#indigenous child graves

[zo1nkss]

I have GOT to stop making 3 second stops on twitter rn, the amount of "wHaT iF tHeY dId ThIs To AmErIcA" posts from ppl literally living working thriving over the graves of my ancestors is driving me fucking insane and I'm going to start getting in serious fights with strangers over it.

[notchainedtotrauma]

they had always been here. every indigenous community massacred, every single prophet assassinated, every child sacrificed to colonialism, every slave rebel shackled in their grave, every unassigned body piled as refuse somewhere, had never disappeared. whatever part they burned into air, whatever part they buried underground, whatever part they threw in the sea, came whole again in every breathing growing thing, and when the warning time came they were all of them (all of them) screaming.

from M. Archive: After the End of the World by Alexis Pauline Gumbs

[hagoftheholler]

Since somebody decided to come into my ask box whining that I'm using a "much more important issue as leverage to demand people care about other bullshit", allow me to give y'all some educational content regarding Indigenous women/two-spirited folk, the history of taking their children away and forced sterilization of Indigenous women/two-spirited folk.

Residential schools were set up by both the Canadian and American governments, and administered by churches. They were used to take Indigenous children from their families to be raised by white Christians as a means to "kill the Indian and save the man". In other words: they wanted Indigenous children dead or abiding by white, Christian standards. If these children did anything "too native", they were punished harshly. They weren't even allowed to speak their native languages without being punished.

The parents of these children had no choice but to give up their children, because they could face prison time or death if they resisted. Many Indigenous children never made it back home, or died trying to find their way back home. The last residential school closed in 1996. Just to give ya an idea on exactly how long ago that is: it is the same year Pokemon debuted.

The Canadian residential school sites are being searched for unmarked graves of Indigenous children, and thousands of these deceased children have been found. Here is a link to a 45 minute long documentary in which a woman talks with her auntie about her experiences living at a residential school.

That wasn't enough, though, because Indigenous women/two-spirited folk were forcibly sterilized for decades without prior knowledge or consent. The reasoning behind these forced sterilizations were based around eugenics and racism. This continued the genocide that has been going on for centuries.

Moving on to what is happening today, the ICWA or Indian Child Welfare Act was established to protect Indigenous children from being displaced from their tribes. It helps ensure that if Indigenous children cannot stay with their parents or extended family, they will be placed in a qualified home and stay connected to their tribe. ICWA is now being targeted by the government, because they think they should have more say in what happens to Indigenous children. This is just continuing the cultural genocide of Indigenous people. Here is a petition for protecting the ICWA. Here is a linktree that has various links on the ICWA and what is currently happening.

Yes, this situation is just as important as roe v wade. I stand by my statement that if you were outraged by the overturning of roe v wade, then you should be equally as outraged by this. Because while Indigenous and other POC were telling us that the overturning of roe v wade was very possible and that we needed to pay attention, many (white) people were twiddling their thumbs thinking "oh, they're overreacting, roe v wade has been established for so long, they would never overturn it". Well, it happened, and now the government is going after Indigenous children for the some of the same reasons they went after roe v wade.

[shadowkoo]

Every Child Matters

I try to share a similar post each year with the purpose of educating those who may not know about Canadian & American indigenous peoples and the struggles we have gone through generationally. But honestly, this year I am pissed off so my tone in some areas may read as such. I will not apologize for that.

I am angry that so many people don't know (not your fault, it's the media's fault and their lack of coverage up until recent years). I am angry at both countries' leaders for doing the bare minimum for many years. And I am angry that so much of my ancestor's history was removed and altered from the truth for centuries.

However, I am glad that with each passing year, more people are learning, and I truly appreciate those who care enough to show their support.

With that said, please mark your calendars and wear orange on September 30th! This is your official reminder! Please continue reading and consider sharing this post so more people are aware 🧡

September 30th is known as Orange Shirt Day, the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, across Canada and North America in remembrance of those who suffered in US/Canadian Indian Residential Schools. We recognize the harm done to generations of children by the Indian Residential Schools and share our collective histories as an affirmation of our commitment to ensure that Every Child Matters! 

Remembering the 150,000+ Indigenous children who endured physical, mental, and sexual abuse at these residential schools; trauma that continues to be felt to this very day by survivors and their families.

