Latest / Upcoming Trial of Nathan Chasing Horse April 14, 2025 / Debriefing from the Sentencing of Nathan Chasing Horse

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Debriefing from the Sentencing of Nathan Chasing Horse · Upcoming Trial of Nathan Chasing Horse April 14, 2025

• Marina Crane: Hello, this is Marina Crane. ⁓ It's actually May 1st. Yes, May 1st. So ⁓ why do you have the pleasure of hearing my voice again? Well, apparently, unbeknownst to quite a few people, I did go down to Las Vegas. And I did... ⁓ witness the trial of Nathan Chasing Horse on my own time. Okay, so I just want to let you know that a lot of things that I do, I do on my own. But I have a few notes that I want to convey about the victims of Nathan Chasing Horse and the impact statements that they ⁓ spoke of. You can find it on YouTube. And ⁓ but I wanted to post some things that I think ⁓ some of the victims, you know, have some revelation about. it's not a direct quote from them, but it's sort of like statements of like stuff that I think all victims of violence, ⁓ it resonates and they want to share things. So the first one it says, a victim of abuse doesn't always look afraid. Sometimes they smile, they comply, they justify, because the fawn response is survival. Now why is that important for me to talk about? It's because my late mother grew up in Indian Residential School from the time she was five to 16, and she had this fawn response. never, I always thought of it as being afraid of white people, because she would be smiling around them. People expect abuse victims to look scared, traumatized, obviously hurt, but it's not always what survival looks like. Sometimes survival is smiling through the pain, compliant and with demands to avoid worse consequences, justifying the abuser's behavior, making excuses, minimizing harm, not because they don't know it is wrong, but because fighting back or showing fear makes things worse. And that's the narrative of my late mother. And I think it's the narrative of most women who have been in abusive relationships where they've been battered women. But also, the reason I focus more on my mother's childhood is because she was taken at the age of five. under the age of 10 children cannot comprehend consent. So this FOM response is so deeply embedded because they don't understand consent. it even goes even further. She was there until she was 15. So again, even having any of those people, I mean, there was a comment. by ⁓ a Sioux female warrior in modern times who said, now that Nathan Chasing Horse has been arrested and is serving life in prison, what about all those priests and clergymen, all those people who took care and abused our indigenous children? Like my grandmother. I'm 74 years old. My grandmother went to residential school and so did both my parents. So this fawn response, you have to understand. They weren't raised by their parents. They were babies when they were taken. Okay, the fond response is survival. It's your nervous system choosing appeasement over confrontation because historically that's what kept you safe. Safed us. You became agreeable, accommodating, eager to please not because you're weak, but because you're doing whatever it takes to survive. And from that outcome, it doesn't look like abuse. It looks consensual, happy even. Now, what does it have to do with me? Again, my parents aren't to blame for this fond response that they taught me. And I didn't really understand it until I was physically assaulted at the age of 19. I want you to understand, I've already reached the age of consent. I knew what consent was. whereas my parents didn't and obviously my grandmother as well because those Indian residential schools were really horrific during my grandmother's and my mother's time as well as during my time. I'm not trying to minimize my experience but I know the different degrees of residential schools that were throughout Canada. The thing is, when I was sexually assaulted, I was talking to my cousin, because she said, oh, Marina, you've been traumatized. I'm going, I was at the age of consent. I complied because I didn't want to, it was a fear response. I told them, I'll do anything you want me to do, just don't hurt me. Like just don't, you know, I chose appeasement and most people who, women who are talking to women about their safety, they say, you know, if the choice is to be complacent and comply, do it because they could, you know, if the alternative is dying. Because like, again, I'm just saying this, I wasn't weak. But because I was going to do whatever it took to survive from the outside, like say with my cousin or other people, they thought that it was consensual. And it wasn't. It wasn't consensual. Because I said afterwards, they dropped off everybody that there were two serial rapists from my community. And in my podcast, you've heard me talk about it. And the one fellow whose ⁓ granddaughters were victims of Nathan Chasing Horse. Like he had no connection with them because he took off from our community and he never took responsibility for raising his children, much like Nathan Chasing Horse. But ⁓ the reason I'm talking about this is that ⁓ the reality of him saying, get upstairs because he still wanted to have sex with me. And I turned to him and I said, if you thought I enjoyed what you did to me, you've to be kidding. And this is the whole point that I'm getting at. He punched me. I was unconscious. The rage he took on my unconscious body, much like the rage Nathan Chasing Horse took on one of his victims who was 13. I know people don't want to hear it and if it's abusive and you hear it, know, turn off my podcast. You know, I'm just trying to talk about fawning and how the reality of... ⁓ the violence of the perpetrator. mean, it was a 10 minute video that was blocked from the audience in the courtroom because he apparently drugged the girl, 13 years old. She's a woman now. She did her impact statement. It's on YouTube. There was a technicality in how they responded to her. because he only got like two years and life. The reason I'm saying that is he got life, but it would have taken him two years if she was the only victim for him to respond for to get a parole. The reason I'm mentioning this is because again, she was unconscious when he took his rage out on her. ⁓ And I've never seen it, but people in my community who went down to bear witness ⁓ before before he was found guilty had seen the video and ⁓ their comments was they didn't know the extent of what this man could do. But again, I'm saying this is how I was treated as well. The fellow beat me to a pulp while I was