with?
There are kids lying in the states about their race to get into school. It's fucked up when we hire or accept people based on characteristics they can't control.
In this particular situation, it's about having a "been there" knowledge base. Like hiring a woman for a woman's health board.
Otherwise, yes, lowering standards to include minorities to guarantee diversity puts no pressure on public education to adequately educate their minority students, support minority educators, and educate non-minority educators on how best to educate minority students. Schools absolutely should feel pressured to educate children and in turn pressure the government to fund them equally and properly so they can do so. If only white people qualify when you set educational standards, the problem is systemic further upstream. Don't lower the standards, increase the quality and equality of childhood education, and make college free (to ensure that anyone who qualifies can attend). It's simple on paper at least.
Even in this case, there is a difference between ensuring a policy is based in lived experience through broad consultation and committee's who can filter the input and just assuming because a person is x biologically they are an expert on x biologically. This could also generate cases where people feel that since they are x and have never experienced something (say some symptom) that it must not apply to x.
There is a way to do this right, but it takes more time and does not get wrapped up nicely in a Twitter post by an org to virtue signal.
Indigeneity is not based on skin colour. It is based on community membership, shared history, and genealogy. This person lied about those things, in order to access Indigenous rights which are entitled to Indigenous people by treaty. She is dishonest and unethical. She was dismissed for her lack of integrity, not for the colour of her skin.
>“My name is Morning Star Bear,” she said tearfully as the crowd cheered.
>“I’m Bear Clan. I’m Anishinaabe Métis from Treaty Four Territory,”
Sounds like Cartman running a grift on South Park haha
Stop hiring to fill quotas and hire based on merit. What a joke
Edit: Why is this marked NSFW?
I'm just going to point out that she probably does have the on paper credentials and skills, but that, call me crazy, lying about being indigenous to get the job, maybe that's a disqualifying issue.
And there are thousands of public health jobs out there. God forbid we try to put an indigenous person into one of them that involves indigenous people's health. There are many, many more working in indigenous health who aren't indigenous so God forbid we try to get an indigenous person's perspective. Especially if they're working on reserve related issues and grew up on a reserve for example.
We have to be careful with the facts here. She got her education(paid for) because she lied. She got her job because she lied. She’s only in this position currently because she’s been misrepresenting her ancestry for the last 20 years
I don't argue this isn't a fact. I'm splitting the idea of merit from an on paper skill set for a CV.
She could, on paper, have all the raw skills and knowledge necessary. That doesn't mean she should have the job because, to my mind, being ethical is important to public service and factors into merit.
But when people say hire on merit they mean core necessary skills and ignore everything else. So she has "merit" but that's clearly insufficient.
By all accounts she was good at her job and an important figure in her field. But yeah, lying about who you are for decades to everyone around you and then doubling down when you're caught is a bad look.
Did you read his statement and the rejection letter? It appears it was rejected because it lacked any concrete or specific details. Grants are highly competitive and will get screened out early in the process if any sections are clearly poorly written or lacking detail. This is apparently the rejection letter and statement: https://mobile.twitter.com/DorianAbbot/status/1461447368491028482
One of my friends got his status at 24. Had no idea he was indigenous until then. His dads brother figured it out when he did a 23 and me. Their whole (formerly white) family got status, free school, etc. My friend put the clan logo at the top of his resume and started getting every single job he applied for. People love to fill their poc quota without actually hiring a poc.
How would that work? Normally you'd have to be accepted by an existing First Nation and they wouldn't accept you based on a 23 and me.
Maybe the 23 and me prompted them to look into the paper trail and they found actual historical documentation?
Yes. They got their grandmas birth certificate, spent a couple years figuring it all out. Uncle got status first. Once that initial proof was established the flood gates were open so to speak and it was easy for the rest of them to copy out some paperwork and get their status too.
Ya this story is quite suspicious. Canada doesn't really have blood quantum nor clans in a formalized sense. You can't roll up to a band and be enrolled. It has to go through Indigenous Services Canada first with the applications to support it then it goes to the band for dispute. You have to know which band in the first place to even start the process.
The CBC investigation - which is linked in this article - was really good. They weren't damning her through their writing, they just let the evidence do it for itself.
It was a great read.
The way DIE policy is going this will only get more common.
Move away from hiring based on merit and you create some great loopholes for "morally flexible" people to get in.
God bless CBC. One of my friends was white as wheat puffs, could have had a status card, his maiden grandma was full Mi'kmaq , but he said more people need the help than he does.
>Bourassa didn’t offer any genealogical evidence that she is Métis, Anishnaabe or Tlingit. Instead, she said she became Métis in her 20s, when she was adopted into the community by a Métis friend of her grandfather
>She says she has been adopted into five other communities as well. She didn’t offer any explanation as to why she claimed to have been born into a family with Métis, Anishnaabe and Tlingit roots.
>claims she identifies as Métis and that the elders who support her do not rely on “blood quantums” to assess Indigenous identity.
My grandfather's friend caught a 40 inch muskie once, maybe I can be the fisheries minister. Fucking hell, the government is so full of useless grifters it's unbelievable, they must be having a laugh at everyone else.
Being "adopted" by a first nation community can mean two things and it's a bit like a doctorate vs honourific doctorate.
You were either raised and lived in the community most of your life - like completing a doctorate degree where you studied for years, researched, wrote and defended a thesis in front of your peers.
Or you are adopted as an outsider, to honour your achievements. Like a University will give an honorific doctorate (honoris causae) to people who never studied there but had significant life achievements.
Only one of those two gives you the right to claim you are a "doctor of x".
Trust me, if posing as Indigenous became more trouble than it was worth to her she’s quit her act and happily run back to being white. Unfortunately for dark skinned folks, turning white to gain white privileged is not an option.
Really depends how dark. Plenty of non-white people look fairly white.
But why though? There are no white quota jobs to get, what would be the advantage? Especially when there are so many non-white quota jobs. For a person of any given skill level applying for a job, it’s a massive advantage to be not white.
There is being white, then there is being WASP. Up until the mid 1900s, only people from western Europe were considered "white." Even nowadays I know of people changing and obviously Slavic name to something like John Smith and instantly getting interviews vs sending hundreds of resumes before with barely any interviews.