Children were stolen around this time of year to attend these ‘schools’. Parents who fought to keep their kids would often be arrested and/or beaten, it was nearly impossible for them to keep their children once the police and school officials showed up to take them. And even once the school season was over, they were not returned to their families.

We knew many children had likely suffered and died from the abuse, but could have never guessed the atrocious number of remains that we are now finding.

As of May 2022, The remains of over 6,000 children have been recovered from unmarked graves at the locations of these former residential schools within Canada, and 500 have been discovered at 19 schools in the US. However, the Interior Department said that number could climb to the thousands or even tens of thousands.

For reference to help you digest how large the numbers will become when all schools have been properly investigated, there were approximately 139 schools in Canada and so far only (as of May 2022) 36 investigations have been completed in Canada. The US has identified more than 400 schools that were highly supported by the U.S. government during their operations, and more than 50 associated burial sites, a figure that could grow exponentially as research continues.

This wasn’t as long ago as you might think. The last residential school in Canada closed in 1998, only twenty-five years ago. As of 2020, 7 off-reservation boarding schools continue to be federally funded.

“Kill the Indian, Save the man” was a common phrase in these schools. Being Indians was savage, but we were ‘savable’ in the eyes of their Christian / Catholic God if we were stripped of the things that made us indigenous.

I am lucky enough to know survivors. I am alive because of survivors.

Survivors taught us younger generations about the horrors they dealt with in residential schools. Beaten, tortured, murdered. Watching other children die from diseases grown in their unclean living situations. ‘Forgetting’ what tribe a child is from and giving them to another reservation to care for until the following year when they’d be taken away again. Raped girls who survived traumatic births at a young age only for their babies to be thrown in the furnace. Sterilizing boys and girls so that if they were released they couldn’t create any more ‘indians’.

These children were ripped from their homes, watched their parents die if they fought to keep their children, were forced to cut their hair (our hair is as sacred as our traditional clothing), and beaten if caught speaking in their native languages. As a 'reward' for good behavior in school, certain children were sent away to live with white families as slaves to 'learn the white way' during long breaks between school periods. 

Keep the families of those who lost loved ones who never returned and the survivors who lived through unimaginable trauma in your hearts. On September 30th wear orange. Join a protest. Support indigenous peoples every day, but especially on September 30th (National Day for Truth and Reconciliation), June 21st (Canadian National Indigenous Peoples Day), and October 8th (American Indigenous Peoples Day). Share our stories. Educate yourself on our history, not the false history written in books by white men, churches, and governments that supported and endorsed these institutions.

Because Every Child Matters.

Resources where you can learn more:

Orange Shirt Society

CBC News - scroll to find the map

NPR

CBS News

CNN News

The Indigenous Foundation

[hussyknee]

Will white queers please come and get their people

The staggering half-wittedness of this logic aside, ALL OF THIS IS ALREADY HAPPENING YOU IGNORANT FUCKS PEOPLE ARE GETTING FIRED REPORTED AND DOXXED RIGHT AND LEFT.

I cannot tell you of the depth of my sheer, utter loathing for these craven, snivelling, ghouls. The last fucker doing this with both the trans flag and Palestine flag in their bio is the final insult. There has been a barrage of these posts by white queers both here and on twitter in tandem with the escalation of Israeli bombings, and some of the responses have been in the vein of "yes we know, but now is not the time". As if it that makes it any less repugnant or your hands any less stained in blood.

After three fucking weeks, the Rafah border has been opened for all of 500 people, most foreigners and dual citizens and a handful of gravely injured Palestinians. Instead of calling for a ceasefire, this demon wants brownie points for letting them leave and leaving the other two million people with a few trucks of """"aid""". So they can patch themselves up before getting blown to pieces. And repeatedly, repeatedly, liberals want us to acknowledge this as the "good" we will lose if Trump comes to power.

This grief is fathomless, depthless, unbearable. Anyone who does this is the same as fascist appeasers and collaborationists. Kids in cages? You don't care about kids being massacred!White queers will literally lick the boots of genociders and child-murderers. You would have sold Jews out to the Nazis, the African slaves back to the slavers, the Civil Rights Movement to the segregationists, the Indigenous tribes to the scalpers and their children to the residential schools.

