I’ve included this twitter exchange as context, and I’m addressing Claude, who by the way is the one who described HIMSELF as an “angry settler”. However, Claude in this case is a stand in for all of the “angry settlers” who for the most part, claim to support Indigenous peoples in our struggles, just not when it “takes [them] hostage”.
We all need to really think about what Claude is squirting out of his word-hole. He states that Indigenous people are putting his family’s well-being and safety at stake (risk). Let’s unpack that.
Indigenous peoples are engaged in PEACEFUL actions. Where land defenders have stationed themselves outside buildings, providing information and putting pressure on policy-makers, these actions have been compared to labour actions, and in fact have been respected as such. Meaning, a number of unions have come out with statements that they regard these actions the same as they would a strike, and they will not cross that picket line. Dr. Glen Coulthard recently cited Harsha Walia as arguing the same consideration should be given to land defence.
The labour comparison can take us further, because we have been experiencing a steady erosion of labour rights, rights that were hard fought for, and hard won. At the core of that steady erosion is the manipulation of public opinion, which invariably paints labour actions as “threatening safety”. How? By withdrawing labour, health workers “threaten” public health, striking teachers “threaten” the ability of parents to work and put students at academic risk, picketing construction workers “threaten” the economy, etc etc.
More and more we have seen governments tabling back-to-work legislation, and criminalizing labour actions, all in the name of “public safety”. The particular bargaining unit in any given situation is demonized: they are greedy, lazy, paradoxically “essential” while also being completely replaceable and unimportant.
I point all this out to show you that any segment of the population can be rendered “the enemy”, even those who are supposedly “protected” by unions. Those without robust labour protections are even more vulnerable to the rhetoric of “public safety”.
Indigenous peoples have ALWAYS been scapegoated as a danger to settler society. Rooted in racist tropes of our savagery and unsuitability to the modern world, we are often portrayed as threat. And what is the threat we present at this moment? Some folks are refusing to be evicted from their land. In solidarity, other folks are blocking, or camping alongside railway tracks. No one is quantifying or qualifying what this ACTUALLY means in terms of real impact. In fact, we recently learned that the CN and Canadian Pacific had come together to broker a “work around” to keep essential supplies flowing.
So at this point of Claude’s descent into angry settlerhood, the danger is an amorphous, theoretical threat. Not directed at him and his family though. Rather, the railway is a symbol of Confederation in a tangible, but also very mythological sense. The “threat” people are responding to is mostly (I believe) based in the feeling that we threaten Canadian coherence.
It is vital to remember, Indigenous peoples have not harmed anyone. We have not attacked, beaten, or threatened anyone. We have not pointed guns at Claude’s wife or children, not even at Claude. We have not removed Claude’s children and forced them into residential schools. We have not criminalized Claude’s family, locked up his relatives, administrated his poverty, created legislation to specifically discriminate against him and his family, nor have we engaged the media over centuries to vilify him and his family, then scold him for getting upset. We have not removed generation after generation of Claude’s family, forced them to speak another language, punished them for practicing their culture, physically or sexually abused them, sterilized them, sent them far away to hospitals where some of them simply disappeared.
I could go on, for a long, long time. I hope you get my point. The violence that Canada is inflicting, right now, on Indigenous peoples is real. It is intense. It murders us, it pardons our murderers, it poisons us in the name of “the greater good”, it turns society against us.
What Indigenous peoples are facing is no theoretical threat, it is a tsunami of death and pain and torment, every single day. It is REAL.
Claude merely *imagines* what *might* happen if his fantasies about the savagery of the Indian play out. Claude wants us punished and harmed because he is afraid, because he has bad thoughts, and his fears consume him. Claude justifies his cowardice and racism by invoking the figures of his wife and child.
Well listen, Claude, and the rest of settlerdom. You and your families are absolutely being harmed. You are at risk. And it has nothing at all, NOTHING, to do with Indigenous people.
Your labour rights are being eroded by neoliberal governments. Your lives are becoming increasingly precarious as the quality of your labour protections are stripped away; you work longer hours for less pay, in more dangerous circumstances, and if you complain you risk losing even the scraps left to you. Your healthcare systems are being systematically stripped to make way for privatized healthcare. Doctors are leaving in droves, maybe you cannot even find a family doctor. Your health coverage means less and less each passing year, and as you age, you need more care, not less.
