Activism is for those who CARRY the label, not those outside of the community

Hey internet, man this has been one hell of a year for public opinion. This is the year I have taken a look at myself as an Indigenous person. (To those of you who are quick to call out my skin color, my body does not produce much melanin. I have albinism.) Not only the label Indigenous, but also the fact that I continually need to mention my genetic condition to set people straight about my ethnicity, has become increasingly annoying. If you’re subscribed to my channel http://www.youtube.com/jddalton you may have seen my latest upload This has been the most traffic my channel has received in one week since half a year ago. Why all the views? Because I wanted my voice heard in response to another YouTuber’s video where they spoke about Indigenous cultural appropriation. This YouTuber however, is not Indigenous.

Instead of making this post super long and explaining what happened, I will leave a link at the bottom of this post for you to watch the video for yourself. The point of this blog post is to discuss further why I called out this person for how she approached this subject with her audience. First of all, I understand that my voice alone does NOT represent the Indigenous community as a whole. We are all individual thinkers and our own experiences with our ethnic culture are going to be different just like our opinions about this other creator’s video. Second, I would like to address some comments I made about this creator in my response video. I mentioned that it appeared to me that she is only on the platform for the business part of it, along with mentioning her subscriber count, and the fact that no other YouTubers seemed to be featured on her channel tabs. I had mentioned this because as a person wanting to spread awareness, her own channel page did not appear to be set in a way that emphasized “networking with others.” I mentioned subscriber count because I felt it was important to at least give my viewer an idea of how many people could have watched her video I was discussing.

Back to my point (see title). You have every right to call yourself an ally to any community that is a minority. We will always welcome those who wish to spread awareness and participate in being educated about socioeconomic issues that minority communities face. But let’s get one thing clear, EVERY community has a voice. And as an ALLY, you recognize that you are not included in that community and the experiences that people OF said community face.

You want to help educate? Feel free to do so, but when using a platform it is basic respect to turn the attention to a voice FROM the community you wish to have represented. If you do not carry a certain label, show respect for those who do carry the label, by referring other viewers to their channel, or extend the courtesy of inviting a person on your channel to collaborate with. Regardless of intentions, know that taking the mic on issues that personally do not affect you, is not only disrespectful, it’s disparaging to that particular community.

Indigenous voices are present on the YouTube platform, but yet our number of subscribers does not even compare to that of other creators from other ethnic backgrounds. Why? Many topics related to the Indigenous community are still discussed today. (Dakota Access Pipeline, 45 mocking us by using Pocahontas’s name at an event honoring Native Veterans) These are issues that WE are able to speak to ourselves. Instead of having outsiders comment on our OWN history and experiences of cultural appropriation, we need to call them out by telling them that their voices are not what we need. We need you to support the voices of the community. Who better to speak about the issues we face than those who LIVE the experience and those who are AFFECTED by these forms of oppression???

Apparently, this other creator was asked to make her video from a viewer who identifies as Indigenous. Her viewers are using this fact as an excuse for her covering the topic in the way she did. Another Native also commented on my video saying that she is excused because she used humor in her video to send the message. Had she been a Native creator, those of us calling her out would more than likely have no issue with the video. Does her ethnicity matter?? In this matter I say YES it does. There have been several other Native YouTubers who have done this concept on their own channels. These videos have been up for a while now, before she uploaded her own version. I will conclude that she did not know of these videos existing before she published her own version. But I still say that she COULD have thought about collaborating with a Native creator. This would have been seen as respectful and would have shown that she truly values the voices of Indigenous people.

My response video can be seen by clicking here.

Childhood on the Reservation

Ever since I was little I was always an active participant in village ceremonies. I took part in traditional dances, I always helped with community gatherings like traditional weddings and other important ceremonies. This happened throughout all my childhood until I was fifteen.

What changed? I had moved away from my home community with education being the reason for leaving. My mother had decided to return to college as a full-time student and complete her degree at the University of Arizona. My sister had also decided to start medical administrative training to enter a profession. And it just so happened that here in Tucson was also the state school for the deaf and blind.

My mom had thought it would be better for me to go to a school where I could receive the best accommodations for my low vision. Not only that, I would also be introduced to learning how to access an urban city on my own with proper mobility training.

Honestly, I hated the idea of moving away from my home. I knew that it was a place that was unlike anywhere else in the world. I valued my cultural upbringing and understood the importance of me being there to actively participate in our traditional events. It was literally the only world I knew.

