Opinion: The continued oppression of Indigenous bodies

PILAR GARCIA Columnist

With the overturning of Roe v. Wade, uncertainty has become a common feeling when reading the news. Maintaining the sovereignty of bodies has become a necessity in the face of legal threats, but bodies aren’t the only thing SCOTUS is in the process of overturning.

In the initial SCOTUS decision draft, Justice Alito refers to the small number of children available for adoption as the “domestic supply of infants” while comparing this to the number of women who were interested in adopting children. Alito’s phrasing is appalling to the general public, that those who have birthed children, whether or not of their desire to keep the child postpartum, are but a number in the adoption industry. However, the “domestic supply of infants” brings up another unforgivable past transgression to Indigenous peoples. Many children were sent to boarding or residential schools, such as Carlisle Indian Industrial School, to rid themselves of their Indigenous practices, to “kill the Indian, and save the man” within Native Americans. Post-removal of Indigenous children, Native nations were concerned with continuing Indigenous heritage and practices. They sought legal protections for Indigenous children to ensure they would remain within their tribal communities, which sparked the creation of the Indian Child Welfare Act. ICWA was enacted in 1978 to protect children placed for adoption or removed from their homes, typically children who lived on Indigenous reservations with their birth parents. After the movement of Indigenous peoples away from their homelands, these reservations became reluctant homes. Regardless of how poverty enraptured communities, Indigenous peoples sought to thrive and ensure they would continue their cultural and spiritual practices for the new generations. With this reasoning, im- poverishment and otherwise, foster care tended to favor taking away children from Native homes almost three times more than their white counterparts. Tribal nations introduced ICWA for tribal nations to protect the younger generations of Natives to ensure the continuation of traditions and sovereignty of the land.

In June of 2022, ICWA was presented to the Supreme Court under the guise of “reverse racism,” that white families are less likely to adopt Native children compared to tribes deciding to place these children within their tribal communities, ensuring the continuation of cultural practices.

ICWA was passed as a protective measure to prevent adoption agencies from removing Indigenous children from their homes, communities and culture and placing them with white families.

Before ICWA, 90% of placements for Native children in foster homes were displaced into non-Native homes, even if other tribal members and relatives were willing and able to care for them.

The overturn of Roe v. Wade guarantees that the wording “domestic supply of infants” is intentional — that those with reproductive capabilities are vessels, particularly Natives, other minority groups and those affected by poverty and income inequality. The discrepancy in the U.S. justice system falls on the shoulders of BI-

POC, who are forced to stagger under the weight of a society that deems them more as bodies than people.

Previously granted protections are being overturned at a staggering rate, leaving the public to wonder what protections will be next on the chopping block.

Indigenous children deserve better. They deserve to be in stable and secure households which encourage their Indigenous culture and heritage, not those that reflect the values of previous boarding schools by issuing complete removal and separation.

So, what can you do about ICWA and the issues at hand?

Begin with engaging in conversations by listening to Indigenous voices and following organizations, such as the Association on American Indian Affairs, with multiple resources for those wanting to learn.