Your environment is poisoning you. If you, like most Canadians, are located in an urban centre, environmental pollution is cutting down your life expectancy, and that of your children. It is bestowing upon you disorders, allergies, diseases. Outside the cities, the land and waters are still sickened. The animals are ill. It all affects you too.
Your education system is being torn apart in the service of neo-liberalism. Your class sizes soar, and your children suffer, directly, in reality, not just in your fears. Housing is becoming a dream, a thing your children may never actually have for their own as they are priced out not just of home ownership, but even rentals. The “gig” economy has them stretched to the breaking point just trying to make ends meet, just trying to access minimums.
Claude, if you aren’t absolutely terrified for the well-being and safety of your family over all this, then you are in deep, deep denial. But I don’t think you are unaware of all this. In fact, I think it leaves you sleepless sometimes.
I think worrying about all of these realities actively harms your health, because it’s truly awful shit. And the worst part is, I think you feel helpless to keep your family safe, because these threats are hurtling towards you from every side. You don’t have a second to breathe because the hits keep coming.
Indigenous peoples are not your enemies. Indigenous peoples are not threatening or harming your family. In fact, we are ALL being harmed by the things Indigenous peoples are fighting against. On top of that we are being harmed in ways you are not.
When you paint us as a threat to your wife and kids, when you let all your pent up fear and stress and feelings of hopelessness coalesce into a fight response aimed at us, you relieve some deep down need in yourself to DO SOMETHING.
But the rational part of you absolutely needs to recognize that you actively make your family more unsafe by doing this, by scapegoating us, and by ignoring the larger picture, the picture where you are only valued slightly higher than Indigenous peoples, because of your skin colour, your support for the settler colonial state, your health, your cishetero presentation, your socioeconomic class. And if you slip up, get sick, get too queer, slip down the rungs of prosperity, you’ll only slightly less reviled than we are.
Ignoring all of this is the real danger to your family. If you love them as much as you almost certainly do, then you need to fight for a better now, and an even better future. You aren’t going to accomplish any of that by making us the enemy, “the threat”. Instead you actively shore up the power of the state that DOES. NOT. LOVE. YOU.
êkosi.
103 Comments
carlosferrand · February 26, 2020 at 2:42 pm
Fabulous answer. Thank you very much
Melisscious Moose (@MelissciousM) · February 26, 2020 at 3:10 pm
Very well written. Thank you for sharing such a complicated and painful situation in a simpler to understand way. There are a lot of factors at play and it’s incredibly hard to understand a point of view from a place where you’ve never had to stand.
One of my favorite poets puts it pretty succinctly:
“Protect your spirit, because you are in the place where spirits get eaten.”
― John Trudell
💙🖤💖
âpihtawikosisân · February 26, 2020 at 4:56 pm
That particular saying is with me often.
Lisa · February 26, 2020 at 3:22 pm
This came out at the right time. I have been so tired of the racist bile many Canadians direct towards Indigenous people in the comments on every news article shared on Facebook. I guess I should stay away from the comment sections, but I feel like if only one of those people could understand what you just wrote in this article, maybe something would change for the better. Maarsii
OlympiasEpiriot · February 26, 2020 at 6:01 pm
Thank you.
Joyce Dillen · February 27, 2020 at 10:36 am
Beautifully put,
Mark Leier · February 26, 2020 at 3:40 pm
Thank you so much for this! May I use it in my first year Canadian history course?
âpihtawikosisân · February 26, 2020 at 4:55 pm
Yes!
Mark Leier · March 1, 2020 at 12:16 am
Thanks so much!
NYB (@BrittanyFaye198) · February 26, 2020 at 3:42 pm
WELL SAID!
Dana Sharp- McLean · February 26, 2020 at 3:59 pm
Wonderfully articulated.
Liam Taliesin · February 26, 2020 at 4:06 pm
Brilliant. Permission to share in Facebook?
âpihtawikosisân · February 26, 2020 at 4:55 pm
Always!
Jaz · February 26, 2020 at 4:11 pm
Thank you for your work. This piece is commentary that is sorely needed and ties together important points of solidarity. I hope us settlers start to listen and offer broader support without the tone policing.
Linda White · February 26, 2020 at 4:21 pm
Brilliant!! Drawing back so as to present the bigger picture effectively places the perceived settler-Native conflict in its proper context. Sharing far and wide.
Shadiya · February 26, 2020 at 4:32 pm
I simply can’t love this enough.
laurajanerinaldi · February 26, 2020 at 5:37 pm
Brilliant. Well said.
