Peace Pipe Dreams: The Truth about Lies about Indians

by Darrell Dennis

Darrell Dennis is a stereotype-busting, politically incorrect Native American/Aboriginal/Shuswap (Only he’s allowed to call himself an “Indian.” Maybe. Under some circumstances). With a large dose of humour and irreverence, he untangles some of the truths and myths about First Why do people think Natives get free trucks, and why didn’t he ever get one? Why does the length of your hair determine whether you’re good or bad? By what ratio does the amount of rain in a year depend on the amount of cactus liquor you consume?

In addition to answering these burning questions, Dennis tackles some tougher subjects. He looks at European-Native interactions in North America from the moment of first contact, discussing the fur trade, treaty-signing and the implementation of residential schools. Addressing misconceptions still widely believed today, Dennis explains why Native people aren’t genetically any more predisposed to become alcoholics than Caucasians; that Native religion doesn’t consist of worshipping rocks, disappearing into thin air, or conversing with animals; and that tax exemptions are so limited and confusing that many people don’t even bother.

Employing pop culture examples, personal anecdote and a cutting wit, Darrell Dennis deftly weaves history with current events to entertain, inform and provide a convincing, readable overview of First Nations issues and why they matter today.

Genres: Nonfiction, Indigenous, Canada, History, Politics, Humor, Book Club

240 pages, Kindle Edition

First published October 18, 2014

Reviews

[Kate · Rating 5 out of 5]

Yes, this book should definitely be required reading in all Canadian schools. The way I learned about First Nations people was pretty much all pre-colonial. Before settlers came, there were Native folk! In high school, I learned a little bit about how Aboriginal people were screwed over, but nothing about how they are living now. It definitely felt like they all disappeared at some point. As an adult, of course I've heard all the stereotypes that First Nations people get government handouts that the rest of us don't get, they don't have to pay taxes, their leadership is corrupt and that's why all the money sent their way is wasted, they're alcoholics, they should just accept the fact that Canada exists now and stop complaining about things that happened so long ago. I've always tried to argue against these stereotypes and opinions while not really understanding how the treaties worked or how to explain that tax exemptions aren't worth all the other bullshit. Next time, I'm just going to refer everyone to this book. The subtitle of this book is exactly right; I learned so much that I didn't know about "the truth about lies about Indians". I also love the tone of this book. It's surprisingly light for being so sarcastic and about something so heavy.

Here's a passage that explains how the land and treaty process works:
"Let's say you walk into McDonald's and order a Big Mac. You hand over your money and get a receipt. You now have an agreement that in exchange for your money you will receive a Big Mac. Five minutes goes by, then another five minutes, and before you know it you have been waiting over three centuries. Finally you approach the cashier and demand your delinquent Big Mac. The cashier asks to see your receipt, which you promptly display. He then informs you that you need to prove that the original intent of the receipt was a promise to provide you with a Big Mac. 'After all, that receipt is from three centuries ago. It could have meant anything.' To top it off, the other customers around you are receiving their Big Macs, no questions asked, and they're shouting at you: 'Get over it and move on. Quit looking for free handouts!' So you take McDonald's to court and their lawyers are happy to stretch out the proceedings until you are flat broke because they know if you could actually afford a legal battle, you wouldn't be eating at McDonald's in the first place."

[Jim Davis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sardonuc humour and grim facts refute myths about First Nations people

A great first book for people who want to understand the history of and present challenges for First Nations/Aboriginal/Native people. It's hard to talk about genocide without bitterness, Dennis makes you laugh or at least groan at his jokes, but the topic is serious. The only downside is that sometimes he uses the jokes get repetive and even disruptive to the narrative. This book focused more on Canada then the US or the rest of the continent, but even Americans can benefit from it. Read it and then demand that your government honour the existing treaties.

[Teena in Toronto · Rating 3 out of 5]

Gord had read this book a couple weeks ago and said it was interesting so I thought I'd check it out.

The author is a First Nations Canadian comedian, actor, screenwriter and radio personality from the Secwepemc Nation in the interior of British Columbia. He has written this book to describe the truths and untruths about the First Nations.

The chapters include:
* Native Names - there was a lot of coverage on what is the politically correct way to refer to the First Nations
* Native Perceptions: The European Point of View
* Native Perceptions: The North American Point of View
* Natives and Alcohol
* Religion & Residential Schools
* Treaties
* Native Land
* Native Government
* The Future

There is a lot of serious indepth information but the writing style is funny and sardonic. You either enjoy his sense of humour or you don't. There is a lot of history and it's a definitely a book you want to read if you want to know more about the First Nations. It gave me a better understanding of their situation ... they have definitely been ripped off over the centuries which is sad.

