What I can't figure out is...

Canuck Pretendian shocked to learn truth about himself

Looks like the US of A isn't the only country where Pretendians (e.g. Senator Elizabeth Warren) rise to lofty heights, only to fall with a thud when they are outed as being, errr... white. Canada has them too, and has had them for at least a century, going back to the time of Grey Owl, shown at left in a portrait by Yousuf Karsh.

Grey Owl, was a popular Canadian writer, public speaker and conservationist. Born an Englishman, he immigrated to Canada and, in the latter years of his life, passed as half-Indian, falsely claiming he was the son of a Scottish man and an Apache woman. He achieved fame in the 1930s with books, articles and public appearances promoting wilderness conservation. Shortly after his death in 1938, his real identity -- Archibald Stansfeld Belaney -- was exposed. He was one of the first Pretendians.

Fast foward to this weekend, when celebrated Canadian author Thomas King told the meeja that he was shocked, shocked to find out that, despite believing so nearly all his life, he is not an Indian Indigenous First Nations person. 

Like Mr Belaney, Mr King wrote books about Indians, including The Truth About Stories: A Native Narrative and The Inconvenient Indian: A Curious Account of Native People in North America. Now, in a piece for the Groan & Wail [Globe & Mail, shurely. Ed.] titled "A most inconvenient Indian", the California born author says he learned of rumours several years ago that questioned his heritage. 

Mr King says he made a concerted effort this year to find their origin, which brought him to an American organization called Tribal Alliance Against Frauds, which investigated his past with help from a University of British Columbia scholar, and found no Cherokee heritage. 

Mr King writes that he did not purposefully pretend to have Indigenous roots. His father left the family when he was only 3, he says, and his mother rarely spoke of the man but said he was part Cherokee. King says the revelation a couple of weeks ago was "so very devastating, though 'devastating' is too pedestrian a word. At 82, I feel as though I’ve been ripped in half, a one-legged man in a two-legged story. Not the Indian I had in mind. Not an Indian at all."

Well, I'll take his word for it, as long as he promises never again to read out the Stolen Land Acknowledgment which is now de rigueur at all public events and ceremonies in the Great No-longer-white North.

Canada Day, from an old stock Canadian's perspective

From north of the World's Longest Undefended Border (TM), Agent 3, who was born in the Sour Apple writes: Duty calls me to attend a Canada Day celebration. I am planning on having car troubles which will force me to miss the opening ceremonies, which consist of some teenage girl butchering the national anthem, and the now obligatory "land acknowledgment ceremony" -- a sad exercise in hypocritical virtue-signalling. If the Indians First Nations want "their" land back, I say: Give it to them! Bah, humbug!

Land acknowledgment ceremonies now de rigueur in USA and Canada

On his visit to Canuckistan at the start of the week (see "The Queen of Horsewomen", WWW 27/5/25), King Charles III began his Speech from the Throne with the now mandatory (and ever-meaningless) land acknowledgment ceremony, which is a kind of Confiteor in which liberals afflicted with white guilt concede that the land on w hich they live was filched from the Indians (feathers, not turbans) by their evil, colonialist ancestors.

Ed.: That sets a record for the longest run-on sentence ever posted on WWW. Please don't do that again.

OK, OK. I will simply point out that apologizing for mistakes made by their unwoke ancestors is not just part of Canadian culture, but official government policy. As witness this press conference given by a spokesthingy for the Nova Scotia division of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (aka "Mounties") on 7 May 2025.

That right there shows you what a joke a country can become under prolonged rule by liberal wokesters. Not only did they apologize to the Mi'kmaq (aka Micmac), the local Indians First Nations,but to "Nova Scotian Africans" as well. Hey, they're a distinct people... apparently. And notice the bilingual preface as well, even though there's nary a soul in Nova  Scotia who speaks la langue de Molière. 40 seconds wasted before getting to the point of the presser.

