Thank you Diogenesister. It is always valued when a person respects and acknowledges our pain.
I am of Odawa nation, although I was never raised traditional, never taught our language, my mother was taken away at the age of 9 up until she was 18 and her upbringing in the institution greatly affected her way of life which resulted in my diminished sense of being. I had to seek out traditions and language on my own. My mother did stay after 18 for a few more years to earn a degree within the same sect, but at the cost of her culture and self-identity. She hadn't recovered completely, and slowly started speaking the language that was beat out of her not until her 40's or 50's. I used to think her situation made her easy prey for JW's but I see all she wishes to do is give hope to people who never had a chance in life, those who never knew hope. She doesn't push people to believe or get baptized, but the study of hope is better than nothing at all. There were a few people who came up to me, gave me a hug, and told me my mom made them rethink suicide. She never showed affection when I was a child and I was already a degenerate kid when I ran away. When we later reconciled is when I noticed the huge change in her psychological state and I finally had a mother. To this day she doesn't judge me, she doesn't preach, she is so accepting even after knowing of all atrocities I've done or caused. I had not met any other jw's outside her congregation until I met my partner, so I never had a biased thought of its members. It was only until I met his parents, that changed. He's not whipped or controlled as some may think. Rather he will treat his family his respect even though they don't deserve it, because that is just who he is. He honors and shows reverence to my mother even though she has never said more than 5 words to him in 6 years, because that is just who he is.
The Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada spent 6 long emotional years gathering evidence and testimonies of survivors of indian residential schools all across canada. The government along with the churches spent over 100 years physically, psychologically and sexually abusing native children as young as 5, sometimes killing them. They were forcibly taken from their parents to assimilate them to 'kill the indian' within. The commission ended up with a 10 volume final report with over 6000 pages within them. You like to read it seems, but I must warn you, it is extremely graphic and powerful. A very sad dark hidden reality in this country's history.