I understood that being away from home meant that I would change. I would lose my ability to speak Hopi and understand it. I would no longer be a “traditional Hopi” but one who would be seen as “pahana” because I would now live in a city nowhere near close to home.

When I first started living in Tucson, I hated having to explain my culture to everyone I would talk to about certain ceremonies. When I would refer to family members, it was difficult to have others understand how our clan system of relations worked. For example, traditionally I have no cousins. My cousins are either my brothers, sisters, aunts or fathers.

Today I am thankful to my mother for making the move in the first place. Before I was aware of the blind community, I hated the fact that I needed certain accommodations when I was in school. I knew that I already had stood out because of my skin and hair color. Having low vision on top of that made me feel more isolated within the community.

The style of Hopi learning is to listen and observe. But due to my eyesight, I was often lost when it came time for visual observation of certain ceremonies being performed. Of course I could see the people, but I would have little clue as to what it was they were doing from a distance. Asking too many questions is also impolite so often times my knowledge of what to do was sometimes spotty. But this situation also helped me to develop a sense of good memory for reference. 

(To be continued.)

Native American YouTubers

I started my channel to share my story of living with albinism as an Indigenous person with a visual impairment. Not too long after I began uploading to my channel I decided that I was ready to come out to my family as part of the LGBT community. Talking about my genetic condition, my disability, and my sexual orientation has always been easy on my channel. Although I do not know of many creators with albinism, I do know that there are a few successul blind content creators who have channels of their own, and of course a huge amount of LGBT vloggers on YouTube. But why is it that my identity of being Hopi, is not as popular of being discussed in my videos?

Honestly, the answer is that it is my choice. I know what will get a bigger response from a majority of my audience, and a majority of my audience is not Native American. This is not to say that I am ashamed of my heritage and culture. I have been very fortunate to have grown up in my village and to have participated in just about every village ceremony throughout my childhood. I have family members who have been Urban Indians their whole lives and although they are Native, they know very little about their own culture. Since 2008 I have lived in the city of Tucson, Arizona which is over 300 miles away from my homeland.

My most popular video on my channel is one in which I share footage of a ceremonial social dance from my village and explain the virtues of being Hopi. It is making its way to reaching 10,000 views! But as far as my Native topic videos on my channel, that is the only one that has a significant amount of views. All my other popular videos are the ones in which I discuss my visual impairment and albinism. So as passionate as I am in wanting to bring more light about my Indigenous background and experiences, I know that the engagement will be minimal compared to other content that is featured on my channel.

Where are my fellow Indigenous YouTubers??? There are several I have subscribed to and they have also subscribed to me. But I am really surprised that there is not a larger list of Native creators out there who upload on a regular basis! Why don’t I talk much about Indigenous topics? Because there is a very low chance that such video topics will lead to an open dialogue with other people either in the comments, or via video responses. We already know that there is a low number of Native YouTubers, but that number gets even lower when you consider a creator’s consistency of uploading videos to their channel. There are numerous channels you can give me, but not many of them upload on a regular basis to connect as strongly with their viewers and, as a result, have a lower amount of subscribers. There are creators that I would love to see more of, but have not uploaded any new content in months!

There are many reasons that factor into a Native American’s channel and it’s potential to “succeed” in terms of views and subscribers. Most reservations have poor internet access and little resources for gathering equipment for high quality recording.  The majority of the Native community is not as outspoken and are very cautious as to how they appear to others in how they act and talk. Like most small communities, being different is more than often made fun of. There is also the aspect that technology and social media is making a negative impact on Native youth as it pulls their attention away from traditional lifestyles of the tribe. Urban Natives more than likely know very little about their tribal culture so their Indigenous identity is hard to be vocal about other than just “looking” like a Native.

These are just some of the issues we face as being Indigenous people in the modern world. I honestly sometimes think that most Native people tend to overlook me and my channel purely due to the fact of my skin color. I have received numerous comments from ignorant people claiming that I am “posing” as a Native American but really am not because I have blonde hair. I don’t look like a Native, so I obviously can’t be one of them.

I want to collaborate with other Indigenous content creators, but in all honesty it is hard on my end to get a response from the numbers that I want to reach. If we as Native people want to see a change in representation online and on YouTube, then we must come together to discuss the topics that affect us as a community. If young Native children are complaining about not seeing a role model from their ethic background then it is up to us to be that person for them to look up to. We need to inspire Indigenous creators to pursue their dreams and network with others to learn and grow.

Where are my fellow Native YouTubers???

A video I made a while back discussing this.