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RE: Sarah Palin's Record On Native Alaskan Issues - 9/15/2008 12:11:07 PM
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ljmac
Posts: 1378
Joined: 11/20/2006
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quote:
ORIGINAL: tracydolls
PHW,
Thanks again for the info. How you treat the least is very important, but you have to remember that the people that you are talking to now are the decendents of those that SLAUGHTERED the Natives in the first place.
Alot has been done in Christ's NAME. He will tell MANY of them I never knew you!
The taking of the children? Wow. Do not Natives have laws about that?
I know African Americans fought not to have Whites be able to adopt them.
With almost the extinction of some Tribes that should be the LAW.
You mean narrow-minded, heartless, bigoted adults tried to children from finding families. I don't think the children themselves said I rather be an orphan.
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RE: Sarah Palin's Record On Native Alaskan Issues - 9/15/2008 8:15:59 PM
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PaleHawkWoman
Posts: 503
Joined: 7/14/2005
Status: online
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Rockwall
quote:
ORIGINAL: PaleHawkWoman
First of all, the term"eskimo" is a racial slur meaning "dog eater". Please do not use it or I will have to report it to the moderator.
While reporting someone to the moderator, please report yourself for breaking the TOS because posting entire articles is prohibited. You have done that multiple times in this thread alone.
Sorry about that but I don't know how how to get a web link on here.
The article about Palin's Indian Policies came from the student website at Oklahoma State University and can be accessed thru RezNet.com. The lonks for the court cases and the DHHS of Alaska stats sources are listed there.
The letter from former ChiefEvon Peter was received thru Our Daily Frybread, a Native Christian News website.
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RE: Sarah Palin's Record On Native Alaskan Issues - 9/15/2008 8:37:36 PM
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PaleHawkWoman
Posts: 503
Joined: 7/14/2005
Status: online
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quote:
ORIGINAL: SonInMe1
I can't hunt deer on my own land without a licence.
Neither can I. I don't live on the rez, and the 407 acres my family owns is near Nashville. I do have a nuisance deer permit which permits me to hunt out-of-season IF we are losing crops to too many deer foraging but I have to have someone from TN Wildlife verify the damage before I can go hunting. FYI, I bow hunt with a 48-lb CaneBrake Longhunter recurve bow made to shoot right or left handed. I do not use a compound or cross bow or rifle. I don't use camouflage, tree stands, blinds, or lures/ attractants, either. I stalk from the ground which means I have to get fairly close for a decent shot. I average 1 deer for every 4 times I go out hunting. I seldom take more than 2 per season as that is plenty of meat, and I don't trophy hunt- I go for dry does and bucks age 3 and under.
This is a very one sided arguement with assumptions made on what the other side of these issues think.
Do "native Alaskans" ( which there truly never was ) need substinence hunting and fishing? When my ancestors came to america, they hunted and fished. Eventually they created a society and livlihoods changed.
Are you saying "native alaskans" all exist on hunting and fishing? If even a majority of them do then I think something has failed here. There are not too many native people's in western society who live like this.
There are aboriginal Alaskans, meaning the peoples who've been living there for the past 10,000 yrs. That makes them about as Native as you can get.
Not all of them depend on subsistance fishing/hunting but a majority of them do. They live in remote areas with no roads or utilities, no stores, and the doctors/dentists fly in maybe once a month during the spring/summer. A friend of mine tried to live in Anchorage to work but got tired of the racial slurs his co-workers kept throwing at him(and the supervisor was in on it too), people putting dog-poo and other gross things in his locker, and getting stopped by the police for just walking down the street(he doesn't drink or do drugs).
He was the pastor of the tiny church up there until the AOG decided that it just wasn't worth the $300/month they paid him for pastoring the church. There are only 75-100 people in his community. So now they meet with no official pastor.
His people live up on the northwest coast of Alaska,and hunt seal, walrus, and are allowed to take 2 whales each year. They also fish. There is no store, no jobs, no roads, no hospital or clinic, no utilities, and some years they don't have a school teacher, either. It isn't an uncommon scenario, being as most of Alaska is still wilderness.
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RE: Sarah Palin's Record On Native Alaskan Issues - 9/15/2008 8:50:48 PM
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PaleHawkWoman
Posts: 503
Joined: 7/14/2005
Status: online
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Rockwall
quote:
ORIGINAL: Dragonnie
taking children away from their homes and getting the most enormous amount in earmarks for her state..
im not a bit surprised.
even the devil appears as an angel of light, we're told.
Are you calling Palin the devil because of an essay floating on the web and isn't backed up by a newspaper article? That's rich.
I guess people do not lie or tell tall tales and Larry Sinclair is another such person. Here is his video and he will submit to a polygraph test to prove that Obama is a gay crack addict. He wouldn't make this up would he? Obama Youtube LINK
The point is not everything in black and white and posted on blogs is the truth.
According to stats taken from HHS in every state, Native children are more likely to be taken from their parents than non-Native children under the same reported circumstances and with far less investigation and even without circumstantial evidence or proper due-process. Native children's cases are usually moved in the express lane to terminate the parents' rights so that the parents do not have time to fight it in court and the tribe, in spite of federal laws(1978 Indian Child Welfare Reform Act) is not given notice by either the state or the municipality of the action. Utah has gone as far as shipping Native children overseas to keep the families from ever getting them back.