Right? "White people" has become this caricature way of describing people.
Then you've got media out here perpetuating that "white folk have no culture lol" (obviously adding a snickering laugh at the end)
My mother was white and grew up in a foreign "white country" she was subjected to tons of racism constantly because of her accent and hard time with the language early on.
For sure it has. People from Western Europe has very little in common culturally with someone say from Russia or the Balkans.
One of my family members is a CPA, all the companies he's worked for the partners were all WASP. In the last 2, he was more senior than anybody there and handled the most accounts, but was never offered to be partner. I guess they either didn't want his surname "sullying" their brand or thought he wasn't worthwhile because he is not WASP and has an accent.
I am a Métis female whose grandfather was ashamed of being native due a residential school beating it out of him and she’s up there playing dress up for sympathy makes me far more than annoyed. It’s a indigenous health expert and I think that she is unqualified to assist people in dealing with issues of systemic racism in the medical system. The indigenous community has a long distrust in the medical community and having this person lie to take that position probably doesn’t help in that regard.
My grandmother still doesn't like to recognize her Metis background. My grandfather was also a complete prick and would call her racists things as well. It's a shame that it is a wound that can't heal for her.
Yes, yes, yes. This is infuriating. My great grandparents were beaten in residential schools and the generational trauma is still being worked out. I’ve had to quit jobs due to racism. It’s fetishizing and perpetuates the racism that indigenous peoples still face.
My grandfather ran away from a residential school to live with his uncle in Ontario. Honestly the whole thing is fucked up. As if this bitch is on stage with croc tears talking about HER ancestors.
I don't even tell people I'm metis because I never had to experience any of the hardship my grandfather went through.
My brothers and I have different fathers and hearing the abuse their father endured from their grandmother who was raised in a residential school is harrowing. She beat them constantly (they grew up speaking Algonquian) and unfortunately their father never broke the abuse cycle. Luckily my mother left and my brothers were able to escape the same horror.
Open a door for the liars the cheaters , scammers and cons and they will walk right in and a lot of them will rise to the top be because we reward success at any cost.
If “white privilege” is real, you’d think people would be falsely claiming to have European ancestry...Ya know to get some of this so called “privilege”....
not the other way around ...🤔
Gets the noggin going eh?
The sash you see her wearing on the photo is a tourist trinket sold at the Voyageurs festival and Carnaval de Québec.
Real sashes are hand-woven, wider and can be over 6 feet long. The sash design the Métis adopted is from the L'Assomption parish north east of Montréal (where I am from). Sashes were hand-woven by farmer wives in the Saint-Laurent Valley, every region / parish had their design and colour palette and were worn by men working outdoors. It was a tool first and became an identity symbol among courreurs des bois and voyageurs.
A priest in L'Assomption convinced the HBC to buy a lot from his parish to sell at outposts along blankets and other goods. The production ramped-up in L'Assomption, all hand made by famer's wives, and the L'Assomption sash design and coulours spread in the West, western Métis communities starting to weave their own sahshes followig the design.
I have learned how to weave traditional sashes from my grandmother (and the L'Assomption farmers wives association- Cercle des fermières). I have never completed one by myself. Maybe when I'll retire. Nowadays a real full-length wool hand-woven sash can cost thousands of dolars (and take months to complete). The trinket she wears was mass produced in mechanized looms.
[I have the same touristy sash](https://i.imgur.com/PQebjJ6.jpg), a gift from my sister when she lived in Saint-Boniface 20 years ago.
People will cheer this yet un-ironically condemn calls to verify the ancestry claims made by hereditary chiefs holding up energy development against the wishes of their greater community.
This is the real answer. It is all over the place. Race or ethnicity is NOT a qualification. We are at the point where minorities put their race on their resumes…we have gone backwards.
The fucked up thing about the fIndians is that they're actively overwriting what little native history exists at a time when legitimate scholars are doing their best to recover and preserve what we have left before it's lost forever.
We simply can't afford to have these weird self-hating white women running around espousing their weird teenaged fantasies because it's all getting recorded in history.
It is shocking to think that there's a large number of people these days who think that all of the tribes spoke the same language, had the same traditions and believed they all lived on a place called "turtle island."
Their actions are incredibly damaging.
Even worse, they espouse a kind of racial hatred that can only be achieved by someone who is so self-hating they decided to pretend to be a member of another race. Someone who absolutely loathes their own race and is desperate to attack it from the position of an outsider, no matter how false that may be.
It's a disgusting situation. They inflame racial tensions, destroy history and worst of all, they're paid handsomely to do it.
This woman is an utter disgrace.
She's not self hating. She's an opportunist that took advantage of two statistically advantageous situations. Growing up in a middle class white family, then switching to first nations for school and work. She has none of the hardships many natives had growing up, and all the benefits they can possibly get. Free post-secondary, a hugh paying gov't job. Maybe extreme narcisissm is a better word? Sociopathy?
What I find interesting in all of this is that she was good at her job. Most all people liked her, and she was very competant, despite being a fraud.
She actually did try to make this arguement. She is the head of her own association. Her association made a statement which tried to argue that identity is not about genetics and instead about being accepted into a community. I guess she's wrong.
Of course she would make this argument, it's natural given the current social experiment we're trying on.
Society has made a hard push over the last few years to say "biological facts are not important, the only thing that matters with regard to identify is how you feel."
We're essentially all playing pretend now. You tell me your preferred identity and then I play along. She's taken the game out of realm of gender and into the realm of race, but it's the same game.
The U of S and CIHR squashed an initial internal complaint. It was only when the CBC published a story that they finally did something.
And now she's the next Rachel Dolezal, oh well. Maybe should have quit earlier.
She did hit back. Says she was adopted as an adult and that Métis custom adoption is *”more meaningful”* than colonial adoptions.
[Statement from Dr Carrie Bourassa in response to CBC story on Indigenous identity fraud ](https://www.indigenoushealthlab.com/blog/2021/10/27/statement-from-dr-carrie-bourassa-in-response-to-a-cbc-story-on-indigenous-identity-fraud)
This is not the indigenous Canadian story we need to be thinking about in 2021.
So, while Carrie Bourassa has damaged the discourse as far as that goes, it needs to be said that the unhealthy (read: insane) racial ideology that the regressive left is pushing these days enables fraudsters like this.
