09/28/2026
As we approach September 30th–National Day for Truth and Reconciliation in Canada–I want to talk about solidarity as optics over praxis.
Slapping an orange shirt icon on a social media profile every September 30th can feel convenient. It looks slick. It lets everyone in your digital sphere know that you possess appropriate social awareness.
Yet, performative solidarity (where there’s no action beyond the optics) functions as a cozy blanket for collective complacency. It offers the aesthetic of moral commitment without requiring a single ounce of actual heavy lifting.
While well-meaning folks pat themselves on the back for sharing graphics, an uncomfortable phenomenon quietly gathers strength in the background:
residential school denialism.
Performative gestures create a massive illusion of progress while leaving the underlying structures untouched. When engagement remains superficial, a dangerous vacuum opens up. In that empty space, denialists operate with total freedom.
Nearly twenty percent of non-Indigenous Canadians endorse denialist claims, while an equal portion reports lacking sufficient knowledge to hold an opinion.
When solidarity remains strictly performative, society fails to build the intellectual and moral defense needed to shut down these bad-faith arguments.
Performative allyship leaves communities vulnerable to misinformation because it prioritizes personal optics, ignoring deep learning and structural accountability.
**This is not to deter you from wearing an orange shirt, but to make it meaningful. Make that shirt itself become part of the spirit of your actions, where its threads are not in vain, but part of your threaded actions.**
Solidarity becomes real when it involves tangible sacrifices and direct action. Real solidarity shows up in quiet, unglamorous spaces. It can look like:
- educating yourself through primary documents and peer-reviewed research
- confronting anti-Indigenous comments at your family dinner table
- redirecting financial resources to Indigenous-led organizations
- institutional accountability and legislative change
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Which brings us directly to a straightforward, impactful step:
emailing to your Member of Parliament (MP) or Member of Legislative Assembly (MLA) for folks in Canada.
Politicians monitor constituent outreach closely (it’s their duty to).
An inbox full of personalized letters from voters carries real political weight. Writing your representative constitutes solidarity in action because it moves advocacy out of the digital void and into the halls of power.
Navigating constant political tension, economic stress, and endless news cycles can cause profound exhaustion. Taking on another fight feels daunting. But we must not lose hope. Sitting back and allowing residential school denialism to flourish carries broad consequences across society.
Allowing facts to become optional creates a toxic precedent.
If society permits the public erasure and distortion of documented genocidal policies, that erosion of truth will not stay contained within one issue.
Misinformation acts like water finding a crack; it leaks into every other crevice of society. When empirical facts and survivor evidence become negotiable in public discourse, democratic integrity crumbles across the board. The same rhetorical tricks used to deny residential school atrocities get recycled to undermine public health, climate science, human rights, and electoral trust.
Solidarity is a daily discipline. So let’s pick up our pens and demand that our political representatives uphold historical truth with real legislative action.
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I have drafted a sample letter (in the comments) to write to your MP and MLA, along with step by step instructions, including how to find your MP and MLA.
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Let your orange shirt SPEAK. 🧡
