Today we celebrate Indigenous Peoples’ Day, and at Cornell University, where we celebrate Social Justice, we especially celebrate Indigenous Ways of Knowing. Indigenous Ways of Knowing recognizes the complexity and diversity of Indigenous ways of learning and teaching, and we especially emphasize that we learn from our lived experiences.

The Indigenous Peoples have learned from our lived experiences that we should have closed our borders before it was too late. We could have avoided dispossession and our painful history. Our traditional homeland has been overrun by cisheteronormative racist and transphobic white supremacists. We should have built a wall-even if it meant dirtying the Clean Air, Making the Drinking Water less safe, and Endangering Certain Species. We are happy that President Biden has learned from our lived experiences.

Had we controlled our borders, we would have Indigenous Peoples’ Day 354 days a year, and Exdigenous Peoples’ Day one day a year.