Is There A Rift Between White "Two-Spirits" and Native Two-Spirits? A Reader Weighs In

NE2SS ran a post on Bo Young's work to promote the Two-Spirit movement. Read the whole text here.

A reader,nehi katawasisiw, pipikisis cree nation, commented to this quote:

Young insists that from a gay and lesbian point of view, there is a "prima facie racism" in saying that people can't do this because they are white. He finds it distressing that spirituality is something that strengthens individuals and communities, yet there are Native American Two-Spirits, "who would deny gay brothers and sisters access to a history, to a tradition that would empower us all." By some accounts, Young would fall into the "Non-Native" category.

with a letter addressed to Bo Young...

Tansi,

Perhaps the source of the rift of which you write comes from the fact that white people are, through treating Two Spirit traditions as up for grabs, trying to claim a culturally specific tradition and history surrounding spirituality & sexuality (i.e.: two spirit) as their own (that is, to colonize it) when it is not.

Two Spirit is not simply an indicator of "sexual orientation"; it is not an umbrella term---it has as much specificity and particularity as Cree, Saulteaux, Asini-pwat, Dine, Innu, Salish, Spokane, Tohono O'odham, et al all do. All of which contain their own discrete identities, separate from European identities.

more

The tension that you and the Elder you claim is "teaching" you choose to dismiss as irrelevant and born of the "fear" of Two Spirit people is actually born of something else entirely: respect for our Grandparents, for ourselves, for our traditions.

In our many diverse Indigenous communities there are many, many different traditions and yet among these societies there are threads of commonality that run through them all like iron ore through the deep stone of the earth. One of these threads is the practice of respect through stepping back.

This practice is something that the European-American community has yet to learn and would benefit from learning before all else.

If you truly understood and respected the Indigenous traditions and beliefs of the people you claim to be a "student" of then you would understand that this "rift" you write about (yet understand nothing of; perhaps you need to study harder) has about as much to do with your "prima facie racism" as it does with fear.

Do you know what colonization is? Let me tell you....colonization is when a person (or entity/polity) decides that the thing it wants, by virture of that desire, belongs to him/her, it.

Your assumption that you can own and have a piece of my Two Spirit history just because you want to is no different from the colonial assumptions that drive manifest destiny.

Actions speak louder than words; the Two Spirit people have spoken and still you are deaf with a whiteman's deafness and insist on intruding where you are not wanted.

An Indigenous person, understanding the principle of stepping back, would accept this and would respect it by not insisting that they have a claim to a specific cultural and spiritual tradition just because they want it.

But then, you are not Indigenous and that makes all the difference in the world. It has nothing to do with race (a ridiculous European phallacy, this idea of "race"), but everything to do with ontological belief systems and soci-cultural cosmologies.

Ekosi,

nehi katawasisiw
pipikisis cree nation

Comments

[edward hagen]

Bo Young is an embarrassment to gay culture. He's a guy who rides other peoples coattails, using their work or accomplishments to try to make a name for himself. Like the Wizard of OZ, there's no one behind the curtain of his self-promoting spiritual pretensions.