Thread by @sunnshiiny

Yesterday I was alerted that my name and a personal photo were being dragged through the mud in an effort to discredit me, my integrity and create serious doubt on my identity as a Métis woman. This is known as a character assassination or more colloquially, a “take down”.

I’ve written about identity politics and even shared that my identity has been attacked by people with hidden agendas.

I’ve even profiled some of the mobbing on Twitter. So people can witness how aggressively abusive some people become when living in an echo chamber you breach.

But those attacks have always been public. Directed at me and I don’t like when others defend me because it’s pointless and makes them a target.

I enjoy an intellectual verbal joust every now and then. It’s a flaw in my character. I’m ok with it.

Most trolls I block, but on occasion I play cat and mouse. Poking holes in irrational logic is amusing sometimes. It keeps my argument skills sharp but also reveals the thought cancelling cliches radicalized extremists have been taught to avoid cognitive dissonance.

So I am guilty of smug derision on occasion. I can admit that. I have a dark side and occasionally feed it.

But when I discover an organized effort to smear my integrity, question my identity and undermine my narrative conducted in secret and behind my back, I get angry.

This isn’t the first time, and if I choose to continue to tweet controversial political threads informing people about issues the press refuses to cover adequately, I expect it won’t be the last.

But I’m not going to suffer in silence anymore.

You come after my kids and publish their image without my permission and make disparaging comments about the colour of their skin and mine, trying to create doubt that I’m a fair skinned Métis, I’m going to expose you & your effort.

I have a Facebook page. I have shut access to my page to everyone I haven’t approved because people harassed me on Facebook in a private group. Questioning my identity because I have fair skin. It’s a form of rejection by some indigenous people. I’ve dealt with it my whole life.

Not white enough to be white, not brown/red enough to be indigenous. Of course if you meet my family, it’s very clear I’m indigenous. I stick out like a sore thumb. Never fully accepted by either side. It’s part of who I am. Add to it my giftedness as a child and I was the freak.

All I ever wanted as a child was to fit in. To be like everyone else. To belong.

My Métis extended & immediate family accepted me completely. I have a large family and numerous aunts, uncles and cousins.

But outside that safety net, I was attacked ruthlessly on both sides.

I didn’t choose my genetics, chance did. I just inherited what was predetermined by fate. Those are the cards I am left to play with. My grandmother was relatively fair skinned & had green eyes, but had very indigenous features. My mother was quite olive toned and looked Métis.

Both my brothers are dark skinned. Genetics is a funny thing. My grandmother had 10 siblings. They were multicolours too. Some were dark, others were fair skinned and some in between. And yes, they all had the same parents. My great grandparents were married 58 years.

In my Metis family I didn’t stick out, but I did outside of that enclave. I acted like a halfbreed, but looked like a white kid. In the 1970’s indigenous and white kids didn’t much play together. So I was always the outsider. Making it more obvious was my unusual first name.

I was teased a lot. But it made me develop a thick skin early in life. I was weird and embraced it. My grandmother enrolled me in sports with cousins, but sports were never really my thing. Books were. I devoured them rapaciously. Thank god for public libraries.

So I know what rejection is. It has always profoundly impacted my existence. I’ve been accepted & then quickly rejected when people learn my true identity. I’ve been called every racial epithet on both sides my entire life. An apple or a halfbreed. Those are the kinder versions.

I’ve watched members of my family be treated like subhumans, including my brothers, who I grew up defending since I was the oldest. Until they learned how to fight, I was their protector, intervening when white kids tried to beat them up at the park.

My cousins did the same for me at Parkdale Elementary/Junior High. I grew up in Parkdale, played sports at Alberta Avenue. Several members of my extended family grew up there too. I moved to McCauley in grade 6. It was referred to as “rubbydub”; full of drunks & homeless people.

I admonished my principal at Sacred Heart School for giving my brother the strap because he was a brown kid. I was 11 years old and full of spit and vinegar, a wickedly smart honours student and as articulate as an adult. So I started activism young. He never got the strap again.

