Ojibwe film critic pans Disney portrayal of Tonto
The problem with The Lone Ranger's Tonto
Controversy surrounds Johnny Depp's portrayal of native sidekick
CBC News
Posted: Jul 2, 2013 2:43 PM ET
http://thumbnails.cbc.ca/maven_legac...p-04669234.jpg
As Hollywood unveils its much-hyped remake of The Lone Ranger, controversy surrounds Johnny Depp's portrayal of Tonto, the title character's Native American sidekick.
A-lister Depp says he is of Cherokee heritage and that he consulted with native leaders about the role. In 2012, LaDonna Harris of the Comanche Nation adopted the American actor into the tribe as an honorary member. Still, some are calling his performance yet another insensitive, stereotypical portrayal of an indigenous person.
Despite some valiant efforts by The Lone Ranger's producers to modernize the tale, "in the characterization of Tonto they've taken a rather dramatic step backwards in terms of representation of First Nations peoples onscreen," says film and pop culture commentator Jesse Wente, who is also a member of the Ojibwa Nation.
See video here: http://www.cbc.ca/news/arts/story/20...ger-tonto.html
"Movies where we have 'redface' going on are essentially inappropriate in this day and age. We've come to that conclusion with so many other cultures and races and yet there's an issue in terms of getting over that mountain with First Nations people."
In the video above, Wente talks to CBC's Jelena Adzic about why The Lone Ranger's revamped Tonto remains inappropriate. The Lone Ranger is released in theatres on Wednesday.
More on the subject of stereotypes like Disney Tonto
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Stereotypes hold back Native Americans, panel says
15 HOURS AGO • DANIEL SIMMONS-RITCHIE JOURNAL STAFF
Speaking about everything from Tonto to the Washington Red Skins, a panel of experts in Native American media spoke Monday night about the perpetuation of racist stereotypes in American society and their impact on the nation's five million Native Americans.
The panel of five members, several of whom are connected with the Native Sun News, a Native American newspaper based in Rapid City, addressed a crowd of about 150 people in a lecture hall at the School of Mines in a discussion that spanned the history of Native American representation in news, advertising and popular media.
Brandon Ecoffey, a member of the Oglala Lakota tribe and a managing editor of the Native Sun News, said that since European colonization, philosophers and early writers framed Native Americans as marginal human beings.
He said those images have morphed into equally narrow stereotypes through the last century, from the depictions of Native Americans crying when they see litter cast on the ground in the 1970s to the feather-headed mascot of the Washington Redskins.
"It's really a legacy that's been established for hundreds of years," he said.
Ecoffey said those images continued to have real implications for Native Americans. If the public views Native Americans as caricatures, that is how they will be treated by policy-makers.
"Do cartoons sign treaties?" he asked the crowd.
On that same note, Karin Eagle, a former staff writer for the Native Sun News, pointed to Tonto, the Native American character who appeared in the Lone Ranger, a fictional series that spanned TV, books, and radio from 1933.
"We weren't really portrayed as unique, individual, people," she said. "We were just caricatures. We were just there to help the story along, when we have our own stories."
The Lone Ranger will be revived this year as Hollywood film with Johnny Depp starring as Tonto. The film has already drawn criticism for its portrayal of the Comanche tribe.
Elizabeth Cook-Lynn, Hunkpati and Ihanktonwan Dakota and professor emerita of American Indian Studies at Eastern Washington University, said that perhaps the most common ongoing misrepresentation of Native Americans is that they are a homogeneous group.
"The most damaging stereotype is that an Indian, is an Indian, is an Indian," she said. "That's a stereotype. There are 500 tribes alive and well in this world and we are all different from each other."
Cook-Lynn said changing those portrayals of Native Americans in mainstream media was no easy feat, given the concentration of the media in the hands of non-Indians.
Addressing a group of students in the room, she emphasized the importance of learning Native American history and challenging misrepresentations when they appear.
"The power that the media has is only what we give it," she said. "I want every student in here to think about that."
Other critics weigh in -- Please post your reviews once you see this movie
I have to say I want to see it, it sounds just like an old timey cowboys and Indians shoot -em up to me. I used to love them, Saturday matinee, 15 cents to get in plus a nickel for a bag of root beer barrels from Woolworth's. Kids throwing their popcorn boxes up to silhouette on the screen and honking their Good 'n' Plenty boxes... All good fun, and the only way to see any Indians at all in movies, but boy, did it mess up my self image and confuse the other kids at school.
The Unforgiving: Ten Savage Disses of 'The Lone Ranger'
ICTMN Staff July 02, 2013
The Lone Ranger, starring Johnny Depp as Tonto, opens tomorrow. It has been, quite easily, the most debated piece of entertainment in Indian country for the past year. But among critics, there is little debate:This, they say,is not a good movie. At the review-agregating site Rotten Tomatoes, which provides a rating based on critical consensus, The Lone Ranger enjoys a 17% approval [[and falling—it started the day with 20%).Ranger's box-office competition is faring much better:Despicable Me 2, also opening tomorrow, scores 80%, while the top three earners in theaters now,Monsters University,The Heat, andWorld War Z, enjoy respective 78%, 62%, and 68% favorable ratings.