Zigakly · February 26, 2020 at 5:56 pm
I’m very grateful for this response. it is very classy. However I must point out that an “existential threat” is a threat to one’s existence. I believe you meant imaginary threat or presumed threat.
âpihtawikosisân · February 26, 2020 at 6:40 pm
I edited to clarify whose existence I think ppl believe to be at threat 🙂
Katre Chung · February 26, 2020 at 5:57 pm
Thank-you! Thank-you! So well-said!
Elizabeth Macdonald · February 26, 2020 at 5:57 pm
Read this to my kids as soon as I got home. Thanks
Jeannie Namagoose · February 26, 2020 at 7:01 pm
Right on! Migwech.
Tina M Pearson · February 26, 2020 at 7:29 pm
Thank you for taking time to write such a clear and incisive piece. I can imagine all of this takes its toll, so double thanks for continuing to be generous. I hope you are taking care to breathe. Are you open to this being amplified on social media and in email to family members?
âpihtawikosisân · February 26, 2020 at 8:23 pm
Yup
cjdown · February 26, 2020 at 7:33 pm
Amazing. Thank you for this.
Sandra Schweder · February 26, 2020 at 7:38 pm
Amen
Jim Roberts · February 26, 2020 at 7:42 pm
Very good!
Francesca · February 26, 2020 at 9:07 pm
Well said!
Dave Dale · February 26, 2020 at 9:14 pm
Very well put. I’ve been struggling to explain much of what you covered to people I have come across who are confused. This is an excellent essay that will assist me helping them understand.
Sylvia Smith · February 26, 2020 at 9:56 pm
Nailed it Chelsea. I’ve forwarded to our anti-racism group who plan to use it with their families and friends who don’t know much truth when it comes to Canadian history. Hope you’re ok with that. Thanks so much for your efforts to teach us.
Gary Kenny · February 26, 2020 at 10:15 pm
You have spoken truths that every non-indigenous person, every settler, like me should take to heart. I am not an angry settler, but I know some. I actually know more settlers who are receptive to the truth than ones who are close-minded or frightened or indifferent. Perhaps that will hearten you a little. Your compelling witness inspires me to do even more in (hopefully) meaningful solidarity with First Nations communities, most particularly the ones I live close to, Saugeen First Nation and the Chippewas of Nawash Unceded First Nation.
Jane Kinegal · February 26, 2020 at 10:16 pm
I wish everyone could read these words.
K bell · February 26, 2020 at 11:11 pm
To start with health care workers can not strike therefore we could not put our patients at risk in that fashion. We could at most hold demonstrations before or after our regular work days or on a day off. Further more poor old Claud I do not feel he was making a threat towards indigenous peoples. I feel he was only saying IF his family was put at risk by this then he would be an unhappy settler. I have read a bunch of ridiculous and outrageous comments on these feeds and they are sick. I can not believe that some are still so barbaric with the racist rants. I refuse to associate myself with such hate. There has also been a lot of good points and concerns that have been brought forth as well. Demonstrations being done in the manner you spoke of are completely legal yes but more importantly supported by the majority of Canadians I would hope. The trouble is that it only takes a few bad apples to turn what should be a demonstration into something more. Setting a fire on railroad tracks shuts that track down. Setting up a blockade and closing roads down making it so people can not go to work to feed their families and in some cases even lose their jobs. This feels like an attack on the average Canadian rather then a demonstration targeting the true monsters. I agree 100 percent that people should do the research and inform themselves long before ever verbally attacking anyone. It really is about time that big oil, large corporations and government answer for their misdeeds to canadians and more importantly to repair the damage they have caused to the environment. I just hope that the few bad apples do not take away from the indigenous peoples true cause. Money is not going to fix anything when it comes down to it. Handing money over does nothing for the cause period. It just makes things more complicated. If any money is involved it should go directly towards fixing the problems. Cleaning up the oil spills closing the oil drill sites no longer in use, which there are hundreds of them which are a ticking time bomb as they are no longer being used and have not been decommissioned and closed/capped in accordance with Canadian law. This will fall onto the tax payers as usual as our fearless leaders can not even seem to force big oil companies to clean up their mess after removing our natural resources and giving it away to foreign countries. We all should be standing together and there should not be us or them attitudes in this. We are all Canadians. We are all equal and we should all be following the same laws and showing the same respect for each other. In order for any true change to happen when it comes to our planet and natural resources it will only happen if we are United and stand together.
