Should we be renaming places and things in Ottawa-Gatineau?

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by J.OT13

Mackenzie King Estate - it would quite an egregious act to rename the Estate built by our longest serving Prime Minister, he would led us through WWII and gifted his property to the Canadian people and was responsible for the creation of Gatineau Park.
.

Mackenzie King is infamous for turning away a ship full of Jewish refugees fleeing the Nazis during WW2. A good number of them ended up dying in concentration camps.

He also presided over the internment of Japanese-Canadians.

(Not even suggesting the domain be renamed BTW. After all, it was his estate. Just making things clear about the history. I'd be relatively happy if this contemporary trend mostly stayed on your side of the river.)

[Kitchissippi]

Mackenzie-King was instrumental in creating Gatineau Park, and that estate played a big part in it.

Nepean Point will likely remain that as a geographic name but the park will have a different name. Sir Evan Nepean didn't seem to have done much for Canada, he was more of an uber-colonial British politician, earning place names just because of his position of privilege and power. I wouldn't be sad to see his name go, and replacing it with an indigenous name would be symbolic of "de-colonializing".

[lrt's friend]

We are facing sad, sad, times when we want to erase our history. History is full of warts and that is part of what makes it interesting. As we sanitize it, there is nothing left worth remembering. We end up losing the context of history when big parts of it become taboo.

I find it odd how we want to erase Sir John A. MacDonald when we are in the nation's capital. Without him, Canada would not likely exist. We change Sir John A parkway, so why would we retain the Sir Georges Etienne Cartier Parkway? The next step is to erase all the Fathers of Confederation, and on and on it goes.

This is a slippery slope, because 'colonialism' has become vogue. But doesn't 'colonialism' apply to everybody who is not indigenous? So nothing is worth remembering unless it is indigenous.

[Kitchissippi]

Nobody is erasing history. It’s just being viewed from a wider perspective. Many Canadians have been brainwashed into thinking Europeans “discovered” America, Australia and the Pacific Islands when there have been people living there all along. It’s a point of view that devalues the indigenous cultures as less than civilized or even human. The Algonquins had place names that were unilaterally changed by settlers, if anyone’s history has been erased, it’s theirs.

[Richard Eade]

And, thus, the story of human existence is repeated, over, and over.

How many place names survived when a group of immigrants moved into a sparsely occupied area – anywhere?

Were the Neanderthals asked the names that they had for referencing places before they were displaced?

I think that there is a lot of ‘romanticizing’ of the aboriginal populations. They were not all sweet, peace-loving, naturalists. Here is a quote from a document on the Canadian Government’s Website:

Despite the myth that Aboriginals lived in happy harmony before the arrival of Europeans, war was central to the way of life of many First Nation cultures. Indeed, war was a persistent reality in all regions though, as Tom Holm has argued, it waxed in intensity, frequency and decisiveness. The causes were complex and often interrelated, springing from both individual and collective motivations and needs. At a personal level, young males often had strong incentives to participate in military operations, as brave exploits were a source of great prestige in most Aboriginal cultures. According to one Jesuit account from the 18th Century, ‘The only way to attract respect and public veneration among the Illinois is, as among the other Savages, to acquire a reputation as a skilful hunter, and particularly as a good warrior … it is what they call being a true man.’ Among west coast societies, the material goods and slaves acquired through raiding were important avenues to build up sufficient wealth to host potlatches and other give-away ceremonies.

From https://www.canada.ca/en/department-...h-america.html

I probably mentioned this before, but my high-school-aged nephew was perplexed when he was at the Canadian Museum of History, several years back. There was a display of War Clubs – except, he had been taught in school that all First Nations people were peaceful. There had been no talk of wars or slavery in his education.

Yes, history IS being modified and ‘adjusted’ to what ‘should’ be taught. But that is certainly nothing new. History has always been reinterpreted as societies have changed.

As for erasing aboriginal names for places: Since many of the European ‘Colonialists’ were led through our area by their native guides, we do have a good number of (Europeanized) Algonquin names for places. Not the least of which is the name of the Country and its capital.

[lrt's friend]

How is North American tribal culture so much different from the clans of Scotland and Wales? None of these societies could possibly survive into the modern era.

As we re-interpret history, we lose what really happened. Is that a good thing? I don't think so.

What bothers me lately is how we look at one historical event in isolation and lose context in what the whole picture was at the time.

[JayBuoy]

History is a living subject. Ideas change, perspectives change. Historiography changes. Its right for us to re-examine the past, and in doing so we are not 'erasing' history, but rather more fully embracing it. In many ways I feel bad for the conservative effort to maintain a narrow, sanitized version of history. It reminds me very much of NIMBYs, attempting to stop change, period.

