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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Lens - November 202111/23/2021 The Lens - November 2021 https://content.govdelivery.com/accounts/IAIOWA/bulletins/2fd0890 1/3 The Lens - November 2021 City of Iowa City sent this bulletin at 11/22/2021 01:54 PM CST Having trouble viewing this email? View it as a Web page. November 2021 | The Lens, a newsletter to expand conversations on equity, justice, and human rights. Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women November is National Native American Heritage Month. The theme for 2021 is “Gifts of our Ancestors: Celebrating Indigenous Knowledge and Cultures.” Yet Indigenous women do not feel celebrated in a society that allows them to vanish at alarming rates without investigation. While white women like Gabby Petito typically receive extensive news coverage when they go missing and are found murdered, Indigenous women experience the opposite. Between 2011 and 2020, Indigenous people made up 21 percent of the state’s homicide victims, while they are only 3 percent of its population. One Northern Arapaho woman, Nicole Wagon, lost two of her daughters within two years: 30-year-old Jocelyn was shot in her home in 2019, and 23-year-old Jade was found dead in a field in 2020, weeks after her mother reported her missing. Jocelyn’s murder has not been solved. Authorities say Jade died from hypothermia, but her mother is certain she was murdered. There was very little public attention paid to either Jocelyn or Jade’s deaths. The advocacy group Native Hope explains there are reasons for this. First, 78 percent of Indigenous persons live off the tribal lands, with 60 percent of those living in urban areas. Those who live on the tribal lands benefit from a coordinated community response when they go missing. Indigenous persons living off the tribal lands do not have access to this level of support. Second, when an Indigenous woman goes missing off the tribal lands, stereotypes hinder the search. There is often little reporting, and when there is publicity, it tends to focus on any negative facts about the victim, placing blame on her. Stunningly, the murder rate for Indigenous women in some areas is ten times that of the national average. Murder is the third leading cause of death for Indigenous women, according to the Urban Indian Health Institute. Deb Haaland, member of the Pueblo of Laguna and the first Native American to serve as a Cabinet Secretary, provides hope to Indigenous communities. As Secretary of the Interior, she created the Missing & Murdered Unit within the Bureau of Indian Affairs office of justice just two weeks after being sworn in in early 2021. The unit now has seven offices nationwide. (Image source: Urban Indian Health Institute) The History of Thanksgiving Just as we are increasingly acknowledging the need to recognize Indigenous Peoples’ Day in place of Columbus Day, the history of Thanksgiving needs to be examined. For Indigenous people of the United States, Thanksgiving can be a painful reminder of all they have suffered and lost under colonization. Smithsonian Magazine reported Professor David Silverman’s 2019 book, This Land is Their Land: The Wampanoag Indians, Plymouth Colony, and the Troubled History of Thanksgiving is a comprehensive corrective to the false narrative taught for so many years in our schools. Another resource is Rethinking Columbus: The next 500 Years, Resources for Teaching about the Impact of the Arrival of Columbus in the Americas authored by Bill Bigelow. There are also other ways to learn about the history of Indigenous Peoples. Subscribe to updates from City of Iowa City Email Address e.g. name@exam Subscribe Share Bulletin 11/23/2021 The Lens - November 2021 https://content.govdelivery.com/accounts/IAIOWA/bulletins/2fd0890 2/3 Many independent films explore issues often ignored by mainstream press. A few of them are highlighted below. Find more, as well as expanded descriptions of those below, here. When this country was being colonized by Europeans, the US Army held forced marches to remove Indigenous Peoples from their homes. Choctaws, Creeks, Cherokees, and many others were forced to walk hundreds of miles, suffering disease, deprivation, and death on the way. The Long Walk: Tears of the Navajo is the brutal story of one such removal. Order it here or watch parts on YouTube. In its misguided quest to “civilize” Indigenous Peoples, the US Government forcibly removed children from their homes and compelled them to attend boarding schools where they were made to adopt European culture and abandon their own. Staff at these schools were often physically and sexually abusive and remains of children who died at them have recently been discovered. Unspoken: America’s Native American Boarding Schools documents this painful story in two parts and can be found here. Indigenous women go missing and are murdered at a rate far higher than others, their cases often receive little media attention, and remain unsolved. Our Sisters in Spirit focuses on this crisis and is available on YouTube here. During the 1950s and ‘60s, the US Government’s nuclear program needed testing sites. Project Chariot is the story of an Alaska Native community fighting to stop the government from detonating nuclear bombs near their town. Even as they believe they have won, they discover they have already been betrayed. It is free on Vimeo here. Corporate Transition For those who wonder if we’ve moved beyond blatant sexism, Natalie Egan has the answer: we haven’t. Egan offers a unique perspective on the problem. As an entrepreneur, she has founded, raised venture capital for, and headed successful companies, both as a man