May 15, 2023
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canadaLANDBACK
#8 Hearts And Minds
Host Karyn Pugliese, producer Kim Wheeler, contributors Trina Roache and Cara McKenna reflect on the season, and - wait for it - Karyn and Jesse argue about whether or not journalism can change the hearts and minds of people.
Karyn Pugliese
Editor-in-Chief
Kim Wheeler
Producer

canadaLANDBACK is a co-production by Canada’s National Observer and Canadaland.

Host Karyn Pugliese, producer Kim Wheeler, contributors Trina Roache and Cara McKenna reflect on the season, and — wait for it — Karyn and Jesse argue about whether or not journalism can change the hearts and minds of people. 

Contributors: Trina Roache, Cara McKenna, Jesse Brown 

Host: Karyn Pugliese, editor-in-chief, Canada’s National Observer

Credits: Kim Wheeler (Producer)

Sponsors: Rotman, Squarespace, Athletic Greens, Better Help

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Transcript

Canadaland’s transcripts are edited to the best of our ability to ensure accuracy from audio to text. Please contact
editor@canadaland.com should you have a correction.

Maxed Out Promo:
Kim Wheeler: If you listen to Canadaland, you probably don’t mind loud men with strong opinions. Canadaland has Jesse Brown at Canada’s National Observer. We have our lead columnist Max Fawcett, and now he has a podcast.|
(High octane music starts)

Max Fawcett: I’m frustrated by the relentless partizan-ship and the refusal to discuss things in good faith. In other words, I’m maxed out. You probably are, too. That’s why in this podcast I’m going to be inviting people to talk with me about my columns and ideas, even people who want to contradict me.
(High octane music concludes)

Kim Wheeler: Maxed out in an age of polarization, one man tried to have a reasonable conversation. Sometimes it works. That’s Maxed Out, a bi weekly podcast, which is part of Podcast Tuesdays at Canada’s National Observer. Find us on iTunes and wherever you listen to your favourite podcasts.
(Ethereal electronic music starts)

canadaLANDBACK is a co-production between Canada’s National Observer and Canadaland.

Intro:
Karyn Pugliese: I’m Karyn Pugliese, host and producer of this season of canadaLANDBACK, and I welcome you to our final show this season. As we were recording this last episode, Mi’kmaq journalist and professor Trina Roache commented that First Nations people experience time differently. And it’s not a linear projection. It’s more like the past, present and future are layered upon us all at once, and that’s a good frame for the story I want to tell you now. 

In January 2020, I’d left my job at APTN. I found myself in Boston on a Nieman Fellowship. I was poring over truth commissions South Africa, Rwanda, Argentina. I’d been thinking about what our Truth Commission had said about the importance of the role the media should play in reconciliation. I was searching for any way forward that we could replicate in Canada. 

On breaks from those readings, I found myself swiping through the news on my iPhone following the story of the hereditary chiefs of Wet’suwet’en, who had just delivered an eviction notice to the coastal Gaslink asking them to stop all work on their territory and leave. 

(Clip from Wet’suwet’en land defenders plays – woman leading a crowd in a chant)

The standoff ensued polarized Canadians. Across Canada, supporters blocked roads and barricaded shipping ports and occupied the offices of elected officials. Among them were non-Indigenous supporters. Conservative leader Andrew Scheer called the land defenders criminals and advocated for Justin Trudeau to call in the police.

Andrew Scheer: It is almost 40,400 KM from the Wet’suwet’en territory to the protesters in Ontario, and the Prime Minister this morning spoke of dialog with the people who are breaking the law.

Karyn Pugliese: On day 16, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau made a speech saying that all dialog had failed. He didn’t call in the police, but it seemed there was little left for police to do but to enforce Coastal GasLink’s injunction.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau: The situation as it currently stands is unacceptable and untenable. Everyone involved is worried. Canadians have been patient. Our government has been patient, but it has been two weeks and the barricades need to come down now.
(Ethereal electronic music concludes)

Karyn Pugliese: For Indigenous people, events were following a historic pattern known by rote. We’ve seen it before at Kanehsatà:ke, Stoney Point, Gustafsen Lake, the Lobster Wars, more than a dozen other land and water actions. But something was different this time. I thought I sensed a mood. First, there were people holding signs saying reconciliation is dead. And that was the first time I asked that question that I asked at the beginning of this series. What if that’s true? What if reconciliation is dead? Then what? Do things stay the way they are? Do we actually have a civil war? If reconciliation is truly dead, just what are the other options? 

