By Louise Dolan

Anyway.

For those of you aren't aware and aren't involved in NDN circles, the Supreme Court just declared that tribal territories and reservations are part of states and are under state jurisdiction, including in regards to charging someone and putting them on trial in state courts for crimes related to the tribe (as opposed to this being left up to tribal courts), undoing decades of precedent for the separation of tribal and state governments.

In a few months, the Supreme Court is also going to be giving a verdict on whether or not the Indian Child Welfare Act, the only thing keeping indigenous children with their families and communities instead of being "adopted" (trafficked) to white Christian families at every chance, is unconstitutional. This act is also dependent on the belief that tribes are sovereign nations and that giving our children to people outside of our tribes is akin to the US government taking Canadian children in the Canadian foster system and trying to adopt them out to American families.

If the ICWA falls, we're going to see a modern Sixties Scoop, with Native children being stolen from their tribes and families and cultures and assimilated into white Christian society. This is not only traumatizing for the children and their families, it's also a form of cultural genocide that has been used against us before and has devastating effects.

There are family members I never knew because they disappeared into the foster system as children.

This is the beginning of what's going to be wave after wave of attacks on indigenous sovereignty and tribal governance. The Supreme Court, even with a Democratic majority, has historically decided against upholding indigenous sovereignty and tribal protection. We're seeing genocide and forced assimilation become federal policy again.

(source)

05.25 - The Grand Star Jelly

Maybe this is harsh but honestly, it feels like a lot of tribal enrollment requirements are actively punishing people for forced assimilation, especially when enrollment requires having an enrolled parent.

One generation is all it takes. One person who decides not to enroll for their own safety, who decides not to enroll their children for their safety, and enrollment is now permanently out of the reach of that family.

Idk, it just feels. . . cruel, I guess. Same with age cut offs. What are you supposed to do when your tribe's enrollment cut off is barely past adulthood but your parent(s) refused to enroll you or you didn't find out you weren't enrolled (or that it was even an option) until you were an adult? Are you just fucked forever?

Lisa Sheehan - Untitled, from the cover of “Chemistry World” magazine, 2020

Prints

Hmm I don't think radfems are very left wing actually

lgbtq+ supporting parents who are also oblivious are the funniest types of allies because it’s awesome to have parents that love and accept u for who u really are and stuff tho it also means that whenever anything remotely gay happens in a show or when i see anything in a store with a rainbow pattern on it my mom chooses to show it to me exactly like this