Controversy over the ancestry of Buffy Saint-Marie

[barkley]

It would now seem she was born and raised in Massachusetts by her natural family -

is there something in the water in Massachusetts? just saying-buffy st marie, 'hilaria' baldwin (no offense intended to the state or the people of but i've been getting bombarded the last couple of days with coming attractions on TLC for the new baldwin reality show and I noticed 'hilaria' has seemingly lost her accent and no longer struggles with english so she's been on my mind).

 

[bcla]

I have news alerts set from CBC so I heard about this situation when The Fifth Estate first did their story. I'm not surprised that Mary Simon has now chosen to rescind Buffy's Order of Canada. It's a sad story but CBC really has the receipts, and nothing Buffy has said has convinced me otherwise.

I was curious about the powers of the Governor General of Canada. I guess the Governor is the legal representative of the monarchy in Canada and typically chosen by the Prime Minister. But I guess this is theoretically a ceremonial power wielded by the King but delegated to a representative as a practical matter.

 

[bcla]

Not the way it works

you get 50% of your dna from each parent. After that people talk in averages. So they "say" you get 25% of your dna from each grandparent and 12.5% from each great grandparent and so on. But that is just an average. You can get 5% of your dna from one of your grandparents and 45% from the other in that couple. That's an extreme, but lets say it's 15% from one and 35% from the other. At that point the maximum amount you can get from the 15% grandparent's parent drops considerably. It does not take long until you inherited 0% from an ancestor. And therefore 0% from all of their ancestors.

DNA apparently isn't 50/50 from parents. Apparently some types of genetic material is only passed down from the mother, and other genetic material can be randomly passed down. It's certainly not a precise split because of a number of factors.

 

[irlandaise]

Not the way it works

you get 50% of your dna from each parent. After that people talk in averages. So they "say" you get 25% of your dna from each grandparent and 12.5% from each great grandparent and so on. But that is just an average. You can get 5% of your dna from one of your grandparents and 45% from the other in that couple. That's an extreme, but lets say it's 15% from one and 35% from the other. At that point the maximum amount you can get from the 15% grandparent's parent drops considerably. It does not take long until you inherited 0% from an ancestor. And therefore 0% from all of their ancestors.

DNA apparently isn't 50/50 from parents. Apparently some types of genetic material is only passed down from the mother, and other genetic material can be randomly passed down. It's certainly not a precise split because of a number of factors.

Thanks to both for the clarification. Nonetheless, Buffy was claiming to have been born in Canada to First Nations parents, not that she had Indigenous blood further back, so we aren't talking fractions.

 

[irlandaise]

I was curious about the powers of the Governor General of Canada. I guess the Governor is the legal representative of the monarchy in Canada and typically chosen by the Prime Minister. But I guess this is theoretically a ceremonial power wielded by the King but delegated to a representative as a practical matter.

Right. I don't know whether recommendations for honors are vetted by the king's staff people back in the UK, or whether GG Simon's office discussed this matter with anyone there before withdrawing the award. I would guess that they gave the PM a heads up. The notice was buried in a routine report of actions by the GG's office, but of course the Canadian news media spotted that section right away.

 

[The Mayor]

Maybe she should consult Senator Elizabeth Warren before she takes that ancestry test!!

 

[bcla]

A couple of award granting organizations are looking into whether or not they might rescind their awards. Apparently she had won a Juno Award for an indigenous category. Another award may be been based on a perceived relationship to Canada and it's clear that she wasn't born in Canada nor ever a Canadian resident.

 

[irlandaise]

A couple of award granting organizations are looking into whether or not they might rescind their awards. Apparently she had won a Juno Award for an indigenous category. Another award may be been based on a perceived relationship to Canada and it's clear that she wasn't born in Canada nor ever a Canadian resident.

I was wondering about those. She has won multiple Junos in the Aboriginal/Indigenous category. (It changed names at some point.) Also a Gemini, which is for Canadian film/TV performers.

Fortunately for her, her awards for "An Officer and a Gentleman" (Oscar, Golden Globe, BAFTA) aren't based on her ethnic background, so those should be safe.

