THUNDER BAY – VIEWPOINT – Someone said that using words your grandma doesn’t understand is disrespectful, implying being smart is colonized. They said, “our culture,” is simple.
Youth, don’t listen to this. We had star charts, we regularly travelled to the Hopis, we had beads imported all the way from Mexico, we grew hundreds of crops that would go on to change the world’s diet as they were so expertly grown.
We had massive philosophies that altered the way white men ruled others, we treated our women, our gays and those with mental illness with compassion well before Europe and inside the Anishinawbek medicine bags were hundreds of medicines of which two are considered necessary out of 10 to declare a country’s medical system as “modern.”
We had methods for keeping meat fresh while Europe was salting theirs and causing health issues, acknowledged that disease was a by product of uncleanliness and also that it was, “in the air,” hence why we burn our smokes. We did this untold years before scientists recognized the value of these ideas.
I’m not sure why some of our “leaders” keep spouting this idea we’re, “simple,” but I can assure you, we’re not.
Tony McGuire
They Media – Thunder Bay Ontario