âpihtawikosisân · February 28, 2020 at 11:16 am
1. Health care workers cannot strike. Yes, thank you for pointing out a concrete example of the labour right erosion I referred to. In Alberta, one of the most intense nurses’s strike happened in 1988, when more than 14,000 nurses walked out in deep winter for 19 days. Nurses faced civil contempt of court charges and individual fines up to $1000 each, and then the nurses union was punished with criminal contempt and fined $250,000. They fought like hell for a new collective agreement and got it, and the union ended up paying over $426,750 in fines; without that kind of organized support, Alberta nurses would have been forced to suffer unacceptable working conditions. Here is more info: https://www.una.ab.ca/116/25-years-later-remembering-the-1988-nurses-strike
Health-care workers are not allowed to strike, you’re absolutely correct; and yet they have, again and again when needed to, even though it is deemed “illegal”. Labour action has always been a struggle, it has always been criminalized and any gains made have been very hard fought for. The 2000 strike was “illegal” too, but the union stood fast. If you wait for labour action to be legal, you’ve already lost.
2. You can read into Claude’s words how you like, but he clarified in later comments that he believes his family is being threatened now. That he is an “angry settler” now. Many, many people confronted him and asked him to clarify his statements, and explain what the threat is in tangible terms, but he did not.
3. Focusing on “a few bad apples” who do things during blockades that you don’t agree with, without also tallying up the violence of the RCMP, the many arrests, the “legal” assaults of protestors, the detentions of journalists, the actual arrest of a journalist, and all the underlying injustices that have brought us here, is…well, what is that? Is it honest? Is it accurate? Helpful? I would suggest it is none of these things.
4. You bring up money. Why? Why are you inventing something that no one at all has discussed? You should be aware that referring to “handing money over” plays into some very deep, and very ugly anti-Indigenous stereotypes, and more importantly, has no bearing on the current situation.
5. The issues you mention, oil spills, cleaning up decommissioned oil drill sites and so on, are the sames kinds of issues Indigenous peoples are trying to address, and you’re right, we do need to stand together and force the provincial and federal governments into action on this. A big part of that is resisting the narrative of “Indigenous violence” and “Indigenous threat”.
Nicole · March 1, 2020 at 1:11 am
Thank you so much for responding to this comment in such a thorough way. I wish I had the eloquence to do such good work on this front.
Suzan · February 26, 2020 at 11:31 pm
This is sane and articulate and there are so many people I wish would read it…think about it…absorb it.My friends on the Kahnawake territory don’t need me to speak for them but I will say niawenko:wa anyway.
Daniella · February 27, 2020 at 12:11 am
Beautifully written with intelligence and patience.
Kathryn · February 27, 2020 at 1:06 am
Thank you for putting into words everything that has been tumbling around in my mind and my heart.
sophieanne46 · February 27, 2020 at 7:56 am
Thank you. Do we have permission to share on social media?
âpihtawikosisân · February 27, 2020 at 10:57 am
Yes
Catherine Murton Stoehr · February 27, 2020 at 8:08 am
I passed this to one of my students and she read the entire thing out in class. Also – I pinned it on my twitter feed and I have 300 followers so….
(thank you – you are my favourite writer)
Bryan Adamczyk · February 27, 2020 at 8:12 am
Nailed it!
dear PM · February 27, 2020 at 10:07 am
Amazing letter, it needs to be shared far and wide. Thanks for this.
William Prettie · February 27, 2020 at 10:27 am
What I am hoping for as a “white settler” Canadian is that more of us who call ourselves Canadian will come to realize that this moment is an opportunity for Canada to be reimagined and reconstituted through the courage of the indigenous peoples and the realization by all the rest of us that we really can create that place of justice and equity we so desire if we will look squarely at our past and refuse to replicate it in our future Canada.
Fiona McMurran · February 27, 2020 at 11:40 pm
Amen to that.
Sherry Hillman · February 27, 2020 at 10:34 am
Excellent response. Chi miigwetch. I will share it widely.
Bobbi · February 27, 2020 at 10:43 am
This is absolutely wonderful. What an excellent response. I hope that it’s read mindfully by some people I know who’ve expressed the views to which you’re responding. Thank you.
Yvon Charron · February 27, 2020 at 11:07 am
Very well said and thought out … Everyone needs to read this
Rosalie · February 27, 2020 at 11:31 am
Beautifully written article. Thank you for this. You have opened my mind to thinking about this situation in a way I hadn’t before now.
Kate Taylor (@kateatcamp) · February 27, 2020 at 11:41 am
kinanâskomitin. I really appreciate you sharing your perspective.
