Imagine camps along a flowing riverbed with children playing, elders and families talking, eating and laughing. Forests stand tall and proud providing shade, fuel and shelter for the people. The land is rocky, sandy, grassy, or wide open. The plants and animals roam freely following a greater plan. The people wake and pray giving thanks for all the life around them.
This is not what the first settlers saw. They saw a lawless land, ripe for “progress”. They did not see that the original people were applying the true laws of the land, the laws respecting Creator and Creation.
Fast forward to the treaties of peace and friendship, treaty alliances to secure the “rule” of a foreign people, and the new approaches once this foreign people became the “rulers” of Turtle Island.
The original people, once so necessary for survival and necessary for alliances are now “the Indian problem”. What is the solution: assimilate or terminate.
Changing Paths
How has the relationship between the original U.K. crown and their successor state changed with the original nations who still occupy Turtle Island?
The relationship has not changed. Each year successor state governments make grandiose announcements about new relationship building, nation-to-nation talks and the latest “reconciliation”.
Mainstream has named the original people as Indians, then savages, then Indians and then Aboriginal, now moving towards “the indigenous”. Why are there continued misunderstandings about the unique nations that have always occupied this land?
The non-first nation people who ventured to the new world came from lands where hierarchical governments ruled. Ordinary man could not upset the balance of his reality. In North America, it was seen that any man could make his mark. Thus begins the fight to break free of European control and to create something unique on this continent. However, since the comparators of the new settler are only government hierarchies, where would a new governance model be found? The unlikely source came from the original people specifically the Haudenosaunee.
Is this common knowledge in the United States or Canada? There have been many valuable contributions made by the indigenous. True sustainability is the way the indigenous lived, respecting the land, water and environment. Without this respect and stewardship, changes that affect all people and all land or water will continue. Currently climate change is challenging not only the landscape of the “new” countries, but also the global landscape.
If one looks south across the medicine line, there is a sovereignty and climate change battle being waged. In Cannonball or Sacred Stone Camp, South Dakota, the Standing Rock Sioux are standing against Energy Transfer Partners and the Dakota Access Pipeline. This proposed pipeline could potentially affect the Missouri river and the hundreds of people, animals and agricultural land that rely on clean water.
Gatherings of indigenous people and allies have gone to Sacred Stone Camp to lend their support on this issue. The support has been in prayers, assistance for food, clothing or lodging. This event at Standing Rock has gained a global audience.
It is interesting that mainstream media is not covering this environmental battle. The original people, the first people of the land are standing with stewardship obligations and fulfilling their purpose by opposing the development. The Sioux people have a prophecy that a black snake would come to destroy the land and water, so they are standing against this pipeline snake that will destroy life for all people.
Instead of covering this issue, the visionary issue that indigenous people see, it seems mainstream media is determined to cover inanities such as celebrity break-ups over real issues. Why?
Is it because covering this indigenous issue to save the water and stop corporate control will expose the true nature of this new “democratic” way of life?
In the European countries, where Canadians and Americans have their roots, the hierarchies and greed of the few became the revolutionary impetus for the masses. In Canada, and America control of government has just changed from an historic aristocracy to a corporate aristocracy.
Where is this evident? Witness Trudeau’s approval of the LNG line and the issuance of permits for Site C in British Colombia. Witness the lack of Mainstream media coverage and the need for a national guard in Standing Rocky to quell the “Indian uprising”. If one looks with a visionary lens at current conflicts and thinks back to the original intent of “civilizing” this land, is there any difference? The indigenous still protect the land and waters. The settler invaders are still trying to further their greedy coffers. Have 500 years of “progress” taught these newcomers nothing?
The land and water are not to be destroyed for the greedy pockets of a few corporate people. Please don’t use the economic argument. Some people will have jobs, yes, but corporations will still avoid paying taxes so these scant jobs will again pay for the rich. If the rich are in trouble, expect governments to step in with bailouts. I know the colonial minds are rapidly spinning saying these things are not related because they think in boxed compartments.
The indigenous believe we are all related. All things matter because all things are related. We live on the same land, we breath the same air, we drink the same water. What we do affects Creation. Until the settler invader understands that “progress” has limits, the earth, land and water will suffer.
If one is so greedy that they need everything here and now, what happens when they die? Do they take anything with them? Is it the knowledge that their “legacy of control” continues beyond them? I would rather leave my grandchildren with the legacy of hope and of an actual future then trying to control my “power” into the future.
