Quite the difference.
* * *
My mother has called the cops on my dad for abuse. My father has called the cops on my mom for abuse. They’ve both been jailed for domestic violence at different times. It didn’t help them, or our family.
Has being in jail helped anyone you know? If so, how?
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Do you think the threat of imprisonment keeps people from being honest about ways they’ve abused others?
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Would you admit to abusing someone if admitting it meant you’d be imprisoned?
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Let’s move out a bit. Let’s think about how nation-states such as Canada are formed. For a nation-state to exist, for capitalistic wealth to exist, you need land. The settlers who landed here knew this. When they spoke of this land’s beauty in their journals and letters, they weren’t respecting the land as a beautiful, autonomous entity, or admiring the interconnected relationships between it and the animals, plants, waters and people it nourished. They certainly weren’t interested in taking up their responsibilities to this land, ensuring it remained pristine for their descendants seven generations into the future.
They were concerned with capitalistic ownership. They wanted to suck up everything they could possibly take, regardless of future consequences, and turn it into material wealth—ostensibly for their countries, but realistically for a select few who would benefit much, much more than the average citizen.
This is what I’ll call extraction mentality. Leanne Betasamosake Simpson writes that “extraction is a cornerstone of capitalism, colonialism, and settler colonialism. It’s stealing. It’s taking something, whether it’s a process, an object, a gift, or a person, out of the relationships that give it meaning, and placing it in a non-relational context for the purposes of accumulation.”
Under capitalism, colonialism and settler colonialism, everything Indigenous is subject to extraction. Words from our languages are extracted and turned into the names of cities, states, provinces or, in the case of Canada, an entire country. Resources from our traditional territories are extracted and turned into profit for non-Indigenous companies and strategic political donations. Our own children are extracted so that non-Indigenous families can have the families they’ve always wanted, so our families will fall to ruin and our grief will distract us from resisting colonialism.
Then, after all of this extraction, the nation-state has the audacity to tell us we should be glad, that the theft was for our own good. Or, more recently, politicians will admit that awful things were done, but that they happened in the past and should be forgiven, despite modern-day equivalents still taking place all around us.
* * *
When you Google the word “abuse,” you get “to use (something) to bad effect or for a bad purpose” or “to treat (a person or animal) with cruelty or violence, especially regularly or repeatedly.”
Merriam-Webster defines abuse as “the improper usage or treatment of an entity, often to unfairly or improperly gain benefit.”
Mentalhelp.net defines abuse as “when people mistreat or misuse other people, showing no concern for their integrity or innate worth as individuals, and in a manner that degrades their well-being. Abusers frequently are interested in controlling their victims. They…manipulate their victims into submission or compliance with their will.”
How do you define abuse?
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I can’t see your definition of abuse, but if it’s anything like the other three, it’s probably safe to argue that nation-states both abuse and gaslight Indigenous people. But because of how ingrained extraction mentality is, the nation-state abuses and gaslights its non-Indigenous citizens, too. Consider this condensed history:
Women were considered men’s property for hundreds of years.
Nearly all of the wealth of so-called first-world countries is a direct result of trafficking Black people in the transatlantic slave trade. Slave ownership was widespread in Canada for over two hundred years, and Black people were not legally considered “people” until 1834.
Japanese Canadians were forcibly interned during World War Two at their own expense, and their property and finances were seized and sold well below market value to pay for it. Unlike in the U.S., Canadian officials did not offer Japanese Canadians food or clothing during their internment. They had to buy everything themselves. There was no apology or financial redress from the federal government until 1988.
After thousands of Chinese men built Canada’s railroads, the Chinese head tax was imposed to keep the families of these men out of Canada.
Labour laws to protect the working class—including rules on minimum wage, paid and unpaid breaks, and vacation time—exist only because unions organized and demanded them.
There wasn’t a United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Disabled Persons until 1975.
Gay marriage wasn’t legalized in Canada until 2005.
Trans people weren’t legally protected from hate crimes in Canada until 2017.
Even when Canada didn’t see these people as people, it still used them, extracting their labour and turning it into profit, then using their desire to be accepted by the Canadian state to coerce them into settling Indigenous lands and erasing Indigenous presence. And all the while Canada has told them that there’s nothing wrong with the way they’ve been treated, or the way they’ve been encouraged to treat others; that if they’ve felt dehumanized, they’re imagining it.
How often have you felt dehumanized this month?
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This week?
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Today?
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Here are another few questions I don’t expect you to answer: If the nation we live in is abusive, if it gaslights us, and if its profit margins and legitimacy as a nation depend on abusing and gaslighting us, how can that nation ever really stop abuse and gaslighting? Why would it want to?
In that way, Canada reminds me of one of those estranged parents that hangs out on message boards. It hurts people it claims to value, hurts people it doesn’t, then when those people finally decide they want nothing to do with it anymore, it asks what it did wrong, hapless, helpless.
Just like those estranged parents, Canada knows very well what it did. What it continues to do.
* * *
My dad still sends me links to writing contests and articles he thinks I’ll find interesting. He still tries to schmooze with people on my behalf, hoping to pry open the door to success just enough for me to slide through. He still jokes with me and lets me make jokes at his expense. His laugh still is the one sure way to make me laugh.