unconscious. So anybody who says, ⁓ Marina, you were traumatized, I'm going, I wasn't awake. I wasn't awake when all this was happening to me. ⁓ You know, it was after that I had to, like the concussions and healing that I dealt with. But it was also that fun response of like trying to be complacent or compliant, like my parents, you know, not to make anybody in the community be upset at my family. So again, this fun response. But inside, you're terrified and you are trying to make it through without triggering more harm. See, because my parents, like my father and my uncles, I know they would have harmed that man. I know I would have been a part of all this conflict. And I chose not to have anything further to do with him. And I didn't want my dad or my uncles to go to jail for, what, possibly killing this man. I just told them, don't do anything. Now, in Indigenous communities, and communities throughout the world, they have a saying, like you can think of having sex with a child ⁓ and not act on it, because that's human thinking. But when you think about it and you act on it, then the first time you act on it, in some cultures they kill that person, because they know that person is going to continue doing it, because they've been allowed to do it. So ⁓ again, Stop judging abuse victims for not looking how you think they should look. Fawning is a trauma response. you've ever had to, hold on, if you've ever used it to survive, you don't get critiqued on how it appears. So for 20 years, that's part of the reason why I've done a lot of self-reflection about abuse victims, because a lot of times people assume, know, ⁓ well, Marina, you know, let it go, you know, walk away from it. And I'm saying, I wasn't there for Nathan Chasinghors. I was there for the victims of Nathan Chasinghors. I was there so that my niece, Roberta's soul could be put at rest. that now justice has been done, the times that she tried to report and the police didn't respond. And that's just not my niece Roberta. There were a lot, even Sierra, she had reported to the police and they did nothing. So it wasn't for the lack of people not trying to ⁓ get justice done. The authorities just didn't care. And that's the whole issue that I'm making too because ⁓ The dynamics of ⁓ relapse and recovery when it comes to the survival is so dynamic and there's so many intersections in it that I think one of the reasons why it's so hard for victims to come forward because of that fear response. I don't want to make waves, you know, that fawning, but that's from intergenerational trauma. Okay, so another quote, again, this podcast is about quotations and about the reflections of the survivors of Nathan Chasing Horse. Very dynamic group of women. I have nothing but admiration and so much ⁓ compassion and just, like, they're so brave. Okay, so here's another quote. We live in a planet where whales sing songs that travel them for miles, where trees can recognize their own offspring and protect them underground, where dolphins give each other's names and where fighting can create glass in sand, where lightning can create glass in sand, where horses can read human emotions, where rain can smell before it even arrives, and where the ocean can glow in the dark. A planet where the stars we see might never exist, but may never exist anymore. So it's the whole dynamics of life, the celebration of life. that's the way we are. When I talk about matriarchy, I was talking with this European woman and she says, yeah, we've talked about matriarchy. the European culture is so patriarchal. Well, of course, they brought it over to the Americas. And I said to her, yeah, I understand, you know, you're non-Indigenous. I said, but you have to be born in it. You have to be raised in matriarchy. It's not something that you just sort of, you know, like, OK, I'm going to be a matriarch. No, and even I think that's the danger to a lot of lot of ⁓ Indigenous ⁓ women who've been ousted out of their Indigenous matriarchal system into foster homes or adoption or even the Indian residential schools like they did everything to erase matriarchy in in in our very fabric our very souls our very physical bodies so here's another another quote Again, I did not expect all this to blow up after he was sentenced. Even 20 years ago when I started writing about him, I just saw him as a a wash-tub actor. You know, of course, like all this fame took place when he was 15. And again, I want people to understand just from my observation that my this is my own personal opinion that Nathan Chasing Horse was a high-risk teenager. Like that means like he needed to have been really looked after. like much like the high-risk suicide girls that I took care of in Utah State Hospital. And again, there are boys, they had their own ward, their own 24-7 security. when a behavior, when somebody, especially a child or a teenager, when they're developing their identity and they're in so much pain and it morphs into what Nathan Chasing Horse later became, is one of the reasons why it's important for me to talk about abuse, you know, childhood, mental health, all the results of intergenerational trauma from decades before we were even born. And that's why, like, you can always say, ⁓ well, that's happening over there, or it doesn't apply to me, or you could pretend. And this is why pretendians do more damage, because we actually have our own people who are pretending that that violence didn't happen because they're fawning. And it does more damage for non-Indigenous people, even if they got 10 % Indigenous blood, but have never had the intergenerational trauma that is a legacy of the genocide that took place in the Americas. Okay, another quote. ⁓ Former actor Nathan Chasinghorse has been sentenced in Nevada for 37 years to life in prison after being convicted of multiple sexual assaults related, sexual related charges involving Indigenous girls and women. Reports also note the outstanding warrants in Alberta remain active, meaning the legal story is not yet over. The case has drawn major attention on both sides of the border because prosecutors said Chasing Horse abused his status as a spiritual leader to exploit vulnerable victims over many years. Survivors told the court about the deep trauma and the betrayal they continue to live with. So you've got to sort of erase it out of your mind that this person was an actor. He, when people ask me, I'm going, no, it has nothing to do with him being an actor, had to do with him posing himself as a spiritual leader. Understand this, like I grew up my whole life, my cousin and I talked about, you my parents, our parents, Dakota