One thing that bugged me was I came across some information that was incorrect. The author said the War of 1812 was between Canada and France. Wrong!! It was between Great Britain and the U.S. When I read that, it made me start to wonder what else was incorrect in the book and I lost confidence in the author.

Blog review post: http://www.teenaintoronto.com/2016/01...

[Kathleen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Peace Pipe Dreams: the Truth about Lies about Indians by Darrell Dennis

In the section A Note on Sources, Dennis writes, " Peace Pipe Dreams is meant to be a quick and dirty introduction to the truth behind the stereotypes, and one of it's central messages is, font believe everything you read about Indians.".

Darrell Dennis looks at European-Native interactions in North America from the moment of first contact, discussing the fur trade, treaties and residential schools. Dennis explains that Native people aren't genetically predisposed to alcoholism, that Native religion doesn't consist of worshipping rocks, and that tax exemptions are so limited that many people don't bother.
Employing pop culture, personal anecdote and a cutting wit, Darrell Dennis deftly weaves history with current events to provide a readable overview of First Nations issues and a convincing argument for why they matter today. 4 stars ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

[riley · Rating 5 out of 5]

Similar in a way to Thomas King’s, The Inconvenient Indian. I found Peace Pipe Dreams to be more direct, approachable, and organized. I also very much appreciated the focus on Canada.

[Randy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I suggest this should be a must-read for all Canadians. The lighter tone of the text should not distract the reader from the important and informative message the author is communicating. This book can help to inform all Canadians and give a more realistic perspective on the issues facing First Nations people in this country.

[eMiLy · Rating 4 out of 5]

The author's narrative style is hilarious and easy to follow. It should be a required reading for Canadian history classes. It provides a much-needed crash course and perspective not found in my own education.

[Jasmine · Rating 3 out of 5]

I would say this is a book that all settler Canadians should read, but I feel that it borrowed too heavily from The Inconvenient Indian by Thomas King for me to give it that distinction. The excerpt on the back cover of Peace Pipe Dreams, the joke about about Tolkien and "One word to rule them all and in political correctness bind them"? Yeah, pretty much that exact same joke is on page 83 of The Inconvenient Indian. The books are similar in other regards, although Dennis does cover different territory; he delves more deeply into treaties and current day conditions on reserves, which I appreciated. The writing wasn't particularly strong; the humour wasn't very funny, so this ended up being much more of a straight-up nonfiction look at Indigenous-settler relations, which is not necessarily a bad thing. I definitely learned quite a bit, and would probably still recommend it (although I would recommend Thomas King first!).

[Mortira · Rating 5 out of 5]

First and foremost, I feel that this book ought to be required reading for anyone that teaches social studies in Canadian schools.

Otherwise, I think any and every Canadian should sit down and read Peace Pipe Dreams. It was all at once informative, infuriating, charming and hilarious. How Darrell Dennis manages to tackle intense and often tragic topics with such wit and grace is beyond me. I was grinding my teeth one moment, and guffawing or giggling the next. The satirical delivery of our twisted history was enlightening to say the least, and I finished the book feeling like I was a slightly more useful member of our unique society for having done so.

[Fahula · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an important read for Canadians. The author’s matter-of-fact and humorous style makes this book easy to digest.

[Mika N · Rating 5 out of 5]

Put simply, Darrell Dennis’ book Peace Pipe Dreams: The Truth about Lies about Indians is very well executed. It is comprehensive and intelligible with hints of wit and sarcasm. The relationship between the North American governments and First Peoples is a long and complex history that can’t be fully summed up in Dennis' 230 page book. However, it is a wonderful starting point to learn about First Nations issues and culture across North America, particularly Canada. Dennis covers 9 main topics, one in each chapter: Native Names, Native Perceptions: The European Point of View, Native Perceptions: The North American Point of View, Natives and Alcohol, Religion and Residential Schools, Treaties, Native Land, Native Government and The Future. Peace Pipe Dreams helped me to contextualize things I have been taught or learned about through the news.

There were many things that shocked me when reading Peace Pipe Dreams, but the biggest one may have been the unemployment rate on reserves and finding out that in some communities “the unemployment rate can be as high as ninety-five percent” (218). Dennis’ writing style flows extremely well and his incorporation of jokes and modern references such as using “Mean Girls to reference linguistic origins” brings some lightness to otherwise heavy topics (23). I really appreciated this about Peace Pipe Dreams because it made it so I could sit down and read it in longer chunks of time, and makes the information more accessible to a wider range of people. It is likely that issues like the under-funding of reserves and the AANDC will get worse before they improve. However, “not since first contact have Native people been so active, so prepared and so ready to change perceptions” which gives me hope that things will get better (229).

