Today is Thanksgiving Day, and it is also the National Day of Mourning, which remembers the genocide of millions of Native Americans and their ongoing erasure today.
In giving thanks today, let us also reflect and act to stop the ongoing genocide of America's Indigenous Peoples.
@QasimRashid
#ALT4U
Plaque reading:
NATIONAL DAY OF MOURNING
Since 1970, Native Americans have gathered at noon on Cole's Hill in Plymouth to commemorate a National Day of Mourning on the U.S. Thanksgiving holiday. Many Native Americans do not celebrate the arrival of the Pilgrims and other European settlers. To them, Thanksgiving Day is a reminder of the genocide of millions of their people, the theft of their lands, and the relentless assault on their culture. Participants in National Day of Mourning honor Native ancestors and the struggles of Native peoples to survive today. It is a day of remembrance and spiritual connection as well as a protest of the racism and oppression which Native Americans continue to experience.
Erected by the Town of Plymouth on behalf of the United American Indians of New England
So very true.
@QasimRashid Thank you for the response! I read some of the report, and the data. Calling it genocide is, IMO, hyperbolic and counter-productive.
I also think that article was written by a racist. They’re offended that Trudeau wouldn’t say the genocide is ongoing, but then they include this gem:
“You can lead white people to water and they'll colonize it, another of my aunties says.”
Here are a few homicide rates (per 100k):
Mexico - 26.6
Puerto Rico - 16.6
Missouri - 11.8
Indigenous Canadians - 8.1
Of course there are plenty of injustices from the past that still need to be worked on. We’re in agreement on that. But saying there is an ongoing genocide — deliberate killing of large numbers of an ethnic group — is absurd.
In Canada, estimating the life expectancy of Indigenous populations is methodologically challenging since death registrations do not usually collect information on whether the deceased was Indigenous. For the first time in Canada, a series of census-mortality linked datasets has been created that can be used to estimate trends in life expectancies among Indigenous household populations enumerated by a census. The objectives of this article are to 1) estimate life expectancy for First Nations people, Métis and Inuit at various ages and by sex for 2011, and compare it with that of the non-Indigenous population 2) examine trends in longevity since 1996 for First Nations people, Métis and Inuit and the non-Indigenous population, and estimate whether the disparity between Indigenous populations and the non-Indigenous population has changed over time. In doing so, this study aims to fill an important information gap by providing a national picture of the life expectancy of First Nations people, Métis and Inuit.
@MWilson @QasimRashid indigenous women are STILL being sterilized during childbirth.
Indigenous women are far more likely to disappear than any group in the US.
If the continued ignoring of the US of the treaties they signed us unknown to you, and the constant economic war still waged against indigenous isn't enough for you, perhaps you remember Standing Rock and the police and federal govt support of corporate takeover of indigenous land. It's just one example among hundreds
@DocJ6 @MWilson @QasimRashid
It might be helpful to explain we're using "genocide" in the cultural sense when in the "ongoing" context. This is not literal genocide, which is killing people based on nationality or ethnicity.
Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying erasing a culture is okay. But calling it genocide is hyperbolic and makes you sound like a troll.
What the US has done to Native American culture is bad enough to justify complaints that are entirely legitimate. Don't exaggerate.
@jeffclough @DocJ6 @MWilson @QasimRashid look at the numbers of indigenous women still bring sterilized and still just disappearing.
These days genocide isn't mass graves. It's called "planning" and the Bureau of Indian Affairs
@QasimRashid #TIL one of the stories of this starting, in 1970. Massachusetts didn't like what Frank James' speech was going to be at the "official" ceremony and tried to make him deliver some PR pablum...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Day_of_Mourning_(United_States_protest)
@QasimRashid My family and I honor them by cooking mostly indigenous foods and we’ve adopted a Navajo elderly woman.
Wish we could do more. We celebrate this day much as we celebrate Pesach - remembering and discussing how we need to care for each other.
A plaque at Plymouth Rock reads:
NATIONAL DAY OF MOURNING
Since 1970, Native Americans have gathered at noon on Cole's Hill in Plymouth to commemorate a National Day of Mourning on the U.S. Thanksgiving holiday. Many Native Americans do not celebrate the arrival of the Pilgrims and other European settlers. To them, Thanksgiving Day is a reminder of the genocide of millions of their people, the theft of their lands, and the relentless assault on their culture. Participants in the National Day of Mourning honor Native ancestors and the struggles of Native peoples to survive today. It is a day of remembrance and spiritual connection as well as a protest of the racism and oppression which Native Americans continue to experience.
Erected by the town of Plymouth on behalf of the United American Indians of New England.
@QasimRashid
I have to stop myself from saying "Happy Decimation of the Native American People Day," which really kills people's moods...not that I care.
For the most part, I've settled on "Happy Turkey Day," because I can't say "Thanksgiving."
You'd think people intent on banning books would ban the ones that enculturate our kids with lies and leave us as adults feeling betrayed and disillusioned or, worse, believing nationalistic fairytales, like the Turkey Day pilgrim fiction.
Burn it.
@QasimRashid I learned that this was called the National Day of Mourning when a sociology teacher wrote that in the syllabus instead of “Thanksgiving.”
She assigned a thick book on genocide for us to read over break.
@QasimRashid oh she was. She changed my perspective on so much; taught me such essential things about our history and society that have been right beneath our noses this whole time. I realized so many of us, especially in the US, don’t half understand the makeup and logic of the very society we are living in.
Her name is Professor Kim DaCosta, my academic rockstar. https://gallatin.nyu.edu/people/faculty/kad9.html
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