So it’s 12:30 in the morning and I’m sitting in my room watching what went on at the NODAPL. Feeling disgusted and tired of the treatment my people have been going through. Tired of the lies and omission of truth that the government has told the people of this country. I feel as though I’m watching Wounded Knee all over again. The fact that everything they have been put through matters to no one but the people standing there and saying no, we will not leave. No you can’t have this land. No you can’t tell me this is not my land when we have a treaty saying this was where we were to be and this is all we had left and yet you take from us again. You lie to us again. How is this ok? You want us to become a part of this country. Well guess what. I sit here writing this from a part of your country. Not sitting in that protest as I wish to be but living too far away and in no condition to join my people to stand for what's right and just.
I spent my childhood life watching my father fall apart in your country before he passed. I watched my mother struggle with hate and condemnation in your country. A part of me would give everything to go back and be where my people are. To stand with them in solidarity instead of watching and waiting; hoping that something good could come of this stand they are making on mine and my childrens behalf. But I’m not there. I’m a bystander watching as you arrest the elderly and children. I watch as you fire non-lethal weapons that can do more damage than a regular bullet. (because at least if you fire a bullet the pain is over quickly)
There are no words for what I feel about this country at this moment. Do you know who these Water Protectors are fighting for. They are fighting for you and and your children; they are fighting for me and mine. They were sitting in the cold with little to no comfort from the elements to say that what you are doing is wrong. And all some of you can say is “leave and go back where you came from”. (I could say so many things about that statement)
How do we call ourselves a Great Nation? I don’t understand how this constitutes as greatness. I don’t see anything in what this country has done or become as anything that I would be proud of. Am I proud of the people in it? A few. I could name them all on the digits of both hands. Do you have any idea of how sad that is? Does anyone in this nation realize what we are losing by desecrating the land that cradles us and gives us life.
We are losing everything. We are ruining everything by not doing right by what we call home. This land is the only one we will have. This planet will not say it’s ok I have another already ready for you to screw up as soon as you’ve finished with this one. That is not how this works. We have only one. It won’t change. You won’t be able to put a bandaid on it and make it better. There is only this one and you're killing it.
I refuse to be a partied to a government that will not answer for it’s actions. I refuse to be a partied to a collective of one percent of the population dictating what is to happen on treaty land. Because when it comes down to it; your bottom line is the only thing that matters. And the lives you have to step on to make your next dollar mean nothing in the long run. So as I sit here and listen to my children sleep on my quiet street I worry. I worry for what you will do next. Where you will force my people to go next. Where you will take this next.
You already have stated by actions and words that you care little for the lives of the Indigenous in this country. You have already trampled on them in public for the sake of your progress. So my question is this. What’s next? Are we to be exterminated as the aborigines in Australia? Will you breed us out? Or will you just move us to an area not wanted again? Keep in mind there really isn’t anywhere else to put us.
But, regardless of where we go or if we just vanish; do you think the world isn’t watching? If you don’t believe they are think again. There are eyes everywhere. And I hope you feel as every eye watches you tear this country apart and for the sake of a dollar.
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