and a woman. Born male, Egan transitioned to female in 2015. As a man, she says, she was treated completely differently, often by the same people. For example, she went to buy a new car from a dealership she had bought from several times as a man. She was expecting the same treatment she had received while male, but the salesman over-explained as if she could not understand what he was talking about, did not shake her hand, did not up-sell as he had before, and treated her with disrespect. It was the same when she tried to raise capital. Having secured $7 million to launch her first business, Egan anticipated the same level of commitment to her new venture. People who had backed her first company now “didn’t take me seriously at all,” she says. Of about 20 investors she contacted, many because they had invested in her first company, only two agreed to invest after her transition. Egan quickly became aware of “the incredible challenges that any marginalized person faces in an industry that’s dominated by white men, investing in white men.” If this was the treatment she was receiving as a white, Ivy-league educated, experienced entrepreneur with years of networked relationships to draw upon, she wondered what women without those advantages must face. Joseph Schneier experienced the other side of the same coin; he transitioned from female to male in 2016. A health-care and education tech entrepreneur, he had delivered a talk regarding why patients behave in counter-productive ways, like skipping pills, dozens of times. Speaking as a woman, he had received “polite but noncommittal” responses. As a man, he gave the exact same talk to a group of investors and “they gave me a standing ovation.” Egan now heads Translator, a Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion company that uses technology to drive its findings and guide its individually-tailored results for clients. She secured initial funding from friends, “angel investors” in the LGBTQ+ community, and the two people who had invested in her first company. Read more about Egan and her story here. Transgender Day of Remembrance Transgender Day of Remembrance, November 20, commemorates all transgender people lost to violence and helps raise visibility of the issues transgender people face daily. One way to participate is to watch a film celebrating transgender persons’ lives and experiences. Here are some recommended films and TV shows featuring transgender characters: The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert This 1994 Australian movie is a cult classic with a 96% “certified fresh” rating on Rotten Tomatoes. A road-trip comedy, the story is also tender and thoughtful. The plot follows two drag queens and a transgender woman who travel across the Outback from Sydney to remote Alice Springs in a tour bus they’ve named “Priscilla” to perform at a resort. A worldwide hit, the film received an Academy Award for Best Costume Design and is renowned for its positive portrayal of LGBTQ+ people and for helping introduce LGBTQ+ 11/23/2021 The Lens - November 2021 https://content.govdelivery.com/accounts/IAIOWA/bulletins/2fd0890 3/3 themes to mainstream audiences in a time when LGBTQ+ characters were scarce. Paris is Burning Released in 1990, this film inspires strong emotion: critic bell hooks famously panned it as turning the Black drag ball scene into a “spectacle of entertainment” for voyeurs. However, the film was one of the first to feature transgender characters on the big screen and introduced mainstream viewers to the Manhattan Black and Latinx drag bell subculture of the 1970’s that continues today. A remake was released in 2019. Tokyo Godfathers This animated Japanese film from 2003 follows Hana, a homeless bar performer, and two also- homeless friends who shelter an abandoned baby on Christmas Eve. It treats Hana’s trans identity as just one facet of her existence, while also acknowledging common issues—other characters often dismiss or misgender her. The story portrays its cast of “drunks, runaways, criminals and assorted layabouts” compassionately. Tangerine Shot entirely on an iPhone 5, Tangerine portrays the friendship of two Black, transgender sex workers in Hollywood. Released from jail on Christmas Eve, Sin-dee hears her boyfriend and pimp has been unfaithful. She and her friend Alexandra set off on a journey to find the other woman and confront the cheating boyfriend. Happy Birthday, Marsha! Although only 13 minutes long, this short 2018 film paints a portrait of Marsha P. Johnson, the Black transgender activist who was first to fight back against police at the Stonewall Inn, and offers “an exquisite historical corrective” of the narrative surrounding Stonewall. The film features Mya Taylor, who also starred in Tangerine. Pose Airing for three seasons before concluding in June 2021, this TV show depicts the New York City Black and Latino drag ball culture of the late 1980s and 1990s. Characters both compete with and support each other while dealing with issues of the time such as AIDS. Billy Porter became the first openly gay Black man to win an Emmy in a lead acting category for his role in the show as Pray Tell, a fashion designer, ball emcee, and mentor to community members. Porter won the award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series in 2019 and the show was nominated for Outstanding Drama Series the same year. Stay Connected to Equity and Human Rights News Follow us on Instagram @ichumanrights Subscribe to the Office of Equity and Human Rights at icgov.org/subscribe. Thanks, and welcome! Questions? Contact Us STAY CONNECTED: SUBSCRIBER SERVICES: Manage Preferences | Unsubscribe | Help Powered by Privacy Policy | Cookie Statement | Help