It seems to happen every year: Critics so gleefully attack one particular film that it seems almost a contest to see who can deliver the best zinger. Here are some of the nominees.
Joe Neumaier,New York Daily News:"Even Johnny Depp can’t save the day":
"Director Gore Verbinski’sThe Lone Ranger is for anyone who thought the Native American guy from the Village People and a western-wear model would make the perfect blockbuster-action team."
Michael Phillips,Chicago Tribune:"The Lone Ranger: Western is Completely at Sea":
"In scenes such as hundreds of Natives being slaughtered by U.S. troops behind Gatling guns, we have Tonto and the Lone Ranger acting like a couple of comic-relief ninnies, screwing around aimlessly for laughs on a handcar. It's as if the movie were having a nervous breakdown. At one point the masked man gets his head dragged through horse manure. WatchingThe Lone Ranger, you know the feeling."
Mick LaSalle,San Francisco Chronicle:"The Lone Rangerreview: Lawman turns antihero":
"The Lone Rangeris a movie for the whole family ... to avoid. It represents 2 1/2 of the longest hours on record, a jumbled botch that is so confused in its purpose and so charmless in its effect that it must be seen to be believed, but better yet, no. Don't see it, don't believe it, not unless a case of restless leg syndrome sounds like a fun time at the movies."
Jack Coyle, Associated Press:"The Lone Rangeris a Runaway Train":
"There's a limit, it turns out, to how much Johnny Depp and a bucket of makeup can accomplish."
Two Jews on Film, StarPulse.com:"Johnny Depp Is More Jack Sparrow Than Native American Warrior Tonto":
"At times [Johnny Depp] sounded like a bad Catskills comedian instead of a Native American warrior."
Alonso Duralde, The Wrap:"The Lone Ranger: Hi-Yawn Silver, Awaaaay!":
"Depp's presence in the movie actively undercuts our investment in the Lone Ranger as a character, much less as a hero. Imagine Christopher Nolan casting Joan Rivers as Alfred in theDark Knight movies so she could follow around Batman and make jokes about his ridiculous outfit."
Bob Mondello, NPR: "A Familiar Wild West, But The Guy In The Mask? Who's He?":
"The script fancies itself a critique of capitalism, a manifesto on manifest destiny, and a saga about silver mines and the slaughter of Native Americans. All very admirable, if not a great fit for scenes that involve Depp communing with snaggle-toothed cannibal bunny rabbits and taking a runaway train ride or six."
William Bibbiani, Crave Online:"At Least Armie Hammer is Good":
"There’s something about concluding the massacre of hundreds of Native Americans with a cheap joke about a horse in a funny hat that rubs me the wrong way. The Lone Ranger tries so hard to be every kind of movie at once that it ends up being no kind of movie at all."
Ty Burr,Boston Globe:"Who Was That Masked Man? Who Cares.":
"Gore Verbinski’s bloated, $250 million western comedy is like watching an elephant tap dance in your living room: Everything gets trampled and the dancing’s not very good."
All harsh words—but perhaps no reviewer comes down harder onThe Lone Rangerthan this guy:
Drew McWeeny, HitFix: "Johnny Depp and Gore Verbinski Fail to Bring The Lone Ranger Back to Life":
"At two-and-a-half hours, it may be the single most punishing experience I've had in a theater so far this year. ... Let's be clear: this is a terrible film by any standards. ... When you cut from the violent genocide of an entire Indian tribe to a wacky scene with Silver the horse standing on a tree branch and wearing a cowboy hat, it's pretty clear you have no idea what story you're telling or why. ... Someone needs to drag this thing out behind the barn and put a silver bullet in its brain."
Read more athttp://indiancountrytodaymedianetwor...-ranger-150249
White Buffalo Woman -- The Time is NOW
Four White Buffalo calves born in the last two decades, including one in northern Michigan, are seen as a sign that the time of greatest need is upon us.
Floyd “Looks for Buffalo” Hand, an Oglala Lakota spiritual interpreter who has since become known as the messenger of the White Buffalo Woman, is one of the truest believers. In a recent book, Learning Journey on the Red Road, he says he had a vision of the spirit woman shortly before Miracle’s 1994 birth. She told him she’d be coming when the cherries were black [[around August) to bring a final chance for reason. Then, he was told, we’d get a chance to examine what we’d done wrong, like polluting the earth, along with a chance to make things right.
http://www.mynorth.com/My-North/Febr...4gU6I.facebook
Anyone remember Romanik's Ranch off I-75 near the Cheboygan exit? From the article:
The Romaniks were just looking for that All-American symbol of the West to supplement a small tourist-oriented game park in Mackinaw City when they bought their first buffalo 20 years ago. At that time, they weren’t even sure bison still existed in the United States, so small were their numbers across the nation. Walt eventually tracked some down and came home one day with 23—instead of the one that wife Marilyn was hoping for. Their tourist park and Christmas tree farm grew to include a bison herd now numbering about 200 animals, an elk ranch, and a profitable meat processing business.
A white buffalo was born on Romanik's farm in 1997.
