TODD HENDERSON: The Folly of Land Acknowledgements.

In fact, choosing a specific group of people (and not others) to acknowledge is an act of hubris, reflecting the “colonial mindset” the acknowledgement is meant to distance us from. After all, the only Native Americans usually mentioned in these acknowledgements are those who inhabited the lands in question when settlers arrived.

In Chicago, land acknowledgements—at everything from university events to NHL games—mention the Potawatomi, because when “white” people arrived here, that is who they found. But native tribes engaged in constant conquest and displacement as well. The Potawatomi are no more the “original” or “true” owners of Chicago than the European settlers that displaced them.

Like all of wokeness, it’s narcissistic performance art by neurotic white people, for neurotic white people.