women, you know, we talked about these spiritual elders who abuse way before I was even born. That's what I'm saying. This isn't something... You know, like, ⁓ gee, they must have been dormant and all of a sudden they want to get attention, but they're talking about this Nathan chasing horse and how dare they. No, excuse me. You know, I've had to give up acquaintances, put my boundaries down because that kind of rhetoric really hurts me, breaks my heart. For many Canadians, this is about more than just... that more than one sentence. It's about justice for survivors, accountability, and making sure every outstanding allegation is fully addressed. What do you think, Canada, should Canada authorities move quickly on remaining warrants once the US process is complete? See, again, why are people so hesitant to prosecute people like our former chief? He's going to appear in court sometime this spring or this year for historical sexual assaults on men. Another band counselor is going to be, you he's been charged as well. So there are hope there. There's another fellow, in my opinion, he just had a court appearance in Edmonton, was in charge of an addiction program, charged with a historical assault of sexually assaulting a teenager. So, ⁓ you know, people say, ⁓ well, it's coming to the surface. It's percolating. Well, I'm hoping like when people listen to my podcast and if it triggers you and you want to walk away, go ahead. But I want you to understand the fact that it triggers you means I've hit the truth. And because of that, it's important to go and seek help, go and get support. The amount of what I've seen and the dynamics of the young women who've gathered together to support each other. And I know it's not just in Soutenna. I know it's not just the victims of Nathan Chasing Horse that gathered together on a Zoom meeting from Montana, California, New Mexico, Arizona. All those women supporting each other. You as Indigenous women out there, or even if you're not Indigenous, you can do this. You can form support groups. to help you go through whatever you need to do to stand and bear witness to your perpetrator, to let them know that person hurt you. Because that's how healing starts, by having the courage to not be afraid to hear you say, you hurt me. Okay, here's another quote. And again, I'm being spontaneous because... It's one thing that people read from books and stuff, but it's another thing when it comes from your own experience. My traveling companion, looked at me and says, Marina, all this is happening because of what you started. Now, to me, was just, like I said, I did it. A lot of the journey that I've gone on is self-discovery, self-reflection. So I can't take it personal like, I had something major to do with this. And I believe there's so many other Indigenous women out there who have done exactly what I've done and who are still doing it and are still facing lateral violence from our own sisters and mothers and aunties. That's why I say, when I go into spaces, when people give me tobacco as an elder to pray, I've come to the point and the realization that I have to say to those people, the organizers, when I go into these spaces, you need to protect me. More so because I'm an Indigenous elder. Not so with Indigenous male elders. But when I walk into that room and there are people who have unresolved issues with their aunties, their sisters, their mothers or their grandmothers, and they take it out on me, a total stranger, because they have unresolved trauma. How do they even know that they're projecting that misogyny onto me? If the people who have invited me continue to protect them, instead of protecting me, the elder who they've called in to help heal. It's a paradox, I know. Okay, so I'm gonna read another excerpt here. Again, these are all inspiration from the survivors of Nathan Chasing Horse, that they feel these quotes are valuable. are the altar, not the sacrifice. There is a difference and most of us were not taught it. You are a channel of the divine, not a metaphor. The kind of body the sacred has always moved through, whether or not the world remembered to say so. When everything around us convulses, when the system we were told to trust keeps fracturing, The feminine does not shrink. She has been here before. She knows how to hold a room, a child, a grief, a fire. So this is not the season to make yourself smaller. We are called to link arms, not retreat. To be a voice where there is silence. To stand for the children and the vulnerable amongst us. To remember that we are ourselves, the return of the light. And this is from ⁓ Ella Rebel Feather. I mean, this strikes home so close to me because, you know, like I stand for the children and the vulnerable amongst us. My mother was taken when she was five. She never spoke about Indian residential school until she was an elder. When this whole truth and reconciliation came about. And believe me, when I heard those stories, like I tell people, you're very fortunate you didn't meet me when I didn't hear this information when I was in my 20s. I said I would have been so enraged that somebody did this to my mother as a baby. Now, I'm an elder and I'm talking to an audience out there of people who have known someone who've attended those Indian residential schools and understand these pretendings, so people who mythologize or romanticize Indigenous ways of knowing. Get your head out of the ground. You're either pretending to be First Nations, Métis or Inuit. Everybody, Inuit, Métis, First Nations, were all our relatives when to those Indian residential schools. So if you do not have a mother, even yourself, your mother, father, grandmother, grandfather, don't even say, ⁓ I've got my status card. Yeah, you probably got filtered in through all the system. of you know, indigenous, a lot of indigenous people working, trying to bring their children home and you got sucked into it now you're trying to get all that glory where you don't deserve that glory because you didn't experience it. You haven't. Again, this is from a lady says, I'm thankful Nathan Chasing Horse being locked up. Now please go after the priests, preachers, pastors, nuns, missionaries that are sexually abusive for Christianity. Those efforts never held accountable. Plus, Christian churches created the statutes of limitation laws so they can't be touched. See, really, white supremacy, patriarchy, it's alive and well. So don't tell me if you're a feminist or you believe, ⁓ matriarchy, we do talk about it, we understand. No, you've got to be born in it. You've got to be raised in it because it's thick. It has a lot of the