'It's really important to celebrate': Bilijk to host first Pride event
CBC
For Jesse Sabattis, who identifies as gay and two-spirit, his home community of Bilijk, or Kingsclear First Nation, will hit an important milestone for 2SLGBTQ youth.
On Wednesday the community will host its first Pride celebrations. Among the activities planned are a barbecue, five different speakers will appear and members of the 2SLGBTQ community will discuss the programming they'd like to see in Bilijk.
"Having Pride events like this, it's really important to celebrate and to show that we are OK, we're good to be ourselves and to celebrate ourselves," said Sabattis, research and ethics co-ordinator with the Wabanaki Two Spirit Alliance.
Sabattis still remembers when Wolastoqey grandmother, Alma Brooks and grand council chief Ron Tremblay said two-spirit people always had a place in community and ceremony.
"I was a lost person growing up, being suppressed, hiding myself," Sabattis said.
"[When they said that,] it was like a lighthouse... [they] said, yeah, I see you, I know who you are, you're safe here to be yourself and that we'll make space for you."
It was a pivotal moment for the Wolastoqey man, who uses he/him pronouns.
Sabattis said he was afraid to come out because he saw homophobic graffiti and heard slurs and jokes growing up.
But since 2012 he said a more welcoming environment in Bilijk, 13 kilometres from Fredericton, has emerged.
He said by celebrating Pride with others from the community it will create a more freeing space.
"It's a beautiful thing to see those seeds being thrown out and then grown and nursed," said Sabbatis.
Grand Council chief Ron Tremblay, Spasaqsit Possesom, said he's happy to hear the community is celebrating Pride this year.
"I think it's a long time coming that our two-spirit people are recognized and they are part of our ceremonies, our walk able life, our society, because they were always there," said Tremblay.
Last week, he released a statement calling on the Wolastoqey Nation to address, among other topics, homophobia in the sweat lodge.
If it weren't for a stem cell transplant — less than half a cup of blood from a stranger's umbilical cord — four-year-old Tristan Ford would almost certainly have died as an infant, his parents say.
A Métis saddle from the early 1800s is at the centre of an exhibit that opened last month at a Swiss museum, along with contemporary beadwork created by other Red River Métis artists.
A dome-shaped device floating in Halifax's Northwest Arm could easily be confused with a buoy, but it is actually a contraption meant to turn ocean water into fresh water.
As of Tuesday, there are limits on the number of bottles of spirits a person can buy at the B.C. Liquor store in Tofino, a move that leaders of the Ahousaht First Nation were pushing for.
This story is part of CBC Health's Second Opinion, a weekly analysis of health and medical science news emailed to subscribers on Saturday mornings. If you haven't subscribed yet, you can do that by clicking here.
Mohawk code talkers and their missions were so vital during the Second World War, that some believe without them, there was no way of winning of the war.
Two feisty ferret babies in Virginia are being hailed as a symbol of hope for the future of their species.
On day one of Donald Trump's presidency, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. says he'll be advising Trump to take fluoride out of public water. The former independent presidential hopeful — and prominent proponent of debunked public health claims — has been told he'll be put in charge of health initiatives in the new Trump administration. He's described fluoride as "industrial waste."
An RCMP national security unit monitored First Nations-led anti-pipeline activism for "potential threats" to the energy, transportation and banking sectors between 2021 and 2022, internal police documents show.
WARNING: this story contains details of cultural items being forcibly removed
Rachelle and Kelly Swan live in a relatively cramped space now. But the upside to their rented low-income government house is that it's away from the haunting site their family occupied for two years, filled with screeches, high-pitched chirps and squeaks from constantly flapping bats.