Yes, I said it. The nationally presented and highly education documentary Through a Blue Lens cannot be trusted. This is not due to inaccurate facts, statistics, falsely edited images, or the malicious intent to deceive on behalf of the police officers. Rather, Through a Blue Lens‘ cannot be considered an autobiography of any of the drug addicts portrayed in the film.

Why not, you may ask?

First off, the autobiography wasn’t written by them, so at the very least, the film would be better labeled as a biography (but I don’t think it could be called that either). However, if you are familiar with Dave Eggers’ What is the What, an autobiography of former Sudanese Lost Boy Valentino Achak Deng, you may ask why I would not outright deny its rights as an autobiography/biography. For What is the What, although we must be careful to consider Dave Eggers’ possible biases or motive to gain a wider readership, there is no explicit disclaimer that What is the What was written to serve some ulterior motive other than to tell Deng’s story and raise awareness for the Lost Boys.

Through a Blue Lens, on the other hand, explicitly states its purpose. At the very beginning of the film, several police officers reiterate that the point of the images shown in the film is to discourage kids from getting into drugs. The camera cuts to some students looking horrified by the effects of six months of crystal meth on a woman’s face.

However, as the film rolls on, the possibility of another motive starts to make itself known. As the camera continues to focus on the shocking and sobering effects of drug addiction, the benevolence and heroic efforts of the police officers and paramedics also come into view. After saving a couple of addicts’ lives, the officers go around and give gifts to some of the long-time addicts at Christmas time. Near the end of the film, one officer states that you “can’t help but feel compassion for them”.

After all the talk about police inefficiency, as shown in Jiwani and Young’s article “Missing and Murdered Women: Reproducing Marginality in News Discourse”, I can’t help but wonder if Through a Blue Lens was a counterargument for it. What do you think?

Have you ever thought about the fact that North American culture’s solution to conflict is to “talk it out”? From kindergarten, if one child hurts another child, he/she is supposed to tell the other how that made them feel. In professional counseling, the point of sessions is to draw out dialogue about the problem. The concept of “talking it out” is everywhere! Who thought that this was the best way to approach every single problem ever?!

Okay, well, maybe there is some benefit to talking it out. In Whitlock’s book Soft Weapons, she brings up a “talking cure” as the method to healing past hurts, because “truth commissions are based on the premise that dialogue about past crimes, violence, and abuse can alleviate the suffering of victims” (79). Why though? Did the government of Canada ask each ex-student of the residential schools if talking about their pain would heal them? And if they did, did they then base the Truth and Reconciliation Commission on the majority who said yes? It is clear that there are some people who think that “talking it out” is not the answer. In the St. Michael’s School exhibit in the Museum of Anthropology on campus, there is an anonymous quote from 1991 that says this: “All we can try to do is get that [abuse] healed so we don’t go on talking about them anymore – that you forgive those people that hurt us in that way.” If some of these Aboriginal people are being pushed to speak out, it could actually hurt them by making them do something they’re not ready for.

In addition, “talking it out” takes two. Let’s be honest here. Talking to yourself can be therapeutic, but we are social human beings, and we need response. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission is encouraging ex-students of residential schools to speak out their testimonies, but are they also ensuring that the other side of the discussion is ready to receive it? We, as a nation, are the audience. If we are not ready to hear and own up to all the terrible things that happened in the residential schools, it’s not fair to the school survivors to make them talk.