intergenerational trauma, the psychological turmoil of how people struggle to raise their children and keep them safe. Here's another. And I don't mean to be going off in a rampage, OK? But I tell you, you had to be present in that courtroom. Prior to the courtroom, like I'd met on August 11th, and then I went down on the 26th and 27th and just the impact statements. Like ⁓ I brought gifts and I said a prayer and I wanted to validate to them before they did their impact statements. I said, we're all here supporting you. Invisible helping hands through Canada and the United States, women who've been fighting to seek justice, we're here with you in spirit. When you get up, and you talk about the impact statements. We're here behind you, supporting you. It's going to be emotional, but you can do it. And rightfully so. You know, you're in a city and you're in a courtroom. It's very cold and callous. People who don't understand what it is to be Indigenous are listening to you. Okay, here, another saying posted by one of the survivors of Nathan Chasing Horse. A resilient mom can be in the worst situation possible. Mental health battles, physical health struggles, trauma, pain, life setbacks piling up so high you can't see over them. And all you'll hear out of her mouth is, I'll handle it. And she will. She always does. I know my mother used to do that too, my grandmother. Okay, it's the sentence that sounds the strength but tastes like survival. Four words soaked in exhaustion that she delivers with enough conviction to fool everyone in the room, including herself, because if she says it out loud enough times, maybe her body will believe it, even when her mind is screaming that she is running on fumes and the tank went empty three exits ago. It's not okay, but okay was never the requirement. Getting through it was. And getting through it is the only setting she knows. In the morning, she wakes up with a body that aches from something she hasn't had time to diagnose. The anxiety, the regrets that greets her before her feet touch the floor, the weight in her chest, and she breathes around the future. She rearranges as so many times she has forgotten it's not supposed to be there. and she still gets up, packs lunch with shaking hands, drives carpools with migraines she'll never mention, sits in the parking lot for 90 seconds collecting herself before walking to work like a woman who is falling. And she's OK, so she she. Let's see falling. Her child, let's see, I'm sorry, it says, sits in the parking lot for 90 seconds collecting herself before walking into work like a woman who isn't falling apart at every direction simultaneously. She's falling apart, but her children will never know. The trauma she carries in her bones, the kind she never fully processed because processing required time and time is a luxury she traded in moments she became someone's mother. The memories that surface at night when the house is quiet and the kids are asleep and she's finally alone with the visions of herself she hides from the world. doesn't even, she doesn't have a therapist, doesn't have the support system that truly understands the depth of what she's navigating, doesn't have the partner picking up the slack, doesn't have the single person in her daily life who looks at her and says you don't have to handle this alone. So she handles it alone. It's the physical pain she ignores, the appointment she keeps rescheduled because it's taking a date of off, meaning losing income she can't afford to lose. The symptoms she googles at midnight instead of addressing because her body is the last thing on her list and her children are the first. She'll figure out, she'll want, that's what she wants to say. But not because she's invulnerable, because she has no other option, because nobody is coming, because the only safety net her children have is her. Failing isn't something she is allowed to do. I'm sorry this is... failing isn't something she's allowed to do. ⁓ So again, only, ⁓ she's surviving in real time. She said she can handle it. The only reason she hasn't stopped is sleeping down the hall, completely unaware her mother is the bravest human being she'll ever know. The resilient mum can be in the worst situation possible. Mental health battles, physical health struggles, trauma, pain, life setbacks. and all you will hear out of her mouth is I'll handle it and you better believe she will hurt for her children for her and her children. You know it's it's one thing for people to you know say well why did it take so long. Well the victims of Nathan chasing horse the one lady knew him since she was 14 supported him. She had her children around him, her three-year-old daughter, who he sexually assaulted at 18, who almost died from a topic pregnancy. And for 14 years, you know, she's trying to get justice. You know, I said to the mom and daughter, said, 20 years ago when ⁓ the moms and daughters were having problems here in my community, a Nathan chasing horse said he was a youth worker. ⁓ I said to the women, I had hoped that the moms and daughters, and they had hoped they would have a new bond with their daughters. I told the mom and daughter, said, the fact that you're both going to be giving impact statements and just to get here and to get up and make an impact, like your statement, very powerful. Like I said, I'm so proud of you. I said, this is everything that I had hoped for in my podcast is for women to know that you do have it in you. You do have that strength to bear witness of the injustice done against you and the people you love and those that love you. Here's a quote. You are allowed to want a life that is quieter than your trauma. A life with less drama, less proving, less survival. You are allowed to build a life that feels gentle. You are allowed to choose ease, to choose good people, clarity and light. And that might seem redundant. It might seem like, a... You know something that ⁓ well, I'm at peace but see for me even as an elder I The the lateral violence I've experienced even even just going down to Las Vegas to support him not him but to support them You know people project it and say well, you're there. You're like I'm like it's a curiosity. I'm there too I'm obsessed with Nathan chasing where I said no 20 years ago. That was not the issue Twenty years ago I was there trying and hoping my niece would get help. The experience I knew is that she was morphing into somebody who was going to be high risk and she did. Couldn't save her. Was victim of human trafficking. Died from a drug overdose. I went down there to support the survivors, because I'm a survivor. I know