And he still does things that make me furious, that make me wonder if he can ever apologize for the past the way I need him to, or make things right the way I think he needs to make things right. He still does things that reaffirm my belief that he will almost always put his own interests first. He still does things that make me question why I continue to talk to him.
But a few years ago he started hugging me. He started saying he loved me before leaving or hanging up the phone. Neither of these were things he’d done often when I was growing up. I didn’t realize how much I needed those hugs, those words, before I had them. And now that I do, I don’t know if I want to let them go. I don’t know if I can.
I want to hold my father accountable for the pain he’s caused while still loving him for the joy he’s created. I want to acknowledge him as a victim, honouring him for what he’s had to survive, without enabling him or criminalizing him as an abuser. I want the nations and communities we live in to stop holding individuals to different standards than they hold themselves to—to dismantle abuse and gaslighting at all levels, micro and macro.
I want you to feel safe being vulnerable.
What do you want?
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Are those desires based on extraction?
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Are they dependent upon capitalism or colonialism?
* * *
If the answers to those last two questions are yes, please revisit the first question.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Success is never achieved in isolation. There are so many people in my life I’m grateful for who have helped me achieve this dream.
Nya:wen to Kiara Kent for your generous, insightful editing of this book. You pushed me when I needed pushing, asked the perfect questions when they needed asking, and always did so with the utmost respect and clarity. These essays are all better because of you.
Nya:wen to Amy Black, Melanie Tutino, Shaun Oakey and the entire Doubleday Canada team for your enthusiasm and belief in this book.
Nya:wen to Monique Aura for creating the breathtaking art that graces the cover of this book.
Nya:wen to my agents, Samantha Haywood and Stephanie Sinclair, for your unwavering support. You are all I could hope for.
Nya:wen to all of the editors I’ve worked with on the previously published essays in this collection. Your attention and talent made each piece worth republishing.
Nya:wen to some of my earliest teachers, Shyam Selvadurai and Michael Helm, for sharing your wisdom and getting me to read the best writing.
Nya:wen to my Creative Writing cohort at York University for being generous with their praise and constructive criticism.
Nya:wen to Roxane Gay, who probably doesn’t remember publishing an early version of “Half-Breed” on The Butter, but whose acceptance came when I needed it most.
Nya:wen to Leanne Betasamosake Simpson, whose writing has shaped me and whose support has nourished me. If she hadn’t asked me to submit to The Malahat Review issue she was editing, then reminded me to submit again close to the deadline, I would never have written the title essay in this collection, and she wouldn’t have suggested the perfect title.
Nya:wen to Waubgeshig Rice and Cherie Dimaline, who both believed in me the moment I met them in Banff. They offered me mentorship and guidance, suggested places to submit my work and made the confusing world of grant-writing much more understandable.
Nya:wen to Jack Illingworth and the wonderful people at the OAC. The grants I’ve received from your incredible organization have helped me create a writing life for myself.
Nya:wen to both my Banff crews for showing me the power of BIPOC community. Every one of you has talent that continues to excite, inspire and astonish me.
Nya:wen to Tanya Talaga for your incredible writing, brilliance, generosity and care. I’ll never get over you choosing me for the RBC Taylor Emerging Writer Prize. I hope I can live up to your faith in me.
Nya:wen to every Indigenous writer who came before me and all who will come after me. You have made and will continue to make Indigenous lit matter.
Nya:wen to Native Twitter for creating a space where I could find my voice and feel the warmth of community, especially when I couldn’t be at Six Nations.
Nya:wen to the people of Six Nations of the Grand River territory for being strong, brilliant badasses. You’ve all taught me how to resist and how to reclaim.
Nya:wen to all the friends who have encouraged me and offered me the gift of their friendship throughout the writing of this book. Special thanks to Brandi Dunn, Gwen Benaway and Chelsea Rooney, who are some of the best friends I’ve ever had and who I love dearly.
Nya:wen to my beautiful family. Dad, Mom, Missy, Jon, Mikey, Dakota, Melita, Teena, Linnie, Gracie, all of my aunties, uncles and cousins. You all taught me how to laugh loud and love deep. Words can’t express how much I appreciate each of you. I wouldn’t have made it without you.
Nya:wen to Miles, who has taught me so much already even though you’re only 12. Being your mother is the best thing I’ve ever done. I love you.
Nya:wen to Mike, my husband, editor, writing partner and best friend. You have made me a better person and writer in every way imaginable. I’ll never be able to repay you for your brilliance, patience, humour, care, love and friendship, but I’ll spend every day of my life trying.
Finally, nya:wen to you, reader, for offering me the gift of your time and attention. I hope my little book earned it.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
ALICIA ELLIOTT is a Tuscarora writer living in Brantford, Ontario, with her husband and child. Her writing has been published by The Malahat Review, The Toast, Room, Grain, The New Quarterly, CBC Books, The Globe and Mail, Vice, Maclean’s, Maisonneuve, Today’s Parent and Reader’s Digest. She is currently creative nonfiction editor at The Fiddlehead. Her essay “A Mind Spread Out on the Ground” won a 2017 National Magazine Award. She was the 2017–18 Geoffrey and Margaret Andrew Fellow at UBC, and was chosen by Tanya Talaga to receive the RBC Taylor Emerging Writer Prize in 2018. Her fiction has appeared in Best American Short Stories 2018, The Journey Prize Stories 30 and Best Canadian Stories 2018.
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