Walt Romanik died two years ago in July 2011, and his wife died in 2006:
http://www.stonefuneralhomeinc.com/f...28&fh_id=11514
In the early 80’s he began raising buffalo and elk, a ranch that grew to encompass Romanik’s Ranch, an agro-tourism business open to the public.
Today, the ranch is for sale, no word on the status of No. 19, the now 16 year old white buffalo.
http://houseworthrealty.com/photos/v...G?m=1362964572http://houseworthrealty.com/photos/v...G?m=1362964562
http://www.houseworthrealty.com/Ranch/
True history -- How the Founding Fathers Despised the Victims of their Greed
Nice Day for a Genocide: Shocking Quotes on Indians By U.S. Leaders, Pt 1
ICTMN Staff, July 10, 2013
These quotes about Indians from American leaders span from the 1750s to 1817.
Stay tuned next week for Part 2.
Benjamin Franklin, from his autobiography, 1750s
“If it be the design of Providence to extirpate these Savages in order to make room for cultivators of the Earth, it seems not improbable that rum may be the appointed means.”
Orders of George Washington to General John Sullivan, May 31, 1779
“The immediate objectives are the total destruction and devastation of their settlements and the capture of as many prisoners of every age and sex as possible. It will be essential to ruin their crops in the ground and prevent their planting more.”
Governor William Henry Harrison, of the Indiana Territory [[1800-1812)
while defending displacement of the Indians
“Is one of the fairest portions of the globe to remain in a state of nature, the haunt of a few wretched savages, when it seems destined by the Creator to give support to a large population and to be the seat of civilization?”
John Quincy Adams, 1802, when rationalizing territorial imperatives as God’s will
“What is the right of the huntsman to the forest of a thousand miles over which he has accidentally ranged in quest of prey? Shall the fields and vallies, which a beneficent God has formed to teem with the life of innumerable multitudes, be condemned to everlasting barrenness?”
President Thomas Jefferson, The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, December 29, 1813
“This unfortunate race, whom we had been taking so much pains to save and to civilize, have by their unexpected desertion and ferocious barbarities justified extermination and now await our decision on their fate.”
James Monroe, in a letter to Andrew Jackson, October 5, 1817
“The hunter or savage state requires a greater extent of territory to sustain it, than is compatible with the progress and just claims of civilized life, and must yield to it. Nothing is more certain, than, if the Indian tribes do not abandon that state, and become civilized, that they will decline, and become extinct. The hunter state, tho maintain’d by warlike spirits, presents but a feeble resistance to the more dense, compact, and powerful population of civilized man.”
Read more athttp://indiancountrytodaymedianetwor...-part-1-150362
Sweat lodge killer on parole
Sweat lodge leader James Arthur Ray leaves prison
- Associated Press in Flagstaff
- guardian.co.uk, Friday 12 July 2013 21.07 EDT
An author who saw his self-help business crash after he led a sweat lodge ceremony that left three people dead was paroled from prison on Friday after serving nearly two years for negligent homicide convictions.
James Arthur Ray, 55, was freed from the state prison near Phoenix. Nothing in his conditions of release prohibits him from holding self-help seminars or conducting another sweat lodge ceremony, but his brother said Ray has no immediate plans to resurrect his business.
However, Jon Ray didn't rule out the possibility in the future, maintaining the deaths weren't his brother's fault.
"At this point, he wants to get out and hide out, and start putting his life back together, which has been completely turned upside down," he told AP earlier this week. "I say that with all due respect because I know a lot of people's lives have been turned upside down because of this unfortunate incident."
The tragedy occurred after dozens of people travelled to a scenic retreat just outside Sedona in October 2009 for James Arthur Ray's five day "Spiritual Warrior" event.
The sweat lodge was the culminating event, touted as "hellacious hot" and a chance for participants to have powerful breakthroughs.
Things started going wrong about halfway through the two hour ceremony. When it was over, a 38-year-old man and a 40-year-old man were dead, and 18 others injured.
Another 49-year-old man slipped into a coma and died after more than a week in the hospital.
At the trial, prosecutors said Ray ratcheted up the heat to dangerous levels, ignored pleas for help, and watched as overcome participants were dragged out of the sweat lodge.
A jury acquitted him of more serious manslaughter charges and convicted him of negligent homicide. He served 85 percent of the concurrent two year terms for each of the deaths. Ray has appealed the convictions, alleging that errors by the prosecution tainted the case.
Ray has acknowledged that he was responsible for the deaths but offered no excuses for his lack of action as the chaos unfolded at the sweat lodge. He and his attorneys said Ray would have stopped the ceremony had he known people were dying or in distress.
None of the victims' families believes that 20 months was a sufficient sentence. They have said they would rather not see Ray in the self-help industry, or he should at least be more accountable for his actions.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013...-leader-prison
Code Talker David Patterson among the vets honored at All Star Game tonight
http://ictmncdn1.tgpstage1.com/sites...dpatterson.jpg
Veterans were honored at the MLB All-Star Game July 16 at Citi Field in Queens, New York [[despite the home club New York Mets offending American Indians this week**). And one of those is Navajo Code Talker David Patterson. He represented the Los Angeles Dodgers at the event.