In the example of street names, I don't quite understand how changing a street name forsakes the person it was named for, or willfully forgets history. I was curious so I looked up the street I live on (Frank Street). Could not find any information about who it was named after ( if anyone knows, please share). BUT, I did find an un-related historical society article about an Ottawa photographer named Frank, who worked around the turn of the century. The article happened to mention that the street he was born on was renamed lol.

We have this tendency now to act like we've reached the end of history. That any change of perspective forsakes memory itself. Rather, people have been writing history into space forever, and re-writing it too. We will continue to do that, and people will be doing it long after us.

Lastly, I'm glad the reconciliation boulevard didn't catch on. It is a really shallow name. I think Watson would have had better success if he pitched an important Algonquin person instead.

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by JayBuoy

History is a living subject. Ideas change, perspectives change. Historiography changes. Its right for us to re-examine the past, and in doing so we are not 'erasing' history, but rather more fully embracing it. In many ways I feel bad for the conservative effort to maintain a narrow, sanitized version of history. It reminds me very much of NIMBYs, attempting to stop change, period.

In the example of street names, I don't quite understand how changing a street name forsakes the person it was named for, or willfully forgets history. I was curious so I looked up the street I live on (Frank Street). Could not find any information about who it was named after ( if anyone knows, please share). BUT, I did find an un-related historical society article about an Ottawa photographer named Frank, who worked around the turn of the century. The article happened to mention that the street he was born on was renamed lol.

We have this tendency now to act like we've reached the end of history. That any change of perspective forsakes memory itself. Rather, people have been writing history into space forever, and re-writing it too. We will continue to do that, and people will be doing it long after us.

Lastly, I'm glad the reconciliation boulevard didn't catch on. It is a really shallow name. I think Watson would have had better success if he pitched an important Algonquin person instead.

As a student of history, I am all for re-interpreting history when it provides a more full and accurate understanding. However, when political correctness gets involved, we can see bias creating an unbalanced view of history.

What is more disturbing is when the cancel culture gets involved. This is when we attempt to bury history. A perfect example is when they wanted to re-honour 'Russell' in its many locations in the Ottawa area. Rather than expose the warts of history, we want to hide it with a false narrative.

[passwordisnt123]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

We are facing sad, sad, times when we want to erase our history. History is full of warts and that is part of what makes it interesting. As we sanitize it, there is nothing left worth remembering. We end up losing the context of history when big parts of it become taboo.

I find it odd how we want to erase Sir John A. MacDonald when we are in the nation's capital. Without him, Canada would not likely exist. We change Sir John A parkway, so why would we retain the Sir Georges Etienne Cartier Parkway? The next step is to erase all the Fathers of Confederation, and on and on it goes.

This is a slippery slope, because 'colonialism' has become vogue. But doesn't 'colonialism' apply to everybody who is not indigenous? So nothing is worth remembering unless it is indigenous.

Did I miss something? I thought the topic at hand was changes to the names of a few things around town? Stuff changes names all the time for a bunch of reasons. For example, the Ottawa River Parkway's name was changed to SJAM Parkway in 2012 via a blatant and self-serving political hack move by the Harper government. I think if we changed the name back to Ottawa River Parkway, it's highly unlikely people would suddenly forget who Sir John A. was. I think maybe you can un-clutch the pearls here just a little bit. Literally nobody's talking about erasing history.

[harls]

My car's GPS still calls it 'Ottawa River Parkway', and I just downloaded the latest update about a month ago. They still haven't got the memo I guess.

Don't know if it was mentioned, but about a month ago there was a petition for renaming some streets in the Plateau (Moscou, Saint-Petersbourg) because of the war in Ukraine..

[DEWLine]

Seconding the argument that Indigenous history be restored and immigrant history added in through the re-naming processes now being brought to bear.

As for rue de Moscou and rue de Saint-Petersbourg...is that under discussion in Gatineau right now?

[J.OT13]

Originally Posted by harls

MDon't know if it was mentioned, but about a month ago there was a petition for renaming some streets in the Plateau (Moscou, Saint-Petersbourg) because of the war in Ukraine..

Of course. We crazy little man in Russia and the overly "woke" assume everyone, anyone and anything with ties to Russia (or a Russian name) is bad.

Even the whole idea of renaming Charlotte to Zelensky. First off, not a fan of renaming century+ old street. Furthermore, Zelensky is a hero now, but let's wait until the war is over and we have a full picture of his legacy before considering honouring him as such (he may very well have a corruption or sex scandal we don't know about yet).

