Victims to Warriors

Abuse is preventable, the solutions are teachable and the need is critical.  Alaska Natives continually have some of the highest rates of child abuse, domestic violence, suicide, and sexual assault in the United States.  While Alaska Natives represented 18 percent of the state population in 2020 (a greater proportion than any other state), they are conservatively twice as likely to experience sexual assault and other violent crimes in their lifetime compared to all other races.  More than 84% of Alaska Native women have had a violent act committed against them and statistics are severely lacking for Alaska Native men.  These disproportionate statistics stem directly from historical and trauma practiced by Westernization in United States, resulting in unresolved childhood trauma and maladaptive adult behaviors that are passed from one generation the next.  

Family violence amongst our Native families has created rifts between our people.  Sexual and physical violence has bred distrust of Native men and in many cases deep feelings of shame for those who remain unable to counter the abuse inflicted by a limited number of men. While there are Native men who do abuse, many more who do not and will not; more, there are those among us who long for a chance to take action to stop the abuse. The twin influences of defining our social issues as men abusing women and children and denying men the ability to make an impact is deeply destructive to our families creating instability in our Native communities.  

While the rates of violence and abuse can be overwhelming, the Victim to Warriors program offers real world solutions to address trauma, especially child trauma, that are based on traditional Alaska Native practices utilizing modern technology.  We do this by embracing the Victims, empowering the Survivors, and awakening the Warriors.  It is meant to be a three month biweekly group program that has 5 Core Concepts:

Core Concept 1. Historical Trauma and Generational Trauma are byproducts and catch all phrases for Historical Abuse and Generational Abuse.

Core Concept 2. Our cultural history is not one of child abuse.  Our heritage is that of a people that recognized the innate value, dignity, and rights of all living things, in particular, human beings.

Core Concept 3. Cultural activities and responses must adapt to changing times and conditions.  Our Cultural Values are sufficient to overcome Generational Trauma at the individual, familial and societal levels.

Core Concept 4. Culture is defined by the Values, traditions, and actions shared amongst a group: Generational Trauma has become a part of our Cultural Identity.

Core Concept 5. Indigenous people do not desire nor believe that Punishment and Condemnation works within family or community groups.  It is our belief that all people are redeemable if they work to reconcile to their victims.

While we strongly prefer building in person connections, the use of virtual meetings and online resources will be an integral part of our outreach, especially for rural areas who may not have access to attend group meetings in person.

Victims to Warriors will developed for Indigenous Alaskans but can easily be tailored for all First Nations people in the United States and we hope its success will be shared nationally and globally. 

Most attempts at healing depends on an individual working on their own healing.  While this can help to a point, it lacks the ability to assist those whose healing is dependent on the family members who abused them. In great part, most programs place the impetus of healing on the victims and fail to address the inherent phycological and emotional strain of reconciling to those who abused them and refused to admit it. This issue arises from the view that the outcomes of childhood trauma are individual issues when in fact that any act of child abuse is a family issue - that is to say, child abuse arises from family issues.  If a family does not address the family issues, every family member, including the victim, will suffer emotional and phycological stress.  In most cases the stress will be debilitating and become the driving force for an individual to seek help.

I would like to develop a program that takes into account the need for family reactions to childhood trauma and to equip those families to build resilience to social issues such as addictions and abuses. Core to this program will be developing the potential in our men and repairing the distrust between the men and women who are and will be parents themselves. While many programs that tackle the issue of family violence focus on sexual and physical violence, this tends to exclude men as participants in the program and focuses solely on how men are harming women.  This program will focus on relational abuse, which is the use of power to control another’s actions.  This view encompasses physical, sexual, emotional, spiritual, financial, custodial and mental abuses of power. It allows men and women to not only speak about their experiences with powerlessness and abuse, but also allows them to fully explore how all abuses of power relates to family dysfunction.

Restoring family and community connections is vital to the healing of our people.

As an male Alaskan Native Koyukon Athabascan counselor for over 15 years, I have extensive personal and interpersonal experience addressing the issues surrounding childhood and cultural abuse.  My own childhood is one of severe abuse and I understand the processes needed not only to survive but thrive physically, mentally, and spiritually.  I grew up in a family of 15 brothers and sisters along with my parents in a remote cabin in Interior Alaska.  Each of us had unique experiences but our trauma was felt as a family.  Through our shared pain I learned how to navigate the complex and painful dynamics of abuse in our home.  

Alaska Native men have the highest rate of suicide in the country and the need to engage men like me is critical.  The Native male population is too often overlooked, marginalized and stereotyped into a corner with little to no outside help to address their specific needs.  Like women, men are single parents, sexually abused, and suffer from domestic violence.  The mental health system in Alaska is sorely lacking Native male counselors and advisors.  I am a lifelong activist and believe the answers like within our people.

I have connected with hundreds of Alaska Native people living with trauma, including flying out to remote communities to offer services through counseling.  I also developed a program using the Fatherhood is Sacred, Motherhood is Sacred model that was accept and implemented by the Office of Child Services in Alaska.  With my experience in implementing the program and my years as a counselor I was able to build the foundation of Victims to Warriors.  I am eager to apply the program and gain feedback.

Abuse among our Alaska Native people has become ingrained in our communities.  The path to overcoming this issue has many roadblocks, with the biggest being our inability to talk openly and safely about within our families and our communities.  The worst outcome for an Alaskan Native is being shunned and ignored by the very community they depend on.  The cultural genocide of our people has left us scared, ashamed, inactive, and unhealed.  Overcoming the taboo of talking about abuse is central to our solving the problems it creates.  Making the unspeakable become speakable takes away its power. 

Location is another difficulty with many rural Alaska Native villages only accessible by boat or plane.  This creates logistical and financial challenges for implementing programs throughout our state.

It is my hope that Solve will provide the resources to impact abuse on a local, state, national scale, possibly a worldwide scale.  To do this I need financial help to be sure, but more than that is having the support and resources and of like minded activists.  I cannot do this alone and want to create a sustainable system that can be implemented anywhere.

As a Koyukon Athabascan, I was born and raised in Interior Alaska with no running water or electricity.  We lived off the land year round.  Survival was intimately connected to our surroundings and each other.  I became a potlatch hunter, providing food for countless celebrations, funerals and ceremonies.  I fostered over 40 Alaska Native children, mostly boys who are the highest risk of becoming statistics as talked about earlier.  I was Foster Parent of the Year in 2014 and my strong desire to advocate for children has not changed. In many was we have lost the deep connections that are meant to see us through our most difficult times.  Abuse is not specific to an area or group.  It connects us as a people and will be overcome if we take the right actions and work together.  I am deeply connected emotionally and spiritually on this issue.  I have hope for my people and believe we are the answer.