Indigenous people aren’t stereotypes: Addressing some of the most common

People often wield the same racist remarks and stereotypes in response to Indigenous needs-based stories or at Indigenous people. Experts work at debunking some of them.

People often wield the same racist remarks and stereotypes in response to Indigenous needs-based stories or at Indigenous people.

When communities need support you’ll often hear, “Isn’t living tax-free enough?” “Jobs are available everywhere,” “I’m tired of ‘natives need this, natives need that,’” “I worked hard and bought my house without taxpayer handouts, so should everyone else,” or, “You seem to think working people are just your disposable cash cows.”

There are also classic misconceptions, like: Indigenous people don’t pay taxes and get free education, most Indigenous people live on reserve and in community, they’ve done this to themselves, etc.

As these racist remarks and stereotypes abound, there’s context and general knowledge that non-Indigenous people seem to be missing.

“Indigenous people did not do this to themselves; the government, the state and the churches (did),” said settler-historian and Douglas College professor Carling Beninger. “Canada was set up from the beginning to enforce assimilation and genocidal policies.”

Beninger outlined how settler colonialism and many government policies attempted to dispossess and assimilate Indigenous people.

“The state wanted Indigenous people to cease to exist and a way that they did that is they set up the residential school system,” she said.

“They wanted to assimilate Indigenous (people) by destroying Indigenous culture, traditions and language through cultural genocide.”