The encouragment of internalized oppression

Not even 10 minutes after we submitted our 580 signatures to keep Nicole Beaulieau on the November 2nd ballot, under the Warriors for Justice Political Party, Kay Mack the County Auditor calls to notify us that over 100 of our signatures are invalid due to the fact a lot of people listed a P.O. box number. On the form, it clearly states that using a P.O. box number is valid, we then called Brad Anderson, who works in the elections department for the Secretary of State, on may 19th Gregory Paquin called Brads office and talked with a young man named Adam who refused to give us his name, Greg was trying to confirm that P.O. box numbers would be valid, this young man reassured us they would be valid, conveniently Brad denies receiving the message of Gregs phone call. If this phone call never existed, why would we proceed so confidently on obtaining peoples signatures with a P.O. box number listed, then we contacted Burt Black, who is the Attorney General of the Secretary of State, he agreed with our argument that those signatures ought to be valid, then we called Mark Richie's office, Mark Richie is the Secretary of State, we talked to his secretary Jim Gelbmann, who stated this is a matter to be looked into. Mark Richie has of yet to get back to us on this matter. Going back to the conversation with Brad Anderson, he stated that the P.O. box option is reserved for more country states like Mississippi or Alabama, where as in Northern Minnesota, territory and home to a lot of Ojibwe people that receive their mail out of post offices, it just seems to me that we are systematically being targeted to prevent us from ever having a say in the decision making process. Somebody is orchestrating this debacle to keep our people out of the Minnesota Senate. Bemidji is a very racist city, and this systematic institutionalized racism is at the forefront of every aspect of life here, generation after generation of this oppression has resulted in internalized oppression amongst the American Indians that call this racist place home. It's very heart breaking to witness so many of my people live their lives defeated here, this internalized oppression is ravaging the lives here of every American Indian unlucky enough to fall in love with this community where racism is a way of life. We have suffered some of the worse criticism from our own people for what we are doing by standing up, these people rather remain counterproductive, they rather feed into the stereotypes, they rather pretend racism doesn't exist, they rather pretend they aren't even American Indian. As if ignoring their own heritage is going to result in their acceptance from our white racist brothers, don't get me wrong, not all white people are racist here, but those in charge are some of the most racist around, more white people understand why we are doing this more then a lot of American Indians do. These American Indians can complain and become irate every time this racism stares them in their face, yet they refuse to support people like us standing up against this systematic institutionalized racism. This is just the beginning of our struggle to break down these walls of injustice, this is just the beginning of our campaign to raise awareness and educate our downtrodden people. We will continue to protest and raise awareness of this racism degrading the lives of the American Indians that call one of the most racist cities in America, "home" We will continue to drag this racism out of the shadows until it can no longer be ignored, the racists of this city will have to own their shame soon of oppressing their Indian brothers.