Student was told not to wear a sweater in school that has the words "Got Land? Thank an Indian"

reply to post by JohnnyCanuck


The thing is, there isn't a person alive today that can do anything about what happened in the past. Unless you have a time machine I don't know about.

What matters is how their people are being treated today and it still isn't very good. The reservation near where I grew up looked like a 3rd world nation. There was a constant struggle over sacred ceremonial ground that is still used today because the local power company had "better" use for the land and it was preventing the creation of more electricity due to it's location in proximity to the dam.

My point is we are still trying to steal land from them!

reply to post by darkbake


Appreciate the courteous reply, thanks.

But I have to disagree. To say that 'all' Natives thought that way is not very fair, and quite the generalization, IMO. You can't really say that all the wars, and other things that the Natives inflicted upon one another, weren't in any way related to land. Even IF all the Natives agreed on that premise, then there would still be those who mark boundaries, and territories. I am not defending the white man's 'right' to butcher, maim, and steal. I simply would like people to admit that not all Natives were peace-loving hippie types, who all lived in a paradise that white men destroyed. Some were every bit as brutal, and savage. People are people regardless. Which is why I think it's funny that people point fingers in the first place. My entire point.

Chronogoblin
I simply would like people to admit that not all Natives were peace-loving hippie types,
who all lived in a paradise that white men destroyed.

The only thing that needs admitting is that the white settlers
did indeed destroy the way of life and homeland of the 1rst people.
The rest is mute, the culture of the people is/was not for others
to decide.

_________________________

reply to post by Hoosierdaddy71


Does it really matter what country.....our sister to the north is as backward as the USA.

I find it highly offensive as a white person. Like I should feel shame for the things that happened before I was born.

I'm so sick of the Natives trying to make us feel guilty for stuff people did in the past.

I was born of this earth and should have as much right to the fruits of this earth as anyone else.

One more thing......There will never be true equality on this planet as long as we permit race based privileges to persist. The handouts must stop!

3n19m470
reply to post by ToneDeaf

 

I probably would've asked her to remove it as well... that shirt is totally disrespectful. It's Native American, people, NOT Indian. Why we continually perpetuate a mistake made by Columbus over 500 years ago is beyond me...

I'm scot-irish/cherokee and am not offended nor is my mom's side(I asked) of the family that is true blood. Why we think we're physically different from anybody else in this world beyond skin color is what I'm stumped on.

dukeofjive696969
Wouldent want to remind white people they raped and plundered native land.

Considering "Indians" also migrated to the land now known as America and warring bloodily with other fractions?

Now on topic, if I would have seen it I just wouldn't have cared. I probably would have had a chuckle if even that. In fact, I doubt I would have noticed it. And I don't understand all the hub-bub about it either. I guess I just don't care enough about what other people are wearing, let me go sign up to Facebook so I can get a detailed account of what everyone else is doing instead of worrying about myself. /Sarcasm.

Well, unfortunately, the winners write the text books. And they enforce the rules afterwards.

Don't tell kids about blankets infected with small pox. Don't tell them about how we screwed tribes over for vast amounts of land for small trinkets nowhere near worth the value we would realize in that land. Don't tell them about entire communities rounded up, and gunned down, rather than going through the hassle of "relocating" them. Don't tell them about the trail of tears. Don't tell them about reservation lands they were forced onto, where uranium and other natural deposits was found to literally be bursting our of the ground after the fact, and then they were moved again. In one case I know about, a uranium mine upwind of the reservation actually pointed their ventilation shafts so as to be blowing directly upon the reservations, causing cancers and deaths. Don't tell them about the predatory loaning schemes being subjected to these people. Don't tell them about how unemployment and drug use is rampant because the outlook on the reservation and life is so bleak.

Shhhh. Don't tell them anything.

Spend SIX paragraphs in a history class on this topic. Spend six months reinforcing the VICTIM status of african americans.


We, are a nation of liars.

reply to post by Chronogoblin


I see, that could be true, especially when you consider wars. Even animals tend to mark their territory and are territorial creatures.

Hillbilly123069

3n19m470
reply to post by ToneDeaf

 

I probably would've asked her to remove it as well... that shirt is totally disrespectful. It's Native American, people, NOT Indian. Why we continually perpetuate a mistake made by Columbus over 500 years ago is beyond me...

I'm scot-irish/cherokee and am not offended nor is my mom's side(I asked) of the family that is true blood. Why we think we're physically different from anybody else in this world beyond skin color is what I'm stumped on.

I agree with you, 3m19m470.....

I am caucasian, but my father was eligible for legal status in the Cherokee nation. And we also had claims on the Sioux nation.

And as for this whole "disrespectful, it's native american, NOT indian..." well, you know what...it's just a way of differentiating a group of people with a word. It's not disrespectful like the "n-word" (god, I hate having to be PC about that when I'm only using it as an example and not in a derogatory manner).....

I don't know how you feel, but I personally don't even take offense to the use of the term "Redskins" in the national sports....Sure, it's got historical meaning to it...where historically it was "derogatory"....but....it just is what it is. Why get so bent out of shape about it? It's a descriptor. And adjective, used incorrectly as a noun. Why get so bent out of shape over it?

Good lord.

Im Piegan Blackfeet.. and Im an NDN. Indian. My head wont explode regardless of what anyone calls me. I have a CDIB card .. Indian. The BIA meddles in tribal affairs.. Indian.

Stop being so damned politically correct. It REALLY gets annoying...

