"If Canada is serious about reconciliation, we need to talk about the true origin of the RCMP. The Image vs. The System The RCMP's public branding—the red serge, the history, the idea of "serving and protecting"—is a carefully maintained public relations effort. But structurally and culturally, several realities exist within Canadian policing. Before they became the Royal Canadian Mounted Police in 1920, they were created in 1873 as the North-West Mounted Police (NWMP). When you strip away the romanticized Hollywood stories, romanticized art, and red-serge tourist imagery, their actual historical purpose paints a very different picture. What the History Books Actually Show Prime Minister Sir John A. Macdonald didn't create the NWMP to be friendly neighborhood beat cops. They were modeled explicitly on the Royal Irish Constabulary—a paramilitary, armed force designed to enforce colonial control. Enforcing the Reservation System: Their core job during the 1870s and 1880s was clearing land for European settlement and enforcing the pass system, which restricted First Nations people to reserves unless an Indian Agent gave them written permission to leave. Residential School Enforcement: NWMP officers were tasked with tracking down Indigenous children who ran away from residential schools and forcibly returning them, as well as arresting parents who refused to send their kids. Suppressing Resistance & Labor: They played a massive role in putting down the 1885 North-West Resistance (the Métis and First Nations uprising led by Louis Riel) and were frequently used throughout the early 20th century to break up labor strikes and monitor political dissidents (such as during the 1919 Winnipeg General Strike). The Gap Between Myth and Reality Canada spent over a century leaning heavily into the "Mountie" as a wholesome symbol of peace, order, and good government. But over the last few decades, historians, independent researchers, and civil liberties groups have increasingly laid out the paper trail showing that the force was designed from day one to be an enforcement arm of government authority rather than a protective service for ordinary citizens. When you see how deep that historical framework goes, it makes the gaps in accountability, internal protection, and police culture today feel less like "glitches" in the system and more like the actual foundation the force was built on. Conclusion: RCMP are not the good guys they pretend to be. In my opinion they are a disgraceful reminder of how Canada was formed and this Canadian is ashamed of them and this country's disgraceful true not their sanitized aka mythical history. It is high time they were disbanded and dissolved. They are a menace to Canadian society. In recent years we have heard much talk of reconciliation with the First Nations people yet the RCMP are still active. The very first step in making things right with the First Nations people should be to dissolve this disgraceful institution and send them packing because they're the ones who carried out the will of the government, not protecting citizens as they would like Canadians to believe. They are a shameful reminder of our horrific and shameful history. They're the ones who carried it out, and any attempt at reconciliation with the First Nations people that does not include a disbanding of the RCMP is in my opinion quite frankly, empty and hollow. Canada needs to get rid of that anti-Canadian constabulary and in so doing we may begin to genuinely allow the First Nations people to begin to heal from the atrocities committed by the NWMP / RCMP and their legacy of blood.