Thoughts on "Indigenous Peoples Day"

 Words matter; sometimes our labels are just wrong. When that happens, it needs to be called out.

I admire and respect the "first peoples" here, but they are neither "native" nor "indigenous." So, "Native American" is a misnomer, and so is "Indigenous People."

True, they immigrated to here (from Asia) long before Europeans did, but they came to North America from somewhere else, just as Europeans, Africans, etc. did. For millions of years, North America was a wonderland of animals and plants, except there were no humans. No native humans here. The first humans came here about 30,000 years ago, which is half an eyeblink in terms of our continent's history.

So, "First People's Day?" I'm all in! The peoples who walked the Bering land bridge, who became Cherokee and Seminole and Apache and Sioux, who lived in harmony with nature, and whom we slaughtered and stole rights from, whom we continue to mistreat even today, have a rich and proud history and we have much to learn from them.

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