Deby · February 27, 2020 at 12:34 pm
We are all Canadian in this beautiful country. I believe the majority of Canadian people support our native communities and am proud to see the progress being made politically in the due processes all Canadians must adhere to.
Education of the majority is crucial to moving forward and that can only be accomplished by peaceful negotiations and a rally cry for all Canadians to take care of our own first , which I believe most Canadian people agree with.
It is unfortunately the rogue individuals and the media coverage of such that is causing negativity. Setting fires on train tracks poses a direct safety threat to those living nearby. That is fact.
I am of micmac descent and my heart breaks that I could not find my grandmother’s grave because it was reused. I cannot get my band card because her mother’s name on her birth certificate is “unknown”.
I and many Canadians are proud that our native people represent our heritage and seek to care for our great mother earth. As a proud Canadian I stand with you in peaceful but effective solidarity . Peace to you all my brothers and sisters.
Sel Healy · February 27, 2020 at 1:20 pm
Thank you for this letter. We all need to be searching for a solution to the many issues at play here.
If I may be so presumptuous are to express my opinion for a possible solution:
It is time that indigenous people be represented, as a block, in Parliament and provincial Legislatures. Trying to communicate with other Canadians and your Government through Aboriginal Affairs (or whatever it is called these days) must be beyond frustrating. Mutual respect and involvement in governing is the way to be truly represented.
Donna Tomson · February 27, 2020 at 1:35 pm
Truth
Twalt'n · February 27, 2020 at 2:10 pm
Yes very great read and paints the picture that we are Land Defendors !
Fighting for everyone’s grandchildren not to have to clean up this old dirty mess called Canadian Government !
Heather Urquhart · February 27, 2020 at 2:46 pm
Awesome. Truth.
Sylvester Narty · February 27, 2020 at 4:05 pm
Ekosi, this is Claude, I think you speak with a fork tongue. Your daming the modern day comforts which you and I both enjoy. Could you perhaps make your voice louder by disconnecting from the poison generating necessities we all enjoy electricity,natural gas, oil, gasoline,cell pho rd etc and etc. Lead by example show us how much better the traditional ways works. Refuse the government money poured into reserves and native programs just for one year. How many billions since the 19 hundreds, devide the total by the native population and I’m thinking all natives are quite wealthy. Do the research and math!
And yes we feel threatened, confrontation appears to be number one in your vocabulary and actions.
Choose work not welfare! Everyone seems to think someone owes them a living. The people of Canada are hard working, responsible people trying to make a living and raise a family.
Ekosi you are not my landlord in any shape or form regardless of your twisted thinking. The only way to prosperty and equality for all is to be united and walk arm in arm for all Canadians. To not rely on social systems, to work, to build a country together. We all have to move out of the past and March forward together.
Claude
âpihtawikosisân · February 28, 2020 at 1:22 pm
My name isn’t “Ekosi” you wanker, that’s Cree for “that’s it”.
Your entire bloviating mind-crap here is full of racism, good job at highlighting the kind of attitudes we’re up against.
Nicholas Engel · February 27, 2020 at 4:54 pm
Wonderful work exploring the settlers psyche! We can not change the present without accurately understanding others and why they take the positions they do. Much love, respect and honor to all our relatives.
khornby · February 27, 2020 at 5:12 pm
Thank you, beautifully written and I will also share
Chris W. · February 27, 2020 at 5:24 pm
I read every word and appreciated your message, hard as it was to hear. Is, “Settler,” a common epithet used to refer to non-aboriginals? Thank-you.
âpihtawikosisân · February 28, 2020 at 1:15 pm
“…settler is a relational term, rather than a relational category…settler colonialism…refers to the deliberate physical occupation of land as a method of asserting ownership over lands and resources. The original settlers were of various European origin, and they brought with them their laws and customs, which they then applied to Indigenous peoples and later to all peoples who have come to Canada from non-settler backgrounds. This does not refer only to those European people with sociopolitical power, but also to those of the lower classes who settled here to seek economic activity.” (p.16 of Indigenous Writes)
Again, “settler” is a relational term, it’s describing a relationship.
dunrobinguy · February 28, 2020 at 1:39 pm
Chelsea, I am a big fan of your writing but I sure hope that you and other Indigenous writers seriously rethink the use of the epithet “settler.” Indigenous Writes is very nuanced in evaluating the various terms that might be use to describe Indigenous Peoples, but your acceptance of the word “settler” is to me roughly the equivalent of “redskin” or “savage” when applied to people like me. In other words, it is evidence of an unthinking and disrespectful attitude. Personally, I am an immigrant, but I could never identify myself as a “settler.” I came to Canada as a child and I am working hard to make Canada a better and more just place by negotiating the land rights of my Indigenous clients. I intend to stay here and to have my descendants stay and make this a better place. I disagree that “settler” is a relational term. It is a nasty slur and a cheap label too easily slapped on people of all backgrounds, motives and values. I really resent the way it is taking over academic writing, and I hope you will at least consider not using or defending it.
