"Best of" Blog Post for the week December 1-7, 2019

Last week's most popular blog post shed light on some modern day assimilation efforts and how once again, they are aimed at Indigenous youth.

It warmed my heart so see how many liked and/or loved this post. It tells me the education of the masses is working...

_______________________________

I am awake, I am alive, as from my sick bed I realize that teaching our Indigenous young men and women how to acquire wisdom is as important now as when the settlers first got here, for the messaging they receive is just as twisted.

Let me explain ...

Western style education is to be taught. It is a world of memorization and tests. It is "do as you are told for teacher knows best".

Not so in Indigenous style learning, for our elders ask our youth "What does this mean to you? Is it important? Why?" At their feet, our youth learn to think, to agree with things that match their soul's beliefs, sifting through the marketing and the hype.

A skill so vital in today's insanity.

Because, in the last few day's, a meme has floated around Facebook, saying that if an Indigenous person dares to speak up we must support them, to do less is to attack our own. To that I say 'BULLCHIT!"

Celebrate that he/she was gutsy enough to speak up - absolutely! But agree only if you do. Support only if you agree. Dare to play AGAINST the stereotype that we all are the same. Dare to remind the world we are unique individuals, just like any member of any other group.

Dare to disagree.

So this is me, refusing to celebrate yet another one of our youth learning to operate the tools of mineral extraction. The big Tonka toys are appealing. The feeling of success intoxicating but now they will be used to destroy the very earth that gives us life.

So this is me asking ... in those courses, where are the time slots held for elders, the leadership, the opposition? Where are the presentations on what can be done with the clear-cut land or the strip-mined acres? Where is that part of the plan, the part that explains what will be done after mainstream gets what they need, the part that explains what type of land will be left for our grandchildren to play on?

Oh, there are none. Gotcha - assimilation, as yet again mainstream targets the minds of our youth.

So no, I will not celebrate the assimilation of yet another community as it signs to resource development. Instead I will celebrate the young man and woman who learns to trap and fish, valuing each life individually, taken to feed their own.

I will celebrate the young who learn the medicines of the bush and how to read the signs of the trees and the animals.

I will celebrate each young person who learns to bead and sew, making clothes in a community that does not boast such things as clothing stores or hair salons.

And I will celebrate each youngster that speaks the language of those gone before, daring to ask to be translated when meeting with government, expecting them to accommodate for once.

Perhaps I will share those confusing messages of celebration, but not until I label them as what they are - assimilation and/or colonization. Maybe then I can add to the wisdom of the youth, showing them we are NOT in the way (as history and present day always deems us), we are NOT behind the times.

Because maybe just maybe we are the only wise ones left.

Food for thought.

I love you. HUGSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS

Sandi