what lateral violence looks like. I know the disrespect I receive from even people I've grown up with. They intentionally, for whatever reason, haven't dealt with their own trauma, and because of that they projected onto me. So yes, I deserve that quiet space, just like every survivor, everyone who's wanting and seeking peace. So for people out there who ⁓ are curious about the things that happen in the courtroom and just how the victims are. Again, I want you to understand the victims of Nathan Chasing Horse do know that there are hundreds of other victims in Canada and the United States. Because all of a sudden, since the sentencing, every, every person on Facebook, every organization is publishing Nathan Chasing Horse's story. And I said to my sister, she says, Marina says, just, I'm tired of it. I don't want to see it on Facebook. And I said, yes, I understand. I said, but understand this. Why weren't they alerting? Why wasn't there an alert when, just like when a child goes missing, an Indigenous child goes missing, why isn't there an alert all over Facebook? Now everybody's posting all this stuff. It's bombarded. the thing about is, let's promote mental health. Let's try and get some stuff going. taking time to take care of your mind helps you show up stronger for your family, your work, and your community. OK, so that's what it said. Take time to take care of your mind. A lot of people, you know, like they, when they try to criticize me, I'm going like, no, you don't get it. And some may never. It'll take, it could take them a lifetime. Like I said, my mother was groomed and, you know, sexually abused in those Indian residential school. And a lot of times when she tried to talk about how she felt, like the fawning, I used to say that the doctors, I'm here in the hospital. I she's afraid of you. They couldn't comprehend it. Well, it's fawning. I said, when you ask her what's her pain level, she doesn't want to have any conflicts. She's going to think that you want to hear her her pain is at a three when it's actually at eight. I said to the doctors, I'm staying here because I'm going to let you know what her pain is actually. So it isn't just people going and seeing people drunk or intoxicated and fighting. This intergenerational trauma is carried in an individual's body for the rest of their lives. Much of what I try to do and talk about is because I love my mom, I love my grandma, I love the matriarchy. I was born into a matriarchal society. Okay, here's another quote. Our Wise Guy Criminal Justice Program is empowering young men to build healthy relations, reduce reoffending and challenge harmful gender norms adapted to the center award-winning Wise Guy school-based curriculum. The program was created to support boys and young men involved in criminal justice. The Wise Guy Criminal... The facilitator makes an impact by authentically connecting with program participants and giving them tools that are skills for positive change. One organization we work with says, the impact made by Wiseguys on young people is consistently positive. Sometimes a referral to and retripediation from the youth. As soon as they connect with the facilitator, they are engaged. Young people share how much they enjoy working and appreciative of the knowledge that have been gained and how to conduct themselves in different situations with new skills. And the program for me in the City of Calgary is called Planet Youth, where we try to connect with both male and female. And for me as an elder, I am really hoping that the educators at the University of Calgary and other programs can help in developing like a curriculum oriented program for our Indigenous youth. It's so important that they participate and that it has an authentic impact for change. It's possible. There are people out there who are dynamically working. ⁓ it says the impact, sometimes a referral is met with tribudation. from the youth, but as soon as they connect, are engaged. Young people share as much that they enjoyed working and the appreciative knowledge they can gain and how to conduct themselves in a situation with new skills. So in Planet Youth, the program is to help youth elders to connect with other youth. And at the same time too, like I truly believe we need to have that curriculum in our First Nations Inuit and Métis schools. ⁓ But those are the quotes that I wanted to share. Again, if any of this has an impact on you and it's triggering, ⁓ like I said, you need to reach out to some support. I know, like I didn't expect ⁓ how people were going to react once he was found guilty. ⁓ Melissa and Ren Leon, ⁓ they're their own separate individuals. ⁓ Everybody's not perfect and it's the struggle as survivors, as women having to support each other. And then sometimes even in that support, there's conflicts, like there are conflicts with families. You you have struggle with a cousin or a brother or sister, don't talk for a couple of months, then you start talking again. It's normal behavior. ⁓ The reality though is... ⁓ It's important. ⁓ I didn't go to any of the trial because it kept on getting delayed. Even if I made payments and stuff, I couldn't recuperate what I've lost. But doing my podcast and trying to get a foundation for my listeners to understand. the cultural impact of ⁓ what it is to be Indigenous living in an Indigenous community. And for those who are pretending to be Indigenous, get off the cross. I need the wood for my sweat. As the fry bread burns, the saga of soap operas that pretendian people out there want to get that job. get that recognition. And I'm not just talking like I have some serious issue with even pretendians whose fathers are white. I mean, they've got their status card, but they also pretend in some ways, not as bad as those who say they only have 10%. But let me tell you, I have a relative who's on TikTok and bless her heart. She says, oh, my grandmother this, my grandmother taught me this recipe. Here's my cousin going, she's lying. She's lying. She said, she only stayed in that one house for one night sleeping on the floor and she makes it sound like that's her life. She said her father was white. My traveling companion who was white, we were talking, I said, you're just damn lucky I have white uncles. because you know systemic racism especially within families one of the ladies that I do podcast with her father's wife she says marina my father will be racist until the day he dies you know I have cousins like who like they're not like the pretendian you know like the pretendian ⁓ relative who has a white father. I'm really grateful to all my first cousins who don't