On the subject of the land defenders, I don’t know enough about the politics of Wet’suwet’en country to know how to feel about the pipeline issue. I acknowledge the legitimacy and value of lawful dissent and protest. I know that some of the sympathetic response to the stance of the hereditary chiefs is genuine and some of it is just some folks loving to have a cause to join and to stir up controversy. I am not by nature a joiner. Nor am I someone who can support a cause I don’t fully understand.
Anyway, thanks for all your good work. You shed much light in many important places on many important matters. Please keep it up!
âpihtawikosisân · February 28, 2020 at 1:48 pm
Absolute nonsense. Comparing the relational term “settler” to racist invectives used to dehumanize Indigenous peoples is complete bunk. Did you read the chapter in Indigenous Writes that lays out what settler means? Because I address these accusations pretty thoroughly.
I also explain that no “term” is every acceptable to “the non-Indigenous peoples living in Canada who form the European-descended sociopolitical majority”. People get very upset, as you are here, with every single term, including: white, non-Native, non-Aboriginal, non-Indigenous, European, etc. There truly is NO “acceptable” term, they are all claimed as slurs. Can we simply not refer in any way to “the non-Indigenous peoples living in Canada who form the European-descended sociopolitical majority”?
Every single other population has been defined to death, and we have no say in what we are legislated as, AND there is a long history of racist discrimination there. Not so with “settler”.
In this case you have chosen to be upset, and yet what do you offer as an alternative? Because the fact is we do sometimes need to make distinctions in these discussion for those discussions to make any sense at all.
So no. I have made the decision with a great deal of thought, with a great deal of research and experience. Be upset, fail to do that work, that’s up to you. If you cannot support us because you are feeling disrespected by being named, you should seriously interrogate what is making you so uncomfortable, because the call is coming from inside the house…
Alison Gillis · February 27, 2020 at 5:34 pm
Thank you.
Jennifer · February 27, 2020 at 6:16 pm
I am a second generation grateful and ashamed settler… grateful to you for writing this generous response. Ashamed of our government for making the “Truth & Reconciliation ” process nothing more than “Lies & Deception”. I dream of a Canada that holds the true caretakers of this great country in the highest esteem… and treats them with the utmost honour and respect… so that one day, perhaps… we can ALL be TRUE caretakers of each other.
You are a blessing. Thank you.
drew milligan · February 27, 2020 at 6:20 pm
When BC courts rule in favour of a gas pipeline that will destroy sacred territory because it will cost shareholders more money to build a pipeline where one already exists, one can say of settler values what Oscar Wilde said of cynics: that we know the price of everything and the value of nothing.
Moni Hans · February 27, 2020 at 7:54 pm
Thanks for sharing this letter. I will share it on my wall.
John Goodman · February 27, 2020 at 9:07 pm
A person born in Canada is not a settler. Let’s just get that straight. Unless you’d prefer if we went back to calling you Indians anyways.
âpihtawikosisân · February 28, 2020 at 1:14 pm
I wrote a chapter on this in Indigenous Writes; I did not invent the term “settler colonial” but here’s why I use “settler” which is a short version of that term.
You might argue that people born here today have “no connection to those first Europeans in the 15th and 16th centuries”, and later who settled here but, “we cannot escape our history so easily. The social and political systems that currently exist in Canada are a direct result of the European-based cultures that first arrived in the Americas all those centuries ago.” (p. 16)
“…settler is a relational term, rather than a relational category…settler colonialism…refers to the deliberate physical occupation of land as a method of asserting ownership over lands and resources. The original settlers were of various European origin, and they brought with them their laws and customs, which they then applied to Indigenous peoples and later to all peoples who have come to Canada from non-settler backgrounds. This does not refer only to those European people with sociopolitical power, but also to those of the lower classes who settled here to seek economic activity.” (p.16)
Again, “settler” is a relational term, it’s describing a relationship. Don’t like that? Change that relationship.
