Little Superstar

Hey Hadji, I think Little Superstar is spying on you. He stole your moves!

Barack is not black, I am not Indian, the BIA always knows what's right for us NDNs

.... and other urban legends that otherwise intelligent people believe to be true. Yes, it sounds crazy, but this would be the title to my new book if I were an author.

The other day I saw video clip where Debra Dickerson claims that presidential candidate Barack Obama is not black. Although he claims his black ancestry, according to Debra, he cannot be black because he is not the descendant of American Black slaves. His father is from Kenya.

Now I know it wasn't meant to be funny, but somehow I found it amusing that someone would openly and publicly make such a ridiculous statement. I think I might have still been ROFL when I read this statement posted today on an online forum about ME in regards to my 4/4 degree Indian blood:

Well enrollment made the mistake and we have to live with it, your dad was Canadian and although he may have been a full blooded Canadian Indian our tribe should not have counted his blood, how that got past the BIA is why we have enrolled members that don't have a drop of Indian blood.

Now this is even more amusing than the Obama is not black argument. My dad was indeed a full-blooded Indian. He grew up on his reserve speaking the language, and only learned English as a second language after a brutal boarding school experience. How much more native can you get?

But of course, the BIA is always right, right? I can only imagine the conversation that would take place today if my dad were still alive .... "Uh, excuse me... I'm sorry, but you don't meet the definition of being Indian in accordance with BIA rules. You don't have any legal right to be Indian, and being Indian is not a choice in this United States so from now on you're going to be a white guy, and your kids.... well, they are all half white."

Anyways... I just think it's funny that we are each being challenged about our ethnicity, heritage, blood-quantum, or whatever by our own people.

So, let me see if I can get this straight.... Obama is not black because his dad is from Kenya. I'm not full-blooded Indian because my dad was from a Canadian Tribe, and the Freedmen are not Cherokee because they don't have the blood quantum to be eligible for Cherokee enrollment, BUT they are descendants of American Black slaves, so if they go along with Debra's definition they can be black, but they just can't be Cherokees, so it's all good. No harm, no foul, right?