soofriends:

deluxvivens:

soofriends:

so-treu:

okay. cause what’s being ignored here, is that it’s not that people don’t understand the difference between a white person and an indigenous person that can pass for white/has passing privilege. we know that there is a difference between being perceived vs. actually being. no really, we KNOW. that tension is part of our history too. it’s part of our families, it’s part of US. we know that because you can pass it doesn’t mean that you don’t get discriminated against or don’t face oppression. that wasn’t the point.

the point was? that in that particular moment and generally speaking and historically, light-skinned & mixed race indigenous people have the same or at the least similar cultural and institutional power to deny black people vital aspects of their being. slavery by both whites and natives had a erasing effect on our history (there ARE. NO. DOCUMENTS. LEFT.) and the same anti-blackness that white folks employ to deny black people’s national belonging (by making us second-class citizens and barring access to resources in *whichever* nation we find ourselves in) is also being employed by Natives who would keep us from being recognized as part of various nations, either offically or discursively.

i dunno, i think dumbthingswhitepeoplesay’s question still stands: if the power relations echo and the effect upon black people is the same, as far as black folks’ lived experience goes, what *is* the difference?

And what natives have been telling you is that most of us never held slaves and most of us never had rolls like the Dawes roll in order to separate you out. We took you in as family and accepted you as members of our tribes.

Could you tell me about society in Cameroon? How about history of Morocco? Wait, aren’t all black people African? YOU DON’T KNOW YOUR HISTORY!!!??? «« This has been the frustrating thing for me, you’re talking about Cherokee Freedmen to people who aren’t Cherokee and do not know that history or only a little of it. This is why people keep telling you that you have to know who your nation/people are, it’s the same way that I have to find someone from Cameroon or Morocco to ask my questions and not just any random black person. We didn’t keep slaves, we haven’t got rolls, we didn’t make you second-class or bar you from anything, at least in my nation.

I wasnt really going to get so directly involved in this but… what about Cameroon specifically? The french colonization, the anglophone colonization, the german colonization, the portuguese slave trade, the arab slave trade, christian influence, muslim influence, liberation from the french, current government issues?

What about Morocco specifically? The french colonization, the slave trade, muslim influence, liberation from the french, current issues with the constitutional monarchy, berber languages and cultures, gnaouas?

I’m not sure what you’re asking, but if your point was to quiz folks on random african countries? Um… I dont quite get it.

And yes, most of the people involved in this conversation do not have dawes rolls and were not slave holders like those in the (eventually western) Cherokee nation. But that part about black blood being a contaminating force? Is an appropriate description of the experience of an awful lot of mixed black native people, five civilized or not.

(bonus vid of bambara in my next post)

That was my point and the reason being, I felt like NA were expected to know about random NA nations.

I thought the frustration was about NA, wholly unconnected with southern states, not being able to recognize your heritage. A Navajo simply can not tell you, “Yup. You’re Choctaw! Welcome home sister!” I understand now that some were denying that heritage, while being ignorant of the history in the first place?

Yes. We were being told our grandmother’s stories were blood myths even though no one ever specified a region much less a particular nation. The original conversation was sparked by a post of pictures & people musing over the lack of black NDN’s & why it was that we didn’t have more of a connection to that part of our ancestry. Somehow our desire to know anything became conflated with a desire to take away the right to self determine. As far as I know, no one involved has been seeking anything more than knowledge, but we can’t even do that without anger & upset.