Btw, you already call us “Indians”, it’s literally a legal term enshrined in the Constitution, you ridiculous owl pellet.
Steve Turner · March 5, 2020 at 3:15 pm
Tigers, Ostrich, elephants and all manner of exotic animals are born in Canada, and yet anyone silly enough to describe these animals as “natural” to this country would be looked upon as an absolute idiot. The only difference between such animals born here and their settler counterparts -apart from genus and species- is that the settlers have the gift of speech and can say “I’m Canadian!, I was born here”, and yet we know that there is far more to matters to make such a moronic statement.
Teresa Carter · February 27, 2020 at 11:27 pm
Beautifully stated. Thank you.
Karl Langelotz · February 27, 2020 at 11:35 pm
Wow
Sterling Holmes · February 28, 2020 at 12:19 am
I hear you and I believe totally in what you are saying. I also believe indigenous people will, in saving themselves, save us all. We support you.
kathykicksit · March 6, 2020 at 1:43 am
yes
JG · February 28, 2020 at 1:15 am
Stunning. Joe Lewis couldn’t of punched better. Let’s make a stand!! Come on people! I can feel the world is turning. The light is breaking through!
Lainie Neal · February 28, 2020 at 1:57 am
I would appreciate permission to share this on my wall. I simply don’t have words at the moment to express my thoughts and feelings in reference to this remarkable analysis and commentary on the recent protests. I want time to consider my response. I am a white settler and 100% supportive of the peaceful protesters on Wet’suwet’en First Nation and all the courageous and dedicated protesters expressing their solidarity In various locations across our beautiful country.
Dionne LoForte · February 28, 2020 at 3:02 am
Brilliantly said. Thank you!
Gary Chernipeski · February 28, 2020 at 7:27 am
Canada has failed many people in many ways. Most of them result from failure to clearly protect property rights in all aspects of law. Someone’s oil. Someone’s pipeline. Someone’s railway. Someone’s land. Someone’s body. Someone’s money.
We are so addicted to holding our neighbour’s things in collective common we will destroy a nation rather than admit it. If we had sovereign property in law this and any dispute would be over in court in minutes.
âpihtawikosisân · February 28, 2020 at 1:21 pm
What are you trying to say here? Private property is literally the biggest impediment to justice for Indigenous peoples in this country, and it is absolutely enshrined into law. Do you mean that because Crown title sits underneath everything, even fee simple, that this is a lack of sovereign property law? I’m not following.
barbara · February 28, 2020 at 8:32 am
at first, I wasn’t going to read the article because I found the lead in disturbing.. but I could not reconcile the headline with the person who posted it.. so I clicked and read it….. these are the thoughts that have been in my mind for some time now… not just over this 1 issue…. but I see this tactic at play openly, and I am disturbed…. I thank you for the time and energy it took to write this out…. I want a peaceful life too…. and I understand that might rights end where yours begin, and I understand that to be true for each of us….
Nicole · March 1, 2020 at 1:21 am
I agree, I was prepared to be disturbed with what was in the body. I think it is a perfect way to get racists to open it and maybe get some education. Maybe.
Pam FitzGerald · February 28, 2020 at 9:39 am
I am a settler angry at angry settlers. I am angry at the hidden racism and not-so-hidden racism. I am tired of the attitude of entitlement. I am mad at their lack of knowledge about their own history. I have an account written by my great aunt that all her family would have starved in Saskatchewan without the kindness of their Cree neighbours. Thank you. If angry settlers did a little digging into their own family histories, they might find similar histories. Roughing it in the Bush written by Susanna Moodie in 1852 tells a similar story. I try to take on those angry settlers where ever I can … in the online comment sections, by sitting in support of Wet’suwet’en chiefs and youth at the Victoria legislature. Yes, Claude, the state does not love any of us, even the angry settlers. The state only loves money and power.
Marilyn MacDonald · February 28, 2020 at 11:04 am
What is shared here is right on! Let’s get our elected representatives to wake up and act in the interests of First Nations’ people who have been waiting for 100s of years!
Arden Waugh · February 28, 2020 at 3:31 pm
Thank you.
Ali Wardill · February 28, 2020 at 10:34 pm
Thank you for such an intelligent, coherent & well informed article.
Kim Mallory · February 29, 2020 at 12:47 am
Well stated.
Lindy Clubb · February 29, 2020 at 10:45 am
Good reading. Not much gear here, instead, lots of support for native rights and our planet’s health….
