I never want to erase the struggle of natives living on reservations, trapped by poverty.
I never want to erase the struggle of natives who are darker than I, who are hated and discriminated against because of colorism.
But being white-passing has its shit too, and it seems to go hand in hand with blood quantum politics.
In elementary & middle school lots of kids would start whooping and hollering like the indians they saw on tv whenever I told them I was native, and then eventually, I stopped telling others about my heritage, because I was always doubted or questioned to the point where it stopped at “but you’re white.”
I kind of regressed for a while and stopped pushing the issue, and decided that maybe blood quantum was right, maybe my skin was right, I was more white than native. Honestly, it hadn’t been till about a couple years ago that I realized there were other natives like me.
But learning more about blood quantum and colonialism made me truly understand all the shit I had internalized about myself, and being aware meant fully feeling the pain of it.
My aunt, for instance, who is by blood quantum standards half Makah told my father not to have children with my mother because then the blood would be almost diminished at a quarter. Do you know how fucked up that is?
If I have children with a non-Makah they can’t be enrolled into my tribe. That sits on my mind all the time. It shouldn’t matter, their great-grandmother is full Makah – they are directly descended. Why are they not allowed the opportunity to learn about their ancestors and be closer to their DNA?
It hurts. A lot. And it hurts to be asked “how much” native american I have in me every time I proclaim myself one.
When watching the documentary Reel Injun, I saw a clip from a bugs bunny cartoon where he’s shooting indians and tallying up the numbers. At one point, he stops and goes, “oops, that one was a half breed” and erases half of a tally mark.
colonialism seems to shit on every native regardless of color
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