This isn't about orphans, this is about children who have parents and extended families to care for them. The policy is based upon destroying Native peoples by destroying the families-taking the children away to be raised white so that the culture and identity will be extinguished. This is immoral and most ungodly. I've known families who've gone thru this and there is no pain you can imagine that is like having the state come in and do this to you and your children. How would you feel if this was done to your for no other reason that your religious beliefs? Or because you were poor? How could anyone justify doing this to someone just because they're Native? Yet it continues to happen. If the church cares so much about families, I wonder where the church is for Native families.
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RE: Sarah Palin's Record On Native Alaskan Issues - 9/15/2008 8:53:46 PM
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PaleHawkWoman
Posts: 503
Joined: 7/14/2005
Status: online
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quote:
ORIGINAL: PolarBear
Hi PaleHawkWoman,
I was going to reply to your informative reply to my post in the original Palin thread and say thanks, but didn't get to it.
Anyway, the points you bring up are certainly disturbing. That's one of many ways the Republicans have been getting off track lately. I'm a Republican because they're supposed to be the party of individual responsibility and a small and responsible government. That seems to have gone by the wayside in recent years so it's hard to say what I'll do. In any case, their policies are still less harmful than those of the Democrats, so I'll have to go with them again for now. 
Someone inside the Republican party needs to slap the leadership upside the head and get the party back on track as the party of high moral and ethical standards. Certainly, the issue of native Americans is one that should be addressed.
Are there any Native Americans active in the Republican Party and bringing these issues to their attention?
Yes. Ben Nighthorse-Campbell is one. And Sen McCain has been a good friend to Native Americans. But most of the GOP hierarchy is decidedly anti-Native American. Evangelical Christians have not been very supportive either.
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RE: Sarah Palin's Record On Native Alaskan Issues - 9/15/2008 9:04:43 PM
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PaleHawkWoman
Posts: 503
Joined: 7/14/2005
Status: online
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quote:
ORIGINAL: rcjames
quote:
ORIGINAL: PaleHawkWoman
RC, she is NOT upholding the Constitution- that is my point. Native people are human beings AND US citizens AND sovreign nations. Ferderal Law supercedes state laws, and federal laws are being ignored in ALaska by officials from the Gov's office on down.
Living in Oklahoma I am quite aware of Native American Nations within the USA.
And like it or lump it the tribes do not get to do what they waqnt outside of the law. They as all of us are juat a part of the countries citizenry.
They do have a reasonable abount of automony within their tribal lands, but cannot demand that the state jumps every time they say frog.
Thanks
RC
Neither is the state allowed to cross that federal line either, but they sure do try. We all know that off-rez we are under state and local jurisdiction, but non-Natives can get away with everything including murder on Indian lands because the Feds won't prosecute it and the state usually doesn't care if something happens to Indians. I was brutally raped by 2 men when I was 19. I knew my attackers and they attacked me BECAUSE I was Indian and said so. They left me for dead after raping, beating, choking, sodomizing, kicking, and threatening to scalp me. I made it 1/2 mile to the hiway crawling on my hands and knees and was picked up by a couple who took me to the hospital in Pocatello. The police were summoned by the medical staff, and when the police found out I was Indian and my attackers were white, they refused to do anything about it, saying that no white man was going to go to jail for raping a squaw and as far as they were concerned it wasn't rape- I was getting what I deserved.
Had I been white and my attackers been Indian, they would have been sent to prison for the rest of their lives. To this day, neither one has seen a day of jail for what they did to me. I guess that's what I should have expected from the American justice system, even tho I too was raised to believe in equal treatment under the law.
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RE: Sarah Palin's Record On Native Alaskan Issues - 9/15/2008 9:35:21 PM
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PaleHawkWoman
Posts: 503
Joined: 7/14/2005
Status: online
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Jhud
quote:
PHW,
Thanks again for the info. How you treat the least is very important, but you have to remember that the people that you are talking to now are the decendents of those that SLAUGHTERED the Natives in the first place.
Alot has been done in Christ's NAME. He will tell MANY of them I never knew you!
The taking of the children? Wow. Do not Natives have laws about that?
I know African Americans fought not to have Whites be able to adopt them.
With almost the extinction of some Tribes that should be the LAW.
This is the kind of absurdity that basically makes such conversations almost worthless. None of my ancestors 'slaughtered' Native Americans - in fact, some of my ancestors were Native Americans. Asuming everyone to whom one speaks is the enemy because they don't happens to have a certain skin color or origin as you do is as bad as any other racist statement.
And adoptions which limit adoptees to a certain race often do nothing but prolong the period in which children are without homes. Apparently some would prefer a child in an orphanage or under state care than in the home of an 'evil' white person. So much for MLK's dream that we would disregard skin color.
US Indian policy from 1876-1978 was to remove Native children from their parents in order to wipe out Indians by forced assimilation. Native parents were afraid to take their sick children to the doctor or hospital because the social workers would come and take them away and the parents never found out what happened to their children. Native women were afraid to go to the hospital to give birth for that same reason. This isn't about children who have no families to take them in if the parents cannot care for them-this is about families being denied that right by the actions of the state in violation of federal laws and civil rights laws. If a white family is allowed to take custody of a child who has been abandoned by or taken away from one of their kinfolk, and the state encourages such action, but then turns around and denies Native families the same access to taking custodyof a child under the same circumstances, that is unequal treatment under the law.
