Is it better?

Question

Is it worst to be forgotten or to be oppressed? My friend always say's that his oppressed because his black and tells every one about his history, but my history is forgotten about even there own people seem to forget, I'm native american and in some countries people think that we never existed, and I'd like to see what people think?

Answer 1

Guess what my friend, you people were not only oppressed, but directly destroyed by whitey.

Answer 2

As long as you have the story then it has not been forgotten. When there is nothing else left in the universe and oppression is gone you will know the story and only the cry of the coyote will be heard. Just because some people never thought you existed doesn't mean that you don't. You have to know the stories to pass them on, and the more people who know the story the bigger the history becomes. How many people really know the true story of what happened at Pine Ridge or Little Big Horn. I live in the UK and in a place where the first Native American came to a long time ago. Most people here don't even know his name. There is a small plaque to him in an old church and we don't even know where his bones are. He died here and was buried here. Do you think he has family somewhere in America. As long as I am alive I will remember him and how strange it must have been here for him in those days. So even in obscurity even he is remembered. Sometimes when I remember I offer tobacco for him.

Answer 3

I think its better to be oppressed than forgotten. If you're forgotten then its like you never existed, so you have to remind people about yourself. If you're oppressed then everyone remembers it because its something that hangs over everyone's heads for a while with teh aftermath. But, haha, I'm black, indian, and a lot of other things. So I have a history of being oppressed and forgotten. Both suck but both can be plentiful. Blacks have been given more rights and Native Americans the government gives money to and stuff now. But look at the Jews. They've been oppressed and forgotten, so to speak

Answer 4

It is true that Native people are the "invincible race". There are even some people who think that Natives are extinct or are going extinct. Little people know about true Native culture or history.

However, Native people are also oppressed. It is not an either or scenario. Natives exist under both conditions you are talking about. Some examples of oppression: They have the highest rates of nearly everything you don't want: poverty, teen suicide, violent death, alcoholism, diabetes, etc.. (all as a result of oppression). Want to talk oppression, the government and supreme court (and many common citizens) don't want to admit (let alone apologize for) the horrible and brutal foundation of this country and how Natives are still discriminated against today.

Having said that I don't think we should ever play the "race wars", the who has it worse game. We are allies. We support each other in our struggles against oppression and cultural ignorance. Natives and African Americans share several points in history. Natives helped during the time of slavery for example, slaves could live on Native land as free men. During the American Indian Movement the Black Panther Party was one of our allies that brought Natives food.

I am a Native woman. That's my two cents.

Answer 5

I agree with Marilyn. Whichever one you are going through is usually worse. I am also Native American, Klulum Tribe from out in Washington( i don't live there now).

Food for thought- does it matter what people in other countries think of Native Americans?? Some also believe the Holocaust never happened in other countries.

I think its more important to have support from people in your own country. Right now there are programs in the U.S. for Native A's . But your African American friend is right on this one. His people were brought here as slaves, tortured. persecuted, treated like cattle. And it wasn't long ago that slavery was abolished. You can still find bigots in this country that believe it should not have been abolished at all.

Answer 6

I have been told that my people have been done worse then the blacks that is because I have some Indian in me, but I don't know? How can I know anything, but my own history and what I read about and that rapidly changes. So if I can hear someone tell something I might can remember and partially be a part of that, but if we don't tell our stories no one will ever hear them and so they won't know the truths and the propaganda flourishes. I can't make up for anything anyone did in the past, but I ask my youngest son, what does it feel like to be mixed and know what your people have done, all of the good and the bad, and he says he don't know he don't think about it and I say it must make him feel like an American. How does he judge this? From today forward I hope.

Answer 7

I do believe in history since it is like the roots that keep on feeding our present existence. Stop knowing and telling any people’s history is like removing planet from the earth. After a while it will simply died and eventually, no one will ever remember what was in its place. Start studying your own history my friend and don’t stop telling it to every one you know. This is the only way that keep the world remembering that there was a native American one day before the European came to your lands.

Answer 8

I think it is worse to be oppressed. I am gay and I am oppressed everyday. A lot of people in the U.S. either think we don't exist or that we are curable. I can get over those people because they are jsut dumb and ignorant. Being oppressed or denied basic rights that all humans deserve is much harder to deal with. Sorry, but oppressed is way harder. Your friend is right.

Answer 9

Being oppressed is worse than being forgotten.

Answer 10

Some of the native American's are still oppressed. Like many they cannot rise out of poverty because they are not allowed to unless they leave their land.

Answer 11

I think that oppression is the act of forgetting.