David E. Patterson Sr. of Rio Rancho, N.M., is among an elite group of marines who helped create the only unbroken code in modern military history. As one of the Navajo Code Talkers, David and other Navajos coded and decoded classified military dispatches during WWII using a code derived from their native tongue. The Code Talkers took part in every Marine assault, from Guadalcanal in 1942 to Okinawa in 1945, including the Marshall Islands, Kwajalein, Iwo Jima, and Saipan, and doubtless helped win the war. After he was discharged, David, now 90, went to college in Oklahoma and New Mexico, becoming a social worker. He married and raised his family on the reservation in Shiprock, N.M., and worked for the Navajo Nation's Division of Social Services until retiring in 1987. He was awarded the Silver Congressional Medal of Honor in 2001 and up until last year volunteered in a Shiprock school on the Navajo Reservation as a foster grandparent.
http://indiancountrytodaymedianetwor...ar-game-150368
** Mets denied an American Indian Heritage Day at their park because they didn't want to offend upcoming rivals, the Atlanta Braves. http://indiancountrytodaymedianetwor...-braves-150354
OK, Francis, time to deal with this load of Bull
Your institution started it, time to get it rolling in the right direction, finally.
Why Papal Bull Claiming Dominion Over Non-Christian Lands Still Matters
Steven Newcomb
August 03, 2013
This past May, I went to the Archives of the Indies in Seville, Spain to see the original documents issued by Pope Alexander VI in 1493, and to see the original Requerimiento [[‘the Requirement’) issued by the Spanish crown government in 1513, 500 years ago this year. The archives director was kind enough to let us see the two original papal bulls. [[I traveled with Dr. Debra Harry [[Paiute Nation) and attorney Sharon Venne [[Cree Nation).
The Requerimiento was written to formally notify the original and free nations in places such as Panama and elsewhere in ‘the Americas’ that they were required by the right of the Bible, the Crown, and the Sword to hand themselves over to Christian domination in the form of the Catholic Church and the Spanish crown.
What do I mean by domination? Domination is arbitrary and unrestrained-control exerted by one person or group over another person or group, or exerted by one nation or people over another. Arbitrary means you get to make it up as you go, on the basis of “whim” or “fancy,” meaning “a fanciful idea.” Given that a whim is “a sudden desire or change of mind,” domination is accurately defined as a presumption of being required to obey the desires and ideas of others, until a habit of obedience is well established. The T-shirt slogan “Obey” is missing a conclusion: “Obey the Domination.”
Around 235 A.D., the Roman Empire entered a phase of despotism that historians of the period term "the Dominate." A couple of years ago a Latin scholar told me that the Dominate translates in English into "domination over everything." Alternatively, it could be phrased "everyone and everything under domination."
Today, overwhelming evidence in the context of the U.S. [[the Patriot Acts I and II, the Authorization of Use of Force, The National Defense Authorization Act, global and unrestrained NSA surveillance, billions spent on the militarization of the police, etc.) suggests that the American Empire has entered its own version of the Dominate, or what the U.S. military has termed its program of "Full Spectrum Dominance 2020" for the year of its scheduled completion.
A precursor of today’s dark period was manifested five hundred years ago by the Spanish crown in the above mentioned “El Requerimiento” [[The Requirement). The document was based on a bizarre Catholic- Christian worldview that God had created such key persons as Adam [[along with Eve, as an afterthought), as well as St. Peter, who became the first in a long line of popes. Later, Pope Alexander VI generously donated to the Catholic sovereigns, King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella, and had awarded them domination over all non-Christian Indian lands “discovered and to be discovered.”
As a result of this belief, the Christian God’s providence, and the pope’s immense generosity, required the Indians, those “discovered and to be discovered,” to obey what theologian Luis Rivera, in his book A Violent Evangelism [[1992), calls “the Spanish domination.” Thus, El Requermiento was a “requirement” arbitrarily imposed on free nations and peoples to ‘Obey the Domination’ of ‘the State,’ through the directives of the Spanish Empire and Emperor [[Charles V). The result was a bloody genocide being committed against originally free and independent nations and peoples, and millions were killed, and millions more forced under domination.
Today, the phrase ‘the State’ is shorthand for ‘the State of Domination,’ which everyone, including ‘Indigenous peoples’ [[peoples under a presumption of dominance) are now considered required to obey. In ‘The Dominate’ of the American Empire, its agents deem the Patriot Acts, I and II, the Authorization of Use of Force, The National Defense Authorization Act, and so forth, to be Los Requerimentos [[The Requirements) of our time.
We are told that those documents require our obedience and subjection to the American Government, the supposed “representatives” of “the American people.” It is the most updated version of a model of domination that is thousands of years old, only this time it is being done with a technological sophistication and capability that those empires of the ancient past could not even dream of. All this is what the Dark Lord Dick Cheney termed “the new normal.”
Nonetheless, we, as the originally free and independent nations and peoples of this hemisphere—‘the Americas’—still have the spiritual and ceremonially capacity to remember our original free existence. This is our permanent status quo ante [[fallback position). Our original free existence renders void any and all claims of any rightful or legitimate domination over us in the name of “conquest,” but it will not invoke itself. We have to explicitly invoke it.