The 1978 Indian Child Welfare Reform Act gives federally-recognized tribes jurisdication over the children of their tribe, just as you better hope that the US has jurisdiction over your children if you happen to be in another country and something happens to you. The Act was to stop social services from arbitrarily taking Native children from their parents and taking children without giving the parents due process. If you think that state and local govt's aren't trying to ignore or circumvent this law you need to sit down and talk with some Native folks. The Native American Law Library has tens of thousands of files on such cases from within the past 10 yrs.
Native Americans aren't Native because of skin color- we're Native because of our distinct and ancient cultures. You don't expect Southerners to "quit" their cultures and become the same as New Englanders, do you? Or for Cajuns to "quit" their culture and become Okies, either. So why do you expect us to quit our cultures and be like you just to prove we're American? As far patriotism goes, 75% of the men and 25% of the women in my family have served or are currently serving in the US Military. 4 have come home from Iraq or Afghanistan in a coffin and 32 have come home wounded, 8 are permanently disabled. What's the ratio in your family?
And before you start that why-can't-you-people-quit-being-Indian-an-just-be-Americans stuff, let e send you to see one of my cousins on my dad's side of the family...the Scottish side. My cousin James is very proud of his Scots blood. He learned Scots Gaelic, learned the history and culture and even lived in Scotland with some of our distant kin there. He has his house decorated inside and out with Scottish stuff, and married his Scottish wife in a traditional Scottish wedding done in Gaelic, which included a hand-fasting ceremony. He wears kilts on a daily basis, plays bagpipes, and flies the Scottish flag off his front porch. He and his wife speak Gaelic in their house and their children also speak it and live the culture. He is also a retired US Marine and I would dare ANYONE to question his patriotism or criticize him for embracing the culture of his ancestors(if you do I hope you can move faster than he does).
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RE: Sarah Palin's Record On Native Alaskan Issues - 9/15/2008 10:07:09 PM
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PaleHawkWoman
Posts: 503
Joined: 7/14/2005
Status: online
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quote:
ORIGINAL: ljmac
quote:
ORIGINAL: tracydolls
PHW,
Thanks again for the info. How you treat the least is very important, but you have to remember that the people that you are talking to now are the decendents of those that SLAUGHTERED the Natives in the first place.
Alot has been done in Christ's NAME. He will tell MANY of them I never knew you!
The taking of the children? Wow. Do not Natives have laws about that?
I know African Americans fought not to have Whites be able to adopt them.
With almost the extinction of some Tribes that should be the LAW.
You mean narrow-minded, heartless, bigoted adults tried to children from finding families. I don't think the children themselves said I rather be an orphan.
jmac, again,we are not talking about children with no extended families to take them in. We are talking about the state arbitrarily taking Native children from their parents without proving abuse or neglect or without adhereing to the same "heal the family" policy they practice with white families to keep the family together, without giving parents or the extended families due process,and without notifying their tribes of legal action as required by federal law.
From 1876 thru the late 1950's native children were removed by force from their parents and placed in boarding schools funded by the US Govt and run by missionaries. The parents would be jailed or killed if they tried to hide or keep their children from being taken. Based upon the philosophy espoused by Col. William Pratt- "kill the Indian to save the man", the children were kept from their families for years, forbidden to speak their native languages or practice any aspect of their native cultures. They were beaten until they dropped for breaking the rules. They were subjected to the most horrendous physical, emotional,verbal, and sexual abuse you could imagine, and 25% of them "disappeared"- their remains found buried in basements and other unmarked graves years later- long after the schools were closed down and excavation started for some new development. This happened throughout the US and Canada, with the full participation of the church. Wonder what Jesus would say about that?
Can you tell me that white folks in this country were treated like this?
There are people in my mother's generation who were abused at the boarding schools and have the scars to prove it. I've heard the stories and seen those scars, and seen the pain in their eyes as they remembered friends and relatives who were beaten to death or raped by the staff. Tim Giago, a noted Oglala author and long-time editor of Indian Country Today described how the priest at St Francis Indian School found a kitten that the boys in one dorm had adopted. He linedthe boys up and killed the kitten right in front of them, then started beating the boys one by one trying to get the "guilty" boy to confess. He beat each boy until the child fell unconscious and then started on the next one. One of the older boys "confessed" to protect the smaller children and was beaten almost to death by the priest. The boy never fully recovered from his injuries and was crippled all of his life. This happened in the late 1950's but was not an anomaly- it was "business as usual" in the Indian Boarding schools.
We are very, very adamant about keeping our children in our own communities because for 5 generations we weren't allowed to keep them at all and because they are our future, the continuation of our people. Stop and think how you would feel if someone came and took over this country, took your house and land, took your assets, and then took our children away from you to raise them up in the culture and religion of the conquerors in order to extinguish your culture and religious beliefs. And all the while they enacted laws which not only marginalized your humanity but purposely prevented you from any due process to protect your family and kept you from even working at the job you've always had, leaving you no way to feed your family.
