All of the "isms" are systemic, IMO, so it isn't a case of "if" I'm sexist, classist, racist, but when and how these characteristics will surface. They can lie dormant for years because I have little or no opportunity to interact outside of my particular world view. It's easy for me to fool myself and think I'm not classist when I don't have families on assistance living in my neighborhood or going to my schools. Where I live, Native Land Claims are in the political forefront. Most people agree colonization almost decimated a whole culture. But just how these issues will find redress brings out our racism. As the dominant culture is threatened economically by these claims the maternalistic/paternalistic attitudes of the past lose their benign masks and become strident attempts to maintain the status quo. I feel my own racism surface and my thinking and talk polarizing into "we" and "they". I don't like to think of myself as racist, but when I'm threatened I want to blame the people rather than the system under which all races live. In terms of the environment it is important that the native and non- native communities work together as to how the land will be sustained into the next century. Native and non-native leaders have an opportunity to acknowledge no one "owns" the earth and at the end of the 20th century we can work for a future together. If these negotiations don't speak for the earth, who will? Leanne Smith [EMAIL PROTECTED]