From the viewpoint of our originally free political identity and law systems, their supposed “requirements” based on their arbitrary ideas, desires, and whims are null and void. The boarding schools and other psychological operation centers used against us and our ancestors during their childhoods were efforts to de-spiritualize us, but the fact that this column is being written demonstrates that those efforts failed.
Our original free existence [[B.C., Before Colonization) is the source of our right of self-determination, which makes us forever rightfully free of any claim that we must obey their claim to a right of domination over us. Our full right of self-determination entails the right to freely choose our political status as Nations and Peoples, which includes the right to live our lives on the basis of our sacred birthright, entirely free from any and all manifestations of their wrongful and illegitimate systems of domination.
Steven Newcomb [[Shawnee, Lenape) is co-founder and co-director of the Indigenous Law Institute, author ofPagans in the Promised Land: Decoding the Doctrine of Christian Discovery[[Fulcrum, 2008), and the Indigenous and Kumeyaay Research Coordinator for the Sycuan Band of the Kumeyaay Nation.
Read more athttp://indiancountrytodaymedianetwor...-still-matters
10 Things Native Americans Can Do Better Than You
ICTMN Staff August 03, 2013
Native Americans are skilled at various things, but here's a list of 10 things Native Americans can do better than most. [[No, seriously. We can.)
10. Play lacrosse
Because we invented it.
9. Snowshoeing
Because, although Europeans had their own form of snowshoes, Native Americans are lauded for inventing the most efficient and diverse.
8. Run on Indian Time
Because “White Man Time will give you stomach cancer.”
7. Letting you know why this is completely and utterly wrong.
Naturally, a Native American will give you a better run down as to why this is fantastically repugnant.
6. Find unique ways to flirt while remaining traditional.
Let’s face it: the potato dance is an art form and a fine way to hit on someone at a pow wow.
5. Host inipis [[sweat lodges).
Listen, just don’t do it if you’re not qualified. It can end seriously bad.
4. Deep fry some dough.
It’s not super healthy, but it’s super nostalgic and pretty delicious with honey and powdered sugar.
3. Not act terribly surprised when celebrities claim to be Native American.
It happens a lot. [[Brad Pitt claims to be Seminole and Cherokee.)
2. Honor Mother Earth
It’s kind of been our thing from the beginning.
1. Laugh
Because, well, without humor the past 521 years would’ve been a lot harder.
Read more http://indiancountrytodaymedianetwor...ter-you-150724
Coming up this weekend, National Potawatomi Gathering
The Gathering of the Potawatomi Nations
Bozho, jayék ginwa
Welcome to the website for the 19th Annual Potawatomi Gathering! This year's Gathering will be hosted by the Pokagon Band of Potawatomi at its Rodgers Lake property, in the heart of the ancestral Potawatomi homelands.
Thursday, August 8 through Sunday, August 11, 2013
The Potawatomi Gathering provides an opportunity for Bodéwadmi people from across North America to come together for language and cultural demonstrations, recreational activities, meals, socializing, and a pow wow. The tribal councils and service programs from the various Potawatomi bands will also meet to discuss business and issues affecting Potawatomi communities across the U.S. and Canada.
The idea for the Gathering began over twenty years ago when Potawatomi leaders recognized they had been separated for too long and needed to come together to share experiences, ideas, and to reconnect as family. It has grown into a multi-day event attended by several thousand Neshnabék annually. Hosted by a different band every year, this will be the third time Pokagon Band has served as host.
Pow Wow
The pow wow will take place at Rodgers Lake starting at 6 p.m. on Friday, August 9 and Saturday, August 10. Join us for traditional dancing, drumming and the crowning of Miss Potawatomi.
Lodging suggestions: http://www.potawatominations.com/where-to-stay
Calendar of Events:
http://www.potawatominations.com/events/week
Where is it? http://goo.gl/maps/si91F
More information: http://www.potawatominations.com/
Another one this weekend -- Odawa Homecoming in Harbor Springs
Bringing Home the Odawa: Powwow Has Grown Since 1992
Levi Rickert, editor-in-chief in Native Currents.
HARBOR SPRINGS, MICHIGAN – The 22nd Annual Odawa Homecoming Powwow will happen this weekend in Harbor Springs, Michigan on Saturday and Sunday.
The first annual Odawa Homecoming Powwow was held in downtown Harbor Springs in 1992 to bring back the Odawak to sing and dance and acquaint the local community about American Indian culture. The first powwow was hosted by the Andrew Blackbird Museum under the leadership of Shirley Naganashe-Oldman.
Since then the annual powwow has grown and become a destination each year for members of the Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa Indians, a federally recognized tribe based in Harbor Springs, Michigan.
Part of the excitement of the powwow is the crowning of this year's Miss Odawa, which happens Saturday.
Canadian Author recognizes the Seventh Fire Prophecy is on track
JOHN RALSTON SAUL
Wake up to the aboriginal comeback
JOHN RALSTON SAUL
Special to The Globe and Mail
Published Friday, Aug. 09 2013, 6:00 AM EDT
Last updated Friday, Aug. 09 2013, 6:00 AM EDT
When Canadians learn that malnourished aboriginal children were used fornutritional experiments, they cannot really be surprised. Shock is a more plausible reaction. We should never be beyond shock. But not surprised. That would be to feign innocence, when we all know that for more than a century, Canadian authorities of all sorts continually acted badly when it came to indigenous peoples. Many Canadians knew this when it was happening. The standard public discourse made these actions possible. These were our governments, our authorities. Our responsibility cannot be denied.
