Wednesday, February 8, 2012

ancestry=alcoholism

So I read in the paper on my to work.. I was struck with a significant blow to my ego.. I read in the 24 hour newspaper a story about some native guy who beat a bus driver.. and the defense of this guy was "citing louie's history of alochol abuse, fetal alcohol syndrome and aboriginal ancestry as factors, lawyer david silverman asked for a condtional sentence."
Im furious about this blurb about his ancestry and the reason he goes around beating people and abusing alcohol as if it's our heritage that created such a monster.
Really!!! Lets list off a few things I know about Aborginal history! We have the opportunity to rise above the bullshit we were faced with in our heritage! I understand the issues and problems that come with such a brutual history of abuse that turns about the person to become such a monster! But you can't sit there and tell me that this is the reason one man beat another man!
I will say it right now! I AM NOT AN ALCOHOLIC! I had a history of my own experiences but with all falling in destruction I found my way through it.. as did my mother, my older sister, and this is not the only history! I can say with certainity dozens of First Nations, Aborginal man and women who had a history of alcohol abuse, and drug issues who stand highly regarded for their strength to get out of such an evil cycle.
There are First Nations men and women who sit in parlament, there are First Nations men and women fighting for our country, there are First Nations men and women who fight for our ability to have a voice. Right next door to my work there are First Nations men and women who are fighting on the right side of the law!
There are First Nations men and women who are not categorized in such hidious amounts of alcoholism, drug abuse or anything! We have the same beauty of a great future as any human being! I am not a product of the history of abuse that we all suffered as First Nations people!

I know that when the Residential settlements came in for some of those elders who suffered such crimes, that most of them killed themselves from alcoholism, or drug abuse, because it was too much for them to bring up stuff, history of their childhood. I know that there are some First Nations who suffered from that Residential school and came above it and helped their people, helped their community!
It has been engraved in the good hearted First Nations know who you are, and where you came from, and bring back all your knowledge, greatness, and everything that would benefit you as a person bring it back to your outstanding community!
FOLLOW YOUR HEART~

I have always been someone who has fallen on my face with garbage I have suffered as a woman, or the things I endured as a child! I could be like all those other young adults who suffer at the hands of addiction. I am not like everyone else, I am not a person of addiction! I Have not let my past control my future! I have stood up and said "NO" to addiction and I have suffered a lot of history of physical abuse, sexual abuse, and many kinds of emotional abuse! I could do this all day! But I choose to get help, I choose to become someone greater! I choose to see my inspirational friends like Margo Kane, or Buffy St. Marie! I have been able to stand up against the ties of addictions, the webs of lies and say no to these effects! And I will not allow some newspaper define my people as being alcoholics! I am furious at the accusation! I know this one individual for whatever reason has chosen to drink, chosen to become abusive but it has nothing to do with his history! He could have sought out help, he could have tried to get out of it! He cannot stand before a judge and say it's because of my ancestry that I am abusive, that I willingly beat a bus driver because he didn't let me on the bus! It's because he was drunk, it was because he was not reasoning with himself and was angry, and his history of abuse was the cause of him making such poor decisions!

I needed to write this down because Im furious that I feel like this. and that I dont understand why some native guys defense is that he has an aboriginal ancestry and this is why he beat a man who suffered severe brain damage.