That has been our experience and the reason we are still very sensitive about justice issues and protecting what we have left...especially our children. If these things were no longer going on, I wouldn't have a beef with it. But they are still happening and I am still going to protest it.
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RE: Sarah Palin's Record On Native Alaskan Issues - 9/15/2008 11:04:14 PM
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ljmac
Posts: 1378
Joined: 11/20/2006
Status: offline
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quote:
ORIGINAL: PaleHawkWoman
quote:
ORIGINAL: ljmac
quote:
ORIGINAL: tracydolls
PHW,
Thanks again for the info. How you treat the least is very important, but you have to remember that the people that you are talking to now are the decendents of those that SLAUGHTERED the Natives in the first place.
Alot has been done in Christ's NAME. He will tell MANY of them I never knew you!
The taking of the children? Wow. Do not Natives have laws about that?
I know African Americans fought not to have Whites be able to adopt them.
With almost the extinction of some Tribes that should be the LAW.
You mean narrow-minded, heartless, bigoted adults tried to children from finding families. I don't think the children themselves said I rather be an orphan.
...We are talking about the state arbitrarily taking Native...
From 1876 thru the late 1950's... This happened (abuse) throughout the US and Canada, with the full participation of the church. Wonder what Jesus would say about that?
Can you tell me that white folks in this country were treated like this?
We are very, very adamant about keeping our children in our own communities because for 5 generations we weren't allowed to keep them at all and because they are our future...
That has been our experience and the reason we are still very sensitive about justice issues and protecting what we have left...especially our children. If these things were no longer going on, I wouldn't have a beef with it. But they are still happening and I am still going to protest it.
The future is bleak for people who hold on to tribalism.
Nobody is after your children except perhaps the people who want to help by killing them before they're born.
Whatever abuses happened to tribal people did NOT happen with the "full participation of the church." Christ's church is the world wide body of believers. I'll guess that less than 1% even knew about whatever abuses took place. Wonder what Jesus would say about your eager slandering of His bride?
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RE: Sarah Palin's Record On Native Alaskan Issues - 9/16/2008 7:08:07 AM
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iluvatar
Posts: 1962
Joined: 4/12/2005
Status: online
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PHW,
Thanks for continuing to remind us of these things. As I'm sure you're aware, news of these issues doesn't get much beyond the reservation borders. Keep fighting.
-Dan.
_____________________________
Well, I've been to one world fair, a picnic, and a rodeo, and that's the stupidest thing I ever heard come over a set of earphones.
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RE: Sarah Palin's Record On Native Alaskan Issues - 9/16/2008 10:55:19 AM
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letusreason
Posts: 815
Joined: 8/30/2008
Status: offline
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Dragonnie
even the devil appears as an angel of light, we're told.[/size]
I really don't think that applies here.
The real question is what appears as a pittbull with lipstick??
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RE: Sarah Palin's Record On Native Alaskan Issues - 9/16/2008 5:20:05 PM
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PaleHawkWoman
Posts: 503
Joined: 7/14/2005
Status: online
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quote:
ORIGINAL: ljmac
The future is bleak for people who hold on to tribalism.
Nobody is after your children except perhaps the people who want to help by killing them before they're born.
Whatever abuses happened to tribal people did NOT happen with the "full participation of the church." Christ's church is the world wide body of believers. I'll guess that less than 1% even knew about whatever abuses took place. Wonder what Jesus would say about your eager slandering of His bride?
How is tribalism bad? Jews are tribaland it has helped them hang onthru millenia of genocide. Celts- the Scots, Irish, Welsh, Cornish, and Bretons- are also tribal(what do you think the clans are?) and have kept their ethnic and tribal identities despite centuries of persecution and attempts at forced assimilation by the Romans, Saxons, Vikings, and English. Would you say they have a bleak future?
Folks in rural areas are also tribal even if they don't recognize that- they are close-knit, clannish, in some areas everyone is related by blood and marriage, and resist pressure from outsiders to change their values and way of life. And let's not forget the Amish and Mennonites- they also remain insular, hanging onto a culture and way of life that is at odds with mainstream society. That is tribalism. Are you telling me that all of these people are doomed to fail because they are tribal and hang onto so-called outdated cultures and values?
The churches involved in the Indian Boarding/Residential schools in the US and Canada most certainly DID know what was going on- the missions boards and hierarchy were very well aware of the abuses and either encouraged it or ignored it. The rank-and-file of the church might not have known, but the stain is indeed upon the whole church, so I have not slanderd the church at all. What I have told you here is the truth, and if you recall it was Jesus who said, "That which ye do unto the least of these ye do also unto Me." He also told us that it is impossible to love God if you hate your fellow man, and what has been done to Native children both in the boarding/residential schools and the court systems is nothing less than hateful no matter how you try to dress it up.
Remember that most white christians up thru the mid-twentieth century thought of Indians as filthy, ignorant savages and brutes destined for extinction.There were those who felt it God's will that had brought the white man here expressly to exterminate the Red Men, who were the children of the Devil (read the works of Cotton Mather). We were not considered to be human beings and as such not eligible for humane treatment or even salvation. George Washington referred to us as "beasts of prey to extirpated so as not to hinder the progress of christian civilization."