American readers shouldn't be smug, though. These land acknowledgment jokes are common enough in the Paranoid States of America. As witness this one:

Land Acknowledgment: The Babylon Bee Wishes To Acknowledge That Our Offices Are Located On Land Once Occupied By Morton & Mayfield Accounting LLC (14/10/24)

and this one 

Housewarming Party Kicks Off With Land Acknowledgement For The Johnsons Who Lived There Since 2019 (28/5/25)

OK, they're from the Babylon Bee, of course. Who else? But if you arrive on time for any kind of gtovernment event in any blue state (or even some of the red ones), don't be surprised to hear the ritual incantation of: Hiya, hiya, hiya. Sorry, sorry, sorry. 

One question remains. If we're so sorry that we took their land away from our fine feathered friends, why don't we just give it back to them?!

Say it ain't so, Buffy! CBC outs beloved Pretendian

2017, the 150th anniversary of Confederation, was made over by Blackie McBlackface, the Gliberal Prime Minister of all Canuckistan, into the Year of the Indian. It was time for guilty whites to acknowledge that they (or their "colonial" ancestors) stole the Great White North from the peoples who used to be called Indians and Eskimos, forever hence to be known as First Nations;and Inuit, respectively.

Canada's shrinking populaation of whites tried to give the land back to the indigenous ones, but they said they'd rather have money (prefereably US dollars), thank you. So "land acknowledgment ceremonies" became the order of the day, a Confiteor to be repeated at the beginning of any public event and even on radio and TV programmes such as Hockey Night in Canada (the only show that anyone watches).

Six years later, the "truth and reconciliation" bullshit goes on and on. But today the CBC (Canada's state-owned broadcaster) is set to reveal the real truth -- not the same as the fake truth which it normally broadcasts -- about one First Nations person who has become an icon of wokeness not just in Canada but also the US of A. 

Walt refers to Buffy Sainte-Marie, a musician known for decades of "Indigenous activism". CBC’s investigative show The Fifth Estate is scheduled to air tonight an episode titled "Making an Icon".

A description of the episode doesn't name Sainte-Marie but says an icon’s "claims to Indigenous ancestry are being called into question by family members" and that its investigation includes genealogical documentation and historical research.

In a statement yesterday, Ms Sainte-Marie said "I don’t know where I’m from or who my birth parents were, and I will never know. Which is why to be questioned in this way today is painful. To those who question my truth, I say with love, I know who I am."

The octogenarian also posted a video on social media addressing the upcoming episode, saying she has shared her story for 60 years. She called herself "a proud member of the Native community with deep roots in Canada.... But there are also many things I don’t know, which I’ve always been honest about. I don’t know where I’m from, who my birth parents are or how I ended up a misfit in a typical white Christian New England home."

Buffy Sainte-Marie became popular in the hippy-dippy `60s for her singing and songwriting, and used her fame to push the "Lo, the poor Indian" agenda at a time when it wasn't receiving much attention and indigenous women were still called "squaws". Her debut record, It’s My Way!, featured several notable songs, including "Universal Soldier", written about the individual responsibility for war. 

Her appearance on Sesame Street began a symbiotic relationship with the PBS groomerfest which has lasted right up to last year.* Here's a stanza she wrote for her first appearance on the show in 1976.

I’m an Indian and I like sunshine

I’m an Indian and I like friends 

And I am real and I can feel and I’d love to take your hand 

Way heyo he-yo! 

Way heyo he-yo!

*Source: "My time on 'Sesame Street' with Buffy Sainte-Marie", "American Masters" on PBS, 6/12/22. 

Excerpt: Sainte-Marie is iconic. She embodies a combination of fierce activism in her quest to fight for Indigenous rights and dignity and a strong belief that everything and everyone can change and ripen. The lyrics in her songs teach us about the devastating history of colonization while encouraging us to stay hopeful. Her educator roots shine bright in everything she does.

What a shame she isn't really an Indian, or First Nations or whatever. Still, she's the first Pretendian to rise to such lofty heights, even earlier than Fauxcahontas, the Senator who (for the time being) represents the great (?) state of Massachusetts, which is where Ms Sainte-Marie was raised. 

*Further reading if you want to brainwash your kids: "Celebrate Buffy Sainte-Marie and Amplify Indigenous Peoples With Your Kids", PBS (who else), 16/11/22.