Autumn EagleSpeaker · February 29, 2020 at 11:55 am
Oki, “word-hole” love it and more. Very articulate and succinct. Thank you.
Clare Graham · February 29, 2020 at 1:02 pm
Thank you for taking the time and thought to craft this essay. Will share.
Jd · February 29, 2020 at 1:09 pm
Brilliant response.
Thank you for persevering, and succinctly showing “the other side”.
Canadians have had their whole bodies submerged in the boiling water too long.
I hope we can, by your brave stance, get out of the house hot water but, i fear the new Canadians just think you are being disobedient. T
The his reading needs to be translated into many languages for their sakes and ultimately for all Canadians, newer, and older.
Heather · February 29, 2020 at 2:33 pm
Every word you wrote is true. Settlers let’s help one another to listen and see that we (all peoples) are in this together. Blame is often misdirected and serves no purpose. Live honestly!
Bradley on the Run · February 29, 2020 at 10:00 pm
Beautifully articulated. All settlers – angry or otherwise – should read this.
Ed · February 29, 2020 at 10:56 pm
This is a great letter and I appreciate the time it took to right. This is something that needs to be read by everyone.
Chey · March 1, 2020 at 9:27 am
Wow… what an amazing read. Miigwetc 🙏🏽
susanna suchak · March 1, 2020 at 4:02 pm
Brilliant, well through through, and erudite response. One of those rare times, when I wish I had said it. Chii miigwetch and nia:wen
Shari P · March 1, 2020 at 8:33 pm
Excellent response. Very well written. We Canadians have many lessons to learn from our Indigenous people. Thank you for protecting Mother Earth and standing up for your beliefs in a peaceful way.
Jeralyne Manweiler · March 2, 2020 at 11:05 am
I have passed this response/thread to some of my teaching colleagues. You clearly unpack the erosion of rights all people should be concerned about while educating those less knowledgeable about the multitude of aggression and microaggressions, discrimination, and racism that result from settler ignorance every day. Chi Miigwetch
Jim · March 2, 2020 at 7:31 pm
Well said, more rights and freedoms are lost by legal process, we just don’t see it as it creeps up on us and then we see it gone. To borrow from Benjamin Franklin, as a people and a country, we must hang together or we could find ourselves hung(out to dry) separately
Garry Jollymore · March 3, 2020 at 7:24 pm
Their should be a new class of Nobel prize. One for the best assessment of a situation and this author should be the first recipient
Steven P Schoemaker · March 5, 2020 at 12:26 am
🎶. Oh Canada, our home is Native land,…🎶
Peyak Strongblood · June 27, 2020 at 6:04 pm
The level of imagined white victimhood in Canada is outrageous.
Just inhabiting space as an indigenous person is an existential threat to whiteness for a lot reasons but mainly that the entire justification of Canada itself is a house built of very shaky cards.
I worked at a small Catholic liberal arts college as an intern and one of the white admissions counselors came up to me one day and out of nowhere (seemingly) said “My people are conquerors, i’m not giving up my land. You’re going to have to fight pretty damn hard to get it back”.
Same dude cracked a ” joke” about MMIW to my face.
Same dude is responsible for vulnerable students; I am not one iota shocked that he exists.
Canada needs a racial consciousness reckoning really, really badly and it’s coming.
I have been ready for for forty years since I first read Malcolm x’s biography and wondered why FN people didn’t have the same level of awareness or organization given our issues are so similar to those of black Americans……
But it’s coming. Canada cannot and will not continue to get a free pass for its atrocities, the ones in the past and the ones it continues to commit today, all while hypcrotically congratulating itself for being “racism free” and that there was “no genocide” in some bizarre echo chamber absent of indigenous and of color voices.
Neil C · June 23, 2023 at 8:13 am
I too am an angry settler, but not for the same reasons as Claude. I am angry for the reasons you’ve articulated in this piece: that we are all threatened and systematically oppressed by colonial, patriarchal, capitalism and by a “state that DOES. NOT. LOVE. [US].” I am angry at the racism perpetually exercised against Indigenous people. I am angry by the Canadian governments’ and states’ deliberate and ongoing shirking of their treaty responsibilities and agreements. I am angry that a better, more humane, more responsible culture is continuously portrayed as “primitive” and/or “savage”, and as “less advanced”, as if technological and capitalist financial growth are the only measures of advancement.
Your blog has become one of my go-to morning readings. Everything I’ve read on this site is fantastic!
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