In some places that mindset still exists. As recently as 10 yrs ago I had a gentleman who was a deacon at a Church of Christ in Hendersonville tell me that since I am Indian, I am the offspring of Satan and damned and there is nothing I can do to be saved. Apparently the Blood of Christ doesn't save everyone.
The schools were operated by the US Gov't and largely staffed by Catholic, Baptist, Methodist, Presbyterian, or Lutheran missionaries and clergy. All have apologized but not all of them did so ungrudgingly. There was one incident back in 1994 where one of the Catholic-run schools- I think it was St. Francis- was being visited by several high-ranking church officials, including one of the Cardinals serving the Pope. The oldest-living alumnus of the school, a Lakota woman who was 104 yrs old, was invited to speak about the fine education she had received. She did, and laid it all out- the abuses, the rapes, the harsh treatments and attitudes of the priests and nuns, the long, forced separations from parents and kin, the whole kit-n-caboodle. The church officialswere mortified, to say the least, and looked nervously at the Cardinal from Rome while trying to get this woman to shut up. The Cardinal made them listen to her and upon returning to Rome told Pope John Paul II about what he had learned. The Pope issued a formal apology to Natives for how they had been treated at the boarding schools.
Still none of the churches involved with running the Boarding/Residentialschools have ever admitted culpability in the murders and disappearances of so many children, and very few non-Native christians know anything about the boarding schools. If they did, they'd have a better understanding why so many Native people reject missionaries and what we refer to as "churchianity". There are some Native people who have bought the "Indian culture is all evil" and attend church and pretty much reject their own people... those are the ones we refer to as "christians". I can't help that the name "christian" has such bad connotations among Native Americans, but it does and for good reason if you can see things from our side.
For those of us who practice the traditions of our tribes, we don't reject Jesus- we know He is the Creator's Son who came for us all, but you can bet we don't "do church". We follow the Jesus-Way as Native peoples, expressing our faith in our traditional cultures, and refer to ourselves as believers. Most of us gave up trying to get the rest of the Body to accept us as the people God made us to be. The Lord accepts us and that's enough, I guess.
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RE: Sarah Palin's Record On Native Alaskan Issues - 9/16/2008 5:35:24 PM
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PaleHawkWoman
Posts: 503
Joined: 7/14/2005
Status: online
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quote:
ORIGINAL: letusreason
quote:
ORIGINAL: Dragonnie
even the devil appears as an angel of light, we're told.[/size]
I really don't think that applies here.
The real question is what appears as a pittbull with lipstick??
You mean to tell me you haven't seen all those ridiculous outfits people dress their dogs up in? If I was a dog and someone dressed me up like that I'd react in such a way as to make the girl in The Exorcist look like Pollyanna. Same for anyone trying to put make-up on me. GRRRRR!!!!
The phrase "a pitbull with lipstick" refers to trying to dress up something as being other than what it is or pass it off as not as bad as it looks, or trying to pretty up something ugly.
There's al lot of stuff going on that could be referred to in this manner.
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RE: Sarah Palin's Record On Native Alaskan Issues - 9/16/2008 5:45:07 PM
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ljmac
Posts: 1378
Joined: 11/20/2006
Status: offline
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quote:
ORIGINAL: PaleHawkWoman
quote:
ORIGINAL: ljmac
The future is bleak for people who hold on to tribalism.
Nobody is after your children except perhaps the people who want to help by killing them before they're born.
Whatever abuses happened to tribal people did NOT happen with the "full participation of the church." Christ's church is the world wide body of believers. I'll guess that less than 1% even knew about whatever abuses took place. Wonder what Jesus would say about your eager slandering of His bride?
How is tribalism bad? Jews are tribaland it has helped them hang onthru millenia of genocide. Celts- the Scots, Irish, Welsh, Cornish, and Bretons- are also tribal(what do you think the clans are?) and have kept their ethnic and tribal identities despite centuries of persecution and attempts at forced assimilation by the Romans, Saxons, Vikings, and English. Would you say they have a bleak future?
Folks in rural areas are also tribal even if they don't recognize that- they are close-knit, clannish, in some areas everyone is related by blood and marriage, and resist pressure from outsiders to change their values and way of life. And let's not forget the Amish and Mennonites- they also remain insular, hanging onto a culture and way of life that is at odds with mainstream society. That is tribalism. Are you telling me that all of these people are doomed to fail because they are tribal and hang onto so-called outdated cultures and values?
The churches involved in the Indian Boarding/Residential schools in the US and Canada most certainly DID know what was going on- the missions boards and hierarchy were very well aware of the abuses and either encouraged it or ignored it. The rank-and-file of the church might not have known, but the stain is indeed upon the whole church, so I have not slanderd the church at all. What I have told you here is the truth, and if you recall it was Jesus who said, "That which ye do unto the least of these ye do also unto Me." He also told us that it is impossible to love God if you hate your fellow man, and what has been done to Native children both in the boarding/residential schools and the court systems is nothing less than hateful no matter how you try to dress it up.
Remember that most white christians up thru the mid-twentieth century thought of Indians as filthy, ignorant savages and brutes destined for extinction.There were those who felt it God's will that had brought the white man here expressly to exterminate the Red Men, who were the children of the Devil (read the works of Cotton Mather). We were not considered to be human beings and as such not eligible for humane treatment or even salvation. George Washington referred to us as "beasts of prey to extirpated so as not to hinder the progress of christian civilization."