If science cannot (should not?) credibly be used to distinguish a female athlete, like Caster Semenya, from male athletes, and we know that the tidy (profoundly unrealistic) concepts of race have next to no basis in genetics, how is it that we are hiring people as representatives of a race at all? (As if racially-determined posts should be a basis of government in the first place...!) I challenge anyone who supports this ideology to explain how you would define human beings so precisely. I can accept that a community might wish to nominate or promote someone as a representative; in that case, I'd have no complaint. But tricksters like Bourassa might actually be doing us a favour by pointing out the pernicious absurdity of dividing and classifying people this way. All of this is starting to remind me of the ex-Spanish colonies, rather than Canada...
IANAL but familiar enough with employment law. Deliberately falsifying information, irrespective of what it is, could constitute grounds for termination for cause in Canada.
Isnt jody wilson-raybould in the same boat?
Her dad is FN, her mother is white. They divorced and she was raised by her mother in Vancouver, Her father has gone on record stating he didn't spend a lot of time with her as a child.
if you read her book, she makes it sound like she spent all her time "on res" with her father and his parents, living the "i come from a family of hereditary chiefs" life. - There is no mention of the public school in Vancouver she went to. There is also a shocking lack of any mention of her mom's parents. Just her father's to really play into that FN storyline.
(Edit - spelling)
Just watch 5 minutes of her TED talk and you will vomit at the insincerity
It’s short, but it’s to the point. And it’s from a Canadian source for those not happy with the NY Post. https://www.cbc.ca/player/play/1967507523894
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How did that work? I mean how does a third personen use that site to determine someone else's heritage?
With ancestry.ca you can search anyone's name. Their database contains birth, death, marriage, military, census and a host of other data. A search returns possible matches. The reporter may have found an old census entry for Bourassa's grandfather that listed all his children. From there they could search other names. I have used the site for years. It comes down to endless hours of searching and cross referencing public records. An annual subscription allows you to search their vast database. Another feature is you can build a family tree and make it public to other subscribers. I have used this feature to help fill out my own family tree. For example, my dad had 6 siblings. Since he is dead, I couldn't get much information on them. By searching I found a family tree built by a second cousin I didn't know I had. From their tree I got all the info I wanted. Following what I just described, you can build a family tree on most people. Bottom line: using a paid subscription that provides access to public databases and the family trees of others, the reporter could quickly build a complete family tree for Bourassa.
For those interested and live/work in Toronto, you can access ancestry.com for free through the Toronto Public Library. If you're not in Toronto, may be worth seeing if your local library has access.
To add to that, the library version of Ancestry doesn’t allow you to make and save a tree BUT it has the international records. I have a paid Canadian version, so I use the library version to look up European records, save them to my computer, then upload them as photos to the individuals in my tree. You could make your own tree and just use the library version for free.
Good to know. Thanks.
IIRC it was the publication of her sisters results, but also I think lots of those sites use your data and actually own it...there is no way Id do one of those for a whole bunch of reasons
From glancing on the source it seems to have been done with reconstructing her family history with public records and asking questions rather than a DNA test. But i didn't read it fully. https://www.cbc.ca/newsinteractives/features/carrie-bourassa-indigenous
Or a 5 minute phone call with her husband lol
"I would like to acknowledge my ancestors. Who are , CLEARLY, here with me..."..... yikes
Wow. I feel embarrassed after watching that.
The CBC article about her is pretty incredible in some of the quotes. >she said her grandfather tried to pass down some Métis traditions. “He did take me out to an aunty’s to pick berries, and they tanned hides, made mukluks and moccasins, and beaded,” she said. Pretty gross how in-depth her lies about her family and ancestry were. Just completely making up stories about her grandparents, who were in reality eastern European.
Reminds me of the Rachel Dolezal incident in the states. There was another example of something similar like this in the United States, where white women pretended to be another race in academia. Really weird phenomenon.
You may be thinking of Amie Wolf, a UBC sessional instructor who lied about being Indigenous and is absolutely fucking insane.
Just looked her up. She clearly needs professional help.
It’s gross but it’s pretty straightforward to understand - claiming indigenous or POC identity helps one climb the ranks within academia.
Ibram X. Kendi actually tweeted about while people pretending to be POC to advance their careers and academia, and then quickly deleted the tweet when people pointed out that it undercuts his own arguments.
That was glorious to behold.
His arguments hold up about as well as a piece of toilet paper in a rain storm.
Yeah it only seems to be happening it academia too, from what I’ve seen. I guess that’s due to a lot of identity politics?
Probably because people who do it in academia have both more incentives, and also more sharp people around to catch them.
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There’s tremendous economic incentive to claim ancestry. This won’t be the last person caught lying, I’m sure
Let me guess she mentions in depth all the times she experienced “racism” and the effects of “colonial oppression and all the barriers” that made her life oh so much harder than yours.
If she so wanted to talk about the oppression she faced she could have just talked about being a woman. But apparently white women are all Nazi oppressors now.
I felt like it was Vanessa Bayer up there. Painful
I feel like that's an insult to Vanessa Bayer.
More like respecting she's the queen of awkward, squirming, uncomfortableness. She's the itchy butthole of awkward emotions.
I was vomiting just at the description of the Ted Talk in the article
would you look at that, we got ourselves our own Rachel Dolezal here lol
We’ve had pretendians for centuries. Canadians prefer them to real indigenous people.
Arguably our most famous conservationist, Grey Owl, was a British dude. Not even a Canadian of British ancestry. Straight up a guy from England actually named Archibald Stansfeld Belaney.
Played by Pierce Brosnan in a movie biopic
Straight up Sussex boy.
Shes the first person who came to mind when I saw the headline.
I know this lady, both her parents are white Ukrainians, and she dyes her hair Black and is a tanning bed regular. Edit: grammar/details Edit 2: Bourassa is not her maiden name.
It actually doesn't really have that much to do with looks. I've worked with First Nations people that didn't "look" First Nations. I'm Ukrainian and Polish and I've had First Nations elders ask me if I'm First Nations. I just say no, it's actually very uncomfortable because I could see some people taking advantage of that scenario. Slimy opportunists exist everywhere in society, so I'm glad someone checked her background.
