I Am Pretty Sure Those are the Same Cops I Saw Dragging a Disabled Woman Across the Pavement By Her Dislocated Arm A Few Years Ago

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Written by shanmonster

A First Nations Longette Lite by Shantell Powell (Inuk/Mi’kmaw, Canada)

CW: genocide, sexual abuse, police brutality


Armed cops are basking in orange glory on Truth and Reconciliation Day. Squad
cars are looking demure in their festive “Every Child Matters” vinyl wraps, and officers
are smiling while I’m whispering “what the fuck” to myself over and over again.
But isn’t this a day of mourning? Sure don’t look it from the expressions on anyone’s face.

The police were the people who kidnapped our parents and grandparents when they were little children.

I stay home, not because I want to, but because cops make my arsehole pucker.
The first people thanked aren’t survivors, the children of survivors, or even the organizers.
The first people thanked are the police for “keeping us safe.” You have got to be shitting me.

The cops opened fire on peaceful, unarmed elders sitting around a campfire at Six Nations.

Today’s a day of remembrance for all those kids in re-education camps disguised as schools.
At least, it’s supposed to be. For the Waterloo Regional Police Department, it’s photo op day.

Social media shows cops solemnly raising the “Every Child Matters” flag alongside the Canadian one.
When survivors and the children of survivors ask the organizers what they are thinking,
when we ask why there is a heavy police presence and why the police are thanked first,

we are talked down to. Told we have a whole lot of healing to do.
How can we heal when you won’t stop tearing open our wounds?

It’s easy to buy orange-shirt solidarity online from companies that have never heard of Turtle Island.1

An RCMP2 officer got my aunt pregnant when she was only fourteen years old, then
called off the engagement and went back home to his actual wife. Pardon me if I’m not thrilled
at these fuckers’ presence on a day that is deteriorating into something you can buy a Hallmark card for.
Bet not a single one of those cops read a word from the Truth and Reconciliation Committee’s report.

  1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turtle_Island ↩︎
  2. Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) | Britannica
    Cover image from Pexels Free Photos. ↩︎

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17 Comments

  8. Shanmonster, you have one of those voices that is listenable. There’s intonation and yet it’s spoken so naturally. The content is so rich too.

    I know about Turtle Island from my American poet who is partly of First Nations heritage. In fact, we’ve had a number of private email conversations on cultural parallels, legends, names between American Indian and, ironically, Asian Indian.

    I use a self-created symbol in my poetry book which coincidentally resembles an identifiable First Nations symbol. I was not consciously aware of it before.

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