As I watched events unfold, I also had this chilling sense that I couldn’t shake. It was if somebody got hurt this time, it would not be like before. And someone did get hurt, but not here, not in Canada, not an Indigenous man. It happened in Minneapolis when Mr. George Floyd, a black man who had allegedly bought cigarettes with a counterfeit twenty dollar bill, was handcuffed and pinned to the ground by police. And an officer placed his knee on Floyd’s neck – suffocating and murdering him – all horrifyingly captured on video.

The Black Lives Matter movement raged for weeks in the US when the movement crossed the border into Canada. There was an incredible act of allyship. The Black community made space for Indigenous voices. So this is all very nonlinear now. Memories of Land Back movements from Oka to Wet’suwet’en and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission are layered over George Floyd and Black Lives Matter. 

But it’s not just me. You and I, all of us. We live here now. We haven’t gotten to reconciliation, but we did get a reckoning; an era of calling out and canceling, of reflection. Of challenging the status quo and afflicting the comfortable even in legacy newsrooms. How do we get to reconciliation? Oh, I have no answers now, not any more than I did in 2020 when I sat in the library pouring over volumes of other commissions. But if it starts with the truth, I know what to do with my journalism degree. Thank you for joining us this season. Let’s wrap it up. Producer Kim Wheeler, thank you for joining me on our last episode.

Part One:
Kim Wheeler: Thanks so much, Karyn, for having me on the airwaves with you. I can’t believe that while this is our seventh episode and we’re wrapping up season one, it’s been a great journey being on this road with you and sharing these stories on this podcast.

Karyn Pugliese: We really got to know each other this season, and I’m so grateful for the chance to have worked with you. So originally on this episode, I kind of thought we might wrap up with an interview with Murray Sinclair, but he has not been feeling well. And so we’re going to do a sort of a look back. And I guess I’m wondering what moments or what things this season you wanted to look back on, Kim?

Kim Wheeler: Oh, there are so many, and we’re going to get to some of the people who have contributed to this season. But I think one of my favourite moments was our very first interview with Elder Bonnie Brissette at Stony Point. 

I live in Winnipeg. I’d flown into Toronto, I rented a car, I picked you up, Karyn, and we drove three hours out to Stoney Point, and we weren’t certain if we were actually going to gather tape on that trip or if we were just going to go in and introduce ourselves to the community. 

And, you know, I’ve always worked in print and radio and audio. So for me to go in as a journalist, you always get what you need. But for you, you’ve worked in television, so coming in with cameras is a different experience than just going into a community and not having to shove cameras in people’s faces. 

So I thought that we would most likely get audio on that trip and get what we needed. You had other ideas, so right away we both had different ideas of how this was going to work. But as I mean, when you’re probably used to getting your way, but I got my way and we recorded with “Bonnie” Brissette that day and she told us this incredible story of when her family was moved from Stoney Point to Kettle Point. And she described what that was like for her. And I just want to share this bit of tape with you and for the listeners.

“Bonnie” Brissette: Dad was sitting on some big blocks from woodcutting asking them what was, what’s or doing there, where is there going with our house? And he said, well, we got to go and live that Kettle Point down by Grandma Flora’s until the war is over and then we’ll come back.

Karyn Pugliese: The government was taking their land. Everyone had to move.

“Bonnie” Brissette: While it was gardening time because I know Dad had planted all the garden and Grandma Laura, who lived next door, had planted her garden. Everybody. Because your life depended on them gardens. They planted them gardens. And so it’d be about I must have been about end of April 1st part of May, because that’s when the frost is on the ground and everybody put their gardens in down there. 

And the day we left Stoney Point, I didn’t even know we were leaving because Mum got us up and we’re having a- we didn’t have no bathroom. We had a big old laundry tub where she scrubbed her clothes in and we’re having a bath. When we got up that morning when we had our bath and mum put our best dresses on us and put anklets on us, we didn’t wear anklets unless you’re going someplace. They said both of those ladies were trying to address what was happening with dignity.