My teens were difficult. My mother became mentally ill and incapacitated. I became the head of the family. So I’ve already raised two boys into adulthood. But I wanted out of poverty. I made it to university, but what a culture shock.

I had to learn fast how to acclimate to a white dominant environment. There were no indigenous support services then on campus. And I was far too stubborn & independent even if there had been. I had moved out at 18. Took a year off to save money and then went to university.

I planned to change the world and was idealistic, optimistic and full of hope and promise. Met my husband at 20 years old. In a bar. But he followed me everywhere for a few weeks around campus and then we became friends.

Mixed our social groups at the Plant. We began dating when we discovered our worldviews were similar. Even though our origins were so disparate. He was from a highly regulated staunch traditional Catholic family, I was a free spirit and mercurial. But our politics jived.

I taught him how to go for walks in the rain & how to connect with nature, he taught me the importance of time management & keeping an even keel emotionally. We complimented one another, and still do. He’s been my rock, my friend, my lover & my children’s father. I love him so.

I spent a career learning how to make social change. At an individual level, a family level, a community and a workplace. By trial and error and with help and guidance. I’ve worked in all white settings and all indigenous settings. I always kept my feet planted in both worlds.

That’s who I am. I don’t apologize for using my fair skin as a privilege to get ahead economically. I hated being poor. So I used the genetics I inherited to escape poverty. But I also have ALWAYS tried to pave paths for those who don’t have fair skin or post secondary education.

Now that my identity is clear, I can tell you my name.

My name is Sunni Rombough. I am from Edmonton, Alberta. My family is from North Eastern Alberta. My grandmother and many of her siblings came from a farm in Whitford, Alberta. A Métis community before Ukrainians moved in.

That scrip land was lost in the Great Depression because my great grandfather couldn’t pay the taxes. His mother is buried at the Andrew cemetery. Jesse Littlechilds. The family moved to McRae, Alberta to be closer to my GGM’s FN siblings at Goodfish reserve.

And to her parents, who lived nearby as Métis squatters. They were permitted by the govt to live the rest of their days in their one room log house with mud and straw insulation and farm a small lot for sustenance. Neither spoke English. They spoke Cree.

I have numerous relatives across western Canada. Some work in oil and gas, some as indigenous activists, some as accountants, construction workers and everything in between. My great grandparents, my mother and my oldest brother are buried in McRae.

That’s my pedigree. I really don’t owe anyone all this information about me. But I’m doing it to prevent doxing and an attack on my children.

This person, who I have no contact with has been circulating bullshit about me and stalking me on Twitter and Facebook.

He’s a FN man of Mohawk descent.

The reason he’s stalking me is because that’s what he does (or has been hired to discredit) as not worthy of indigenous status or acceptance in the community, because their opinion dissents from the First Nations #LandBack agenda.

I exposed NDP’s and Cindy Blackstock’s lies about LPC fighting children in court.

That hit a few nerves and for an entire day I spent time blocking the hundreds of trolls and supporters who were angry I had dared to challenge their agenda. To remove LPC from power using lies.

Here is the offending thread which I stand behind 100%.

And this is what is being circulated on indigenous Twitter. A lot of people read that thread and began to question Blackstock’s and Singh’s veracity. And rightly so. That’s why I wrote it.

https://twitter.com/sunnshiiny/status/1435679640178200577

I’m not Matthew Britton’s only target. He works to discredit others as well. But I’ve never interacted with him directly and he has me blocked. I would never have known he was talking smack about me if others didn’t let me know. He uses his identity to discredit others identity.

My Métis grandmother taught me that truth is essential to being a good person. Those who lie, cheat and manipulate to get what they want are not following traditional indigenous teachings. I believed her and it’s how I live my life. With integrity & honesty.

