Now That Their Public Forum Overwhelmingly Rejected The Mascot, What Lies Ahead For Skowhegan?

Penobscot Youth Council members drove through an ice storm to be present for the Skowhegan mascot public forum.
Photo credit: Jeff Kirlin

Continuing my report back on the January 8 public forum, I want to say that Albie Barden was a particularly memorable speaker. Pursuing a "show, don't tell" strategy, Barden stepped to the mic not to call for more education about Native culture in our area, but to actually provide some.

Albie Barden  Photo credit: Jeff Kirlin

Barden honored his ancestors by carrying his father's garden hoe, one he still uses. Then he honored the bounty of the Earth by bringing flint corn and a local bean variety, both grown thousands of years ago locally. He also brought some salmon, a traditional food from the Kennebec River before it was dammed. He offered the board and everyone in the audience enough seed corn to grow it themselves, and spoke of his vision of everyone doing that. He modeled gratitude and respect. But, and this is important: he never claimed to be an Indian.

Penobscot member Skyler Lewie, 15, telling the board they cannot possibly know what it feels like to be in her shoes.
Photo: Jeff Kirlin

Overall, the strategic reach of the speakers for retirement was broad and deep. Some pointed out the moral imperative to respect others as we ourselves wish to be respected. Some pointed out the legal dangers of a publicly funded school system clinging to discriminatory practices. Some pointed out the economic dangers of doing things that are illegal.

Student Kayla Dickinson pointed out that racially motivated bullying at Skowhegan Area High School is a daily byproduct of a racist mascot being tolerated.

Dickinson reminded the board that students deserve a safe learning environment, and scolded the board for not providing that.

Several students pointed out how hard it is to play sports for teams perceived as racist throughout the state. 

Skowhegan Area Middle School student Carly McCabe told the board that running cross country as a "so-called Skowhegan Indian is embarrassing" and that she is further embarrassed because the board has done nothing about the mascot problem.
Photo credit: Jeff Kirlin

Some provided history lessons on the Norridgewock massacre in the 1700s, and some provided information on the effects of the mass removal of Native children from their families in the 1970s. Some provided citations for studies demonstrating the harm of Native mascots on young people's confidence and educational outcomes. Some listed the many, many education and psychology organizations on record opposing Native mascots.


(If this embedded video of the entire public forum does not work for you, you can view it here on YouTube.)

Interestingly, nobody spoke to an ongoing informal boycott both of business displaying Skowhegan Indian Pride signage, and of the town itself. Based on social media postings I've seen, there are numerous people who vote with their pocketbooks and decline to shop or dine there these days. Sadly, Skowhegan's identity as a sinkhole of racism is pretty well established by now and it will take years to undo it.

My grandpa is a lifelong skowhegan resident, can confirm the racist bit.

— your mom (@w33niehutjunior) January 10, 2019

But, there are some glimmers of hope on the horizon.

Still from DAWNLAND.
Click here to download a free PDF of the DAWNLAND Viewer’s Guide.

A local arts council is working out a plan to screen the documentary DAWNLAND so people in Skowhegan can learn more about how the state of Maine treated Native families when I was in college.

You can also see DAWNLAND today, January 12, at 11am on Maine Public Broadcasting's Independent Lens.

Also, Showing Up For Racial Justice (SURJ) central Maine chapter is looking into organizing a door knocking campaign similar to one I participated in last year in Augusta (you can read about that here).

There are lots of other ideas floating around, too. The time is right to move in a positive direction.

Ripping Children From Their Parents Is, Unfortunately, Nothing New #DawnlandMovie

Jessica Stewart was handcuffed at the U.S. Customs and Border Protection Office in South Portland, Maine where she was non-violently protesting separation of children from their families seeking asylum at the U.S. border with Mexico.

People are aghast and distraught at reports and photos flowing out of the thousands of detentions of children trying to cross into freedom.

Thousands across the U.S. staged a National Day of Action to protest caging children after ripping them from their parents, sometimes literally from their mother's breast.

Not surprisingly, we find that wealthy corporations like General Dynamics are profiting from the warehousing of human children. My sister supplied contact info to let them know how you feel about their cost of doing business:

Twitter: @GDMS
General Dynamics “Ethics helpline”: 800-433-8442

This is the current events context for my viewing the just released documentary Dawnland in Bangor, Maine on June 14. It demonstrated that while I was living a comfortable existence as a college student in Maine during the 1970's, Native children were being torn from their families by the state. Many were placed in abusive foster homes. All were denied access to their culture, their language and in most cases, their grandparents.

The Maine-Wabanaki Child Welfare Truth and Reconciliation Commission spent two years collecting the horror stories of victims of a practice they decided was accurately described as cultural genocide.

Many interviews had to be suspended because the victims were crying too hard to speak as they revisited traumatic events that had occurred decades ago. (The same is said of women being interviewed after having their children taken from them at the border.)

Denise Altvater's on-camera interview was halted when she was overcome by emotions as she described life with her siblings in foster care. "I never cried. I never cried. We spent four years there and every day was torture."

Georgianna, a Passamoquoddy elder, testified: "I can't get over the nightmares. You can't heal someone who's gone through hell."

Two of the commissioners and several of the Maine-Wabanaki TRC conveners were present for discussion following the Dawnland screening. One viewer asked, We see the truth, but where is the reconciliation?

Commissioner Sandy White Hawk, who is Sicangu Lakota by adoption, was not in Bangor but is seen on camera noting that the healing process might be underway because, "You told your story among your relatives and they heard you." A poem she wrote says, "Once you were children. Then you were victims. Then you were survivors. Now you are warriors."

Commissioner gskisedtanmoogk (key-said-TAH-NAH-mook) is Wampanoag from the community of Mashpee located on Cape Cod, and a family member of Nkeketonseonqikom, the Longhouse of the Otter. 

gskisedtanmoogk said of reconciliation, "That's the long road."

Photo: Gregory Rec, Portland Press Herald

May I live to see the 1,900+ children ripped from their families at the southern border put a foot on that road. A lot of decolonization work will have to happen before that becomes possible. Let's get busy.