Toronto Star story, headline led to archives purged of ‘offensive’ info
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Blacklock’s Reporter says a Saturday Star headline and story led to Chief archivist Leslie Weir to order pages both “modified or taken down ASAP” inside hours of studying each, though no employees was engaged on the weekend.
Pages on John A. Macdonald, Fathers of Confederation and the Conflict of 1812 have been amongst these eliminated after a June 4, 2021 e mail from Star reporter Jacques Gallant.
Gallant was irked an “on-line biography of John A. Macdonald had nothing about Residential Faculties and the Chinese language head tax. Does Library and Archives Canada plan to switch the bio to incorporate a extra correct depiction of his time as Prime Minister or does it intend to take away it totally?”
The next day a Star headline on June 5, 2021 with Gallant’s article stated: “Inside Emails Present Confusion And Dismay Over Ottawa’s Glowing On-line Profile Of John A. Macdonald.”
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Archives managers distributed the Saturday article by e mail and Weir went into motion instantly and by the top of the day on June 5 webpages deemed most offensive have been eliminated.
Gallant, nonetheless, contacted the archives once more on June 7, 2021.
“I see the Macdonald bio has been eliminated and changed with an error message,” he wrote. “That stated, I see different pages stay on-line.”
He additionally stated Indigenous students have stated the federal government ought to admit it was mistaken to maintain the online pages up till this time and apologize.”
Gallant requested once more through a June 8 e mail: “Does Library and Archives Canada plan to apologize?”
“Library and Archives Canada is sincerely sorry some customers have been offended by content material on its web site,” wrote Weir.