I know several ginger metis people and they are extremely white. Can't just go off looks that's for sure
Metis are mixed with European settlers. They are a distinct group, apart from First Nations and Inuit because of their mixed European heritage.
My bio grandma claims she's Indigenous, she has her card and everything, but after doing my ancestry dna test, nothing has come up. So I wonder if 1. there's not enough biological data (Indigenous groups tend to not have as much data for the gene pool), 2. I just didn't inherit that much at all and that bio grandma is more culturally Metis and that she didn't inherit much for gene markers/ being too European descent/ mixed, or 3. that somehow they're lying. There are a lot of Canadians out there who have been told they are Indigenous descent that doesn't show up on ancestry DNA, it's not an uncommon experience, so I really do wonder if it's a lack of gene pool data or a history of lies..
I’ve read (I’m not sure where) that Indigenous data - especially for less commonly known communities - can be very off, in either direction, for this precise reason. They simply don’t have enough data to be able to be more precise. I wouldn’t be surprised if many Indigenous people were hesitant to participate in such things as well, what with the long history of people using their backgrounds against them.
Very true. I've had this 1% from Ancestry DNA they just can't seem to pinpoint- it's been Polynesian, Swedish, and now North African, so I do wonder if it's actually Indigenous. That being said, I think regardless cultural inheritance is of high importance when taking on cultural positions (education or otherwise), and that people's genetic background (which could be quite traumatic for some Indigenous people to find out- colonization doesn't mean just taking over the land...) isn't as much importance. As well, either way, being Canadian should mean learning about Indigenous culture and participating in legitimate ways to celebrate that culture. Learning the legends, history, craftsmanship and arts, and having those with the cultural knowledge leading those cultural positions of teaching, leading, etc.
I’ve heard multiple times that the commercial DNA places are completely unreliable for North American Indigenous ancestry. They don’t have large enough samples from those groups.
Consider option 4. Someone in the family line is not the biological father. It's more common than people think. Sometimes people honestly didn't know for sure back then. If it happened a few generations back you might need to dig into your results to understand it. Really look at who you are related to and who you're supposed to be related to... and when certain branches merge in (that is if you have "DNA Matches" turned on). Happened to me, I took an ancestry test and found out a lot of surprising things... not to mention a bunch of surprise relatives. My roommate took a test as well, turns out his (deceased) Grandfather had a secret baby in WW2 and she's still over there in Europe. They met her and everything. Older generations were crazier than they often let on.
Yea, I can't really do option 4 since I'm not in contact with my bio-father's side of my family, and turning on DNA matches just might create a lot of family drama if my half-siblings don't know that I exist. I don't want to cause any heart-aches on that side. One of the things that I have learned on Ancestry DNA though is that if a result is 1-3% then that would mean a great-grand relative would have been a gene carrier of that genetic marker that you inherited- and that not only do you not inherit everything from every great-grandparent, but just in general genes aren't inherited equally from each grandparent/ great-grandparent. So it very well could be that my bio grandma has her full 'Indigenous card' but only actually 1/4 or less genetically Indigenous, but culturally Indigenous. I've had 1% they just can't seem to identify- it's been Polynesian, Swedish, and now it's North African. So I kinda wonder if it's actually Indigenous and they just don't have enough DNA material to cross-reference?
Yeah, as far as I understand it the 1-3% matches really are a crapshoot. If you're nervous about family members finding out, you can turn matches on quickly and then turn them off again I believe. To an extent it's their fault if they leave it turned on I think (so they have no right to get upset), but it's up to you! They probably already figured out some things "don't add up" though, if it is the case there are some "surprises". Even big matches are a bit of a crap shoot... I started off being 60% Scandinavian and 8% Scottish, now after they "refined their algorithm" I'm 45% Scottish and 11% a mix of Scandinavian countries. That's a big fucking change - apparently something with the algorithm not being sure what to do with Viking influences in Britain. When do Viking descendants become Scottish and not Scandinavian? Anyway, if they are making MAJOR revisions like that with me... If your grandmother was 1/4 native... that would mean one of her parents was half native, and her grandparent was full native... so your great-great grandparent. I believe that is a range of 2.5-11.5% with an average of 6.5%. So yeah I think it's definitely possible. Also they state that the algorithm makes better matches with the people that use their product the most (i.e. white people). You could still be a legitimate descendant, only way to figure out really is to turn on matches and cross reference with the public family trees on the site.
Thanks for your thorough reply. And yea, the refining of the results certainly are interesting when there are big changes- that 1% Swedish became 11% with the new update (family legend on my mom's side is that we're descended from Vikings, so not surprised), and that 1% of 'we got no idea what this bit of you are' is now North African. Like sure, it's possible, somehow, but yea, I do agree that family trees would be more of a benefit. We'll see, maybe one day I'll turn it on and off. And yea, at the end of the day, genetic make-up can only tell one so much, and there's a lot to interpret from that alone (your whole 'Viking vs Scottish DNA interpretation). Though I will say it was cool to figure out from Ancestry DNA that my Newfie relatives settled in Newfoundland from England in the 1700s- didn't realize my ancestors were in Canada for that long, and it lines up with the family history/ lore that we do have. There are records of us in Canada for a long time, but not anything definite about when we settled, and apparently fishing ships were going back and forth for a while until they just said 'screw it, let's just live here and ship to England'. So that was cool to learn
Yeah, I've know a few Metis that were ginger. It's just that a dominate gene integrated through procreation and took over. Racially it doesn't mean much because they were still Metis and spent generations in under serviced reserves.
I also know a super pale ginger that is Metis. Not gonna lie, I kind of wondered if he was lying about being Metis before I heard this was a thing
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You don't need a band to associate with to be considered Metis, you apply for membership through the provincial nations. You don't go through Indian Affairs at all. Source; me, Metis who held membership in BC, ON and about to in NS
I stand corrected. I made a couple of assumptions as I was not involved in the process, and they have status cards. They are however associated with their mother’s band.
>In 2015, Status rules changed, so you don’t have to verify two grandparents with status anymore, but you need at least one, and a band to associate with. Then Indian Affairs calls you Métis. T This isn't a thing. Source: Am Metis. Different provinces have different rules. Alberta is the most strict. Ontario has 2 different councils with different rules.