What’s more, this will not be the last shocking revelation. There must be much more to come.
And so an official national apology was a good thing. But it will not be nearly enough. For a start, everything must come out and be made clear. Full responsibility, whatever that involves, must be taken. The political, legal and bureaucratic cringing, prevarication, negotiating over which documents to release, when, in what conditions, only make the whole tragedy more humiliating for all Canadians, aboriginal and otherwise. How can any of us agree to live together in any sort of healthy relationship if there is not clarity, as well as full and concrete responsibility taken for the past?
We must also be very careful about the language, emotions and assumptions that come with this terrible opening up.
Great wrong was done to indigenous peoples when they were not in a strong position to resist, although they did resist as best they could in the circumstances. But I have never heard a First Nations, Métis or Inuit person say they wanted to be seen primarily as a victim. That would be marginalizing and demeaning. What they want is that their situation be understood. They want responsibility taken. They want to be heard. They want their dignity back.
That is why there is such insistence on respect for the treaties. We are all signatories. We are all treaty people. Those treaty agreements shaped Canada. The landed immigrant becomes a treaty person the instant she or he swears allegiance as a citizen of Canada.
What indigenous peoples are after is their full and proper place on this territory. They are the original founding pillar of everything done here. Their influence on the shape and habits of this country has been and remains enormous.
Yes, Canadian authorities began acting badly once they saw they could get away with it. Yes, the indigenous population plunged in the second half of the 19th century from as many as two million to fewer than two hundred thousand people. And so the racist policies aimed at assimilation, as well as cultural and even physical disappearance, gained traction.
But those days are long past. That is, the aboriginal position has changed radically. And that was the underlying message of last winter’s protests and fasts, of Idle No More.
Those 150,000 or so aboriginal people are now approaching a million and a half, and they’re on their way to two million. Those who were forbidden the right to hire lawyers as recently as the Indian Act of 1927 now have more than 1,000 lawyers of their own. They are in an increasingly strong legal position, having won case after case at the Supreme Court over the past 40 years. Having been forbidden the practice of their own spiritual beliefs, an increasing number of their young are embracing them. Forty years ago, there were virtually no aboriginals in colleges and universities. Now, there are more than 30,000 and the number is growing. There are thousands of indigenous corporations and businesses. And when National Chief Shawn A-in-chut Atleo stands up to give the 11th LaFontaine-Baldwin lecture on Saturday, he will be the third indigenous lecturer in the series.
Yes, aboriginal politics are messy. The national chief, the Assembly of First Nations, other chiefs and other groups are arguing over strategies, attitudes and structures. But this is not necessarily a weakness. It can also be seen as strength. Differences of opinion and strategy are normal in communities growing in self-confidence and power.
The central point is that we are witnessing a remarkable comeback. A century ago, we were convinced that aboriginal peoples would disappear. Today, those same aboriginal peoples are central players in Canada’s future.
As a whole, Canadians have not yet woken up to this reality. Worse still, our governments, bureaucracies and most of the legal community are still lost in denial of the aboriginal reality. They go on fighting every detail of every negotiation in order to slow down this return in force. There is still no willingness to admit that Ottawa funds far less for the education of each First Nations child than the provincial governments fund for each non-aboriginal child. Officials at all levels are still ducking and weaving over the lack of clean water and housing, inadequate sewage systems, malnutrition, child poverty and other poor reserve services. They continue to hide behind numbers and narrow arguments.
The reality is that the reinvention of the relationship between aboriginals and non-aboriginals resembles the 1960s and ’70s reinvention of the relationship between francophones and anglophones. And it is just as important for Canada’s continued existence.
This reinvention begins with all of us, including our governments, assuming full and active responsibility for the wrongs of the past and the continuing destructive or ineffective policies. But it is of equal importance that we embrace the central role of indigenous peoples in our history, present and future.
Are these two elements not contradictory? Absolutely. But the real world is full of contradictions and complexities.
The simple truth is that we are all witnesses to the remarkable comeback of the aboriginal peoples. This will mean fundamental shifts in power, in financing and in how we all live together. We can pretend this is not happening; we can manoeuvre in order to delay it. But it is going to happen. We have everything to gain and nothing to lose by embracing this comeback as living proof of the strength of these cultures and peoples. We are witnessing how central they are to the future of this country.
Now is the time to listen to what they are saying and understand what they are calling for.
Shawn A-in-chut Atleo will deliver the Institute for Canadian Citizenship’s 11th LaFontaine-Baldwin lecture on Aug. 10 at the Stratford Festival’s Avon Theatre.
