Turkey Day

It's Thanksgiving Day in "the land of the free", or so the story goes.

 

The "Land of the Free". It makes you think, doesn't it?

I wonder what native Americans are thankful for on Thanksgiving? Don't you?

Without being facetious - have you ever stopped to really, actually think about it?

Are they perhaps thankful for not having being completely exterminated by the people their ancestors saved from starvation after they landed on their shores - or their descendants? 

Are they thankful for the tiny reservations of land their people have been relocated to and forced to live in, despite being the First People of North America, dispossessed by foreign invaders who landed and relentlessly swept aside all that lay before them - including the native American nations and territories and natural resources that had been there since long before the arrival of the settlers? 

Are they perhaps simply grateful that their ancestors survived the Trail of Tears - and every other forced relocation, death march, slaughter and massacre endured by their tribes at the hands of European conquerors? 

Are they thankful for having their own cultures destroyed, suppressed, barely hanging on by a thread after having an oppressive foreign religion forced on them by a people who ironically enough, had fled England because they were not allowed to practice theirs?

Are they thankful for being perpetually under the thumb of a hostile government which treated them like subhuman animals in the past, and today alternates between treating them like something between second-class citizens if not as undocumented immigrants who occupy land that would be better put to use for running oil or gas pipelines through, and paying lip-service to them as America's "First People"?

Are they thankful for being deprived of voting rights and political representation in their own country?

Food for thought, eh?

Happy turkey day, folks. ;)

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If you would like to know more about Christina Engela and her writing, please feel free to browse her website.

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All material copyright © Christina Engela, 2019.

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