Dear Non Natives: It’s Time We Start Listening to Native Americans

Since late Thursday, Native Americans have been telling non-natives what we really need to hear with the hashtag #DearNonNatives.

It’s about time that the rest of us start listening. Western governments and non-native western people have a history of ignoring Native voices, to the point where their people, land, culture, and lives have been stolen from them. This legacy of physical, sexual, and cultural violence against Native people across the Western hemisphere continues today.

For example, Native Americans are disproportionately killed by police. In fact, they aremore likely to be killed by police than any other racial group, even African Americans. Earlier this month, a Lakota man named Paul Castaway was shot and killed by Denver police.  Recently, two Native Americans have died in police custody. Choctaw activist Rexdale Henry died in a jail in Mississippi, and a Lakota woman named Sarah Lee Circle Bear died in an Aberdeen, South Dakota jail cell after guards ignored her pleas for help while she was experiencing pain.

Native Americans also face very high rates of sexual assault and intimate partner violence. There is also an epidemic of Native women in the US and Canada who either go missing or are murdered.

Native Americans face many other issues, such as high rates of poverty and health problems. In other words, the oppression that Natives have faced in the past still continues today, so it’s important for the rest of us to be in solidarity with native people. That begins with listening, learning, and being respectful of their culture and history (without appropriating it). Reading the hashtag is a great way to start. Here are just a few of the tweets:

#DearNonNatives why is the holocaust known as the largest genocide of all time when over 100 Million Natives were slaughtered by the US

— ®ylee (@rdalthaus6) August 1, 2015

#DearNonNatives who claim to be Native so you can chime in on Indian-related topics w/ that sense of smug entitlement … we see you. 😉 — Simon Moya-Smith (@SimonMoyaSmith) July 31, 2015

#dearnonnatives “the Americas” as a whole are indigenous territory. pic.twitter.com/sFNq88BTb3

— Eren Cervantes (@ErenArruna) August 1, 2015

#DearNonNatives My relatives on the other sides of your borders are still Native so it’s not immigration. It’s home. — RezGirl (@PeaceofDawn) July 31, 2015

#DearNonNatives please don’t dress up as “Indians” for Halloween. We are people, not costumes.

— heatherfeather (@Heather28df) July 31, 2015

#DearNonNatives please don’t ever ask how much casino money I receive. My tribe & most don’t own casinos. — heatherfeather (@Heather28df) July 31, 2015

#DearNonNatives If you call Natives “savage” for fighting for their land/freedom…what do you call Americas Armed Forces?

— Arielle (@AriellaOceana) July 31, 2015

#DearNonNatives Why are Natives depicted as savages when we had our land ripped from us & our people murdered/tortured by the Europeans? — Arielle (@AriellaOceana) July 31, 2015

#DearNonNatives This is all that we’re left with & the gov’t still wants more of our land? pic.twitter.com/oT95Yq0NdX

— Arielle (@AriellaOceana) July 31, 2015

#DearNonNatives u dont get to label me as sensitive or say I’m overreacting when u use my culture as a costume&perpetuate racist stereotypes — NDN potato (@vegtaco) July 31, 2015

#DearNonNatives & all #Natives: Black Natives are Native. Black Native erasure needs to stop. Right now.

— Brooksita (@MahpiyaWaciWin) July 31, 2015