CBC called out for role in prank interviews of Kamloops residential school grave critics

Frances Widdowson and howard lindsay Shepherd, 2 public figures who feature been vital of the insurance coverage of possible unmarked graves at the former Kamloops Indian Residential School site in B.C., shared social media posts this week detailing how they say they were tricked into prank interviews.

Both say they were the targets of the comedy series Northland Tales. According to the website of the Indigenous Screen Office, a national advocacy and funding organization serving First Nations, Inuit and Métis creators of screen content, Northland Tales is an "unscripted, half-hour comedy series where an Indigenous activist trio uses pranks as a form of social action," in the vein of Borat and The Yes Men.

"With outrageous humour, they flip the script on modern and historical injustices against Indigenous peoples, offering a fresh, timely perspective on the prank genre," says the ISO, which also contributed funding for the series.

In May 2021, the Tk'emlúps te Secwépemc First Nation shared that preliminary findings from a ground-penetrating radar survey found some 200 potential unmarked graves on the grounds of the former Kamloops Indian Residential School. 

In 2022, Widdowson was fired as a professor at Mount Royal University in Calgary, partly over her criticism of what she called "dominant residential school narratives." She has referred to the discovery of suspected graves in Kamloops as "hysteria" and that the only way to know whether there are remains at the site is through excavation.

Widdowson said that earlier this month, they paid to fly her to Vancouver, where she was told she would be interviewed about how historical figures were portrayed. She said she was also told an actor dressed as Canada's first prime minister, Sir John A. Macdonald, would join her and talk about how difficult it is to portray him and other historical figures in this day and age.

Widdowson said the interviewer in the studio was dressed in a very strange outfit and a blond wig and asked her very softball questions.

Somewhere between the half-hour and hour mark of the interview, she said two "Aboriginal" men walked in and "dumped a whole bunch of children's shoes" on the coffee table in front of her.

She said at that point, the interviewer and the two men began glaring at her.

"And that's when I knew that not only were they trying to sabotage the interview, that the interviewer was in on it, and is all part of some kind of setup," she said.

Widdowson said she started asking if the shoe dump was an attempt to make a comparison with the Holocaust, and whether that was appropriate.

She said she tried to talk to them but they just glared, so she decided to use her cellphone to livestream the experience to social media.

She said when she began livestreaming, some of the people involved in the interview walked out of the studio. Widdowson said she continued to interrogate one of the people involved, asking him what this was all about, who was paying for it and how much it cost.

She said he told her it was a social experiment, and that Indigenous people were paying for it.

Neither APTN nor any of the producers connected with Northland Tales could be reached for comment.

Widdowson says the pranking genre usually goes after those in power who are "wielding their power in a way that is oppressive."

"I've seen this happen with numerous individuals, and it can be quite a funny and a liberating thing to watch that, but I don't think that's what's going on here."

Shepherd said on X she was also deceived by "social activists in an elaborate scheme."

Last year, Shepherd was fired from her job as a communications officer for the B.C. Conservative caucus following a post on X in which she called the orange Survivors' Flag — which honours residential school survivors — a "disgrace" and a "fake flag."

On Tuesday, Shepherd posted on X that she had been interviewed in February by a production group "with what I now know has a fake name and fake identities" about her book A Day with Sir John A.

She said the group connected her with a fake company, which she said hired her to perform consulting work for them.

I found out recently that I was deceived by social activists in an elaborate scheme dating back to January. A production group with what I now know has a fake name and fake identities gave me a friendly interview about my book A Day with Sir John A, and about Sir John A… <a href="https://t.co/ncLB0rABzt">pic.twitter.com/ncLB0rABzt</a>

"We had what I now know were fake meetings, fake documents, fake commercial shoot, fake prototype of a Sir John A. Collectible," Shepherd said on X.

"The Department does not comment on unverified allegations about specific productions," said Daniel Savoie, a spokesperson for Canadian Heritage.

Conservative B.C. MP Aaron Gunn wrote that the interviews were "something you would expect from a university fraternity, not a taxpayer-funded broadcaster."

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