In some places that mindset still exists. As recently as 10 yrs ago I had a gentleman who was a deacon at a Church of Christ in Hendersonville tell me that since I am Indian, I am the offspring of Satan and damned and there is nothing I can do to be saved. Apparently the Blood of Christ doesn't save everyone.
The schools were operated by the US Gov't and largely staffed by Catholic, Baptist, Methodist, Presbyterian, or Lutheran missionaries and clergy. All have apologized but not all of them did so ungrudgingly. There was one incident back in 1994 where one of the Catholic-run schools- I think it was St. Francis- was being visited by several high-ranking church officials, including one of the Cardinals serving the Pope. The oldest-living alumnus of the school, a Lakota woman who was 104 yrs old, was invited to speak about the fine education she had received. She did, and laid it all out- the abuses, the rapes, the harsh treatments and attitudes of the priests and nuns, the long, forced separations from parents and kin, the whole kit-n-caboodle. The church officialswere mortified, to say the least, and looked nervously at the Cardinal from Rome while trying to get this woman to shut up. The Cardinal made them listen to her and upon returning to Rome told Pope John Paul II about what he had learned. The Pope issued a formal apology to Natives for how they had been treated at the boarding schools.
Still none of the churches involved with running the Boarding/Residentialschools have ever admitted culpability in the murders and disappearances of so many children, and very few non-Native christians know anything about the boarding schools. If they did, they'd have a better understanding why so many Native people reject missionaries and what we refer to as "churchianity". There are some Native people who have bought the "Indian culture is all evil" and attend church and pretty much reject their own people... those are the ones we refer to as "christians". I can't help that the name "christian" has such bad connotations among Native Americans, but it does and for good reason if you can see things from our side.
For those of us who practice the traditions of our tribes, we don't reject Jesus- we know He is the Creator's Son who came for us all, but you can bet we don't "do church". We follow the Jesus-Way as Native peoples, expressing our faith in our traditional cultures, and refer to ourselves as believers. Most of us gave up trying to get the rest of the Body to accept us as the people God made us to be. The Lord accepts us and that's enough, I guess.
Your animosity toward white people and to Christ's church is well documented.
You're way too eager to slam people. First you say that your itemized abuses took place with the "full participation of the church," which is impossible. Then you say there are people who think "Indian culture is all evil." Who says that? I suspect nobody.
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RE: Sarah Palin's Record On Native Alaskan Issues - 9/16/2008 7:12:34 PM
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PaleHawkWoman
Posts: 503
Joined: 7/14/2005
Status: online
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jmac, I am not hostile to white folks in general or I wouldn't talk to most of my family... I am 3/4 white. I am perturbed by people who can't seem to take the time to walk in someone else's shoes for a while and at least try to understand where they are coming from.
I DO have difficulties with "churchianity" but not the faith. Portions of church doctrine do not gibe with Scripture and the modern church seems to be more about the business of church than matters of faith. If you took the time to learn what the church has done in this part of the world to the Native inhabitants, you would understand why we are often hostile... and the sad truth is the church has not exactly been too eager to take the steps necessary to establish a proper relationship with us. I suspect that it would cost way too much in the way of pride.
And yes, we often get told by non-Indian christians that we need to quit being Indian and just be like everyone else, that our cultures are demonic( like American culture isn't?) and cannot be redeemed by the Blood, that to prove we are "saved" we have to basically be white. We get told that we are possessed by the demons of our ancestors when we dance at powwows and gatherings, that our traditional regalia is possessed and must be burned, and a whole lot of other equally ignorant things.
I don't hear anyone telling my Scottish kin to give up their "demonic" culture, music, and reglia. And I DO know what my Scottish ancestors believed before they were christians and it WAS truly pagan, complete with gods, spirits, and human sacrifice. Yet you will have people proudly play bagpipes in church, and wear kilts and the like and no one tells them to burn it.
One AOG lady toldme I had damned my daughters by givng them traditional Native names and to save them I had to choose a "christian" name fromthe Bible. "Like Jezebel or Delilah?" I asked. "That's in the Bible so it's gotta be christian!" She looked at me and then stormed off. Yeah I was baiting her, but her ignorance was appalling and she was the head of the women's ministries at that church.
I'm not so much hostile as I am frustrated by the lack of compassion and the ignorance- much of it seemingly chosen_ that I am exposed to everytime I deal with non-Native folks in general and white evangelicals in particular. I can't help it that the history books left out a lot of things that no one wants to think about or that the church has taken some very unscriptural stances over the years when dealing with issues of race/ethnicity, colonization, slavery, women's right's, labor/worker rights, and recently politics(Hey, God doesn't HAVE a party!). I see christians who are so legalistic that they think that they speak for God but no one else does and if you don't fit into their definition of christian then you are damned-and I do NOT mean they use the Biblical definition either but some pharisiacal system of hoops you have to jump thru to please THEM, not God. There are those who think that "being made over in the image of God" means "You will look/walk/talk just like me".
I grew up in the South and went to a Methodist church. According to the Baptists and Church of Christ, I was going to hell. They each also thought the other was going to hell. It was and still is ridiculous that that even went on.