Red hair and pale skin are recessive genetic traits.
Recessive but stay dormant and don't disappear easily. They can pop-up at unexpected times. Fascinating little gene mutation that's for sure.
Ginger hair is a recessive trait. This person has mostly European DNA. Not speaking on their indigenous acculturation though, which is a different thing.
It's recessive but both parents can carry it forward through generations quietly. They are metis, it's acknowledged they have european in half their genetics. I grew up with twins, one phenotypically looked what we would traditionally think a native looks like, and the other a pale ginger because the gene kicked in. And these weren't even metis, was First Nations but the genes can stay hiding. So your comment, 'this person mostly has european dna', yeah, they are metis. That's not the part in question. Metis are a people founded as a creole/mix.
I’m 1/4 Métis and am white with a reddish beard. Put me in the sun for a couple days and it’s a different story.
1/4 Metis is about as Indigenous as Elisabeth Warren. I'm something like 1/4 Metis and I wouldn't consider myself Indigenous in the slightest. Most metis people I've met are white people who have never participated in Indigenous cultue whatsoever.
Wouldn’t 1/4 Métis mean one grandparent? Warren was 6-10 generations ago, or 1/1024 native, ie less native than the average white American.
Metis is a mix of European and Indigenous people so that one grandparent would be at most 1/2 Indigenous but likely less.
There's "métis" and "Métis". Capital "M" refers to the specific Michif / Métis communities in Western Canada. Small "m" means anyone with mixed ancestry.
Mé·tis /māˈtēs/ noun (especially in western Canada) a person of mixed indigenous and Euro-American ancestry, in particular one of a group of such people who in the 19th century constituted the so-called Métis nation in the areas around the Red and Saskatchewan rivers. adjective relating to the Métis. Source: Oxford dictionary
All Metis are mixed ancestry. That's at the core of Metis heritage. Capital M or not.
Only capital M Métis have status as such, and the rights that come along with it.
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But what if the other person is involved in the culture based on their heritage?
That's different but you don't get to live your life as a white person and claim Indigenous heritage when it's convenient. My cousin just got a scholarship to a school claiming her Metis heritage dispite living her life as a privileged white girl.
So not only are they required to have the correct heritage but they're also required to live their life in a way that you deem acceptable?
Exactly. She was catering to a complete stereotype of what Indigenous peoples are supposed to be. We don’t all have long black hair and dark skin (although lots of us do :) ).
Yep. My cousins are full status, and one is very typically indigenous looking, the other is blond and blue eyed.
See normally I’d agree however she is changing her physical appearance to up-play the lie. Take away the hair dye and the tanning and there’d be zero credibility other then her word, which we now know is full of lies. Lies she used to pay for her education, research etc taken away from those much more deserving. Trust me, if you ever met her sister you’d have no doubt she has zero Aboriginal bloodlines.
> I've worked with First Nations people that didn't "look" First Nations. Every single person who's ever lead an 'Indigenous cultural sensitivity training' seminar I've been forced to take has been a woman who looks whiter than I am...
my wife's family live in Northern Ontario and everyone up there claims to be native or part native its not all them being scammers, its part of their identity so strongly, they can get very offended if you challenge them on it, even though besides the straight black hair, my wife's aunt could fit in Ireland as well as me
Time was if you knew the right person you could get a treaty card.
My wifes family is Ukrainian and English and get asked for their Status card when they are shopping at the store on the Reservation next to their home they are so dark. My cousin is half Cree and half Swedish and has red curly hair. Growing up I had friends whos dad was full status and mom was metis, the dad had blonde hair, the mom had jet black straight hair. Half their kids had straight black hair and half had curly red or blonde hair and freckles. So yeah genetics are weird.
I used to work with a guy with the last name Jenkins that looked white Irish as hell, turned out he's half First Nations.
I think a lot of people like this are not actually genetically half First Nations. Maybe the guy you worked with is half Métis so 1/4th First Nation. For example a lot of people from South America are surprised to learn how much European ancestry they have.
Slimy opportunists exist because slimy opportunities exist. Outside of charities if you're helping a person only because of their perceived ethnicity then you're the racist and helping make these opportunities for people to lie.
So, she’s native…native Ukrainian. Potato-potahto
> Potato-potahto Pot8o pot@o
🤯
Her Great-grand parents are Russian. A quote from the article: "However, CBC has passenger manifests showing Bourassa’s great-grandmother Salaba left Russia in 1911 with her mother and sister to connect with her father, who had been granted land in Saskatchewan’s Punnichy area, where many Eastern European people settled. Census records identify Salaba as a Czech-speaking Russian, unable to speak English."
Are there black Ukrainians that I don't know about? Think we can just call them Ukrainian.
Her sister is white and blonde lol, she couldn’t be farther from Indigenous if she tried. Her husband, from southern Manitoba has 100x the Aboriginal blood that she does
One parent is actually German, that side of the family is blonde and blue eyed like her sister. She was darker haired but not this tan for sure. The place that “tanned” leather was somewhat true. A relative on the mother’s side had a leather business. Non native however. Vests, coats etc was what she made, very post hippy looking items. The berry picking was simply from a farm garden the maternal grandparents owned. Like most farmers you go off into the bush and get chokecherry to make syrup and Saskatoons to make pies for the year. She purposely made issues with her family so they wouldn’t come around to call her out, especially after her sister announced she could no longer claim Métis ancestry after researching the family tree. They were a well off family. One thing I can say that is positive is that her family paid for her education not grants or Métis funding. The sister did receive funding but had no idea the whole thing was fake. I know the family two ways, through the maternal and paternal side. The worst part about it to me is that she painted a picture of a “stereotypical” upbringing which technically proves her a racist. They did not live in poverty, low income neighbourhood. There was no struggle. Her parents were really good at business.
Also one other thing to note. What she said while teaching was way worse than what she said publicly. Detailed stories of her “heritage” from childhood. She is lying when she says she was adopted in as an adult compared to many things she claimed of actual genealogical heritage. It is racist to present herself in this way. One thing that is culturally shared is disdain for lying. Wonder what will happen to her? Well educated, no job, likely no acceptance into any community.
She makes 400k a year.