 

[bcla]

More of her previous awards have been rescinded.

https://www.cbc.ca/arts/commotion/d...ie-s-juno-awards-and-polaris-prizes-1.7479339​

The Juno Awards and the Polaris Music Prize have announced that they are rescinding the honours Buffy Sainte-Marie won from their organizations over her career.​

​

The decisions were made in light of her recent acknowledgement that she is an American citizen.​

Not sure that was correct. She's generally acknowledged that she's legally an American citizen, but made an excuse that she couldn't satisfactorily prove that she was actually born in Canada because of......reasons.

https://www.thestar.com/entertainme...cle_2ed9cb67-95cc-5ef2-abcc-b4a8d1c49804.html​

TORONTO - Buffy Sainte-Marie lost her Juno awards, Polaris Music Prize and several Hall of Fame inductions in a matter of hours on Friday — a continued unwinding of her legacy as arts organizations react to the musician saying she is not a Canadian citizen.​

​

The board of directors at Canada’s Walk of Fame issued a statement Friday evening saying the organization has “made the difficult decision to revoke Buffy Sainte-Marie’s 1998 induction.”​

​

A representative told The Canadian Press it is undecided what happens to the singer-songwriter’s maple leaf-shaped star on the sidewalk outside Toronto’s Royal Alexandra Theatre.​

 

[irlandaise]

Yeah, she's still being very vague about it. A CBC article last week said, "In her first statement since she was stripped of the award, the singer-songwriter says that she's an American citizen and holds a U.S. passport, but was adopted as a young adult by a Cree family in Saskatchewan." So she hasn't quite admitted that she has U.S. citizenship because she was born here.

 

[barkley]

Yeah, she's still being very vague about it. A CBC article last week said, "In her first statement since she was stripped of the award, the singer-songwriter says that she's an American citizen and holds a U.S. passport, but was adopted as a young adult by a Cree family in Saskatchewan." So she hasn't quite admitted that she has U.S. citizenship because she was born here.

is she having memory problems?
she released a statement to the Canadian press on 3/4 that said she had "made it completely clear" she was not Canadian when she was awarded membership to the order of Canada back in 1997 AND also that she "made it completely clear" she was not Canadian to Rideau Hall, as well as to former prime minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau when he invited her to perform for Queen Elizabeth in 1977.

 

[bcla]

Yeah, she's still being very vague about it. A CBC article last week said, "In her first statement since she was stripped of the award, the singer-songwriter says that she's an American citizen and holds a U.S. passport, but was adopted as a young adult by a Cree family in Saskatchewan." So she hasn't quite admitted that she has U.S. citizenship because she was born here.

Sure - I've heard of that adult adoption, which doesn't sound like anything formal. Even if it were a legal adult adoption, I don't believe that would specifically grant her Canadian citizenship, unlike physical birth in Canada, a child adoption by Canadian citizen family, and/or demonstrable biological birth to Canadian citizen parents.

Buffy Saint-Marie has never been a permanent resident of Canada. Her residence has always been in the United States, and she's reportedly currently living in Hawaii.

 

[barkley]

Sure - I've heard of that adult adoption, which doesn't sound like anything formal. Even if it were a legal adult adoption, I don't believe that would specifically grant her Canadian citizenship, unlike physical birth in Canada, a child adoption by Canadian citizen family, and/or demonstrable biological birth to Canadian citizen parents.

I was curious so I looked it up-

When a Canadian citizen adopts a person over 18, the adoption must meet the following requirements in order for the person to be granted citizenship:

• A genuine relationship of parent and child between the person and the adoptive parent existed before the person attained the age of 18 years and at the time of the adoption.
• The adoption is in accordance with the laws of the place where the adoption took place and the laws of the country of residence where the adoptive parents reside.
• The adoption must not have been entered into primarily for the purpose of acquiring status or privilege in relation to immigration or citizenship.
• The adoption must not have occurred in a manner that circumvented the legal requirement for international adoptions.