Schools have dress codes for a reason. ANYTHING that could be considered inflammatory is not usually allowed since the students are there to focus on the curriculum and not on riot-inducing rhetoric. If I wore a t-shirt or sweater that said something like "as a former fetus, I'm opposed to abortion", might you consider that inflammatory and distracting from the school curriculum? There's a time and place for everything and, while I personally have no problem with the woman's wardrobe, school was not the place to display it, imho.

reply to post by snowspirit

It would be like if people living in any country in South America called themselves Americans.

There's only one country that has Americans

Kind of like Egyptians not being African even though they are in Africa?

Lucid Lunacy
reply to post by snowspirit

 

It would be like if people living in any country in South America called themselves Americans.
There's only one country that has Americans

Kind of like Egyptians not being African even though they are in Africa?

No, we are NORTH American. Subtle but important difference, eh?

Advantage
Good lord.
Im Piegan Blackfeet.. and Im an NDN. Indian. My head wont explode regardless of what anyone calls me. I have a CDIB card .. Indian. The BIA meddles in tribal affairs.. Indian.
Stop being so damned politically correct. It REALLY gets annoying...

I asked an Ojibwa how she preferred to self-identify. She answered "First Nations." Good enough for me. So...accusations of PC might actually be presumptuous?

JohnnyCanuck

Lucid Lunacy
reply to post by snowspirit

 

It would be like if people living in any country in South America called themselves Americans.
There's only one country that has Americans

Kind of like Egyptians not being African even though they are in Africa?

No, we are NORTH American. Subtle but important difference, eh?

Advantage
Good lord.
Im Piegan Blackfeet.. and Im an NDN. Indian. My head wont explode regardless of what anyone calls me. I have a CDIB card .. Indian. The BIA meddles in tribal affairs.. Indian.
Stop being so damned politically correct. It REALLY gets annoying...

I asked an Ojibwa how she preferred to self-identify. She answered "First Nations." Good enough for me. So...accusations of PC might actually be presumptuous?

edit on 15-1-2014 by JohnnyCanuck because: (no reason given)

Nope. I read all of the replies and noticed that several were claiming to know the "correct" way to address American (USA) Indians. Canadians.. half of my parents rez is in Canada. They identify as 1st nation.

Advantage

JohnnyCanuck

Lucid Lunacy
reply to post by snowspirit

 

It would be like if people living in any country in South America called themselves Americans.
There's only one country that has Americans

Kind of like Egyptians not being African even though they are in Africa?

No, we are NORTH American. Subtle but important difference, eh?

Advantage
Good lord.
Im Piegan Blackfeet.. and Im an NDN. Indian. My head wont explode regardless of what anyone calls me. I have a CDIB card .. Indian. The BIA meddles in tribal affairs.. Indian.
Stop being so damned politically correct. It REALLY gets annoying...

I asked an Ojibwa how she preferred to self-identify. She answered "First Nations." Good enough for me. So...accusations of PC might actually be presumptuous?

edit on 15-1-2014 by JohnnyCanuck because: (no reason given)

Nope. I read all of the replies and noticed that several were claiming to know the "correct" way to address American (USA) Indians. Canadians.. half of my parents rez is in Canada. They identify as 1st nation.

Good answer!

dukeofjive696969
Wouldent want to remind white people they raped and plundered native land.

I rarely find the incentive to comment on threads,but this crosses a line in my book.

The bloodline of most "white people" as you derogatorily write them off, were NOT even here while those events took place,NOR began by the current government,but you STILL have the audacity that every man woman and child is responsible for the death of an entire culture?

Get out.
---
To respond to the main point of the thread, yes what happened to the Natives of this land was awful.
The scale of the violence aside, it's nothing special.

Violence, bloodshed, and wiping out entire sections of people off the face of the earth has always been an ongoing thing in human history, and if The powers that currently rule over that section of time it will seem like it always will be.They might be right.

Tl:dwtt Stupid shirt, stupid kid, and a somewhat better ending that it could have been.
Let it go,and read up on something more meaningful.

"Thank an Indian" .... All they did was rollover and give up the land. Plus they still own plenty of land and make plenty of money off of it. It's not offensive its just a stupid shirt

Darkmask
I find it highly offensive as a white person. Like I should feel shame for the things that happened before I was born.

I'm so sick of the Natives trying to make us feel guilty for stuff people did in the past.

I was born of this earth and should have as much right to the fruits of this earth as anyone else.

One more thing......There will never be true equality on this planet as long as we permit race based privileges to persist. The handouts must stop!

How can you be offended by "Got Land?" "Thank an Indian" ...? This in and of itself is not offensive, the offense is what you are reading into it such as ""Make us feel guilty".

As far as your rights to the fruits of the earth, do you have a right to build a garden in your neighbors lawn or run a cow there? No, because that is their earth.... you only have the right to your own, for which was once native lands.

Can you honestly forget this land was first inhabited by natives? I can't... I owned land here, and every single time it rained arrowheads and other native artifacts would be uncovered by it...with every arrowhead that was uncovered I knew what land I was on, it was definitely theirs long before I ever called it mine.

Should I feel guilty for what others did, no... I should only feel guilt for what I do that is wrong.

However, since you speak of "handouts" I was on the reservation in pine ridge for a short time. I was welcomed into the homes of strangers, felt all manner of kindness from those I encountered, and was never made to feel guilty. But I never saw those handouts you speak of. Not one handout did I see...

I don't think there will ever be true equality on this earth until we stop trying to blame someone else for everything, and each take our own blame that is due us. And we do have our own blame, even now.

3u40r15m
"Thank an Indian" .... All they did was rollover and give up the land. Plus they still own plenty of land and make plenty of money off of it.

The difference between opinion and fact is...facts. Since you have found this site important enough to sign on, and this post important enough to comment upon, you might want to research that statement of yours. Otherwise, it's just trolling, and that gets old, quick.