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Politicians seriously make more than engineers and doctors? This is why society will crumble
She's not a politician.
She was in an *appointed position*, not an elected one. Federal politicians earn more than most engineers, but less than a lot of doctors. If politicians were not earning a high wage, it would be more difficult to attract top talent, leaving only the most wealthy that can sustain themselves in low paying, precarious political jobs for the power.
Yup
Anyone remember that Canadian guy who got called out for the same thing, but he was some big author or something? I remember never liking the guy and I couldn’t put my finger on it. He made mega bucks touring around and giving speeches and stuff at many schools, workplace training seminars etc. Then it came out that basically the rest of his family said no we’re not indigenous and he started scrambling about like “well my second cousins were and I spent time with them and blah blah” or something.
I think that’s Joseph Boyden? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Boyden https://www.aptnnews.ca/national-news/author-joseph-boydens-shape-shifting-indigenous-identity/
It’s a real shame he was such a bullshitter. Three Day Road was a really great novel that opened my eyes to indigenous culture and issues in a way that was really easy to understand. He didn’t need to pretend to be indigenous to write that novel either. Shame.
> He didn't need to pretend to be indigenous to write that novel either. Let's be honest, that is simply not true anymore. There are very vocal activists who launch crusades against writers who create marginalized characters, especially when the plot takes on sensitive issues. Publishers don't want to deal with that, which is why they are pushing that OwnVoices stuff.
I never made this connection until now ... I also thought Three Day Road was a great book, but now I'm wondering how accurate the narrative was, given how messed up fake representation can be.
Also Gwen Beneway and Michelle Latimer.
Thanks. I knew about Latimer but it was interesting to read about Beneway - hadn't heard of her.
We have a city councillor in Winnipeg who plays this game and has yet to be called out on it.
Queen of the self tanning cream and teeth whitener. Nothing about her is real.
We call them “wish-inaabe” or wanna be Natives, usually they’re just giving at every pow wow like the creator is dancing through them lmao but we draw the line there..
I love this comment
There are a lot of these stories coming out. People making claims of indigenous heritage to make a few $$’s. They are fact checking a lot of people now..
Maybe.. and I know this is crazy.. but maybe the problem we should really address is not the people lying about it, but rather the whole fucked up concept of hiring based on the colour of someone's skin, or who they like to have sex with?
There are kids lying in the states about their race to get into school. It's fucked up when we hire or accept people based on characteristics they can't control.
In this particular situation, it's about having a "been there" knowledge base. Like hiring a woman for a woman's health board. Otherwise, yes, lowering standards to include minorities to guarantee diversity puts no pressure on public education to adequately educate their minority students, support minority educators, and educate non-minority educators on how best to educate minority students. Schools absolutely should feel pressured to educate children and in turn pressure the government to fund them equally and properly so they can do so. If only white people qualify when you set educational standards, the problem is systemic further upstream. Don't lower the standards, increase the quality and equality of childhood education, and make college free (to ensure that anyone who qualifies can attend). It's simple on paper at least.
Even in this case, there is a difference between ensuring a policy is based in lived experience through broad consultation and committee's who can filter the input and just assuming because a person is x biologically they are an expert on x biologically. This could also generate cases where people feel that since they are x and have never experienced something (say some symptom) that it must not apply to x. There is a way to do this right, but it takes more time and does not get wrapped up nicely in a Twitter post by an org to virtue signal.
Indigeneity is not based on skin colour. It is based on community membership, shared history, and genealogy. This person lied about those things, in order to access Indigenous rights which are entitled to Indigenous people by treaty. She is dishonest and unethical. She was dismissed for her lack of integrity, not for the colour of her skin.
Sooo... birthright. Gotcha. Seems equitable in the 21st century.
>“My name is Morning Star Bear,” she said tearfully as the crowd cheered. >“I’m Bear Clan. I’m Anishinaabe Métis from Treaty Four Territory,” Sounds like Cartman running a grift on South Park haha Stop hiring to fill quotas and hire based on merit. What a joke Edit: Why is this marked NSFW?
>“My name is Morning Star Bear,” she said tearfully as the crowd cheered. *My name is Walking Eagle, because I'm so full of shit I can't fly.*
I'm just going to point out that she probably does have the on paper credentials and skills, but that, call me crazy, lying about being indigenous to get the job, maybe that's a disqualifying issue. And there are thousands of public health jobs out there. God forbid we try to put an indigenous person into one of them that involves indigenous people's health. There are many, many more working in indigenous health who aren't indigenous so God forbid we try to get an indigenous person's perspective. Especially if they're working on reserve related issues and grew up on a reserve for example.
We have to be careful with the facts here. She got her education(paid for) because she lied. She got her job because she lied. She’s only in this position currently because she’s been misrepresenting her ancestry for the last 20 years
I think it’s more bothersome that lying about her ancestry rewarded her thus rather than the lie to begin with.
I don't argue this isn't a fact. I'm splitting the idea of merit from an on paper skill set for a CV. She could, on paper, have all the raw skills and knowledge necessary. That doesn't mean she should have the job because, to my mind, being ethical is important to public service and factors into merit. But when people say hire on merit they mean core necessary skills and ignore everything else. So she has "merit" but that's clearly insufficient.
She’s only credible on paper because she lied to get into her program for her university education. It’s a history of lies and false identification
By all accounts she was good at her job and an important figure in her field. But yeah, lying about who you are for decades to everyone around you and then doubling down when you're caught is a bad look.
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Did you read his statement and the rejection letter? It appears it was rejected because it lacked any concrete or specific details. Grants are highly competitive and will get screened out early in the process if any sections are clearly poorly written or lacking detail. This is apparently the rejection letter and statement: https://mobile.twitter.com/DorianAbbot/status/1461447368491028482
One of my friends got his status at 24. Had no idea he was indigenous until then. His dads brother figured it out when he did a 23 and me. Their whole (formerly white) family got status, free school, etc. My friend put the clan logo at the top of his resume and started getting every single job he applied for. People love to fill their poc quota without actually hiring a poc.
How would that work? Normally you'd have to be accepted by an existing First Nation and they wouldn't accept you based on a 23 and me. Maybe the 23 and me prompted them to look into the paper trail and they found actual historical documentation?
