WARMINGTON: RCMP land acknowledgement comes before news on missing Nova Scotia kids

The missing kids can wait – the land and cultural acknowledgements were the RCMP's priority.
Most agree, the most important thing to the Nova Scotia RCMP should have been the search and whereabouts of six-year-old Lily Sullivan and her four-year-old brother Jack Sullivan.
But a shocked country has come to the conclusion that woke culture seems to have trumped all in their news conference in Pictou County on Wednesday.
With time being of the essence when it comes to missing children, the media officer spent 40 seconds at the top of her briefing doing land and culture acknowledgements in both official languages.
'I acknowledge we are in Mi'kma'ki, the traditional and unceded ancestral territory of the Mi'kmaw people,' RCMP Cpl. Carlie McCann said, reading aloud a land acknowledgment. 'I also recognize that African Nova Scotians are a distinct people whose histories, legacies and contributions have enriched that part of Mi'kma'ki known as Nova Scotia for 400 years.'
She then repeated it in French.
These siblings were reported missing last Thursday, May 2, from their family's rural trailer home about 20 minutes from New Glasgow. The children are reported to not have not been in school for the week prior to a 911 call to alert police they had vanished.
The RCMP press conference was to announce the larger search was coming to an end in favour of a smaller, more focused one.
'It has been an all-hands-on-deck effort, using every available resource and tool,' Staff-Sgt. Curtis MacKinnon, district commander for Pictou County District RCMP, said in a news release. 'We're transitioning from a full-scale search to searches in smaller, more specific areas; we'll be retracing our steps to ensure all clues have been found.'
MacKinnon told reporters at the news conference 'our thoughts go to the family and loved ones, to everyone who has worked day and night to work to bring them home' and 'since the first 911 call was received by the RCMP, a multi-agency search has been underway where teams have been working around the clock.'
It's true, you don't need a news conference to tell the public about new major new developments. Or to announce that a search is being scaled down. But when it comes to police, it is also true there are often strategic reasons why they do things a certain way and this must be considered in any condemnation of them.
Any suggestions police were not doing their job is false. They clearly have been. And they care about the missing siblings – even though MacKinnon told reporters 'the likelihood that they're alive right now is very low.'
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However, what can't be ignored is the appearance that political correctness was deemed to be most important in this matter. This will need to be explained and requires a review as to who ordered it and why. Was it a political directive, or from headquarters, a local idea, or something inside the probe that police dropped in for a reason?
The RCMP is taking the media's calls but so far has not addressed this. Police have also not indicated there is any 'Mi'kma'ki' or 'African Nova Scotian' element in this case. If there wasn't an investigative reason for the RCMP to make those mentions, there will have to be a discussion to ensure nothing like that happens again.
A police service's job is not to deliver political agendas but to protect the citizenry it serves. But they should be given a chance to explain why these acknowledgments were offered ahead of the update.
Prime Minister Mark Carney's office has so far not responded to questions.
One important factor on land acknowledgements, or acknowledgements of a specific community, is there are no federal laws that instruct police, politicians or any other group that they must be done.
The Canadian Bar Association offers advice on the appropriate regional wording of said acknowledgments but also says, 'While you may believe land acknowledgments are important, they are not mandatory, nor are they consistent and there is no legal weight to them.'
In other words, there is no law saying anybody needs to offer any acknowledgment to anybody.
But there are places like the City of Toronto, which in its policy says 'providing a land acknowledgement at the beginning of an event or meeting gives time for reflection and demonstrates recognition of Indigenous lands, treaties and peoples. It involves thinking about what happened in the past and what changes can be made going forward in order to further the reconciliation process.'
Perhaps there's a reason the RCMP did this. But so far, they have not provided one. Needless to say, the public has been quick to make judgements on social media.
'This must stop,' Canadian university professor Gad Saad posted on X.
'This seems like the type of situation where you just get straight to the point,' Canada Proud posted on X.
'Canada is lost,' End Wokeness wrote on X.
'Just when you thought Canada couldn't get any more embarrassing,' Quillette editor Jonathan Kay posted to X.
While people debate this, one Mountie told me there is no way officers on this case would ever have approved putting a land acknowledgement ahead of the missing kids.
'People have lost the plot,' the officer said.
This cop assured the men and women working this case in the field will ignore all wokeness, from whoever encourages it, and will focus on the goal of finding these children.
jwarmington@postmedia.com

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