We have a loooooong history of indigenous erasure in the Americas.
And as a mixed indigenous person who was actually raised by my indigenous side (but doesn't "look" indigenous) I often wonder if all those infographics and memes and essays about appropriation and other race-related themes weren't initially penned by white supremacist segregationists who fiend for widespread minority erasure, by tricking minorities into believing WE invented segregationist values, such as promoting isolationist and xenophobic ideals while posing as us.
Were political enemies literally appropriating us, while accusing others of appropriating, in order to sow division and create an atmosphere of voluntary erasure, in particular to erase any pride or public display by the growing mixed population, or those in various diasporas who might be more assimilated into American culture? What a clever way to shame us out of participating in our own communities, right?
For me this has meant feeling like I have to practice my own ancestral traditions in secret or else face assumptions that could mean a painful social death, if I speak about anything to non family members who might be quick to spout something they saw in an infographic on facebook from a mysterious source.
The pressure to just forget about my indigenous side and let traditions die off and choose to do only things from the white half of my family is INTENSE in this political atmosphere.
A lot of divisive race-related shareable posts came about exactly during the time when Russian think tanks were infiltrating Tumblr and other platforms masquerading as blogs we trusted, but were later exposed as Russian trolls pandering to each American group in as divisive a way as possible to steer an election.
It worked. I thought everyone knew about this but maybe not everyone used Tumblr during that time when that scandal was discovered.
Closed attitudes lead to the death of any culture, since culture does not exist in a vacuum, no matter how much we pretend that everyone fits in tidy little boxes and delude ourselves that labels keep us safe.
To be clear, I'm not defending appropriation or defining what that is or is not. It's just a long winded question of who really initiated certain conversation that circle the internet? I have my suspicions.
This is a long ramble and maybe it makes no sense to anyone but me, but it's my diary so nyeh.
9:21 p.m. - 2021-08-29