National Aboriginal Day

Like most natives, I live in a city far from my “home” reserve.  All of my friends are non-native.  Some of them watch the CBC - some even take it seriously. This means a lot of them have a lot of stupid ideas about natives.

As a public service, I’d like to address a few of the ‘misunderstandings’:

Terminology

I have never in my life used the term “First Nations”.   I’ve met white Women’s Studies majors who use the term “First Nations”, but I have never met a native who used the term “First Nations”.  I have never been honestly offended by the use of the word “Indian”.  In fact I’ve heard a hell of a lot of natives call themselves “Indians”.  The only people who are offended by that word are the aforementioned Women’s Studies majors.

Coincidentally, I have never used the word “settler”, I live in Vancouver, British Columbia - and not “Occupied Musquem Territory”, as some of the more political Indians like to refer to my home town.  It’s not ‘occupied’, it’s not Musquem, and it wasn’t some unnamed territory, it was a place called ‘Xali Xali’ before the dreaded ‘white man’ came.

The White Man

I’ve got no problems with the white man.  I don’t have a chip on my shoulder about him.  Nor am I some ‘uncle Tom’.  There’s no such thing as a native ‘uncle Tom’.

Victims

People who think natives were all victims, give us the moral agency of a tree.  We didn’t just sit around while the white man pushed us to and fro.  Natives were the backbone of this province up until the early part of the 20th century.  They provided the labour force for most of the key industries.  They weren’t forced into it a gun point.  Natives as individuals made individual decisions and took jobs at white-owned canneries in order to make money and buy nice things.  Who wouldn’t?  Enough natives leave their traditional territories to live near a cannery, and suddenly they’ve been dispossessed - which is a shame, but it’s as much a result of the choices of individual natives as it is the result of the white man’s perfidy (which I don’t deny).

Drinking

Do you know the looks an Indian gets when he queues up to buy a case of beer at the liquor store?  Yeah you’re all white liberals behind our backs, but let an Indian get some lager, and your red neck sure does start to show.

Bingo

Indians do in fact play bingo way more than white people.  I don’t know why.  Indians just like gambling a lot I guess.

Spirituality

I’m an atheist.  My mother is an atheist, my brother is an atheist, and most of my aunts and uncles are atheists.  We never worshipped the Grand Tyee, Great Spirit, Buddha, or whatever.  That was dead long before we came around.

But we do still practice the old traditions.  I have no idea why.  I like our traditions better.  Native funerals are just easier to deal with than other kinds.  You dig a hole, put someone in, bury them yourself, there’s cold water involved, and then you have to give money to everyone.  It’s more satisfying than sitting in a pew a passively singing at some eunuch with an odd collar.  There’s physicality, you get your anger out - it makes sense to me.

Laziness

Reserve Indians are lazy defeatists.  City Indians are not.  The Main and Hastings tribe is the exception that proves the rule.

Friend of Nature

I admit that I am holier than thou when it comes to nature.  I walk to work, recycle, all that crap.  And I am really shocked when people litter.  I’ve never cried a single tear at the sight of it though.

My brother on the other hand will pour motor oil into a city drain, chuck hamburger wrappers in a flower bed, and will drive a massively polluting truck to fetch the mail.

Judging from the state of the reserve, my brother is the normal one.

Alright …

Now I’m off to celebrate National Aboriginal Day by going hiking on the side of a mountain, then to a BBQ and drinking binge.  I may buy a lottery ticket.