Quiet Canines Podcast

What do Macklemore and Wounded Knee have in common? Quick recap: Macklemore says free Palestine on stage at an Ed Sheeran concert. Zionist billionaire Robert Kraft colludes with stadium owners to get Macklemore kicked off the tour. Let’s go back 137 years and you tell me if you see parallels. The Ghost Dance was a Native American religious movement that spread rapidly across the western United Sta...

These impressive structures predate the Egyptian pyramids and Stonehenge. But Australian Senator Pauline Hanson calls the people who built them the most primitive race on earth. This reminds me of how Canada justified Indian residential schools. Both countries rely on a myth that Indigenous peoples were savages or primitive peoples who needed civilization through Western education. Here’s the trut...

The Ed Sheeran and Macklemore story has got me thinking about an Indigenous leader named Opechancanough. And I wonder how many young Opechancanoughs there are currently living in Gaza and the West Bank. In 1561, Spanish explorers kidnapped a Powhatan Indian youth named Opechancanough and brought him to Spain to meet King Philip II. The King considered Indigenous peoples heathens and saw it as his...

The Ed Sheeran and Macklemore story has collided with three parts of who I am. I have been a New England Patriots fan my entire life. I have probably watched every Patriots game since I was a child. And for all those years, I never really thought much about the owner Robert Kraft. I cared about the team. But this week, something happened that made me look at the man who owns that team very differe...

In the 1800s, an Indigenous man named Atatíc̓eʔ looked across the Great Plains and had a terrible prophecy. He warned his people that the bison would soon disappear and he understood what had to be done. For the Ql̓ispé people, the bison were the centre of their traditional way of life. Atatíc̓eʔ wanted to create a protected herd on tribal land, but his proposal was rejected. From 1871 to 1883, At...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit quietcanines.substack.com For decades, the dominant scientific narrative .”regarding the domestication of dogs has painted a biased picture. According to the traditional view from Europe, the story begins with hungry and opportunistic wolves lingering on the fringes of human camps. In this version of history, early humans were the absol...

The bodies kept appearing out of nowhere. In March a whale corpse was found floating in San Francisco Bay. Then, in April, a whale was found dead and beached in Oregon. That same month, another whale, this one a juvenile, was found lifeless and lodged among woody debris in a Washington State river, miles from the ocean. As of the middle of August, 187 gray whales have been found dead this year alo...

Last year Alberta Premier Danielle Smith enacted three pieces of legislation impacting transgender youth. Bill 26 prohibits gender affirming medical care for children and youth under the age of 16, even if their parents’ consent and their healthcare providers approve the care. Egale Canada, Skipping Stone and five gender diverse youths took the government to court, arguing that the law violated se...

The First American Revolution was not in 1775. It happened 100 years earlier. When conquistador Francisco Vázquez de Coronado arrived in the Southwest in 1540, he imposed Requerimiento, or requirements, on the Native Americans. This religious doctrine authorized the Spanish to subjugate Native Americans and force them to abandon their own faiths. According to the document, meant to be read by conq...

The following story is one version of a Haudenosaunee tale that teaches every creature has a purpose and importance according to the Creator’s plan. Lacrosse is in the forefront of the legend. Long ago a lacrosse game was set to be played by the animals with four legs and the winged birds. Captains for the animals were: the Bear, noted for overpowering all opposition due to his girth; the Deer, kn...

Did you know that the Mexican gray wolf is an endangered species that was deliberately exterminated, rescued from extinction with a captive breeding program, and has only recently recovered to a few hundred animals. And Trump just signed an executive order that might allow cattle ranchers to start killing them again. By the late nineteenth century, cattle and sheep ranching had spread across the S...

In an Anishinaabe creation story, the Creator gives Original Man a responsibility: to travel across the Earth and name the living things he encounters. During his journey, he notices that other animals have companions. He is alone and asks the Creator why. The Creator sends Ma’iingan, Wolf, to accompany him. Together, they travel the Earth, visiting its places and learning about the life surroundi...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit quietcanines.substack.com In the 1920s, the richest people per capita in the world were members of the Indigenous Osage Nation in Oklahoma. After oil was discovered on their land, they rode in chauffeured cars and lived in mansions. Then, one by one, the Osage were killed. Mollie Burkhart watched as her family became a prime target. Her...