get on the bandwagon and try and create false narratives about my relatives, my aunties, my uncles, our grandfathers, our grandmothers. They're quiet. They know they've never lived in an Indigenous community, either Metis or Inuit. And bless their hearts, they're respecting those boundaries. But I have some other relatives who are Sioux and some who aren't, who, you know, some people like they either have a mother who's been famous for what, having a shelter in the city. Again, understand this. We do not have emergency shelters or emergency homes under our own jurisdiction. Anything that happens in foster care in our communities are governed by the province. So when I say the empowerment and the understanding of healing, especially when it takes a village to heal a child, my community didn't have that 20 years ago and they still don't. If a child is apprehended, they go right into the system, the provincial system, either being monitored by social workers on the reserve or being monitored by social workers in the city by provincially run and operated programs. Now, historically, when I was young, this one woman she was married to, an older white man, racist guy, you know, but her daughter and her grandchildren, like, you know, when the daughter is giving presentations with the city police or, you know, like talking about truth and reconciliation. And this is where you can investigate as an audience. If you're non-Indigenous, or even if you're Indigenous, ask them, what about your dad? Ask them about their white fathers. Ask them how their influence played on them. The majority of times you will see if they're pretending because they won't talk about their dads. They won't. I find it completely, you know, dishonest. And for those women who do talk about their racist dads, hey, I know what you're talking about. You know, I went to school my whole life. I've been around. I've had racist friends. you know, it's just the reality. We were born into this system. But I do really think that the way life is and the actual people who are actually living and trying to protect their children or living in our communities who, like I said, I read some of the articles, like how hard it is for a woman. And like I said, I took care of my mother. My mother ⁓ was that woman. I saw her struggles. ⁓ I took care of her. I told her, I said, when you go into the hospital and when it's your time to leave this earth, I'll be there for you. I said, I know I wasn't there when you were a baby in those residential schools. I know you were frightened and afraid. That fear restructured her whole nervous system throughout her whole life. That's why I try and talk about early childhood development and how the brain is developed and why ⁓ people who've been traumatized the way my parents were, the long lasting effects, why some things people do, like people like Nathan Chasinghurst do to children. is unforgivable. I don't forgive those priests or nuns or people who took care of my parents in residential school. I don't. They did the unforgivable. Understand that. That fawn response was so they wouldn't, you know, like they wouldn't say anything. They didn't want to create any problems because they'd be punished. That's why if I go into a room, somebody gives me tobacco and I'm going to pray. Or if I have a young woman who says, I dabble in matriarchy. I'm going, no. If I trigger and I'm confrontational, it's for a good reason. It's for good reason because there are so many people who are so complacent, don't understand that fawning. You know, try to mansplay me. or any other woman who doesn't fawn over their white privilege. And if it's triggering, fine, because that means I've touched a bone. But I have white friends who will sit uncomfortable in what I'm saying and how I talk. I've grown up with white people my entire life. I'm just fortunate, like I'm not afraid to be confrontational. It's not like I'm going to hit anybody or do anything violent. It's the reality. Like this is how people see us. If we are not assertive, if we don't have boundaries in place and we refuse to be treated like that. See the whole premise of my going to the trial and witnessing. You know, when my mother passed away, I did Wiping Away's and releasing tears ceremony. I didn't totally understand how the Native Women's organizations across Canada, United States, because we come from so many different tribes and so many different ways of knowing. But the bottom line is we have this common thread. When I talk to my other friends who are from different tribes, And I say to them, I went to the courtroom, I went to the courthouse, I said a prayer for the mum and daughter, I gifted them. I gave three gifts. The two gifts I gave to the mum and daughter, and the third gift I gave to ⁓ a non-Indigenous witness. And when I talked to my friend in Edmonton, and ⁓ I said to her, ⁓ I went, I ⁓ did this prayer to let them know that I was wiping away the tears and releasing the soul of my niece. In that courtroom, when I heard them, I was saying a prayer to Creator, saying a prayer to my niece that said, you can leave now. You can leave to your next life. Your spirit can go into the next great mystery. Your spirit doesn't have to be here to justify what happened to you. You can go now. You can be at peace. That's what I told my family members. Anybody who wants to portray lateral violence towards me or my family, they can try it and I'll say, she's at peace. She's at peace, leave her alone. She's no longer here with us. The justice she needed and to be heard is done. I've done everything that I could possibly do to make sure her spirit and soul was released. When I explained that to my friend up north in Edmonton, she said, Marina, she says, this is what we do. So they may be dead. People don't understand. Not indigenous people do not understand this. She said, but they have not seeked justice. Their spirits are still not at rest. So you've got to understand. And this is what I try and say to people. This is inherent rights. first 500 years ago, the first 100 years, settlers, Portuguese, French, Dutch, English and French, killed five generations of our children. The first 100 years, they killed 125 million children. They're still doing that today. They did it, tried to do it in Indian residential schools, industrial schools. They're trying to do this today when a single indigenous woman dies and she has five kids. The provincial welfare system that's in place in our communities that aren't sovereign puts our children in the foster care systems in the city, where the average age of our children being trafficked is 14. Now, yesterday