Kim Wheeler: So this happened within her lifetime. This is someone who is still living today, who it could be, you know, your listeners, grandmother, your great grandmother, who may still be alive within our lifetimes, that happened. It’s not something that’s way in the distant past. 

And I find that incredible. And I just always kind of think what would happen if people came into our neighbourhoods and said, okay, that’s it, you have to move to the other side of town. And they just like literally jacked up your house, put it on a flatbed and drove it with all of your stuff inside without it being packed, without it being, you know, tied down or whatever, and just totally moved your life without your say. And that’s exactly what happened to Bonnie. And, you know, that community is still living with it today. 

(Ethereal music plays)

Coming up, Canadaland publisher Jesse Brown. Is going to reflect on that and reflect on the season. So let’s see what the other contributors had to say.

(Ethereal music concludes)

Karyn Pugliese: One of the stories I always wanted to do was to go back to one of the land actions that had happened 20 years ago and reconnect with the kids who were out in the front lines then just to see how they processed things and how they’re doing. 

So I was very pleased to work again with Trina Roache, a journalist who I’d worked with at APTN, who back in 2001 covered the lobster wars at Burnt Church. She’s a professor at King’s University, and she’s joining us now.

Kim Wheeler: When you went back, Trina, to talk with Curtis and we can hear in the dock you did for canadaLANDBACK what it was like for you and you’re there in the moment. And you know, like as journalists, we’re recording and you’re kind of on. But when you finished and you were you were going home, what were you thinking about then?

Trina Roache: You know, what really stayed with me was how quickly like, you know, Curtis and I are talking about things that happened 20 years ago. And the part of the the doc the part of the interview that really stayed with me and of course, it made it in the doc is that we’re watching these old videos that he has on YouTube and there’s an RCMP boat. He’s on it, He’s a Mi’kmaq Fisheries ranger, and he’s talking about this incident where the RCMP are just like in pursuit. 

The first time we watched the video, he was kind of laughing and there was like you could see and he even said, my adrenaline, this makes my adrenaline, it goes right up again. Um, just watching the videos, it takes them right back. But then as quickly came a very emotional response. And I’m like 20 years later and that was right there for other people that’s in the past.

And I think we apply sometimes this Western way of thinking about time. They want to settle things so they can move on. That’s a very Western thing. We progress forward, we move forward. We put things in the past. But you could see talking to Curtis, it doesn’t stay there, right? He lives with that now for us, the ancestors are here. The future generations are right there. I just want to share the clip where Curtis and I are sitting and we’re watching these videos of what happened that day on YouTube. And he just has a really visceral reaction to what we’re watching.

Curtis Bartibogue: In our boat full of tear gas and almost passing out because I couldn’t breathe. And the RCMP that arrested us, he had his knee on the back of my neck with his whole weight on the back of my neck. And I’m gasping for air, not just from the pressure of his weight on my neck, but also fighting to stay alive because of the tear gas that was in my lungs. And he had his tactical rifle pushing down on the temple of my head. 

And it’s … 20 years. I still remember it like yesterday. Every time I smell gasoline or an exhaust from like a snowmobile or an outboard motor, it brings me right back to that day. Sometimes you get real tense for no reason. You’re just sitting there and you’re holding your muscles and then your neck starts to get stiff and your back and. And that still happens like 20 years later – and it never goes away.

Karyn Pugliese: I hear that moment in his voice, and there some moments during the panel to where where Kim and I started the panel. We did the first round of questions, and I think I shouldn’t have been surprised — I don’t know if surprised is the right word — but I was affected by how close this all was for everybody who was still on that panel.

Trina Roache: For me, these stories and listening to the podcast as a whole, you could see that even Ipperwash, which is before, right, even if it’s our parents or grandparents that experience things like we still have that ripple effect, right? 

Canada is a resource extraction project and it hasn’t done a good job of dealing with land rights, but we’re still here. Curtis is still here. His kids are here. They live in that community and so we’re not going anywhere. So these things have to be resolved. 