Every Canadian should read Peace Pipe Dreams: The Truth about Lies about Indians. White colonizers must read Peace Pipe Dreams. Canada is supposedly on the path of reconciliation, however there is still so much work to be done. While a lot of it needs to be done by the government, regular people must also decolonize some of our thought processes and embrace First Nations cultures. Peace Pipe Dreams: The Truth about Lies about Indians is the perfect place to start.

[Phoenix · Rating 4 out of 5]

Myth Conceptions

In a book that's funny, angry, laid back and informative at the same time, Darrel Dennis rants, riffs and puns his way through a minefield of harmful stereotypes that have been held about North America's largest invisible visible minority. His first subject is the problem of politically correct naming of First Nations, and even he has run into problems. "Indian" for the non-native is totally un-PC, as one of my children recently and vociferously reminded a tour guide, but acceptable within native communities, and at times even embraced, especially as the term is legally embedded into treaty rights with Canadian and American governments.

One of Dennis' big issues is stereotypes about drugs and alcohol. Natives are statistically no better or worse than northern Europeans in this respect, nor is there a genetic disposition. Another is the too high suicide rate in native populations attributed to structural social and economic disadvantages. No less important is his discussion abuse of native children and their communities perpetrated by the system of residential schools which occurred in Canada, the US and Australia. This is a shameful episode in our collective history on this continent that needs to be acknowledged.

There's lots of good information and argumentation. Recommended for personal reading and school libraries where it should be put on display so that both teachers and students get a chance to see it and read it. The argumentation excellent, but it could be improved with a more extensive bibliography of sources used instead of Dennis' advice to just look it up on the Internet. Many of the examples of legal inequality that Dennis covers are Canadian, so possibly he should consider an edition with more Americanized references for the US market.

Recommended!

[Cathryn Wellner · Rating 5 out of 5]

Darrell Dennis comes from people whose unceded land is not far from where I have been living for the past decade and a half. So I was particularly interested in reading what he had to see about the "truth about lies about Indians" so prevalent in settler culture. The bad news is, I came away totally mystified as to how we will ever reach true reconciliation. The good news, I finished the book determined to figure out my own complicity and what part I can play in reconciliation.

Dennis is a humorist and throws a lot of laugh-worthy curve balls while he lays out his arguments. His anger bubbles below the surface and regularly explodes. I get it. I come from a long line of people whose beliefs were such triggers for the people around them they were perpetually on the run. My people helped invade the Americas because they were not tolerated where they were. That does not excuse their cluelessness toward the people they encountered.

So here we are, occupiers in a land that was never meant to be ours. We've done a pretty thorough job of trashing it. And somehow the indigenous people around us have been resilient enough to hang onto some pretty excellent ideas as to how we can treasure this land and each other.

Canada likes to think of itself as color blind, but that doesn't extend to indigenous peoples or people of color. So...we need talented, passionate writers like Darrell Dennis to give us a swift kick in the patoot. We are on this land together, but we are not sharing this land as we should. Thanks to writers like Dennis, we may learn enough to shake us out of complacency and onto the path of real reconciliation.

[Hélène · Rating 3 out of 5]

I wanted to have a better understanding of what is going on with the aboriginals on reserve and off reserve in Canada and how it works with the government and Aboriginal (Indigenous now) "special rights". And also the story behind this complicated relationship between our communities.
I'm not from Canada so I don't know well Canada history.
Thank to that book, it's more clear and I'm glad for that. But! It was so hard to read...the author took a sarcastic tone most of the time and sometimes it was a bit annoying, really. Also a lot of repetitions and of course a lot of references to laws and treaties which is normal to explain the history and all the political things we tried to do to assimilate them. Because of that, I find it hard to stay focus but the subject was really important for me so I persevered. Now I am more knowledgeable and I can talk about it with less fear of saying something stupid or disrespectful. That's why I recommend this book for all the knowledge you will get even if it's not a cake walk ;)

[Ryan · Rating 4 out of 5]

In Peace Pipe Dreams, Darrell Dennis attempts to dispel lies and stereotypes about First Nations with an engaging and humorous irreverence. He is informative but not overbearing, which is not to say any issue this book explores is simple. These concerns involve multiple communities with distinct cultural, political, geographic, bureaucratic, and legal details and histories -- this list of adjectives could be expanded. I worry that malice contributes to these stereotypes, as do indifference and ignorance, but nearly every issue Dennis explores here surprised me in its complexity. In other words, one takeaway that I expect to endure having read this book is to be wary of the "pan-Indian" concept. I have also recently read Lynda Gray's First Nations 101, and I found this the more readable primer.

[Mariel · Rating 5 out of 5]

A thoroughly enjoyable and important read! Darrell Dennis's writing is brisk and engaging. His warmth and sense of humour makes even larger volumes of information feel "readable." Many topics (particularly stereotypes) are approached with levity, and serious topics are rendered with sensitivity.