John Ralston Saul,Canadian author, essayist, and President of PEN International, is the author of A Fair Country: Telling Truths about Canada.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/comme...ticle13668699/
Meantime we have plenty of work to do here - Nez Perce step out in front
Tuesday, August 6, 2013
Night 2: Nez Perce protest tarsands megaload
Night 2: TUESDAY, Aug. 6, 2013
Update: New photos from Night 2 Rolling Blockade:
http://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2013/0...dblock-of.html
On the second night of Nez Perce blocking the tarsands megaload, about 100 Nez Perce slowed the mega-monster to a crawl with a rolling human blockade.
Messages are pouring into Censored News from around the world in support of the Nez Perce blockade tonight!
Long Walker Standing in Solidarity with Nez Perce protesting tonight: From Anishinabe/Pomo on Long Walk 4 Return to Alcatraz, in Ohio tonight:
"To all out there taking that sacrifice stay strong in your heart and remember Creator sees us all and will guide us throughout. We will have you in our prayers when we walk tomorrow. Sending Love and prayers for peace. Migwetch for being there. Lisa p. LW4"
From Hawaii, Pua Case, "Nez Perce, you are warriors!! Make Strong warriors..we are gaining strength from you!"
Teddy Draper Jr., Dine' on Navajoland, said, "Keep standing strong, the rest will follow."
Lewiston Tribune Online Updates
http://lmtribune.com/article_9fad7bb...9bb30f31a.html
UPDATE 11:45 P.M.: Protesters were throwing softball- to basketball-sized rocks in the road in front of the megaload to create obstacles.
Police and Omega Morgan employees quickly removed the rocks.
Protesters on scene range in age from children to elderly tribal members.
Althea Ellenwood, 11, said she is there to "represent our tribe and not let them come out here and destroy our land."
Tribal member Rebecca Miles said she was pleased to see the women and young people standing their ground, both tonight and during last night's protest.
"What I saw last night was just so moving, to see the young people and the women standing their ground," she said. "There was just a bunch of new leaders born last night."
UPDATE 11:15 pm Tuesday, August 6: The megaload is moving again, but slower than a walking pace.
Idaho State Police, Nez Perce County sheriff’s deputies, and Nez Perce Tribal Police are urging people to stay off the roadway. Protesters are taking issue with tribal police for their role in trying to keep the megaload moving, rather than protecting the tribe and its homeland.
“We have the right to assemble, we have the right to protest. It’s in the Constitution,” said Del Rae Kipp of Lapwai, who is one of the protesters facing charges from last night’s blockade near the Clearwater River Casino.
“That megaload is violating a court order. Make it stop,” Lana Rickman of Lapwai shouted at police and Omega Morgan employees, as the shipment crawled along the highway.
Law enforcement personnel have arrested at least two people thus far tonight.
UPDATE 11 pm Tuesday, August 6: A blockade has formed at the interchange of U.S. Highway 12 and U.S. Highway 95 east of Lewiston. Protesters have blocked the highway and are talking with Nez Perce Tribal Police.
A megaload that is traveling east on the highway can’t get through.
UPDATE 10:30 pm Tuesday, August 6: Two groups of megaload protesters have formed in the area of Ant and Yellowjacket, just east of the U.S. Highway 12/95 interchange.
One group has formed at the parking lot at Ant and Yellowjacket, and another has formed a short distance away. Neither group has entered the roadway.
The megaload is scheduled to travel through the corridor tonight on its way to Alberta, Canada, on U.S. Highway 12.
Nez Perce and supporters are protesting for a second night the tarsands megaload on sovereign Nez Perce Nation. The protest halted the tarsands megaload for three and one-half hours last night before the arrests of the Nez Perce Executive Council in the predawn hours of Tuesday morning.
Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p4bYaadpaSg#at=18
Predictable political opposition to Native resurgence in US
Hartford Courant Joins Blumenthal’s Anti-Indian Campaign
Gale Courey Toensing August 10, 2013
It’s the oldest continuously published newspaper in the United States. George Washington placed an ad in it to lease part of his Mount Vernon land. Thomas Jefferson sued it for libel and lost. Mark Twain tried to buy stock in it, but was rejected. It’s Connecticut’s largestdaily newspaper. And now it’s joined Sen. Richard Blumenthal and other elected officials in a racist anti-Indian campaign against reforming the federal recognition process – all in an effort to stop additional Connecticut tribes from being acknowledged and opening casinos.
RELATED:Blumenthal Stirs Opposition to Federal Recognition – Again
RELATED:Connecticut Towns Join Sen. Blumenthal’s Anti-Indian Tune
The Hartford Courant, which began as a weekly in 1764, published an editorial August 8 warning against a draft proposal of changes to the Interior Department’s federal acknowledgment process that Interior Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs Kevin Washburn released June 21.
RELATED:Washburn’s Bold Plan to Fix Interior’s Federal Recognition Process
Blumenthal is leading the campaign in opposition to the reform effort in order to stop the Eastern Pequot Tribal Nation [[EPTN) and the Schaghticoke Tribal Nation [[STN) from possibly regaining the federal acknowledgments they received in 2002 and 2004, respectively. The acknowledgments were overturned in 2005 after Blumenthal led a relentless and orchestrated campaign of opposition and political pressure involving local and state elected officials and an anti-Indian sovereignty group and its powerful White house-connected lobbyist, Barbour Griffith & Rogers [[BGR). An Indian Country Today Media Network editorial, “A Lack of Interior Fortitude,” describes “the force of outside pressure” and its impact across the country.
