Hi friend,
A couple of weeks ago, we had some lovely weather here in Seattle, and we went out on one of the long day trips we enjoy, this time to Twin Beach, Washington.
It's an easily-accessible beach right between two small rivers. A couple of bald eagles perched on some old pilings out in the water and enjoyed some admiration from the humans in the vicinity.
On the way home we stopped in Sequim and grabbed takeout, then took it to a picnic table at the administration building of the Jamestown S'Klallam tribe. When we were done eating, we explored the beautiful garden and veterans' memorial there.
As we walked, I gave my husband, who hadn't been familiar with the concept of Indian residential schools, a very brief overview of their history. They've been at the top of my mind and heavy on my heart since seeing the news that 215 First Nations children were found in a mass grave at a residential school in Canada.
Residential schools took indigenous children from their parents and forced them to abandon their families, language and heritage in a violent and murderous tradition. This practice ended in the 1990s -- not long ago at all -- and its racist, genocidal, evil effects are permanent.
This week's quick resources below will help you learn more about the history of residential schools, and what you can do right now to help indigenous folks.
This week, I also want to talk about intentions and organizations.
Good intentions can get complicated fast. In the real world, here's what this often looks like:
1. You see an injustice happening to someone and you want to fix it, so you find some like-minded people and jump in.
2. None of the people you've rounded up are from the population that's experiencing the injustice, but that's fine because you're working on their behalf, right? You and your friends are all fired up. You do lots of work. You even do it for free because you believe in your cause so much.
3. The people you're trying to help don't quite seem to understand how hard you're working to help them. They keep complaining about the work you're doing, and sometimes they even accuse you of being part of the problem.
4. When you ask them how to fix it, they don't always answer. You invite them to get involved in your cause, but they don't seem interested. Sometimes they even want payment.
As someone who's putting in a lot of work for free and trying hard, it's confusing.
Why wouldn't someone on whose behalf you're working want to be involved with what you're doing? Why don't they see how important this is? If they see problems, why don't they want to jump in and fix it? Do they think you're made of money? Why are they so difficult?
There are a couple of things going on here. This is a longish piece, so head over to the blog to read the rest.