I really appreciated Dennis's content in terms of specifics (historical and legal background, etc - all concise and made accessible even to people with minimal prior knowledge) but I most appreciated the shifts in thinking he introduces and emphasizes. Dennis situates what many settlers may considers to be a bygone "past" as a present of continued impacts and a present, continued responsibility of reconciliation. For example, understanding that Canada as we know it - its riches, resources, wealth, and power - were made possible by treaties with Indigenous nations (and of course, there's much to be said about the gross unfairness in how these treaties were communicated and executed) helps illuminate how we (all Canadians) are "treaty people" and the beneficiaries of such treaties. Thus, it is the responsibility of all Canadians to work towards reconciliation actively and continuously.

This book was an engaging, accessible primer to the history of Canada's relationship - past AND present - with the Indigenous Peoples of Turtle Island.

[Lindsey · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book is incredibly informative and works to dismantle systemic racism and stereotypes that First Nations, Métis and Inuit people face in Canada. It is not meant to be read in one sitting, but requires time for digestion and contemplation. It does read dry in many places and is redundant in others. It would appeal to an adult audience who already holds knowledge or interest in historical and contemporary relations that have existed and still exist between the Crown, Canada and Indigenous Nations.

[Anna Bunce · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is excellent. While previously I was recommending "Inconvenient Indian" Thomas King to people who were interested in developing a better understanding of Indigenous issues in Canada/North America, I think this book will be the one I recommend first. Humorous and EXTREMELY accessible, this is the book you could recommend to your offensive uncle and he'd probably enjoy it. Great read, even for someone who has a good knowledge base on Indigenous issues.

[Jennifer · Rating 4 out of 5]

So much important information, this is one book that a person could read multiple times and still not get it all. Canada’s relationship with our indigenous people groups is complex and, quite frankly, ugly with centuries of broken promises, abuse, manipulation, and under-handed deals. If we can understand the truth about “what should have been” we can better understand how to make things right today and in the future.

[Kari Heggen (checkedoutbooks) · Rating 4 out of 5]

I listened to the audio and the authors tone worked really well with that, I'm not sure his humor would have worked as well in print, probably would have come across as fairly condescending. This was a great book, I wouldn't consider myself uneducated on the plight of Native Americans in North America (this book focuses heavily on Canada) but I learned a lot of new things listening to this. I enjoyed the levity and realism this book brought to the table and would recommend it!

[Darlene · Rating 4 out of 5]

The author's relaxed tone and dry wit makes the busting of stereotypes less volatile and more an opportunity to understand just how nonsensical some of the things out there are. At the same time, you get a good understanding about how belief in these stereotypes has shaped Canadian policy for the worse. 4.5 stars

[Catherine · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5/5
It started out with a bang for me…. Very enlightening, amusing and quite interesting. I tore through the first half of the book and then it became so tedious I could only read a couple of pages a day. I ended up skimming the last 30 pages because it was too detailed for me. I did learn a lot though.

[TYLER · Rating 4 out of 5]

Has some lashful undertones stereotypical of comedians (comedy often disguising ang healing hurt). Although arduous at times with Social Studies textbook type bold headings and information relayed underneath each bold title, the author shows resilience to coming off as too much of a bitter Betty.Worth reading with a genuine and forthright voice.

[Siobhan Ward · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book felt well-written and honest. I kind of thought it was going to be more tongue-in-cheek humor, but it was such an informative read. I learned a lot, mostly about how little has changed. This was written back in 2014 - and so little has changed since then. We still have the same problems in Canada and no real progress has been made, so that was pretty stunning to realize.

[Denise Goodkey · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting read about how Canada has treated Indigenous people over the years. It is a little bit dated, and there are better books ( An Inconvenient Indian ) but it is still with a read as the author covers some material that isn't found everywhere.

[Joanna K · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent, easy to read book with a ton of sarcastic humor which uncovers so many falsely held assumptions as well as falsehoods media has ‘taught’ me. So glad to have read this for deeper understanding of the history of Indigenous people and Canada.

[Joan · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’m always grateful to expand beyond my settler understandings and this book had a lot of good information about treaties, the Indian act, taxes and reserve money presented in a way that was very readable.

[Nicole · Rating 4 out of 5]

Definitely worth the read. The hypocrisy in our governments dealings with our First Nations is beyond comprehension.

[Jessie · Rating 3 out of 5]

3/5 stars
A very informative book. I enjoyed some parts more the others but this book for sure filled many gaps in my Canadian history education.

[Ashley Michaud · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book, funny and informative - this was just what I needed when and how I needed it :) thank you Darrell f sharing your message