or today, it's been shown that two victims of Nathan Chasing Horse are suing the hotels in some of the hotels in Las Vegas because for years they were told they were being trafficked out of these casinos. And that's happening here in Calgary. know, the accountability of people who don't do anything knowing full well Indigenous people are being trafficked out of their establishments. Those things are real. Our own people are doing this to our own children. And what? This fawning? They don't want to create any problems because of violence? I mean, it's evident. It's quite evident. After 20 years, when I decided to ⁓ take the people who had... sexually assaulted me. One of them died at 27 from cirrhosis. The other one, he's older than me, I think he must be 80 now. ⁓ You know, he served time. But it was during the investigation, even to the RCMP, didn't tell me anything. There was lateral violence towards my family. And I still received lateral violence, even though it's not even me that hurt my niece. But the reason I'm saying this is that a lot of times ⁓ this lateral violence is so unconscious because people are either jealous because I have a voice or they think that, ⁓ geez, that's so triggering. And I'm going, no, I did not do this for Nathan Chasing Horse. I did this to release a soul. I did this so that matriarchy, especially in Canada and the United States, no, you're not alone. That pain, that grief to try and seek justice for a murdered or missing relative, I know. I'm just grateful that I was able to see this right to the very end where this man is going to be spending the rest of his life in a penitentiary. And even if he appeals it and is released, he's now a child predator, a sex offender. Look at how many times he's appeared on the news media since he was found, when they said he's going to serve life. Like the gravity of it. That's why, like the irony or the paradox. Like to get it out there. wasn't because he was a movie star. It was because he was supposed to be a spiritual person. Especially like when there's a renaissance happening with our youth. A renaissance that has never been seen before. Like there was parts of it in the ghost dance. And there's parts of it where non-Indigenous people start to mansplay our own religion, saying the next great prophet is going to be a Native American. And a lot of Native American people bought into it. Yeah, so that's what made Nathan Chasing Horse who he is. ⁓ A false prophecy. So for all those who ⁓ are not from your home community, like one of the elders from my community said, only Sutena can heal Sutena. Only Kree can heal Kree. So in other words, if you're from ⁓ a different community, only your community can heal your community. I see it. I see the dynamics of it with our young women in Sioux, Tina, healing each other. Like I am so grateful and proud of them, much like I am with the mother and daughter who organized the support group for the survivors of Nathan Chasing Horse. That's matriarchy. That is matriarchy in its fullest. Hand it down from our mothers, our grandmothers, our great grandmothers. You know, tell people, do you know there's a small town in South Dakota that was created just for settlers to murder pregnant Sioux women. They would hunt pregnant women down, kill them, gut them, pull out their babies, scalp the baby and the woman. They created a town in South Dakota just for that. Now, if it's disturbing and you don't like hearing it, hey, it was against the law for my family, my grandparents, anybody, just even utter words like what I'm telling you, to even dance. Do you know the metaphor of the dance, the powwow or what people call powwow? Do you know that when a Sioux comes in with that flag, that hook, you have 38 feathers? Those represent the largest mass execution in Lincoln when he killed the Sioux warriors. The largest mass execution. In that spring when they ran away from Fort Snell in Minnesota, they came to a raging river. The cavalry was behind them because there's bounty, bounty on every Sioux head. You look at the state of Minnesota, you will not see a reservation there. They banished all the Sioux people. They hunted them out of the state of Minnesota. Talk about stolen land. Now the Sioux is when they came to the Missouri River and it was just like it was dangerous. They took braids the sweetgrass and tied it into the pony's hair, put the women and children on the ponies and they pushed the horses into the water and the horses carried them across that water. When the cavalry came and they couldn't get across because they were on saddles, leather saddles, the horses were scared, couldn't go in. But when the Sioux people were on the other side and they knew they had saved their relatives. They wanted to honor the horse for saving them. So the following spring, they had a sun dance. They painted up their ponies, created a song, their drums were made of leather with water. And as they pounded their water drums as the horses danced into the sun dance arbor, the story says those horses knew this was an honor song for them. And they pranced in that circle. to the beat of the song. From that time on the Siouxs gave the name of those horses, they gave them the name Shunkawaka which means holy dog. See, the fringes that are on our shawls are buckskin. Those represents the hair of those horses that had the sweetgrass tied to them. When you come walking into a powwow of Sioux Sioux Sioux celebration, you will see them bringing in that flag, those eagle feathers. Those represent those 30 men that were hung, 38 men plus two that were hung. When you see people dancing behind, that represents those horses, shonkawaka. Those things they don't teach you in history books. Those things were held illegal for even my grandmother, my great grandparents to even talk about. To silence us, to make us fond over white supremacy. Yes, there's reason to be angry and have hate in your heart, but see, I don't. What I'm giving you is history, lived knowledge that has been handed down to me. through our matriarchal system that I was born into. I honor my mom, my grandmothers, like I honored my niece. Her life meant something. I tried to seek justice for her even when she was protecting him. She would have protected him with her own life. That's what I try to get people to understand when young people are so hurt. They don't understand consent. That's what he took away from all those children he hurt. He's serving life now. He has no respect, human respect for himself or anybody. His whole central nervous system has been disrupted from the very time he was born. Now, for me, growing up with