Crystal Willcuts: Native people are still fighting for their dignity

Perhaps all of the recent anger and unrest in the world means humanity is moving towards something better. Perhaps these are birth pains pushing us towards light. The abolition of slavery, the defeat of Hitler, the Civil Rights Movement, while painful in process, brought humanity to a better place.

African-American men, women, and children struggled in the mid-century fight for civil rights here in the United States. It was a long and brutal fight fought with sticks, stones, laws, words, and names like the N-word and all the brutality it still conjures today. Some died so that future generations, this generation included, could be equal and respected. The Two-Spirit community struggled for rights of recognition and is inching away from hateful names and acts, and towards equality and the freedoms found therein. A brighter dawn breaks for them. The political world is crashing in on itself and people are seeing dysfunction. Wanting to be heard, they are raising their voices and calling for change.

Yet for Native people, the harsh reality of deep-seated racism continues to smack us in the face. Dan Snyder and the onerous name of his football team are under scrutiny. The public is questioning whether the term “redskin” is racist or not. The Native community is reminded that we are still at war, a perpetual fight to establish ourselves in this society as people deserving of respect and dignity afforded everyone else.