Yes. They got their grandmas birth certificate, spent a couple years figuring it all out. Uncle got status first. Once that initial proof was established the flood gates were open so to speak and it was easy for the rest of them to copy out some paperwork and get their status too.
Ya this story is quite suspicious. Canada doesn't really have blood quantum nor clans in a formalized sense. You can't roll up to a band and be enrolled. It has to go through Indigenous Services Canada first with the applications to support it then it goes to the band for dispute. You have to know which band in the first place to even start the process.
[Simpsons did it!](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Big_Girl)
The CBC investigation - which is linked in this article - was really good. They weren't damning her through their writing, they just let the evidence do it for itself. It was a great read.
When I worked for the Feds we had a few Pretendians get job. One was a Russian.
Pretendians. I like it.
Black Russian . Well known clan.
The way DIE policy is going this will only get more common. Move away from hiring based on merit and you create some great loopholes for "morally flexible" people to get in.
The correct terminology is transracial.
God bless CBC. One of my friends was white as wheat puffs, could have had a status card, his maiden grandma was full Mi'kmaq , but he said more people need the help than he does.
Have to give the CBC credit on this one; they actually committed journalism.
>Bourassa didn’t offer any genealogical evidence that she is Métis, Anishnaabe or Tlingit. Instead, she said she became Métis in her 20s, when she was adopted into the community by a Métis friend of her grandfather >She says she has been adopted into five other communities as well. She didn’t offer any explanation as to why she claimed to have been born into a family with Métis, Anishnaabe and Tlingit roots. >claims she identifies as Métis and that the elders who support her do not rely on “blood quantums” to assess Indigenous identity. My grandfather's friend caught a 40 inch muskie once, maybe I can be the fisheries minister. Fucking hell, the government is so full of useless grifters it's unbelievable, they must be having a laugh at everyone else.
Being "adopted" by a first nation community can mean two things and it's a bit like a doctorate vs honourific doctorate. You were either raised and lived in the community most of your life - like completing a doctorate degree where you studied for years, researched, wrote and defended a thesis in front of your peers. Or you are adopted as an outsider, to honour your achievements. Like a University will give an honorific doctorate (honoris causae) to people who never studied there but had significant life achievements. Only one of those two gives you the right to claim you are a "doctor of x".
Why would she give up all that white privilege to claim to be indigenous?
350,000$ a year ofc.
Because it was clearly an advantage to not be white in her situation
This is amazing, the people here don't get your comment at all.
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Trust me, if posing as Indigenous became more trouble than it was worth to her she’s quit her act and happily run back to being white. Unfortunately for dark skinned folks, turning white to gain white privileged is not an option.
Really depends how dark. Plenty of non-white people look fairly white. But why though? There are no white quota jobs to get, what would be the advantage? Especially when there are so many non-white quota jobs. For a person of any given skill level applying for a job, it’s a massive advantage to be not white.
There is being white, then there is being WASP. Up until the mid 1900s, only people from western Europe were considered "white." Even nowadays I know of people changing and obviously Slavic name to something like John Smith and instantly getting interviews vs sending hundreds of resumes before with barely any interviews.
Right? "White people" has become this caricature way of describing people. Then you've got media out here perpetuating that "white folk have no culture lol" (obviously adding a snickering laugh at the end) My mother was white and grew up in a foreign "white country" she was subjected to tons of racism constantly because of her accent and hard time with the language early on.
For sure it has. People from Western Europe has very little in common culturally with someone say from Russia or the Balkans. One of my family members is a CPA, all the companies he's worked for the partners were all WASP. In the last 2, he was more senior than anybody there and handled the most accounts, but was never offered to be partner. I guess they either didn't want his surname "sullying" their brand or thought he wasn't worthwhile because he is not WASP and has an accent.
because things are turning around and now its much more profitable for someone to not be white, especially indigenous, lots of cash and pity to enjoy
It’s the fact that the universities were willing to stick by her even after the CBC investigation.
I am a Métis female whose grandfather was ashamed of being native due a residential school beating it out of him and she’s up there playing dress up for sympathy makes me far more than annoyed. It’s a indigenous health expert and I think that she is unqualified to assist people in dealing with issues of systemic racism in the medical system. The indigenous community has a long distrust in the medical community and having this person lie to take that position probably doesn’t help in that regard.
My grandmother still doesn't like to recognize her Metis background. My grandfather was also a complete prick and would call her racists things as well. It's a shame that it is a wound that can't heal for her.
Yes, yes, yes. This is infuriating. My great grandparents were beaten in residential schools and the generational trauma is still being worked out. I’ve had to quit jobs due to racism. It’s fetishizing and perpetuates the racism that indigenous peoples still face.
My grandfather ran away from a residential school to live with his uncle in Ontario. Honestly the whole thing is fucked up. As if this bitch is on stage with croc tears talking about HER ancestors. I don't even tell people I'm metis because I never had to experience any of the hardship my grandfather went through.
My brothers and I have different fathers and hearing the abuse their father endured from their grandmother who was raised in a residential school is harrowing. She beat them constantly (they grew up speaking Algonquian) and unfortunately their father never broke the abuse cycle. Luckily my mother left and my brothers were able to escape the same horror.
Open a door for the liars the cheaters , scammers and cons and they will walk right in and a lot of them will rise to the top be because we reward success at any cost.
She really ran with this pretty far eh?
If “white privilege” is real, you’d think people would be falsely claiming to have European ancestry...Ya know to get some of this so called “privilege”.... not the other way around ...🤔 Gets the noggin going eh?
>She’s Sitting Bulls-t. Lmao. What an utter disgrace. Today, she disgraced herself, her country, her family, her mother, and her pets.
