#indigenous problems

It has problems yes, but it's a movie about Indigenous Resilience in the face of colonialism. Spirit's monologue at the beginning is enough already to support that.

"Like the wind in the buffalo grass, we belonged here. We would always belong here."

Here In the Midwest with the Native Community a lot of People let unimportant things get in the way of being a Community. I lived in Oregon most of my life, lived and grew up in my Indigenous Community, knowing that there was some kind of general respect for one another. That being a Elder, Teacher, Healer or Leader was something that you earned. The the respect wasn't automatically given to a person. Here there is so much division and mistrust within the community that it is hard to make any kind of Group plans or gatherings. I could write a long essay about the condition of the Community that I currently live with. It's been on my heart and in my mind to find some way to help change this, I know that it won't be something that is fixed right away. However I tend to find myself discouraged and I let those Ideas file away  into my  " Brain Palace" and never get used.  Today my roommate Chelsea and I went to an Earth day Celebration in Chicago that was being hosted by their Native Center. It was amazing! I had a really good time, it was just Indigenous and Non-indigenous people eating and talking with each other. A woman that I consider a true leader and she has earned my respect, told me that We should go for the change we truly want to see and not to be afraid of the people who might want to destroy or ruin what we are trying to do. That we should just focus on the people who want to be apart of that change with us. She said a lot of things to us tonight, I know that in my heart I already knew the things she was telling me. I felt silly I wasn't raised to think that way, I wasn't raised in an environment where you just give up or give in. I told her that We needed to hear those words. I feel like that is why we were supposed to go up there today. 

Before we get this pow wow started, I need to make one thing clear, American Indians are pissed off. They wake up in the morning pissed off, they hunt and gather all day pissed off, and after a few games of bingo after work to take the edge off, they go home, grab a bag of artificial cheese covered processed maize chips (Doritos) and watch the white man’s news and get even more pissed off. They live in a welfare state where they are not allowed control of their money, they can prosecute criminals but can only hold them in prison for one year, and in Tahlequah, the capital of Cherokee nation, the teen pregnancy rate is close to 80%. Alcoholism is rampant. I’ve seen men, age undetermined, cutting the tops off of Aquanet cans, straining the hair spray through bread, and then taking shots of it. And few will ever leave. It doesn’t even cross their mind in spite of the condescending manner in which they are treated by the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the pissant Fisher Price government they are given permission to have. Bear in mind, Indian nations are sovereign nations caveat at the pleasure of the federal government or more accurately at the acquiescence of powers given by the tribe to the government. So they are really not sovereign at all. So do Indians have a reason to be pissed off ? Yes!!! Every time they take a breath. Does the hate fix anything? No, it only makes things worse.

So what is this all about? A revolution, make no bones about it. And whether this is reported in the mainstream media which it hasn’t been and whether you care enough to find out the outcome, Cherokee Nation has the sovereignty and apparently the will to assert it. And every damn tribe in the country needs to support them, because this lack of cohesion is what destroyed them in the first place. This following article is well-written and covers what is going on out in Eastern Oklahoma.

Bureau of Indian Affairs Tries To Block Cherokee Ejection Of BlacksWritten by R. Cort KirkwoodThursday, 15 September 2011 12:07The Cherokee Nation is in a heap of big trouble from the top chiefs at the federal Bureau of Indian Affairs, which has fired an epistolary arrow at the nation because it sent its black members on a trail of tears.The tribe booted out 2,800 descendants of blacks freed during the War of Northern Rebellion and given the full rights of Cherokees in 1866. Blacks, the tribe says, are not Indians. The pointed admonition from the great white city in the East ordered the tribe to let the blacks back in. A federal agency cut off a wagonload of wampum.The Cherokees’ answer? They’ll stand their ground.Booting Out the Blacks

The Cherokee relationship with blacks began many moons ago. Most people don’t know it, but many Cherokees not only owned slaves but also fought for the Confederacy. Others sided with the Union.

In 1866, the U.S. Government and victorious Union Cherokees signed a treaty that gave free blacks living on Cherokee lands the full rights of the Cherokees. Says Article 9:

All freedmen who have been liberated by voluntary act of their former owners or by law, as well as all free colored persons who were in the country at the commencement of the rebellion, and are now residents therein, or who may return within six months, and their descendants, shall have all the rights of native Cherokees: Provided, That owners of slaves so emancipated in the Cherokee Nation shall never receive any compensation or pay for the slaves so emancipated.