If you are our allies please shut these scumbuckets down. Otherwise, don't worry, I'm sure the Democrats are gearing up to be the same kind of defenders to you that they've been to Muslims, Latin immigrants and the Black community. Genocide will definitely feel better if you've chosen who gets to do it to you.

[thepersonperson]

I don’t think you can isolate the kanji 夫 the way you can with 厨 in mizushi. In English, it would be as if we were to interpret the word “salesman” to carry a secondary meaning of “sales husband” or “sales lover” because the word “man” in English can also mean husband or lover in isolation, per Merriam Webster. Like that’s just not how a native speaker would interpret those words or construct a pun. I think Gege uses bonpu because it’s a specific Buddhist term, like Sukuna’s not only calling Gojo mid in a general sense, but also specifically a person who has not achieved spiritual awakening.

Prev Related Ask

Oho! But why not anon? Why shouldn’t I isolate the 夫 in 凡夫? Wordplay is a very flexible thing across all languages.

In English you give me the example of “salesman” -> “salelover”. And I don’t think that’s quite right. What’s going on here is much more like “red rum”=“murder” from The Shining.

(Spoilers below the cut.)

A native English speaker coming across "red rum" in isolation would not think to combine the two words and read it backwards. The context of The Shining is what makes us realize there’s more to it than “red” and “rum”. Upon reflection (in the mirror) the “red rum” becomes “murder”.

This doesn’t mean the “red rum” is only “murder”. The clever thing about this wordplay is that both readings represent something in the story.

The Shining is about an alcoholic man, Jack, losing his mind while isolated at a decaying hotel for work and trying to kill his family. It's his son that starts saying "red rum" early on in the story. (The hotel is also haunted because it’s built over the graves of murdered indigenous people and there's other supernatural stuff going on. I think that’s important to know too.)

Rum, a type of alcoholic drink, is a nod to the root cause of Jack’s problem, the alcoholism. Red is a recourring color in both the book and the movie that seems to represent a lot of things within the narrative. The red on cheeks flushed in drunkness or anger, the blood of those spilled within the hotel’s grounds, a warning sign of danger… “Being in the red” is also a problem for both Jack and the hotel’s finacial state. (And Jack’s mental state too.)

Murder is the danger Jack poses and the reason the hotel exists in the first place.

It’s also noteworthy that a child (Jack's son), who is probably too young to fully grasp concepts like death at the hands of a caretaker, is trying to communicate this danger in 3-letter words that aren’t understood by the adults around him. He’s also copying or mirroring what something else is telling him.

It’s a warning of what’s to come and why it is happening while reiterating narrative themes, but that requires both readings. There’s not one reading or the other, both are happening at the same time. And the only way we can conclude this is by considering the rest of the story.

And if you want to see really abominable wordplay that just breaks all the rules in Japanese, please read Umineko. It’s spoilers to discuss how insane and niche it is, but it make sense for the story because the characters are unhinged weirdos that enjoy screwing with people in esoteric ways that drive you and the people they’re tormenting crazy. (Those who have read know Exactly what I’m talking about.)

(Very mild Umineko spoilers.) Being able to solve the ridiculous wordplay riddle in Umineko requires that you understand the particular neurosis of the character that created it. This character loves both Japanese and English word games and literature. Even though the riddle is written in Japanese, you use that knowledge of this character’s westaboo tendencies to recognize that some of the kanji are secretly representing English letters. And those kanji have to be isolated and read a different way using hints contained within the riddle. (Aka no native speaker would think this way normally. There’s a good reason this thing didn’t get solved for YEARS. Massive Spoilers for proof of this. Shout out to the one person who managed to do it before the solution was released, well sort of.)

I’m using all these weird examples because this is the particular kind of freak Sukuna is. If it were any other character, it would be reaching. But because he is a literature nerd that bends and breaks the rules as he wants, his Dismantle and its kanji doubling as cutting to understand/solve, and the fight being framed as a date, there is a very real chance he meant the mid husband on top of the ordinary/unenlightened readings (religious connotations too). All these readings are to be taken at the same time because Sukuna truly is [redacted] Umineko.

