A short personal reflection by Sandi L Boucher on the meaning of wearing orange shirts around September 30th (Orange Shirt Day/Truth and Reconciliation). She critiques performative displays—urging learning and allyship beyond symbolic gestures—while contrasting reactions in Ontario (Thunder Bay) with Manitoba, praising Manitoba for electing an Indigenous premier (Wab Canoe) and for substantive actions such as searching landfills for missing Indigenous women. The speaker frames these observations as part of ongoing reflection and learning.
Chapters
Okay, so the next one. One of the things I do as an Indigenous person is constantly not only taking note of what I just saw or heard or experienced or read, but analyzing it and reflecting on it and most definitely looking to see if this new puzzle piece, how it fits in with my old puzzle pieces. So I want to go back a couple weeks ago when we were talking about September 30th. I guess it's almost a month ago now, time's flying. When I was talking about orange shirts and I put out a video that said, if you're going to wear an orange shirt, excuse me, and you're not doing anything else, don't wear the orange shirt because it reduces it to just being performative, that we need you to do more. If you are actively learning, growing, being an ally, whatever, then go ahead. But it's got to be more than that. And how, you know, seeing everyone wearing an orange shirt made me want to scream with where were you yesterday? And where are you going to be tomorrow? But then I saw an article. It was Wab Canoe commenting on what he described as the sea of orange. The fact that in. So Wab Canoe is the provincial premier of the province of Manitoba. He is Indigenous and has, you know, walked that path and has his spirit name and his language and dances, pow wow, just beautiful. And happens to be the premier of the Canadian province, which is just absolutely amazing. Hang on, did I freeze here? I think I did. So hopefully you heard what I had to say. So Wab Canoe, Indigenous premier of the province of Manitoba, and he was describing Manitoba saying that it was a sea of orange shirts, and he was thrilled. So I had to sit back with that. And I was like, okay. Because seeing a sea of orange here in Ontario or specifically in the city of Thunder Bay, didn't strike me as a positive. So I had to unpack that. And then I realized, duh, of course he's happy. He is the Indigenous premier of the province. The province of Manitoba is doing so much more than wearing an orange shirt. They elected an Indigenous, obviously Indigenous practicing Indigenous person. That sounded weird. How do you practice being Indigenous, practicing Indigenous culture? Someone who practice, actively practices their culture. They elected him as a prime, their premier. They are doing the search of the city dump looking for the possibility that some Indigenous women are located there. They are. What else I did, I write down searching the landfills. Bottom line, after reflecting on all kudos to Manitoba for one, like, holy moly, talk about sending an example. And two, based on all that province is doing, Wab as premier, danced in his full regalia to powwow and didn't face a backlash or any backlash that made any kind of news. I assume some rednecks had some things to say about it, but whatever. Enjoy your sea of orange, because there's a province where, if I saw a sea of orange there, I would more lean to. You are doing something, even if it's just celebrating your indigenous premiere. So I just wanted to share with you that because, yes, we have to look at. That's the unpacking. That is the learning new things and growing. So I hope you're gonna do that. So now we're gonna go into the final part of this video. So. So next.