This faction of First Nations and NDP are not being honest. In fact Mr. Britton is a hired gun. A FN version of Warren Kinsella. Sent in to do damage control & discredit to someone who is offering truth that may disrupt the smear campaign against LPC and PMJT.

Normally I wouldn’t give a crap. Like I said, I have a thick skin and threats to exclude me fall on deaf ears. It makes me angry, but I can cope. It’s not that I hide my identity, but I shield it for my children’s protection. They aren’t indigenous activists. They’re kids.

All for naught it seems because my children’s image has been plastered all over indigenous Twitter, along with insinuations that this photo proves I’m not indigenous or Métis.

Identity politics and putting mine & my children’s image on Twitter is a threat to me and my kids.

This is the length this radicalized extremist faction of FN will go to in order to remove of the constitution and all human rights, including Treaty rights, to arrange for conservatives to be elected.

Hypocrisy regarding FN children & willingness to put me & my kids at risk.

Anarchy is what this radical faction is working for. Are NDP and CPC both working to remove LPC so this radical FN faction, who does not represent all FN people, can economically benefit from the control of FN lands. Is denying some indigenous rights protecting their profits?

Which is exactly what I wrote in my thread. Only LPC is partnering with FN, Inuit, Métis and non-status FN on reconciliation & UNDRIP.

NDP, GPC & CPC ALL focus primarily on FN land claims and on this sub faction of the FN community. Ignoring all other indigenous peoples. Why?

This faction of FN is attempting to undermine reconciliation for every other indigenous identity but FN. But they’re also willing to vilify those FN who do not support the LandBack agenda.

Most FN are aligned with O&G in Alberta and with CPC winning the election.

How many NDP & CPC supporters believe all FN are going to block all pipelines? Nothing could be further from the truth. There are several FN who have plans to invest in pipelines and fossil fuels. You’ve been played for fools. Why do both NDP & GPC have such poor climate plans?

A better question would be how many clandestine partnerships have been formed between FN who likely will gain land through UNDRIP and large investors in O&G and other industries waiting for LPC to be deposed from federal authority so there are no regulations stopping them?

I don’t begrudge FN communities from creating revenue for themselves and their members. I do object to blocking Métis and non status communities from the same reconciliation benefits and attempting to discredit their indigenous status as legitimate. I object to destroying Canada.

What is happening in Canada is fraud. Yes FN still suffer under apartheid conditions. But now a faction of FN seems prepared to abandon their integrity and partner with the very entities who have been performing genocide at every other Canadian’s expense.

Mainstream Canadians, ignorant of indigenous politics and competition for resources, are swimming in white guilt and prepared to hand over the nation and remove all constitutional protections for themselves and all indigenous people.

If you think removal of our constitutional rights is going to mean we aren’t at huge risk from foreign and domestic violence, you’re an idiot!

Greed and avarice along with desperation and profound poverty has been used to engineer FN capitulation of sovereign rights for relief.

Your vote for NDP and GPC provides the ability of this faction of FN & CPC to destroy Canada as a nation. No discussions, no negotiations, just swift removal of the Canadian constitution, rights & freedoms and unfettered access to FN land for resource development worth trillions.

That’s LandBack.

That’s why I’m being attacked. That’s why my kids lives are being threatened. This isn’t a game. It’s a threat to us all.

It doesn’t matter if they know who I am. I was already a target. Now my kids are too.

And so is every other Canadian who dissents.

Now let’s put these two seemingly disparate events in perspective.

FN LandBack and unmitigated COVid.

Can a nation of people protest the dissolution of the constitution and all rights & freedoms attached to it if they are fighting for their lives under extreme COVid infections?

https://twitter.com/globalcalgary/status/1439386662153461762

That’s what is on the ballot.

Is it clear now?

Now add this. Why does the gun lobby want military grade rifles made legal?

https://twitter.com/RBlakeBrown/status/1439644258412204033

Funny you should say that?

https://twitter.com/somersvick/status/1439680499614683136