[elloellenoh]

The Dangers of Current Book Bans and Censorship in the US

This movement to ban and soft censor (quietly pull or not purchase) books is extremely dangerous. They are deliberately targeting diverse books, in particular - LGBTQ+ and BIPOC, because this is a movement to silence historically marginalized voices.

The people leading the book banning effort don't want these books in schools, libraries, even bookstores! They are not content to police their own children, but have taken grave overreaching steps to police what ALL youth have access to. But the worst part is the deceptive campaign of lies and misinformation that is used to control a very specific narrative. Books are accused of being porn, grooming, race baiting, fearmongering. But that’s not what it is really about. At the heart of this book banning movement is a desire to take away our youth’s ability to read and empathize with people who are not white, not cis, not straight, not able bodied. It is the most egregious form of othering. It is hammering home to those who do not fall within those labels that they are not part of the American story. Because when they ban LGBTQ+ and BIPOC books as they scream “think of our children!” what they are really saying is they are only interested in protecting a very specific type of child.

These book bans are driven by the larger movement to restrict classroom conversations and lessons about race and LGBTQ+ issues that has been led by certain groups driven by fear and hate in response to the progress made by marginalized voices. It’s not new. There have always been people in power who are afraid of what “losing their power” would look like. They thrive on fear mongering. Fear of the poor, of immigrants, of Black and Indigenous people of color, of those with mental and physical disabilities, of LGBTQ+ people, of all who are not like them. And these days anyone speaking up become the targets of harassment, hate and threats, especially teachers and librarians.

But know that they are targeting schools, and children, because controlling education and our youth is a long game strategy for them. If the impact of racism and bigotry are not taught in the classroom, if books about marginalized kids are censored and unavailable, we risk creating a generation of kids who never learn the value of empathy. And when marginalized kids don’t see themselves in the literature they read, we teach them that they are not valued, not wanted. That they are not equal. And there is no greater devastation to a child than to feel like there is no place for them in the world.

Right now we all need to be aware of what is happening and do whatever we can to speak up, make noise, fight back! There are so many ways you can help. Read articles. Pen America and Book Riot has been following the bans across the country. Take a look at all the books being banned. Support the authors and the books however you can. Go to the library and borrow them. If they are not there, ask them why. Attend local government meetings and make yourself heard! Form banned book clubs. Write to your local school boards, assemblymen, congressmen, let everyone know that banning and censoring these books is wrong! There are both small and big things that everyone can do!

Remember, there is a young person out there who needs one of these books so that they can feel seen and loved and know that they are not alone. That book just might save their life.

[heyftinally]

Just saw a literal child on here say "people who support Palestine aren't true Americans".

Good job, you paid 5% attention in 4th grade history - indigenous tribes are the true "Americans", not us. Right idea, wrong application. Let's hold you back a grade and try again.

Bold of you to assume I want to be a "true American". In this country, the people that talk about "true patriotism" are racist, semester, queerphobic pieces of shit. I don't align myself with bigots. So if that makes me "un-American", then fucking good. Fuck this bigot-loving country.

I love having literal children try and shame me for opposing a genocide. Sit down, drink your juice, and watch "skibbidi toilet" or whatever it is. Let this adults defend PEOPLE TRYING TO SURVIVE AN ACTIVE GENOCIDE.

Be thankful it's not your 6yo sibling you have to carry with you in pieces in a ripped grocery bag because you don't have time to stop and even consider giving them a burial, knowing the unmarked graves of your parents are piles of rubble hundreds of miles away.

[sarkos]

