An Afro-Indigenous History of the United States

first thought was, “Why do white-looking Natives always send me some
shit when it comes to Black folks?! Damn! Can a nigga live?” My second
thought was, “Here comes both the antiblackness and anti-Indianness.” And
sure enough, we saw both.
A self-identified Indigenous woman on Twitter wrote, “If you aren’t
Native, keep your hands off our culture! We rock our regalia beautifully
every single day.” In a six-point thread, she explained:
1. Miss Chocolate Pocahontas is sexualizing Native women in that trash
regalia.
2. Our sexual assault rates are some of the highest, a lot is caused by our
Native women being sexualized.
3. She is using the name Pocahontas with ignorance, not thinking of her
ACTUAL (not Disney) history.
4. Yes she is a beautiful Black woman. No she is not the Black
Pocahontas.
5. No it is not anti Black to call out cultural appropriation against Native
people when done by Black folks.
6. Any of you, including Black folks and poc can be problematic and
anti native and I’ll call you out just like I would a white person.” 12
Of course, Black women did not sit idly by. One person wrote, “You do
NOT get to decide what is anti black or not. If you don’t like BW (Black
women), just say it. No need to bash this girl for wearing a Disney outfit.”
Another Black woman wrote, “Black folks need not to be simple minded.
This is offensive & I thought it before I even opened it. Yall gotta respect
other ppl culture too.” Another person wrote, “Thank you for breaking this
down and educating that culture appropriating doesn’t just happen in the
Black community. (I’m also black).”
There are several things happening in these responses. People are upset
about antiblackness and Indigenous erasure. Indigenous people are upset
that a Black person played Indian. Black people were mad that a Black
woman got called out for playing Indian; however, others understood the
issue. Indigenous women had the right to be angry. After all, Black lesbian
feminist Audre Lorde has made a convincing case for the usefulness of
anger when calling out racial insensitivity. 13