I see justice issues that go ignored while churchmembers chit-chat over latte's and talk about nothing that matters worth a darn. I see christians argue over what color of carpet they need for their new multi-million dollar building while the homes of the disabled and the elderly are falling down because they can't afford to get them fixed. I see people sitting in church who are ignored by the people sitting right next to them, people who come alone and leave alone like shadows passing thru.
When I was a child I heard people at our church talk about my mother like she was a dog because she was divorced(my dad left us) and they considered her to be one step above a prostitute. Can you imagine how that that felt to a 5 yr old kid? I heard people gossipping about folks in church as a child and they're still gossipping about people in church, and some of the meanest things I have ever heard or read have come out of the mouths and off the keypads of christians.
So it isn't just us Native folks the church needs to reconcile with... it's everybody. I'm not saying that nothing good ever comes from christians or churches or The Church, but there's waaaay too much that is not good at all coming from the same sources.
Besides which, you don't know me. Is this how you would speak to me face to face? I'd hate to even ask what image you have of me in your mind.
I do not know Sarah Palin as a person, but I've been studying her Native policies and actions towards Native peoples and it has not been good. I'm glad she's pro-life, but that will not help me or my people if she decides to go after all of us as she has Native peoples in Alaska. We are the smallest minority in our own land, and the GOP has always been hostile to us. We have no one who will trouble themselves to stand up for us, and that includes the church. George W Bush declared a tribe of 563 people to be extinct with a Writ the first week he was in office and the church didn't say a thing. Heck, James Dobson even applauded President Bush for doing so.
If Palin becomes President I have no doubt she may try to do the same thing to all of us. Eisenhower terminated half of the federally recognized tribes while in office and many of them struggled for years to get their recognition and lands back. Many are still struggling to that end. We are trying to survive, struggling to keep who we are alive. Few Natives get abortions so I fear someone who is pro-choice far less than I do someone who is anti-Indian.
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RE: Sarah Palin's Record On Native Alaskan Issues - 9/16/2008 8:45:10 PM
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rlj
Posts: 2179
Joined: 4/14/2005
Status: offline
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quote:
Your animosity toward white people and to Christ's church is well documented.
I see more of Christ in the average paragraph posted by Palehawkwoman than in all of my years of listening to your drivel. I don't see the animosity in her posts I see the Christ that in her that overcame that animosity.
quote:
Then you say there are people who think "Indian culture is all evil." Who says that?
Here's one example:
One AOG lady toldme I had damned my daughters by givng them traditional Native names and to save them I had to choose a "christian" name fromthe Bible. "Like Jezebel or Delilah?" I asked. "That's in the Bible so it's gotta be christian!" She looked at me and then stormed off. Yeah I was baiting her, but her ignorance was appalling and she was the head of the women's ministries at that church.
Do you need it spelled out using phonics, phoenetics or ebonics? Can you read through a couple three typos LJ?
There used to be a man named Charles that was a frequent contributor to Crosswalk. He was half Native Indian and half caucasian. He would often talk of Native American issues and their relationship with the church, sometimes the wrongs that were done with the same tone as PHW. What they both had to say very much corraborated.
Here is more of what PHW was trying to say:
quote:
Boarding schools were an important part of the American Indian experience. They still are a critical factor in why some American Indian parents find it difficult to communicate with public school system administrators and teachers – and even more difficult to trust them...
At the time reformers believed that assimilation and off-reservation boarding schools were the lesser of two evils. They were a better policy than extermination, getting rid of American Indians by shooting them or starving them to death. Just because something is the lesser of two evils doesn’t make it right....
*Many boarding schools were established far away from reservations so that students would have no contact with their families and friends. Parents were discouraged from visiting and, in most cases, students were not allowed to go home during the summer.
*Indian boarding school students wore military uniforms and were forced to march.
*They were given many rules and no choices. To disobey meant swift and harsh punishment.
*Students were forbidden to speak their language.
*They were forbidden to practice their religion and were forced to memorize Bible verses and the Lord’s Prayer.
*Their days were filled with so many tasks that they had little time to think.
*Indian students had no privacy.
*Boarding school students were expected to spy on one another and were pitted against each other by administrators and teachers.
*Students were taught that the Indian way of life was savage and inferior to the white way. They were taught that they were being civilized or "raised up" to a better way of life.
*Indian students were told that Indian people who retained their culture were stupid, dirty, and backwards. Those who most quickly assimilated were called "good Indians." Those who didn’t were called "bad" Indians.
*The main part of their education focused on learning manual skills such as cooking and cleaning for girls and milking cows and carpentry for boys.
*Students were shamed and humiliated for showing homesickness for their families.