To this day, these churches still draw from the spiritual legacies of Christian missions and receive funding from off-reservation congregations under that definition. Global Ministries of the United Methodist church spent over $11m in 2022 for missionary services. Wels spent $661,018 just for the Apache missions and over $23.5m for all missions, as laid out in its most recent report, from 2023. Wels first came to Arizona in 1892, five years after the Dawes Act. When it was clear that exterminating the Apache people would not be possible, the federal government engaged Christian denominations working with the military to force the assimilation of the Indigenous people. RH Pratt, the superintendent of the first “industrial” boarding school under this policy, coined the term that embodied the philosophy behind these institutions: “Kill the Indian in him, and save the man.” pews and stained glass Federal boarding school policy allowed the military to forcibly remove Apache children from their families and send them to industrial schools in an attempt to militarize and alter their identities. They were forbidden to practice their religion or speak their language, and reports of physical and sexual abuse were common. Many children never returned home. If an Indigenous child was found outside during school hours, Indigenous police were appointed to snatch the child and deliver them to a school under the US military’s jurisdiction. If a parent sought to hide their child, they could be imprisoned or cut off from food and other necessary daily supplies. Apache children were kidnapped and taken as far as Pennsylvania, where they were forced to fully assimilate into Anglo-Christian society. Their clothes were burned, their language forgotten. Many children died of disease, neglect or abuse. And while the number of deaths is not yet known, it is believed that Apache children comprise a quarter of the graves at Carlisle Indian Industrial school. To think that 1800s attitudes towards Apache children have changed would be a mistake. Outside of the Wels mission, volunteers of other denominations drive around in colorful buses and still pick children up throughout the reservation, whether on the side of the road or other public areas. They take them to play games and learn about their version of Jesus and then drop the kids off again where they found them hours before. Parents are not always told or asked permission.

They took part in Apache ceremonies. Their schools expelled them for satanic activities | Native Americans | The Guardian

Great-Grandad survived Carlisle. In his words, “It was a hell of a way to meet Jim Thorpe“

All of this is why my reaction to someone telling me they’re Christian is the same as “Would you like to hold this blue-ringed octopus?”

[justinspoliticalcorner]

AP, via The Guardian:

At least 973 Native American children died in the US government’s abusive boarding school system, according to the results of an investigation released Tuesday by officials who called on the government to apologize for the schools. The investigation commissioned by the US interior secretary, Deb Haaland, found marked and unmarked graves at 65 of the more than 400 US boarding schools that were established to forcibly assimilate Native American children into white society. The findings don’t specify how each child died, but the causes of death included sickness and abuse during a 150-year period that ended in 1969, officials said. Additional children may have died after becoming sick at school and being sent home, officials said. The findings follow a series of listening sessions held throughout the US over the past two years in which dozens of former students recounted the harsh and often degrading treatment they endured while separated from their families.

“The federal government took deliberate and strategic action through boarding school policies to isolate children from their families, deny them their identities, and steal from them the languages, cultures and connections that are foundational to Native people,” Haaland, a member of the Laguna Pueblo tribe in New Mexico and the country’s first Native American cabinet secretary, said in a Tuesday call with reporters.

“Make no mistake,” she added, “this was a concerted attempt to eradicate the, quote, ‘Indian problem,’ to either assimilate or destroy native peoples all together.” In an initial report released in 2022, officials estimated that more than 500 children died at the schools. The federal government passed laws and policies in 1819 to support the schools, the last of which were still operating in the 1960s. The schools gave Native American kids English names, put them through military drills and forced them to perform manual labor, such as farming, brick-making and working on the railroad, officials said. Former students shared tearful recollections of their experience during listening sessions in Oklahoma, South Dakota, Michigan, Arizona, Alaska and other states. They talked about being punished for speaking their native language, getting locked in basements, and having their hair cut to stamp out their identities. They were sometimes subjected to solitary confinement, beatings and withholding of food. Many left the schools with only basic vocational skills that gave them few job prospects.

At least 973 Native American children died in forced assimilation boarding schools for indigenous peoples, per an inquiry by Interior Department Secretary Deb Haaland.

[aisling-saoirse]

Carlisle Indian School Cemetery, Pennsylvania

Hey Everyone, Today I went to the infamous residential boarding school cemetery with my Shawnee coworker, I'm not native myself but wanted to look for record of my grandfather's former neighbor there.

The cemetery is located on an Army Facility, you have to get an ID and background check before going on. The complex history of the site is mostly erased but there are still some portions where you find relics of this memory. Of these Jim Thorpe's name (famous indigenous athlete) is plastered everywhere but whispers from the servicemen about ghost stories and rumors of unknown bodies being burned in the (former hospital) hotel's boiler room were told to us. We kind of found this a bit offensive honestly but most people we encountered were very happy we were researching the site.

