today is indigenous peoples’ day and i am struck by this thought: would all the non-native people (settlers) who support and speak up for indigenous rights, still do so if we were in the midst of genocides on turtle island? does the distance in time, when atrocities are already a fait accompli, make it easier to acknowledge the native’s humanity? what u would have done in the 1830s, during the cherokees’ forced displacement and ethnic cleansing by andrew jackson, is what u are doing right now as indigenous people are burned alive in makeshift tents functioning as hospitals in gaza. u would probably have been silent. once the theft of land has been accomplished, it’s easy to decry historical massacres.