Local activist Rose Henry looks back at a life well lived

Local activist Rose Henry looks back at a life well lived

Welcome to the End of Racism March 21 2012

Well anti-racism day is just about over for another year. Trying to figure out if this year is any different from any other year. I have Learned that it is not really. People are still being treated based on their economics, gender and skin color. This one of those few days that I have not been told how lucky I am because I don't have to pay taxes. This is wrong I have to pay taxes even though I have this little card that is handed out by the federal government that says "I don't have to pay." But because I don't have a "HOME ON RESERVE LAND" I have to pay; as if I stop being an Indian because "I am living off of reserve land." See Off reserve First Nations have to pay taxes like the rest of the world. Our health care is always second to the worse if it is not the worse and education is always a huge struggle for us to attain past grade eight because most of the schools are located off of reserve land and still being taught by non-status. Out health services and medications are not what our genetics are accustom to or delivered by our own people because there is not enough of us fully trained in the non-status ways. So the Indian Act that was introduced in 1967 designed to oppress First Nations and to a certain degree still does has succeeded in dismantling the spirit of being First Nations. It has created a lot of UN-necessary stress and hardship. It has killed a few of us physical as well as spiritual and it has allowed turtle island to continue to thieve on the oppression of FN people and the sweat equity of some of the world most marginalized working poor to come to this country for a better future. For this we must thank the corporations who continue to traffic human beings for their own gain. The gain of the corporate people like Embridge who are determined to ram their pipeline down our throats and up out butts all for the sake of their benefits and to destroy what is left of beautiful First Nations Territory