We compulsively go with current "trends" that sometimes proves to be the wrong move in the long run.

[Tesladom]

Will our Great great grand children pee on our graves for what we did today???? Probably... very likely Societal norms and morality is an evolving thing, we can't look at the past using and judge it based on today's morality, we can only learn from it

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by DEWLine

Seconding the argument that Indigenous history be restored and immigrant history added in through the re-naming processes now being brought to bear.

As for rue de Moscou and rue de Saint-Petersbourg...is that under discussion in Gatineau right now?

There were some rumblings but not in any serious way I don't think.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by Tesladom

Will our Great great grand children pee on our graves for what we did today???? Probably... very likely Societal norms and morality is an evolving thing, we can't look at the past using and judge it based on today's morality, we can only learn from it

My money is on our treatment of animals (eating them, euthanizing them, not considering them as "persons") as our posthumous moral downfall!

[JayBuoy]

Originally Posted by J.OT13

Of course. We crazy little man in Russia and the overly "woke" assume everyone, anyone and anything with ties to Russia (or a Russian name) is bad.

Even the whole idea of renaming Charlotte to Zelensky. First off, not a fan of renaming century+ old street. Furthermore, Zelensky is a hero now, but let's wait until the war is over and we have a full picture of his legacy before considering honouring him as such (he may very well have a corruption or sex scandal we don't know about yet).

We compulsively go with current "trends" that sometimes proves to be the wrong move in the long run.

we don't have to wait. Zelensky is a rightist, basically Ukraine's Trump. Look at his political record prior to the war. He eroded democratic rights. He also used the war as an excuse to suspend political opposition. I mean, the praise he gets is straight propaganda, and its pretty embarrassing frankly.

edit: I don't think its 'woke' per se- its not coming exclusively from what you might think of as the 'woke' subculture. There's this widespread hysteria. I would say its related to the way Russia has been propagandized in our media since forever.

[Kitchissippi]

Originally Posted by Acajack

My money is on our treatment of animals (eating them, euthanizing them, not considering them as "persons") as our posthumous moral downfall!

The other day a news item was that mushrooms can really communicate with each other. Strike them off a vegan’s menu, too!

[JayBuoy]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

As a student of history, I am all for re-interpreting history when it provides a more full and accurate understanding. However, when political correctness gets involved, we can see bias creating an unbalanced view of history.

What is more disturbing is when the cancel culture gets involved. This is when we attempt to bury history. A perfect example is when they wanted to re-honour 'Russell' in its many locations in the Ottawa area. Rather than expose the warts of history, we want to hide it with a false narrative.

I struggle to understand how cancel culture or political correctness are relevant ideas here.

On the first point, not sure how we can be ostracizing someone dead - what with streets usually named after the formerly living. Also, people have been critical of many of the figures in question since long before the term 'cancel culture' was coined. Is all criticism 'cancel culture' now? Can you please elaborate on how critical examination of historical persons is cancel culture?

Street names aren't history, it's just an honour. Having a street named after you won't stop people from forgetting who you are, and neither will NOT having a street named after you prevent you from being remembered in history. Its the same with statues, buildings etc.

I would appreciate examples of how this NCC selection process or city efforts to rename streets is biased.

[lrt's friend]

As we remove commemorations relating to important historic figures, the publicity surrounding these removals encourages a predominant one dimensional view of history. So, Sir John A. MacDonald's main achievement becomes the creation of Residential Schools. That has already been achieved with Sir Hector Langevin, and we are well on our way to having a similar view of Egerton Ryerson. Has this really encouraged a deeper view of these people's lives? I don't think so.

We can argue to the contrary, but highly publicized removal of commemorations discourages people from examining history themselves. These people have been discredited. There is nothing more worth knowing.

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by Acajack

Mackenzie King is infamous for turning away a ship full of Jewish refugees fleeing the Nazis during WW2. A good number of them ended up dying in concentration camps.

He also presided over the internment of Japanese-Canadians.

(Not even suggesting the domain be renamed BTW. After all, it was his estate. Just making things clear about the history. I'd be relatively happy if this contemporary trend mostly stayed on your side of the river.)

This is how things get started, when facts are not quite correct. The MS St. Louis attempted to land on June 7, 1939 and was refused by the Canadian government. This was prior to the beginning of World War II and a couple of years before the Holocaust really got going in Europe and long before it was generally known in Canada.

We can argue that Mackenzie King should have allowed the Jews on the ship to land, but to call it an infamous decision is over the top. The Canadian government could not predict the subsequent outcome.

The issue of Japanese-Canadian internments was another matter.