parents who, like I'm not a result of FASE or anything, because it was illegal. illegal for my parents to even have alcohol or even leave the community unless you had a signed certificate saying we could leave. Everything and anything I say about systemic racism, lateral violence, if it triggers my white friends and they're willing to hold space for me. I've grown up with women who could pass for white. I have a sister who can pass for white. I have friends in high school, who look white. All of a sudden now they have their business. They get jobs and say, ⁓ I've got indigenous blood in me. Well, where the hell were they when I was going to school with them? They were so ashamed to be indigenous. That's what I call pretendians. I grew up with them. They were my friends. Like I said, I have first cousins whose fathers are white. They don't pretend. They don't. They don't try to gain money, false hope, false expectation. on their story, on lies they create about their fathers or their mothers. See, the one thing in terms of spirituality and matriarchy is to tell the truth. When my niece recanted everything she said about Nathan Chasing Horse, I said, that's a responsibility between you and Creator. I heard what you said. It's been given to me now. Now, this Nathan Chasing Horse is sentence to life. My work is done. That truth that my niece, the testimony, that truth, I said, I have to be accountable to Creator. because you disclosed it to me. I've released it now for her. He's guilty. She doesn't have to prove nothing. All that behavior that that made her so dangerous to herself and others. That's why these things are unforgivable, because of the pain that ripples throughout our communities, our Indigenous communities. Well, that being said, like, I, ⁓ I hope this brings you some comfort in knowing that in 20 years and just the struggle to get this man caught, you have to have patience. The amount of people that are out there that are still seeking justice, that are still being patient, they're out there. I know that. My heart goes out to them. My heart goes out to you if you're looking for peace and some balance. It's possible. Sometimes I need invisible helping hands. Just to say, Marina, look at what you've done. Just like I say to the mum and daughter, what you're doing and how you're doing it is a legacy that's going to help so many people. Because then you become these invisible helping hands to other people and the ripple continues. So for all my listeners who are Indigenous, we are part of this collective and holistic way of healing. Sometimes non-Indigenous people may not understand it, but when you're born into it and you're taught by your relatives to show respect and to honor and show respect for yourself, as each stage of life we go through, from childhood to teenage life, young adult, middle life, till you become seniors, everything has its time and place. But I will continue. doing podcasts when and however ⁓ the need arises. But I'm only doing this because it was such an emotional event to witness. It would have been totally different if I had ⁓ saw it live stream. But I was right there in the courtroom. I was right there behind Nathan chasing horse, sitting directly in front. He was sitting directly in front of me. He knew who I was. He spent the majority of his life discrediting me. He spent the majority of his life discrediting me. Why? Because of a blog I wrote warning people of how dangerous he was and still is. And for all those women who came up and gave me a hug and thanked me for my blog. And then for the people in my community, the women who are jealous because of my blog. Everybody has an opportunity to write a blog. I don't need to give them permission. Everybody has a right to heal and tell their story. All they have to do is have respect for themselves and do it. If anything, in all the meetings I go to with other elders, that's the bottom line is respect. Show respect for yourself. People will look and wonder who you are and how you manage to have that respect. Because you have to love yourself first before you can even help people, to even show people that's important to love yourself. This is a legacy that I hand down from my matriarchs. My cousins, we talk about our relatives. They taught us to respect ourselves. They taught us not to never give up, no matter how hard things get. No matter how mean, spiteful. We take it, we gotta keep going. People are depending on us. We don't know it because we're invisible helping hands. But anyway, I go on and on and on. But no, I really appreciate everything and all, like I said, all the invisible helping hands. The third gift before I finish this, I totally forgot. Like I said, I gave two gifts to the mum and daughter, and then I gave a third gift to a non-Indigenous person. And I quoted something from the Truth and Reconciliation as part of... witnessing cohorts and allies to bear witness and stand as witness to bear to bear witness of when justice is being done like to to validate yes I did it I did see what happened I saw I saw the crime I I heard I've witnessed the impact statements of the victims of Nathan chasing horse I said now that you witnessed it this gift I give you is going to represent that you have a responsibility now to tell people when you see injustice done against Indigenous people, you have now the responsibility to say, I witnessed it. What they're talking about is true. There is no denying it. The systemic racism, the harm that's being done to Indigenous children is real. Yes, I have to validate everything I do in this life and rightfully so. This is how I was taught. So again, thank you my relatives. Thank you very much. This is as I started my blog 20 years ago. I didn't know who it was going to touch, what direction it was going to take, or if anybody, even if anybody cared. It was just just blind faith or just just trying to make sense of it myself, even if I was just listening to myself or writing it down, typing it. It was something, it was a process, an actual physical thing that I had to do to move forward. Okay, enough being said. Have a great day. Today is Sutana Day. The entire office, the whole community is celebrating our sort of independence type of thing. That being said, I hope everybody who is listening and has stayed in tune this long have a good day and hopefully we'll see each other sometime down the road. Like I said, sometimes I don't even know people come up to me and they say, oh, I saw you on TikTok or I heard you. So again, thank you for just being there for me. I appreciate it. Wopidamidakyapiyawasana. We're all related, my relatives.