Learning an Indigenous language could save us from catastrophic climate change. The world will soon cross a dangerous climate change threshold. That’s according to a new report from the United Nations. Maybe the way out of this mess is to teach our children an Indigenous language. Language is not just a tool for communication; it influences how we see the world. European languages, like English an...

In the 1920s, the Osage Indigenous Nation in Oklahoma became the wealthiest people per capita in the world after oil was discovered on their land. Then, they began to die. Dozens of Osage citizens were mysteriously poisoned, shot, or bombed in a coordinated plot to steal their oil rights, a period known as the Reign of Terror. Local authorities were bought off, and the early investigators failed....

In the 1920s, the richest people per capita in the world were members of the Osage Nation in Oklahoma. After oil was discovered on their land, they rode in chauffeured cars and lived in mansions. Then, one by one, the Osage were killed. Mollie Burkhart watched as her family became a prime target. Her relatives were shot and poisoned. Other Osage were also dying under mysterious circumstances, and...

Elias Hill was the only civilized Indian of the nineteenth century. This story begins with the Gradual Civilization Act of 1857, which was passed before Confederation. This Act sought to assimilate Indigenous People into European settler society. The government created a process whereby a male Indian over the age of 21 could apply for enfranchisement. Women could not apply. For an Indian to be dee...

This Indigenous lawyer is participating in classic residential school denialism, whether he means to or not. Alberta lawyer Leighton Grey spoke at the Alberta Separatist rally in Edmonton over the weekend. He told the story of how his grandmother was “grateful” for her sixteen years at an Indian residential school. He said it allowed her to become a nurse and raise her family out of poverty. He ma...

Look at these two losers poking fun at Canada’s military. We know the American military is bigger and more powerful. But if you think an invasion means rolling tanks into Ottawa, you don’t know our history. The Canadian military has already modeled exactly how it would respond to a US invasion. It would use unconventional warfare. It looks just like how Indigenous Nations historically defended the...

In the 1940s, the Canadian government discovered that Indigenous children in residential schools were suffering from serious malnutrition. They found low body weight, vitamin deficiencies, anemia, inflamed gums, decaying teeth and other signs of poor nutrition. Instead of feeding these children proper nutrition, Canadian officials and researchers such as Dr. Lionel Pett, a chief architect of Canad...

We all know that Trump loves tearing up Democratic agreements. He replaced NAFTA with USMCA just to stick it to Bill Clinton. He abandoned the JCPOA just to spite Obama. On his first day back in office, he revoked 78 orders issued by Joe Biden. As he and MAGA Republicans like to say, he owns the Libtards or Dumbocrats. But why on earth is he tearing up a deal made by George Washington? In 1794, Wa...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit quietcanines.substack.com For decades, Rapa Nui was presented as a warning about environmental destruction. According to the famous collapse story, the people cut down their forests, exhausted their resources, descended into conflict and nearly destroyed their own society. Archaeology, ancient DNA and new research now tell a very differ...

Indigenous Canadians understand the danger of allowing Donald Trump to steer the ship. In 1613, the Haudenosaunee Confederacy met the Dutch and created a diplomatic blueprint known as the Two Row Wampum, or Kaswentha. This belt features two parallel rows of purple beads set against a bed of white. It represents two distinct vessels traveling down the river of life together. One row is the Indigeno...

Indigenous Canadians know why Donald Trump’s skin tone is the colour of rust. Centuries ago, the Haudenosaunee Confederacy and European settlers established a diplomatic framework known as the Covenant Chain. Initially forged in iron and later upgraded to silver, this chain was a living and breathing metaphor for international relations. The choice of silver was deliberate because it reacts to its...

Donald Trump wants to change the name of “Lake Ontario” to Lake America. But history shows that he’s going to fail. Before Canada or the United States existed, this region was a massive, thriving geopolitical trade hub. On the south shore, in modern Upstate New York, lived the powerful Haudenosaunee Confederacy, including the Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga, and Seneca. On the north shore lived t...