There’s always the potential for another Ipperwash, for another Oka, for another burnt church. And so, yeah, we carry these things forward in a personal way, but we also carry them just as Indigenous people — knowing that that potential — if we assert that that potential is always there.

Karyn Pugliese: Cara McKenna, thank you for joining us. You work with us on canadaLANDBACK this year. I was so happy to work with you.

Cara McKenna: Yes, it was great. I got to work on the “Hacks, Flacks and #Landback” episode going into the tangled sort of relationship between journalists and land defenders and police.

Karyn Pugliese: You had some clips from that that you wanted to talk about.

Cara McKenna: Yeah, it was hard to choose. As you said, I think Kim on Twitter, it’s an episode that could really be taught in journalism schools. There’s so much there. But I think one particular clip that stands out to me in our episode is Kim Goldberg speaking near the end, where she talks about Gustafsson as one of the first, if not the first exclusion zones for media and the deliberate sort of misinformation campaign on the part of police.

Kim Goldberg: I think it was really problematic, and I don’t even know how they completely how they managed to get away with that. But it probably was one of the first exclusion zones which have now become a thing. And I think the exclusion zone, combined with this really overt disinformation campaign the self-confessed admitted to by the RCMP smear campaign, the two things just resulted in Gustafsson not getting proper coverage for the most part, and being portrayed in a negative light. The Gustafson Indigenous people at the standoff were portrayed as armed rebels, radicals, thugs, fringe group tended to be the language used in talking about them in the media. Kara, I.

Karyn Pugliese: Cara, you work in B.C., so this is something that I imagine must have been close to you because that’s where a lot of the exclusion zones have happened.

Cara McKenna: Yeah. I think for me it felt really relevant because I can’t help but connect it to today and this increasing use of exclusion zones that we’ve seen. You know, I was a kid when Gustafsen Lake was going on, but just being able to kind of use it as a launching point almost and how it’s affected land actions today and how that relationship between police and journalists has evolved or not.

Kim Wheeler: It surprises me that in this country our journalists can be arrested and that they can be charged and they can be taken to jail in Canada. And we don’t think that that happens here. But it does. And it’s you know, it’s very deliberate and it depends on what the protest is.

Cara McKenna: I think the police have gotten too comfortable almost. It’s like. Even in Fairy Creek, do you remember there was that one video where an officer was ordering a journalist to be silent or she would be removed?

Fairy Creek Clip: (unclear) “Shame!”, “They’re arresting media! Leave the media alone”, “Shame!”, “Don’t you realize what your doing (unclear)” 

Cara McKenna: And she had just asked him a question and they just get so aggressive and it’s like, I think now we’re seeing some change with the Narwhal and Amber Bracken suing the RCMP. And I think for a long time it was just, well, journalists and police were kind of hand in hand, like almost working together in this weird, creepy way. 

I remember a few years ago on Burnaby Mountain, for example, there was a bunch of people that were going to cross the injunction line for Trans Mountain and their construction site, and they had made an announcement that they were going to cross this injunction. And so a bunch of media showed up and I was one of them. And the RCMP had been there pretty much every day. 

But that day they just weren’t there and deliberately like turned the blind eye to these people crossing the injunction when they had been arresting dozens of people shortly before. So.
(Ethereal transition music plays)

I feel like they kind of deliberately know as well and when to stay away and when to come and when eyes are on them and when they’re not. So it just speaks to that importance of having media there all the time.
(Ethereal transition music concludes)

Part Two:
Karyn Pugliese: So to start out, Jesse, do you remember when we met?

Jesse Brown: I remember meeting you at a journalism gala. Our first conversation was me apologizing for something or making excuses or somehow, and I remember you laughing at me and kind of miming a person flagellating themself and whipping themself on the back. Like. Like, oh, like I was performing some ritual of of self-torture and you were just laughing and laughing. That’s what I remember.

Karyn Pugliese: Okay. I don’t know why you speak to me, but actually the first time we met, I just realized this eight years ago, May 18th, 2015. That’s when we met Jesse.

Jesse Brown: That’s very specific.

Karyn Pugliese: The first time we met, you interviewed me at APTN about APTN.

Jesse Brown: -representation was certainly an issue. But beyond that, the type of representation also turned out to be a problem. 39% of the stories that actually were about Aboriginal people were found to portray them and their issues in a negative light. 