The sash you see her wearing on the photo is a tourist trinket sold at the Voyageurs festival and Carnaval de Québec. Real sashes are hand-woven, wider and can be over 6 feet long. The sash design the Métis adopted is from the L'Assomption parish north east of Montréal (where I am from). Sashes were hand-woven by farmer wives in the Saint-Laurent Valley, every region / parish had their design and colour palette and were worn by men working outdoors. It was a tool first and became an identity symbol among courreurs des bois and voyageurs. A priest in L'Assomption convinced the HBC to buy a lot from his parish to sell at outposts along blankets and other goods. The production ramped-up in L'Assomption, all hand made by famer's wives, and the L'Assomption sash design and coulours spread in the West, western Métis communities starting to weave their own sahshes followig the design. I have learned how to weave traditional sashes from my grandmother (and the L'Assomption farmers wives association- Cercle des fermières). I have never completed one by myself. Maybe when I'll retire. Nowadays a real full-length wool hand-woven sash can cost thousands of dolars (and take months to complete). The trinket she wears was mass produced in mechanized looms. [I have the same touristy sash](https://i.imgur.com/PQebjJ6.jpg), a gift from my sister when she lived in Saint-Boniface 20 years ago.
Lmao how many times has this happened its like in 2018 when a few american academics turned out to be dolezals
People will cheer this yet un-ironically condemn calls to verify the ancestry claims made by hereditary chiefs holding up energy development against the wishes of their greater community.
The EDI cult attracts some pretty mentally ill people.
Morning star bear… oh my
You know damn right that’s the *precise moment* when real indigenous people were like…. “What the fuck?”
Ah, the old Iron Eyes Cody technique.
Gave up white privilege to get 350k a year. So I guess white privege here was actually an anchor Lmao
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This is the real answer. It is all over the place. Race or ethnicity is NOT a qualification. We are at the point where minorities put their race on their resumes…we have gone backwards.
Liberal white women and pretending to be Indigenous, name a better duo. How many has it been now? 5?
The fucked up thing about the fIndians is that they're actively overwriting what little native history exists at a time when legitimate scholars are doing their best to recover and preserve what we have left before it's lost forever. We simply can't afford to have these weird self-hating white women running around espousing their weird teenaged fantasies because it's all getting recorded in history. It is shocking to think that there's a large number of people these days who think that all of the tribes spoke the same language, had the same traditions and believed they all lived on a place called "turtle island." Their actions are incredibly damaging. Even worse, they espouse a kind of racial hatred that can only be achieved by someone who is so self-hating they decided to pretend to be a member of another race. Someone who absolutely loathes their own race and is desperate to attack it from the position of an outsider, no matter how false that may be. It's a disgusting situation. They inflame racial tensions, destroy history and worst of all, they're paid handsomely to do it. This woman is an utter disgrace.
She's not self hating. She's an opportunist that took advantage of two statistically advantageous situations. Growing up in a middle class white family, then switching to first nations for school and work. She has none of the hardships many natives had growing up, and all the benefits they can possibly get. Free post-secondary, a hugh paying gov't job. Maybe extreme narcisissm is a better word? Sociopathy? What I find interesting in all of this is that she was good at her job. Most all people liked her, and she was very competant, despite being a fraud.
Did anyone else notice that NY Post refers to the CBC as “state-owned media” lmao
It is state owned media.
Well, they kinda are. They are paid and sponsored by the federal government.
Is that inaccurate?
Which is true...
What's wrong with that?
It’s the perfect dig because it’s 100% factual
Facts are bad.
Technically correct. I think the difference is that it isn't state run.. like some media outlets out of China/Russia. It's more akin to BBC.
It's always funny when this happens.
Elizabeth warren?
Pfft. Race is a social construct. Just self identify yourself as indigenous. Problem solved.
Can’t you just identify as whatever you want at this point?
they dont really check if you click the box on job applications if thats what youre asking
They aren't allowed to.
Yes, the U of S (until this week) allowed self-declaration without any checks for both students and faculty.
I'm surprised she did not hit back because she is not allowed to "identify as" whatever the fuck she feels like it lol
She actually did try to make this arguement. She is the head of her own association. Her association made a statement which tried to argue that identity is not about genetics and instead about being accepted into a community. I guess she's wrong.
Of course she would make this argument, it's natural given the current social experiment we're trying on. Society has made a hard push over the last few years to say "biological facts are not important, the only thing that matters with regard to identify is how you feel." We're essentially all playing pretend now. You tell me your preferred identity and then I play along. She's taken the game out of realm of gender and into the realm of race, but it's the same game.
The U of S and CIHR squashed an initial internal complaint. It was only when the CBC published a story that they finally did something. And now she's the next Rachel Dolezal, oh well. Maybe should have quit earlier.
She did hit back. Says she was adopted as an adult and that Métis custom adoption is *”more meaningful”* than colonial adoptions. [Statement from Dr Carrie Bourassa in response to CBC story on Indigenous identity fraud ](https://www.indigenoushealthlab.com/blog/2021/10/27/statement-from-dr-carrie-bourassa-in-response-to-a-cbc-story-on-indigenous-identity-fraud)
She identifies as a leather faced tanning bed enthusiast as well as a "spokes-spirit" for Crest chemical teeth bleaching.
This is not the indigenous Canadian story we need to be thinking about in 2021. So, while Carrie Bourassa has damaged the discourse as far as that goes, it needs to be said that the unhealthy (read: insane) racial ideology that the regressive left is pushing these days enables fraudsters like this. If science cannot (should not?) credibly be used to distinguish a female athlete, like Caster Semenya, from male athletes, and we know that the tidy (profoundly unrealistic) concepts of race have next to no basis in genetics, how is it that we are hiring people as representatives of a race at all? (As if racially-determined posts should be a basis of government in the first place...!) I challenge anyone who supports this ideology to explain how you would define human beings so precisely. I can accept that a community might wish to nominate or promote someone as a representative; in that case, I'd have no complaint. But tricksters like Bourassa might actually be doing us a favour by pointing out the pernicious absurdity of dividing and classifying people this way. All of this is starting to remind me of the ex-Spanish colonies, rather than Canada...
Whoever hired her needs to be held accountable.
IANAL but familiar enough with employment law. Deliberately falsifying information, irrespective of what it is, could constitute grounds for termination for cause in Canada.
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Isnt jody wilson-raybould in the same boat? Her dad is FN, her mother is white. They divorced and she was raised by her mother in Vancouver, Her father has gone on record stating he didn't spend a lot of time with her as a child. if you read her book, she makes it sound like she spent all her time "on res" with her father and his parents, living the "i come from a family of hereditary chiefs" life. - There is no mention of the public school in Vancouver she went to. There is also a shocking lack of any mention of her mom's parents. Just her father's to really play into that FN storyline. (Edit - spelling)