given what's going on in NDN country, the Idle No More phenomenon, and the seething undertow of rage, i thought i'd let this image resurface. people have been asking me, "why aren't i doing more for the cause." which kind of pisses me off. i've been doing protest art and writing for nearly 20 years. why should i jump on a bandwagon? Besides, i always tell people, being born native is being born an activist, because, as i've said before, you have to justify yourself and your people to white people every day the rest of your life.
back in the 1970's, canada was so racist, that i would get beaten up every day, in every school i ever went to, by racist little shits. and not one or two kids, it would be a group of kids beating me up every single day. saying shit like, "You dirty indian, go back to your rez, you stinking indian, you stupid indian, you think you can go to school like us? Where's your chief now? hahahah!!!" and all sorts of other evil, racist slurs i heard every single day growing up. it all stopped in 1979, when we moved from the prairies to vancouver, british columbia. but the prairies were fucking racist and still are today. i was in regina, saskatchewan last year, and to me, it felt like kamloops in the 1980's. i still get treated shitty today. i'll go shopping, and the white people in front of me will get chatted to, asked lots of questions, and then when it's my turn, nothing. strictly business. so fuck you canada.
anyway, read the letter above, it's only one of thousands of memos he wrote that basically created institutional racism. canada, once they knew our traplines, what to hunt, what could grow, and how to survive without our help in opening up this vast country, basically threw us to the gutter. creating "round the fort" indians and the mentality of the handout. nothing has changed since, except we're getting educated and worldly. something that was repressed for over a century. imagine beating and verbally abusing someone for over a century and expecting them to function normally in society. and not only beating them up for that length of time, but telling everyone who watched, that we deserved it, and that they should either help, or get back and not get involved.
then create laws that enshrine these values and create land prisons where we can't leave or own anything of value, or sell anything of value until the early 1960's. and take away all the children for a century and put them through cultural meat grinders that strip them away of language, culture, dignity and family, then shove them back to the street upon graduation and expect them to act civil and integrate normally into society. imagine that happening to your children and your family for a century and then expect everything to be fine.
imagine being a child of two parents who went through that nightmare called the residential school, and probably being conceived in one, because your mother got kicked out at the age of 16 for being pregnant with you. imagine growing up a life on the run, seeing nothing but alcoholism and brutal violence and physical and mental abuse the first ten years of your life and then being told to try to act normal and to smile and say nothing is wrong, it's alright, the rest of your adult life. imagine becoming a parent and struggling to overcome so many negative things in your life and to be a good dad, even though you never had one, and have little parent skills but doing the best you can and struggling to learn as fast as your children. imagine that. now, can you imagine why so many other natives are pissed off in canada and are finally uniting?
can you?
cb
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