Please find below, with no paywall, a thoughtful piece from leading editorial writer Lee Harding illustrating that many contemporary statements about traditional indigenous culture promoted by aboriginal leaders and activists, painfully unfamiliar with their own lifeways or those of other native peoples, are either grossly exaggerated or have been totally invented to score political or financial points.
So “anthropologist Will Roscoe with popularizing the term ‘two-spirit.’ Roscoe and his mentor, Harry Hay, were involved in a hippie counterculture gay men’s group called the Radical Faeries. This non-native community emulated native spirituality. Neither Roscoe nor Hay was Indigenous.”
Of course, school children are now taught that “two-spirit” is a native thing. Indigenous history is largely a fanciful white creation.
I watched the creation of the two spirit movement in real time at the University of Victoria. The majority of Native students were aghast at when was being done. This wasn't the only outside modification to their culture. Since I had an archive pass, I was able to read oral accounts of their history and stories dating back to the late 19th century, as well as actual recordings made in the 1920s. There was no mention of Ice ages, mammoths, or sabre tooth cats. Now, however, these stories abound, all created in the last 35-40 years. Most natives may have rejected the term Two Spirit, but other nonsense has made its way into their culture.
That's not surprising at a university though, where ignorant students pick up every cause without understanding much of what they're supporting. I would argue though that these stories, fabrications, whatever you want to call them, aren't invented by non-indigenous people at all. I've heard enough court proceedings and discovery proceedings to realize that it's accepted that what an indigenous person says is to be accepted without question.
lol. “Cultural Marxists”. I’m Paiute, idc about western culture, and even less so about a “threat” to it. A Russian white guy’s ideas on colonizer governments means nothing to me and my people.
"Roscoe and his mentor, Harry Hay, were involved in a hippie counterculture gay men’s group called the Radical Faeries." Hippies...it seems that so much damage inflicted on us started in the "Peace...Love...Drugs" era.
It may have seemed like a good idea at the time, but you can't socially engineer you way out of the animal kingdom, there are always predators waiting for signs of weakness.
One of my sister's friends caught the tail end of the Hippy movement. She ran away from home at 16 and ended up on a commune on Vancouver Island. Within two months, she was pregnant. Free love only applies to the predatory men the Hippie movement attracted. Most communes fail because they have no economic basis, and because nobody wants to do any of the work. When this one failed the men scattered like cockroaches with the lights on. She showed up at my sisters wedding 4 years later with two children, no husband, and no hope.
So “anthropologist Will Roscoe with popularizing the term ‘two-spirit.’ Roscoe and his mentor, Harry Hay, were involved in a hippie counterculture gay men’s group called the Radical Faeries. This non-native community emulated native spirituality. Neither Roscoe nor Hay was Indigenous.”
Of course, school children are now taught that “two-spirit” is a native thing. Indigenous history is largely a fanciful white creation.
I watched the creation of the two spirit movement in real time at the University of Victoria. The majority of Native students were aghast at when was being done. This wasn't the only outside modification to their culture. Since I had an archive pass, I was able to read oral accounts of their history and stories dating back to the late 19th century, as well as actual recordings made in the 1920s. There was no mention of Ice ages, mammoths, or sabre tooth cats. Now, however, these stories abound, all created in the last 35-40 years. Most natives may have rejected the term Two Spirit, but other nonsense has made its way into their culture.
Are you saying "outside modification" as meaning done by non-indigenous actors? I would argue that, if that's your meaning.
That is my meaning. None of the activists i witnessed pushing this were natives.
That's not surprising at a university though, where ignorant students pick up every cause without understanding much of what they're supporting. I would argue though that these stories, fabrications, whatever you want to call them, aren't invented by non-indigenous people at all. I've heard enough court proceedings and discovery proceedings to realize that it's accepted that what an indigenous person says is to be accepted without question.
That is a possibility.
is it though? a fanciful white creation? Seems like white folks are just willing dupes.
Oh no, kids are learning to be accepting of people different than them. The horror.
lol. “Cultural Marxists”. I’m Paiute, idc about western culture, and even less so about a “threat” to it. A Russian white guy’s ideas on colonizer governments means nothing to me and my people.
"Roscoe and his mentor, Harry Hay, were involved in a hippie counterculture gay men’s group called the Radical Faeries." Hippies...it seems that so much damage inflicted on us started in the "Peace...Love...Drugs" era.
It may have seemed like a good idea at the time, but you can't socially engineer you way out of the animal kingdom, there are always predators waiting for signs of weakness.
One of my sister's friends caught the tail end of the Hippy movement. She ran away from home at 16 and ended up on a commune on Vancouver Island. Within two months, she was pregnant. Free love only applies to the predatory men the Hippie movement attracted. Most communes fail because they have no economic basis, and because nobody wants to do any of the work. When this one failed the men scattered like cockroaches with the lights on. She showed up at my sisters wedding 4 years later with two children, no husband, and no hope.