Well, since 1999…
(Canadaland clip fades out)

was that the first time we met? Did we not meet at one of those CJFE type things before that, or did that come afterwards?

Karyn Pugliese: That came afterwards. But that was the first time because I had no idea who you were. And then somebody mentioned that you had broken the Jian Ghomeshi story and they told me I should not do this interview with you because you were this media critic. If you want to get me to do something, I guess the best way to get me to do it is to tell me not. So I decided to give you the interview, and I’ve gone back and I’ve listened to that interview and I can hear my polite, I’m meeting this white guy who’s asking me questions about Indigenous journalism, and I’m probably never going to see him again  Voice-

Jesse Brown: No I remember that very well. And what I remember is that you gave me the business afterwards because you were expecting a tough accountability interview. And in fact, you were prepared to answer very specific questions about how could somebody who has worked as a PR flack for Indigenous leaders then be in a position of investigating them as an independent journalist and leading a newsroom that has to hold them to account? And isn’t that a terrible conflict of interest? 

And you, I think, felt like you got off easy and then you were mad that I didn’t ask you tough questions. 

(#280 The News Bosses: APTN’s Karyn Pugliese Clip plays)
Karyn Pugliese: -you started it.

Jesse Brown: Why do you think that one narrative of Idle No More being a critique within Aboriginal communities towards corrupt leadership was a more attractive narrative in mainstream news than the truth?

Karyn Pugliese: Was it more attractive or is it just that they don’t understand it? Idle No More had existed for months before the mainstream media picked it up.

Karyn Pugliese: And the conversation that you’re remembering it like about me mocking you was I think at a second time that we met. And you were actually saying that, you were noticing things in the press and you’re a media critic, and it was about I think really what you were talking about was systemic racism that you were seeing in the press that you thought you should be covering, but you weren’t sure if it was your story. 

And what I said is you’ve got to get over your white liberal guilt. You cannot keep us out of the stories that you cover because you’re afraid you might misstep or because you have white liberal guilt about it. So, you know.

Jesse Brown: This is where a phrase coined by George W Bush comes in handy, which is you misunderestimated me. You attributed my softball interview to like, the racism of lower expectations that I was being nice because I didn’t want to be. Had you been a white journalist, I would be tough on you, but I didn’t want to be seen being mean and doing an oppositional accountability interview to an Indigenous journalist.
(Canadaland #280 The News Bosses: APTN’s Karyn Pugliese Clip concludes)

What you fail to consider is that I might have just been unprepared and I didn’t know that you’d been a press flack before that. But I do think that you made a very strong point, which later on, and it was one that is true, that when critical stories have come up in which I was cast in that role of holding Indigenous power to account or Canadaland would be in a position of criticizing whether it’s Indigenous journalists or Indigenous leaders. Yeah, there’s definitely a kind of hesitancy and a gut check and a fear that we’ll just get it wrong because there’s a lot of cultural context that we might not appreciate.

Karyn Pugliese: I think it’s fair that you do feel uncomfortable. I feel uncomfortable sometimes covering communities that aren’t my own and really being worried about if I’m getting it right. But do you ever feel like you got something wrong?

Jesse Brown: Often. And then there are things that I still struggle with the process of orienting myself in our coverage of stories that involve Indigenous people or Indigenous issues like where I found a comfortable spot is exactly as you describe. 

It’s the discourse among white people or non-Indigenous people, but usually white people. That’s where I feel the most confidence in speaking up. So when something happens in the media where another white journalist wants to kind of bully into a story and make assertions and apply a standard that would not be applied elsewhere. I feel a lot bolder in taking them on. 

I feel like there’s, I think, a worthwhile conversation being had about like, does that have to be the labour of Indigenous journalists every time and the kind of predictable abuse that comes with that. So I think where we’re heading and where maybe you were leading me was to my interview with Terry Glavin.

Karyn Pugliese: I wasn’t leading you anywhere. I wanted to know your opinion, not mine.

Jesse Brown: So to really take apart the Terry Glavin interview, 

(Canadaland #786 Digging For Doubt Clip plays)
Jesse Brown:-you agreed to that. What kind of conversation do you want to have? Because I want to have a conversation about your article.