The hardest part was honestly visiting the graves, there were 227, I believe more went missing. Some students had their nations attached to their names others were simply listed as unknown, almost all of them were far from home. Because I am not native I will reserve my emotions about this space, many survivor's families who I've talked to have mixed emotions about what these schools meant (after all Jim thorpe did become a great athlete). however it is very hard to suppress the image of a child stolen from their family brought to (what is explicitly) a military run concentration camp and never being seen by their family again. The violence and acts of genocide commited and continued by the united states in the act white supremacist hegemony are really everywhere. The land does not forget what it holds.

This is not meant to be a comprehensive history post, if you happen to know of an indigenous person who may have attended a residential school or are interested in learning more about them you can search for information on this website: https://nibsda.elevator.umn.edu/page/view/152

[raincitygirl76]

September 30, 2023 marks Canada’s third official National Day of Truth and Reconciliation, as per link at the bottom of this post.

Above are my nieces before school on Sep 29 (the closest school day, as Sep 30 falls on a Saturday this year. Mon, Oct 2 is a statutory holiday in lieu of Truth & Reconciliation Day).

The Every Child Matters shirts I bought them last fall still fit (miraculously, considering how fast they both grow!). I bought them from an indigenous BC artist who was donating a portion of the proceeds from the sale of each shirt to an indigenous-run non-profit which raises money to lease very expensive ground penetrating radar equipment. Used to find unmarked mass graves on the grounds of former Canadian residential schools, so those children can finally be put to rest with dignity.

https://www.canada.ca/en/canadian-heritage/campaigns/national-day-truth-reconciliation.html

[fureverbookworms]

Our Share of Night by Mariana Enriquez

Note: I read this book about four months ago and I am writing this based on my brief Storygraph review and what I can recall from it.

This book is a multi-generational saga that follows a man and his son trying to escape the clutches of an Argentinian cult through some of the country’s most tumultuous decades. It has horror elements, but I wouldn’t hold it in the realm of your typical King or Hendrix novels. Rather, it’s more of an overarching gothic, heavy atmosphere that mainly focuses on the horrors of generational trauma, colonialism, and political unrest. There is also just a hearty dose of gruesome body horror and magical realism.

I was enamored with the world building. I wish I could go back and erase the first two thirds from my mind to experience them again. Enriquez does an amazing job nesting this cult and its history within the actual historical atrocities surrounding the characters. Some of the more harrowing parts have some foundations in reality, such as the exploitation of indigenous children by plantation owners and the mass graves of the politically disappeared.

Another key element of this book is Juan and Gaspar’s relationship. Enriquez does not craft a morally perfect father figure in Juan. We are first introduced to this man who is desperately trying to save his young son from the clutches of this cult, Gaspar, but then he later morphs into a man who will do anything to protect Gaspar from his own fate, including being his son’s abuser. I think that swapping from Juan’s point of view to young Gaspar’s point of view at the time she did was a genius move for tension building. The reader has more of an understanding of Juan’s motivations and reasoning for his actions than Gaspar does, but we experience those actions through the lens of his victim. It adds another layer of gut twisting dread to the reader every time the two interact because we simultaneously know that Juan is doing what he sincerely believes is the best thing for his son and we have to watch this man be his son’s monster.

I am deducting just a fraction of points purely because it was so long and the story did seem to get lost in the weeds at times. I wouldn’t gripe about it, but the ending was confusing and a bit lackluster in my opinion. There are so many parts of this book that I remember vividly (such as the AIDs vignette, Juan and Gaspar’s road trip, the World Cup saga, “Haunt me,” the reveal of the children on the plantation, etc) but I cannot for the life of me recall how the main issues of this book were resolved. I do remember being confused and needing to go back a couple of times in an effort to figure out what the hell just happened.

That said, I’d be down for a reread or revisit this via audiobook if I have the time. I would highly recommend this book for anyone who wants to be utterly immersed in the author’s work and read an incredibly heavy, slowly paced epic.

4.5 stars

CW: child abuse, body horror, violence, racism, classism, homophobia, the AIDs crisis, death of a parent, graphic sexual content, gore, torture. (Essentially, if it’s bad, it likely makes an appearance in some form or fashion).

