Thanksgiving? Or Day of Mourning?

Today is Thanksgiving Day, one of the most important and commonly observed holidays in the United States. Typically families would get together to have a lavish feast consisting of turkey, cranberry sauce, and sweet potato. This day is said to be the worst time to travel, as millions of people rush (fly, drive, ride) to return home at the same time. It goes without saying that this holiday is accompanied by drinking, football (American football, that is), and shopping.

Historically, Thanksgiving commemorates and celebrates the first harvest of the earliest settlers from England who landed in now Virginia and Massachusetts almost 400 years ago. As legend has it, in 1621, the English pilgrims—nay, colonizers—invited a group of Native Americans (Grand Sachem Massasoit and Wampanoag), who taught them how to fish, grow crops, and survive the harsh winter, to celebrate their first harvest and to give thanks to God. The English fed their guest for three days and the Native Americans in return brought 5 deer as gifts. History books tell us that the two peoples were grateful and respectful to each other and the feast was a manifestation of their mutually generosity and friendship.

And yet to Native Americans, Thanksgiving Day represents something very different. It is insulting and derogatory; it is a reminder of history, but not the one taught in history books written by the colonizers. Native American and their allies observe Thanksgiving as a day of mourning. They mourn the rape of their land and the massacre of their ancestors. It symbolizes the beginning of centuries of genocide, slavery, and injustice; it reminds them of the hideous crimes of their “generous and grateful” colonizers. The fact that it is a day of celebration is ironic, to say the very least.

Many would defend that the meaning behind the holiday has changed; that it is about giving thanks to one another; that it is a rare occasion when families would go out of their way and put aside conflicts to gather; that it is no longer associated with the tragedies and wrongdoings of the past. Some might also say that it is exactly because of the past conflicts that we should highlight the positive events between the two cultures/peoples; that we should celebrate friendship not again and again remind how wide the fissure between the Natives and the European-Americans is; that we should move on.

But move on how and to where? Can the victors unilaterally tell the victims to let go of the past and move on and celebrate the friendship they once shared? Can we and should we strip away the meaning and history of such an important holiday? Can we celebrate when others mourn? Can we forget before we were forgiven? Can we reconcile when the injustice from the past is yet to be reconciled and in fact still exists in a different form, described with a different language?

Certainly no one would admit that they are celebrating the massacre of millions of Native Americans with millions of turkey (46 millions each year, to be more precise). But when your neighbor, from whom you took the land you now live on, is still mourning and grieving their lost and still suffering, isn’t it only respectful to not commemorate it with joy (and unnecessary bingeing)? Shouldn't this be a time to solemnly remind ourselves the true history of this country, and the tragedy behind the prosperity of the New World? Shouldn’t this time be spent on reconciling with the victims of colonization and the subsequent “inner colonization”? Shouldn’t this be a time to eradicate similar oppressions perpetrated here and elsewhere?

If we were to give thanks on this very day, we should be giving thanks to those who have forgiven us. Their forgiveness is a grace that contemporary United Statsians do not deserve.

Christian Chan
Day of Mourning, 2007
Cambridge, MA