Terry Glavin: Well, go for it. How many times do you want me to? Come on, Jesse! Let’s have you!
(Canadaland #786 Digging For Doubt Clip concludes)

Jesse Brown: And though you weren’t leading me there. Yes, you were. Do I ever feel like I’ve done anything wrong? And I think that. You know the right answer and the simple answer. And the short answer, which I never give, is that you were right and others were right, and that was ill advised. 

But I wrestle with that. I think ultimately I stand by what we published because you were very generous at a time when you didn’t have to be. And you and Robert Jago spoke to me afterwards, and I think that context was crucial. It was essential for putting that out as an editorial package. 

But that was a story that ran on the front page of The National Post by Terry Glavin. That story was a lie. That story was a story that took a couple of kind of procedural errors in how mostly foreign media was reporting on Indigenous grave, you know, discoveries or announcements and somehow extrapolated from that wildly and without basis to suggest that the protests were wrong, and also that the protests were all white, which is just factually untrue.

Terry Glavin: Well, I’m not welcoming of is major national and international news organizations putting words into the mouths of Indigenous people, one after the other after the other, right across the country throughout this craziness, and I’ll call it that. This is a story about white people losing their minds.

Jesse Brown: Did I do a very good job of challenging him? No. I think I could have done a lot better. But I know that there’s more to the argument as to why I shouldn’t have done it, which is simply one of harm to hear these two white guys talk about it. And for me to be kind of like maybe, you know, even if I was more equipped, but just like as if this is a debate that is legitimate, can harm people. I feel a sense of responsibility. And I feel like that is where I where I factor in imperfectly and where I where I really beat myself up is like, I wish I’d just done a better job of it.

Karyn Pugliese: I’m gonna ask you to talk about canadaLANDBACK. What was the season like for you? Like you literally just handed over control of this to me and Kim. 

I asked you, who’s the audience? I’ve been used to writing for Indigenous audience. And you were like, well, mostly obviously not Indigenous there will be some Indigenous people listening, but mostly on Indigenous sort of like an under 40 kind of audience. And so I kept that in mind when I was writing it.

Jesse Brown: You know, I like podcasts and I like good journalism and I like hearing from people involved directly. I mean, first of all, it is an interesting question. Who’s this for? I can’t think of anything more like if the project is to change the hearts and minds of Canadaland mostly, you know, settler audience. Like, I don’t think that’s what journalism is for. I don’t think that makes for good or interesting journalism. 

I actually conversely think that like, insular conversations like that actually is exciting to me to hear people talking the way that they talk amongst themselves about things that matter to them is one of the most amazing things that podcasts can do. It can take listeners into places and give you a seat on a couch that you would never otherwise have access to, and that’s more interesting to me.

Karyn Pugliese: So how did you change on Land Back? What was the where did you start? Because I swear to God, Jesse, I remember some conversation with you like years ago where somebody was talking about Land Back and you said, But that means that nobody in Canada owns the land. And they said, That’s right. And you went. Okay, then. And you just changed the conversation.

Jesse Brown: I think that Land Back similarly provoked a knee jerk reactionary response within me more than I probably voiced, which is which is a similar like it’s actually probably like the first thing is protective and defensive. You can’t have the Land Back it’s my land. I don’t even care how I got it, you know, like I’m invested in this system, you know, like I got in just before the real estate, like, went nuts. Like I was like, the last working journalist who could buy a house in Toronto. Like, that’s it. You know, I’m not giving it back. 

It was very necessary for me to hear. Yeah, calm the fuck down and make making a joke out of like, we’re not coming and measuring the drapes. No one is. I forgot how you put it, Karyn, but you were funny. No one is coming for the deed to your house. And in fact, some of the worst things that Canada did to Indigenous people were by the liberals of the time who thought that like, all right, all right, we’ll make this right.

And each one of those efforts, besides the fact that they were done poorly and done dishonestly and ended up doing all kinds of harm, really what they were trying to do was buttress the status quo and make it okay -what was taken and what was done. 

