|
Dear Nonprofit Colleagues,
As we confront our history and our current practices, we are constantly learning of the impact of racism on BIPOC communities. This history includes the impact of nonprofits that had misguided intentions and actually harmed the people they intended to help.
This past month we learned of unmarked graves of 751 First Nations people, primarily children, hidden on the grounds of Kamloops residential school in Saskatchewan. This discovery follows on recent news of at least 200 similar graves at a residential school in British Columbia. There were also as many as 500 native boarding schools in the US, most run by Christian church denominations. These were nonprofit organizations with a mission to "civilize" Indian children, but they caused extreme harm and abuse and intentionally undermined native families, culture, and languages. The National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition is also a nonprofit, one that is currently working to expose the true history of these residential schools.
Indigenous communities still face institutional neglect and disproportionate suffering. For example, native women are murdered in the US at 10 times the rate of white women, and many more are missing. The Urban Indian Health Institute in Seattle has documented both the extent of the problem and the shortcomings of Washington state's institutions in addressing the problem in the report MMIWG: We Demand More.
I hope we can continue to learn from our history and continue to engage in the issues of our day where the light of truth and activism to change our current practices is needed. While these issues are extreme, please also take the time to slow down and review how your work may have unintentional consequences for the people you serve (or those you fail to serve). How will your efforts be viewed in the history books?
In solidarity,
Laura Pierce
Executive Director
Washington Nonprofits
|