[walrusmagazine]

Where the Children Are Buried

Thousands of Indigenous children died at residential schools across Canada. This is the story of one community’s search for unmarked graves

For decades, Indigenous communities and families had raised the alarm about children who attended residential schools and never came home, but neither the schools nor the government made any systematic effort to record their deaths. Estimates range from several thousand to upward of 25,000 across Canada. Because the Department of Indian Affairs regularly refused to ship bodies home due to the cost, children’s remains were often interred on site or in local graveyards. Those lands were often then sold and leased and disturbed by commercial and agricultural use. “Subjected to institutionalized child neglect in life, they have been dishonoured in death,” noted the TRC, which incorporated the testimonies of nearly 7,000 survivors. Most records that did exist, including cemetery locations, were destroyed or hidden by the federal government and the Catholic Church. (Between 1936 and 1944 alone, the government destroyed upward of fifteen tons of paper.) Often, burial sites are known only through local oral histories—as is the case in Delmas.

Read more at thewalrus.ca.

Photography by Sara Hylton (sarahylton.com)

[bookclub4m]

Episode 176 - Fantasy

This episode we’re talking about the genre of Fantasy! We discuss whether fantasy needs magic, clam powers, forklore, Tears of the Kingdom, worksonas, It’s Always My First Day at Wizard School, and more!

You can download the podcast directly, find it on Libsyn, or get it through Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, or your favourite podcast delivery system.

In this episode

Anna Ferri | Meghan Whyte | Matthew Murray | Jam Edwards

Things We Read (or tried to…)

The Empress of Salt and Fortune by Nghi Vo

When the Tiger Came Down the Mountain by Nghi Vo

Trail of Lightning by Rebecca Roanhorse

Storm of Locusts by Rebecca Roanhorse

Sing, Nightingale by Marie Hélène Poitras, translated by Rhonda Mullins

A Master of Djinn by P. Djèlí Clark

The Haunting of Tram Car 015 by P. Djèlí Clark

Under the Whispering Door by TJ Klune, narrated by Kirt Graves

The Salt Grows Heavy by Cassandra Khaw

Lakelore by Anna-Marie McLemore

Babel: An Arcane History by R.F. Kuang

The Chill by Scott Carson

Nothing but Blackened Teeth by Cassandra Khaw

Big Machine by Victor LaValle

Other Media We Mentioned

The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien

Dragonriders of Pern by Anne McCaffrey (Wikipedia)

Elfquest by Wendy and Richard Pini (Wikipedia)

Read it online free!

Steven Universe (Wikipedia)

Sailor Moon (Wikipedia)

Squire by Sara Alfageeh and Nadia Shammas

Graceling by Kristin Cashore

The Golden Compass / Northern Lights by Philip Pullman

The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien

Redwall (Wikipedia) Brian Jacques

The Discworld Mapp: Being the Onlie True and Mostlie Accurate Mappe of the Fantastyk and Magical Dyscworlde by Terry Pratchett and Stephen Briggs

Discworld (Wikipedia)

The Chronicles of Narnia (Wikipedia) by C.S. Lewis

The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis

Alanna: The First Adventure by Tamora Pierce

Wise Child by Monica Furlong

Juniper by Monica Furlong

The Sandman (comic book) (Wikipedia)

Ella Enchanted by Gail Carson Levine

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (Wikipedia)

The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom (Wikipedia)

Yakuza 0 (Wikipedia)

A Song of Ice and Fire (Wikipedia) by George R. R. Martin

The series of novels on which the television series Game of Thrones is based

The Wheel of Time (Wikipedia) by Robert Jordan

The Black God's Drums by P. Djèlí Clark

Leaving Mundania: Inside the Transformative World of Live Action Role-Playing Games by Lizzie Stark

Links, Articles, and Things

X-Men (Wikipedia)

Scarlet Witch

Magik (Illyana Rasputina) (though her magic powers are separate from her mutation)

Magical girl (Wikipedia)

Alebrije (Wikipedia)

Dungeons & Dragons (Wikipedia)

Independence Day (1996 film) (Wikipedia)

30 Fantasy fiction by BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, & People of Colour) Authors

Every month Book Club for Masochists: A Readers’ Advisory Podcasts chooses a genre at random and we read and discuss books from that genre. We also put together book lists for each episode/genre that feature works by BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, & People of Colour) authors. All of the lists can be found here.