If we give this little bit back or if we give these rights or if this is done, can we just continue to pillage and the power dynamics that are baked into that? Just repeat the cycle and set up the next generation of atrocities, you know? So how the hell do you get out from that? And I think my understanding of the concept is that you actually have to go back to the beginning.

Karyn Pugliese: You know, I think this is like a really interesting thing, Jesse, because this is where, like amongst our disagreements, like we really have one. I do think that journalism is about changing the hearts and minds of the people. And based on what you just said, I think I win.

Jesse Brown: I want to be really clear here. I don’t think that journalism doesn’t change the hearts and minds of people. What’s the fucking point of it? If you end up thinking and feeling exactly as you did at the beginning? What’s the point? I just have a problem with journalism that sets out to do that. I think that you get into trouble when you try to change somebody’s heart.

Kim Wheeler: Jesse I just wanted to back you up a bit. When you were talking about Land Back, you were talking about Canadaland and giving space to Karyn and I to create canadaLANDBACK and. Not being involved, like, you know, just giving us the space. And I think that’s all part of Land Back as well, is, is people making space. Giving space over for us to tell our stories. And you also said that maybe it’s not up to Indigenous people to do all of this heavy work all the time. But we’re the ones who started off telling our stories in the media and pushing mainstream and non-Indigenous media for space to tell these stories. And and I still think it’s up to us as indigenous people to tell the stories because that’s where the truth comes from. Right? And by you giving us space to make canadaLANDBACK on Canadaland. That’s part of the reconciliation step. And it’s a microcosm of the entire Land Back movement.

Jesse Brown: This is our flagship show – this is our biggest audience. And I feel like, too often the way that this gets handled in Canadian media is here’s the Indigenous corner. See, we’ve created a little corner. And you can tell stories over here in the corner and it gets branded in a way that, like, the main audience isn’t going to check it out anyhow. So I didn’t want to do that. Thank you both for trusting me to do this with us-for us. Because that that I think that did take some trust.

Credits:
(Ethereal electronic music starts)
Karyn Pugliese: That’s it. We’re out of here. Thanks, everyone, for listening to this season. And despite what Jesse said, the Revolution will be podcast. The season of canadaLANDBACK was hosted and produced by Karyn Pugliese. That’s me and produced by Kim Wheeler. 

(Ethereal electronic music concludes)
Take us out Farewell Davidson.

(Farewell Davidson song plays out) 

Jesse Brown: You can listen to Canadaland ad free on Amazon music included with Prime.

More from this series
Host Karyn Pugliese, producer Kim Wheeler, contributors Trina Roache and Cara McKenna reflect on the season, and - wait for it - Karyn and Jesse argue about whether or not journalism can change the hearts and minds of people.
May 15, 2023
The landback movement isn’t just about getting land back. It’s more than that. It’s a reclamation of culture too.
April 17, 2023
Landback is not just about returning real estate. It is about Indigenous people reclaiming who we are and making ourselves whole again.
March 13, 2023
Since 2019 five journalists have been arrested at land defenses, several others have been detained or threatened with arrest - why?
February 6, 2023
Land claims can take generations to settle. Sometimes communities lose patience, sometimes development forces them to take a stand or risk losing their land forever. Barricades have become a familiar scene in Canada. The land issue is rarely settled when barricades come down. Instead the community is left with court cases, post traumatic stress, and unresolved human rights issues. Some of those people are children..
January 2, 2023
In part two: After a peaceful reclamation of the army base built on their land in 1993, elders of Stoney Point lead a movement to take back Ipperwash Provincial Park, which was also part of their original land and contained a burial ground. Racism and political interference turned a peaceful movement into a violent act of state aggression on September 6, 1995. This episode recalls the events of that night, and examines the fallout in the 28 years since, asking if reconciliation will ever be possible for the people of Stoney Point.
November 21, 2022
What began as a peaceful land reclamation would turn into one of the most terrifying acts of violence and state force against unarmed people in Canada.
October 24, 2022
Is it Indigenous stewardship ownership or is it becoming just another holographic bumper sticker? What does landback mean to you, and to your nations and homelands? And is there room for settlers in this movement? This is the first episode of a new 6-episode podcast called Canadalandback!  In it, we talk about what landback means, we host our first roundtable discussion and take you inside a land-based education program. 
April 18, 2022
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