I never knew much about Buffy Sainte-Marie or cared for her music. She wrote one song that I kinda liked, the Charlatans version of Codine. I liked it enough to track down her version that I did not like. Her affected, machine-like vibrato was a real turn off. I figured Indian heritage had something to do with that but her music was badly dated coffee house folk singer schtick I couldn’t connect with.
When reports of her making up her Naive American heritage surfaced in late 2023, the reason her music hurt my ears clicked. The kitschy vibrato, the lumpy lyrics were her schtick niche, an early 1960’s idea of what an American Indian would sing and sing like. A limited talent whose Indian schtick gave her career early traction then became all as her recording career declined and she refocused on making a career as a fake professional Native American.
When I showed her picture to my Japanese partner who knew absolutely nothing about Buffy Sainte-Marie, he laughed saying, “is this white woman into American Indian cosplay or something?” Yep, a life of cosplay. He was incredulous that people fell for it when she was so clearly not American Indian. That will be her legacy people remember: a crazy American cosplaying white lady who dyed her hair and tanned excessively. Her music will be forgotten.
The CBC’s Fifth State documentary exposure of her ‘Pretendian’ lies was a shock to some, mostly Canadians, but more interesting to me was the former CBC darling attempting to preempt the documentary broadcast with a video statement claiming she might have been born ‘on the wrong side of the blanket’. For sure she was on the wrong side of something, clearly panicking, muddying waters for the sake of ‘protecting’ others.
She quickly scrubbed all Cree Piapot birth references from her online bio, an action that confused the Piapot First Nation acting Chief who said she could clear things up with a DNA test. Again she said she was “removing facts” because she had an “obligation to protect” her ‘supporters.’ Whoever they are…oh wait she’s talking about the mush heads who still fall for her con:
The CBC’s investigation has caused tremendous pain to many Indigenous people, particularly to Sainte-Marie’s Piapot family, who have reportedly suffered harassment since the investigation…It is the responsibility of journalists who cover these stories… to go beyond just “public interest,”… and whether they are leading us to a place of clarity and understanding. It can be true that Buffy Sainte-Marie is part of the Indigenous community by adoption and not by blood; in fact, recognizing Indigenous sovereignty requires us to learn to distinguish between the two…
<However…>
We cannot use her impact and relationships to excuse her lies, nor can we say that those lies negate her citizenship in Piapot.
MICHELLE CYCA “What’s the Point of “Pretendian” Investigations?”
What a hot mess. These are the kind of people who always say the same thing, ‘she did so much for native people,’ never explaining what it was she exactly did for them, ignoring that she helped herself the most. Yet they would gleefully massacre Buffy’s reputation if she wore a MAGA hat. Sane people call it enabling. Fortunately most people see the ruse for what it is, like Red Nation channel co-hosts Melanie Yazzie and Elena Ortiz on their January 8 episode, Buffy St. Marie and the violence of Pretendianism, coolly dismissing Buffy as, “just a white woman who dyes her hair and tans excessively.”
People in the indigenous community, the music industry, certainly the Sesame Street producers and CBC producers, knew the truth and swept it under the rug. Why stop now? Is Buffy more profitable to the media as a sinner than a saint? They will never come clean and take back the accolades and awards they showered on her all these years. That would piss off their sponsors, no money in that.
Buffy will never come clean either, never get a DNA test, or do any of that teary showbiz confession stuff. Not unless there’s lots of money in it. Living a lie is the only way she knows how to make a living. It’s like the famous kiss off line the lawyer tells her ungrateful bad egg client at the end of the classic Japanese 1982 movie Suspicion, “Well if that’s the only way you can make your living, make the best of it.”
She has the right to remain silent, but the weight of stolen accomplishments and accolades will only grow heavier with time. Like Elizabeth Sobieski discovered at the Academy Museum where Buffy’ Sainte-Marie’s bio lovingly lists every single exposed lie:
Buffy Sainte-Marie (b. 1941) was the first Indigenous person to win an Academy Award— Original Song, for “Up Where We Belong,” which she cowrote for An Officer and a Gentleman (USA,1982). She is a Cree musician, author, educator, and actor who was born in Canada and raised in the United States by adoptive parents. An activist whose songs often address the struggles of Indigenous peoples, Sainte-Marie was blacklisted by American radio stations who refused to play her music in the 1970s. Nevertheless, Sainte-Marie has prevailed with one of the longest running careers as a singer-songwriter in North America.
Sobieski matter of factly noted, “Buffy Sainte-Marie is about as Indigenous as Frank Sinatra.” A quick check of the Wikipedia entry for the song reveals then husband composer Jack Nitzsche and lyricist Will Jennings did the real composing, Buffy contributed the song title, if that. In other words her song credit, like her Academy Award, is pure Hollywood. How very Cosplay.
February 2025: Canada quietly stripped Buffy Sainte-Marie of her Order of Canada honor. A moot gesture at this point, nobody cares and only remember the giving. The former honorary Canadian was always and remains, an American citizen living in Hawaii.
March 2025: Billboard reports her Juno Awards and Canadian Music Hall Of Fame Induction were revoked. The Independent reports she said, “It was very lovely to host the medals for a while, but I return them with a good heart.” She also says Canada knew all along she was not a Canadian citizen…if so, that’s on Canada and makes it worse actually: they knew exactly what they were doing. I don’t think she’s lying, but she’s certainly trolling the Canadian institutions that pretended she was a Canadian. She went along with it of course, neatly illustrating how awards and medals are marketing, not honoring.
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