Peace reigned for 120 years. But then, in the early 1980s, the Cherokees decided that only full-blooded Cherokees are real Cherokees and members of the tribe, thus excluding blacks. The U.S. 10th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld that decision in Nero v. Cherokee Nation.

In 2006, the tribal Supreme Court ruled that blacks had been unjustly deprived of tribal membership, which led to a petition to remove the freedmen’s descendants from the tribal rolls with an amendment to the Cherokee Constitution.

The Cherokee people fully supported the amendment, the Associated Press reported: “More than 76 percent of Cherokee voters approved the amendment stripping the descendants of their citizenship.”

The tribal Supreme Court upheld that vote of the 300,000-member tribe.

The move is hardly cosmetic, AP reported, because ejection from the tribe prevents blacks from voting in its special election, to be held September 24, to determine the new chief.

Reported AP:

The Cherokee Supreme Court ordered the special election after it said it could not determine with certainty the outcome of a close and hotly contested June election between incumbent Chad Smith and longtime tribal councilman Bill John Baker. The results had flip-flopped between the two during weeks of counts and recounts. Baker had twice been declared winner, but so had Smith.

And a vote for the new chief isn’t the only thing at stake. Eviction from an Indian tribe means “revoking [the blacks’] citizenship and cutting their medical care, food stipends, low-income homeowners’ assistance and other services.”

In short, no tribal membership, no freebies.

Freedmen Descendants Unhappy

The descendants of the freed slaves who were members of the Cherokee Nation, once known as one of the Five Civilized Tribes, say the Cherokees have gone way beyond speaking with a forked tongue. They claim the Cherokees are pounding the usual racial drums.

“It’s a red man, black man issue just like it’s a white man, black man issue,” Raymond Nash, 64, of Nowata, told AP. “It’s embarrassing, really. It should have been over a long time ago.”

Marilyn Vann, president of the Descendants of Freedmen of the Five Civilized Tribes, said it’s a red-and-black issue as well. “This definitely is a setback for our freedmen people because we were all eager to vote in the upcoming election,” she told the AP:

The attitude is more like, “We can’t put them in chains, so we’ll do anything we can to take away their rights.” It’s a matter of racism and politics.

Unsurprisingly, the black “Indians” went on the warpath in a federal court, asking it to make them Indians legally and force the tribe to accept them.

Government Agrees With Blacks

The big chiefs in Washington, D.C,. agrees with the freedmen’s descendants.

Thus, the Assistant Secretary of Indian Affairs, Larry Echo Hawk, AP reported, penned a letter to acting Chief S. Joe Crittenden that told him the tribe had better get back on the civil rights reservation. “I urge you to consider carefully the nation’s next steps in proceeding with an election that does not comply with federal law,” he wrote. “The department will not recognize any action taken by the nation that is inconsistent with these principles and does not accord its freedmen members full rights of citizenship.”

That means whoever wins the special election won’t be the new chief because the vote won’t count — or so the government says.

As well, AP reported, the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development froze $33 million of money destined for the tribe.

Crittenden says no way, no how. “The Cherokee Nation will not be governed by the [Bureau of Indian Affairs],” he told AP. “We will hold our election and continue our long legacy of responsible self-governance.”

Chad Corntassel Smith, one of men vying for election in the special election on September 24, told AP the decision to eject blacks is not about race, but about blood. “I’ve consistently supported the Cherokee Nation’s right to determine their own national identity.”

So are Indians pissed off. Yes and some are very, very racist, but there are those who want the best for the future of the Cherokees and to hold on to tribal purity for as long as they can because eventually many tribes will simply disappear by holding the blood percentage needed to be a tribal citizen where it is. And what needs to follow this? Chief Crittenden must tell the federal government to take all of the freebies and shove them where Brother Sun don’t shine and pay up on this Ponzi scheme they are running. Then the tribes might have a chance of surviving and even growing. Crazy Horse has a big smile on his face today and is sitting just a little taller on his horse. I haven’t forgotten about the Freedmen. So, what about the Freedmen? Well I took a class in law school taught by a former chief justice of the Keetoowah Band, another Cherokee tribe that has far stricter citizenship guidelines than Cherokee Nation. He asked the class whether Indians should have ownership of land, resources and their sovereignty. And everyone agreed that they not only should receive these minimal scraps but also repossess much, much more. And then he asked us the same question about blacks. Again the answer was yes. “And tell them to send me a postcard from Africa to let me know how that is working out,” he lilted. Honesty doesn’t come any more naked than that. So stand your ground Cherokee people and watch your top knot…