By Paige Dickerson
Today she visited the Quileute Tribal School.
She will also be on the beach Friday at twilight for a bonfire, pictures and time with fans who are visiting for Stephenie Meyer Weekend in the Forks area.
"Tinsel is giving back and sharing her gifts and talents with our Native youth."
Forks has declared this Saturday Stephenie Meyer Day and this weekend Stephenie Meyer Day Weekend. Let's all celebrate this great American!
For more on Korey, see Tinsel Korey Answers Critics and Tinsel Korey Comes Clean? For a previous visit to the Quileute rez, see Trimble Talks About Twilight and Twilight Fans at Quileute Days.
10 comments:
So what happened? I meant the reader of this blog who was there when the Hindu Tinsel Korey showed up? Did the person even bother spreading the truth? Challenged Korey? It may not be appropiate to some folks there but I would definately stand-up and tell the truth, especially to the chairwoman after reading her comments. If Korey is "sharing" anything, it might be about how to steal identities and become someone that you are not. Teaching the opposite of being yourself. My assumption.
GENO--
I am glad to see that more and more people are talking about this. Rob, thank you for these posts.
Look at this MySpace PM, sent in 2005:
http://tinypic.com/r/2mfg4tl/3
What's especially disgusting about this adoption lie is the fact that she is taking advantage of the fact that there are REAL adoptees out there who deal with very REAL struggles as a result of being taken away from their REAL families and their REAL cultures. Unlike her, though, since they ARE Native they do the work to find their families. You'd think someone with all that privilege and access and so many Native resources could do that, but there's nothing to find out since she ran away from own (REAL) Hindu family in Toronto to play nish in Vancouver. Now she is elbowing her way into communities down here in the U.S.
It is pretty telling that this fraud is so aggressive and convinced of her own 'indigeneity' she thinks she can "teach" Quileute youth anything. The amount of entitlement she feels to our cultures is DISTURBING - the fact that she is setting out to mislead Native kids under the guise of "teaching" them, a slap in the face to all Skins (aware or oblivious), especially true educators. Tinsel Korey is the embodiment of anti-Native values: lying, denial of one's history, disrespect of one's own family/culture AND of the very peoples she claims yet is not one of, ignorance of our customs and protocols and of her own place in this world (a South Asian daughter of immigrants, not an Indigenous woman). Not only that, she is merely patting herself on the back...not contributing anything of substance. I'd like to think she thought it was a good idea to "give back" to the very peoples and communities she is leeching off of. Of course, "giving back" would mean she'd have to own up and APOLOGIZE, an act you could never expect from a thieving, cowardly racist.
- m.
Oh, and one last thing -
When speaking of Timothy Patrick Barrus, a.k.a. 'Nasdijj', Sherman Alexie said, "The last act of colonialism is for the dominant culture to completely supplant the Native one." Nobody believed Alexie - an Indian, for chrissakes - when he questioned Barrus' alleged Navajo identity. It's a sad day when Native people who speak out against these liars are shot down and silenced, even after the imposters practically do the outing themselves. Tinsel "I can't keep my imagined identities/the nations I 'belong to' straight" Korey needs to be held accountable for the despicable things she's done in order to further herself and her masquerade of a career as an "Aboriginal actress/artist".
- m.
I'm not sure the "reader" read my blog until after Korey had come and gone. I'm reporting a lot of personal testimony, which isn't as convincing as hard evidence. And Korey is a Twilight actor who could inspire Quileute children whether she's Native or not.
In other words, I doubt the person had enough info or was in a position to challenge Korey. Besides, if the tribe made a mistake, it's arguably the tribe's fault, not Korey's. It would be rude (and not in keeping with Native values) to invite Korey and then confront her.
But things may be different next time. As they say, forewarned is forearmed.
Note that Paige Dickerson of the Peninsula News wrote two articles about Korey's visit. In the second article, she wrote, "Korey, who says she is from the Canadian tribe of Anishinaabe...." I took this as an implicit acknowledgment of the controversy surrounding Korey.
In the MySpace link you shared, M, Korey says, "As for the tribe question...I was adopted so I'm not quite sure. I was born in Toronto though, so a lot [of] people guess Ojibway."
If she's not sure which tribe she's from, is she sure she's Native? Based on what, exactly? Does she have any evidence that one or both of her birth parents were Native?
More to the point, if she was unsure in 2005, why is she talking as if she's sure in 2009? "I don't know if I'm Native or not" is a valid position. But I guess she won't get many Native roles if she admits she may not be Native.
Please someone produce some concrete evidence so all this anonymous posting is unnecessary!
Anonymous m has just produced the most convincing piece of conjecture so far but where is some proof?
I went to highschool with her. She went to William Lyon Mackenzie CI in Toronto, Ontario. Her birth name is Priti Zachariah and she was born in 1981.
The anonymous above is wrong. Tinsel Korey did go to William Lyon Mackenzie C.I, but her name is Harsha Patel, and she was born in March of 1980.
Harsha Patel?
OMG!
Anyone have a pic of her in High School?
Man, how is she getting away with this? And for so long. This is disgusting!
And she is getting so much press. Ugh. Someone needs to research and find out more!
She is gross. This is disgusting!
found this: http://harshapatel.tumblr.com/
I'm not going to discuss the here and there of previous posts regarding Tinsel. they speak for themselves. But I do want to say, that she was invited due to the role she played in a movie and not the role she plays as "native american." Whether she is or not, she was invited, and from what I have read, gave a very motivational talk and hung out w/ the children of the La Push area. Can we focus on the good of that visit?
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