Have a Happy, BIPOC Thanksgiving

By Maya Mackey

The holiday season comes with a lot of mixed emotions. Some folks are excited to visit family they haven’t seen in a while and to gorge themselves on traditional meals that only come once a year. Others dread the travel and dealing with toxic relatives. Thanksgiving carries an additional jarring experience—the cognitive dissonance of celebrating what was ultimately a genocide of America’s Indigenous people. If you’re the “woke” person in your family.  I feel your pain.

While there have been attempts to right the wrongs of the past—renaming Columbus Day to Indigenous People’s Day for example—others have fallen short (like declaring the day after Thanksgiving, “Native American Heritage Day.”  America will never buck tradition so here are some ways to honor Native Americans this Thanksgiving.

1. Actually give thanks (or money!) to Indigenous folks or Indigenous-led organizations. The American Indian College Fund is a non-profit that aims to create scholarships for Native Americans to receive a college education. There is also the Native Americans Rights Fund and Americans for Indian Opportunity, which support Native American sovereignty and protection of land and culture.
2. Consider starting the family meal with a land acknowledgement. Wherever you eat your meal this Thursday was once a tribal land robust and thriving with Native Americans. We can hold a moment of silence for the loss of their people before expressing gratitude for the current blessings and provision in our own lives. 
3. Get involved with a Land Back Movement. The Land Back Movement for Native Americans is similar to the movement for reparations for African Descendants of Slaves (Black Americans). The tenets of The Land Back Movement are to help Indigenous people’s get their land back and to be trusted and appointed as leaders to help repair our relationship to earth and improve our environmental habits. 

However you celebrate this Thursday, remember that solidarity is the way forward to the America we actually want to live in. While White Americans need to be doing all the work frankly of honoring and restoring dignity and political power back to Native Americans, we as BIPOC individuals (that’s Black, Indigenous, and other “people of color”) need to apply pressure on White people to truly deal with the sins of this nation and to make room for everyone to achieve that American Dream.