RELATED:A Lack of Interior Fortitude
The editorial insinuates that the Interior Department and Bureau of Indian Affairs officials are corrupt and can be “bought.” It implies that Connecticut tribes are not “real” and, getting down to basics, it complains that if more tribes are recognized and open casinos, the state will have to renegotiate compacts with the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation and the Mohegan Tribe, who own and operate Foxwoods Resort Casino and Mohegan Sun, and will likely get a lot less than the 25 percent of slot revenues it now receives. Mashantucket and Mohegan gaming “has brought the state much wampum,” the Courant says, in the commonly misinformed belief that wampum was “money” and in ignorance of the contractual and ceremonial uses of the beautiful polished quahog shell beads.
Ironically, while expressing willingness to accept the $3 billion-plus that Mashantucket and Mohegan have each contributed to the state since the 1990s, the Courant distains Indian gaming. “Big-time Indian gaming — a highly questionable policy to begin with — has been with us for a quarter-century,” it says. But there’s no need to recognized more tribes, because, “Most of the real tribes have all been recognized by now.”
It’s not a pretty read.
Even the headline -- “Feds Would Open Door To 'Casino Tribes' “ – uses the pejorative “casino tribes” catch phrase that was so popular during the Bush administration when anti-Indian casino sentiments reached a frenzy. “The issues around Indian gaming ought to be well behind us in this state. … But the Bureau of Indian Affairs keeps trying to stack the deck… In the guise of making the process more efficient and transparent, the draft guidelines make tribal recognition much simpler,” the editorial says, insinuating that the BIA is cheating and the proposed reformed rules are rigged.
RELATED:Bush Administration Put the Wreck in Federal Recognition
The proposed new regulations would require tribes to prove continuous political authority and community since 1934, aligning the review with the federal government’s repudiation of the allotment and assimilation policies of the late 1800s and early part of the 1900s and eliminate the requirement that an external entity identify the group as Indian since 1900. The draft proposal also gives new weight to tribes that have maintained state-recognized reservations since 1934.
Blumenthal was successful in arguing in 2005 that the EPTN and STN’s reservations established in 1683 and 1736, and their long tribal-state relationships were irrelevant and the Courant echoes his argument. But state recognition and state reservations were considered appropriate evidence by former Interior Secretary Gale Norton,and by former Acting Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs Aurene Martin.
RELATED:Gale Norton Told: Reverse Recognition or Be Fired
RELATED:Former BIA Head Says Schaghticoke Petition Was the Best
No official spokesperson from EPTN of STN could be reached for comment, but an STN source who asked to be unnamed said Connecticut officials and the mainstream media are “ignorant and hypocritical.“ Not a single Connecticut official showed up at the Interior Department’s consultation and public comment session on the reform proposal at Penobscot on June 24, the source said. “That was the proper forum for them to express their opposition in an open transparent way, but no. It’s a repeat of the back door political influence they used in 2005 and yet they demand that the tribes be transparent,” the source said.
RELATED:Judge Denies Schaghticoke Federal Recognition Appeal
http://indiancountrytodaymedianetwor...ampaign-150807
Starting Our Fifth Year Here
Can you believe it?
Haven't seen Ravine in a good long while, you still around, niijii? For those who like stats, here is our history:
The first year, we had a lot of stories and lore. The first anniversary started with post #400. At that time, we had "nearly 10,000" views.
Anniversary # 2 starts with post #747, and we have 30,165 views. News really dominated the year, with police happenings in Seattle, sacred site desecration in Michigan, and more. We also had stories, music and dance.
8-11-12 Post 952
8-12-12 Post 1242 177,803 views
I have been privileged to keep posting as Ravine prophesied in his first post, and to have a visible if mostly silent audience. It has been my wish that what I share will open some doors and let the light shine on things that have been hidden from us for too long. Thank you for being a part of this thread.
This has been an eventful year, with the kindling of the Seventh Fire in Canada, the continuing disrespect for our people and the Earth we all live on worldwide, and more and more threats to our sacred water. Does it have to take major threat for us to wake up and come together for our own good?
Here is a good teaching from our friends at WhiteBison.org, something to help us put our feet on the good path:
Elder's Meditation of the Day - August 12 |
http://www.whitebison.org/meditation/images/oakfall.gif |
"With one mind we address our acknowledgement, respect, and gratefulness to the sacred Cycle of Life. We, as humans, must remember to be humble and acknowledge the gifts we use so freely in our daily lives." |
-- Audrey Shenandoah, ONONDAGA |
The sacred Cycle of life - the baby, the youth, the adult, the Elder. Let us respect all directions, the four directions of the Grandfathers; let us respect their power. Let us remember we belong to the earth, the earth does not belong to us. Help us to be respectful to all the gifts You have given us. |
Oh Great Spirit, help me this day to be humble. Let me not attack anything in deed or in my thoughts. Let my thoughts focus on the beauty You have created in all things.
Why should we worry about our impact on the Earth?
Part 2: 8:42 Oren Lyons on our connections to the Earth and All Our Relations:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tqfvU...795F333092A024