Light from Uncommon Stars by Ryka Aoki

Road of the Lost by Nafiza Azad

A Broken Blade by Melissa Blair

A Thousand Steps into Night by Traci Chee

The Last Tale of the Flower Bride by Roshani Chokshi

The Unbroken by C.L. Clark

The Book Eaters by Sunyi Dean

Legendborn by Tracy Deonn

VenCo by Cherie Dimaline

The Daughters of Izdihar by Hadeer Elsbai 

We Hunt the Flame by Hafsah Faizal

Blood Scion by Deborah Falaye

The Gilda Stories by Jewelle Gomez

The Lost Dreamer by Lizz Huerta

Black Leopard, Red Wolf by Marlon James

The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin

The Björkan Sagas by Harold R. Johnson

Untethered Sky by Fonda Lee

Six Crimson Cranes by Elizabeth Lim

A Magic Steeped in Poison by Judy I. Lin

The Grace of Kings by Ken Liu

The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches by Sangu Mandanna

The Return of the Sorceress by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

The Famished Road by Ben Okri

Beasts Made of Night by Tochi Onyebuchi

The Monsters We Defy by Leslye Penelope

Black Sun by Rebecca Roanhorse

The Jasmine Throne by Tasha Suri

Cemetery Boys by Aiden Thomas

The Rage of Dragons by Evan Winter

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Join us again on Tuesday, June 20th we’re talking about celebrity book clubs and one book reading campaigns!

Then on Tuesday, July 4th we’ll be discussing non-fiction books about UFOs and Aliens!

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Court Case Threatens Native Sovereignty

A serious threat to Native American tribes across the United states looms large. A decision on the Supreme Court case Brackeen v. Haaland -- a direct assault on the constitutionality of the Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA), and by extension, the very right of tribes to be classified as sovereign nations -- is expected later this year.

Enacted in 1978, ICWA was part of the federal government's efforts to rectify the incomprehensible harm it caused to Native families through the forcible removal of Native children from their communities into boarding schools or non-Native foster and adoptive homes. Between 1819 and 1969, hundreds of thousands of children were taken from their families and homes.

ICWA establishes minimum standards for a Native child to be removed from their home and empowers tribes to be more involved in adoption and custody procedures for kids enrolled or eligible to enroll in tribal nations. The law gives tribal courts exclusive jurisdiction over members who live on tribal land, in the hopes of keeping families together, and creates a process whereby they're noticed and involved in cases outside of these boundaries.

For years, people and organizations hostile to ICWA have tried to erode the legislation through the court system. Should ICWA fall, it's not only adoption and foster cases that will be gravely impacted; the basic foundations of tribal sovereignty could be unwound. Observers in Indian Country have long believed that attacks on the legislation have broader aims in mind than the well-being of children, and many anti-ICWA proponents are also perceived as gunning for access to natural resources, mineral rights and more.

Calling into question the authority of Congress to deal with tribal nations as distinct sovereigns would have ​major reverberations throughout the field of Indian law. These attacks on sovereignty can be traced back to the Trail of Tears, the deadly westward displacement of five tribes between 1830 and 1850 initiated by then-President Andrew Jackson. The argument made at the time was that the tribes were being overwhelmed by European settlers, and they would be annihilated if the government didn't take them into custody and move them. ​In truth, those tribes controlled the waterways, and Andrew Jackson said, "​We want it, and we are going to take it."

Tribal sovereignty predates the coming of the colonial powers. From 1778 to 1871, the United States federal government signed 370 treaties with tribal nations. Many were used as tools to forcibly remove Indigenous people from their native lands and relocate them to reservations. In exchange for the land they had lived on for generations, tribes were offered many now-broken promises from the government: of peace, the provision of health and education, hunting and fishing rights and protection against enemies.

According to the Constitution, treaties can only be enacted between two sovereign nations. That status and the right of tribes to self-govern was affirmed in the 1832 Worcester v. Georgia Supreme Court case. It's also grounded in the Constitution through not one, but two clauses, and was reiterated yet again in the 1990s by a Department of Justice memorandum that tribal nations have the unique status of ​"domestic dependent nations." You can help protect tribal sovereignty by supporting the Native American Rights Fund.