*When they finally did go home, as to be expected, many boarding school students had a difficult time fitting in.
http://www.kporterfield.com/aicttw/articles/boardingschool.html
Indian Boarding School Abuse – Including Child Molestation
quote:
In the late 19th century, the Bureau of Indian Affairs (in conjunction with various churches) placed thousands of Native American children into Indian Boarding Schools. At the boarding schools, the children were forced to give up their Indian heritage and were forbidden from speaking their native languages. They were routinely beaten and sexually abused, and some even died. Essentially, the goal of the United States government was to assimilate Native Americans into “white society.”
http://www.hermanlaw.com/html/native-american.html
_____________________________
-Roger
This is who I'm voting for. He is from the same party I voted for last time. This is consistent with my belief in the failure of the two party system and my disgust with it.
http://www.baldwin08.com/#
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RE: Sarah Palin's Record On Native Alaskan Issues - 9/17/2008 12:13:59 AM
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zamdad
Posts: 1697
Joined: 4/8/2005
Status: offline
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quote:
ORIGINAL: SonInMe1
I can't hunt deer on my own land without a licence.
This is a very one sided arguement with assumptions made on what the other side of these issues think.
Do "native Alaskans" ( which there truly never was ) need substinence hunting and fishing? When my ancestors came to america, they hunted and fished. Eventually they created a society and livlihoods changed.
Are you saying "native alaskans" all exist on hunting and fishing? If even a majority of them do then I think something has failed here. There are not too many native people's in western society who live like this.
I haven't read through the whole thread yet. This is not a folder I normally post in. I stopped at this post to clarify something, then I want to address the OP. After having lived in Alaska for 18 years ther are many things about life in "the bush" that folks in the lower 48 will never be able to comprehend. There are many native villages that have no grocery store, no means of buying food the way most Americans do. They survive by hunting and fishing. Much of this is done in the traditional way. Only, they have adopted many of the modern methods such as boats, planes, snowmachine (snowmobile for lower 48 residents), ATV's and such to get to the game and get the game out once killed. So, yes, they do need subsistence hunting and fishing.
During my time in AK I served in the Eskimo scouts with the Alaska Army National Guard. I attended the University of Alaska Fairbanks and graduated with a degree in criminal justice. In the 18 years I lived there I gained a deep respect for the native folks, Athabaskans, Eskimo's, Aleuts, Inuit's, each and every native Alaskan I got to know. Just like us white folk, each group has their problem children too. It's not the group, it's one bad apple who refuses to accept personal responsibility.
That being said, Palehawkwoman, while you and I have disagreed on some things, I find that I mostly agree with with you on real life issues. I have a hard time in dialogue with you when it comes to issues having to do with race. It's apparent that this is where your passion is. I commend you for having such a strong passion. Yet, other than what you read in the very thorough research you do, how can you truly relate to Alaska natives? Aside from the color of your skin and your love of traditions, there is a vast difference between native culture in the lower 48 and Alaska natives. I fear that your passion for your race completely detracts for your passion for Christ. If we are going to resolve racial dofferences and move forward, shouldn't He be the center of our universe? Sorry, but your comments on racial issues leave me feeling like I'm listening to Al Sharpton or Jesse Jackson. Yet, in many other issues I've discussed with you I know you and I are on the same page.
_____________________________
The two hardest things to handle: failure and success.
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RE: Sarah Palin's Record On Native Alaskan Issues - 9/17/2008 4:04:01 AM
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LabGuy
Posts: 3281
Joined: 9/22/2007
From: NW Pennsylvania
Status: offline
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I was curious about this thread and stopped in for a look, and I have to say I am shocked at some of the responses to PaleHawkWoman. Folks, we're supposed to be brothers and sisters in Christ. Can we put down the political crack pipes and stop the biting and devouring of one another for daring to disagree with whatever candidate we like? (No candidate is perfect!) What must the Lord think when He sees this?
I know it's all just words on a screen, but there are real people behind them with real concerns. We can't forget that; He certainly doesn't.
-Robb
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RE: Sarah Palin's Record On Native Alaskan Issues - 9/17/2008 2:37:53 PM
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78frogger
Posts: 58
Joined: 4/19/2005
Status: offline
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I think most Americans would be shocked if they found out about the many children who were taken from their Native parents so recently. I know I was. It is was a terrible and sad ordeal and I can't imagine being in their shoes and that's probably one of the worst things you could do to me is take my children.
I don't see what that has to do with Palin though as that was happening before she was born and ended long before her political career. She has done nothing anti-native as you claim. She followed the state constitution which is for equality of all people versus the racist federal law in regards to subsistance hunting. It was for subsistence hunting not commercial and sport fishing and hunting.
As far as dealing with families losing their children the laws are impartial which is all she controls. Statistics are irrelevant because they almost never convey reality. To say they know that Alaskan Natives are taken from parents more often under the SAME circumstances is bologna. I have been involved in these types of cases with relatives. Even after years of dealing with it it was hard to honestly tell what was truth and what was misleading or downright lies. So for some agency, researcher, or whoever to come in and say they now all the details of the case and it's the same as this other case is hogwash.
I know that the Office of Child Services (in some states called other things like Child Protection Agencies, etc.) is given a LOT of power. Some say too much. Some say it is necessary. It is a hard call because people don't want to restrict them in protecting children but I also think that there is a tendency (understandably considering what they deal with) to become cynical, hardened, or untrusting. After dealing with case after case after case they may think of it as more of just a job instead of realizing the power they have over a families life both parent's and child's. There may be racist case workers too and considering the human nature of all races it wouldn't surprise me. That would be a travesty considering the power they have. Many judges will give more credit to a caseworker then a parent. After all, EVERY parent they deal with is going to say what it takes to defend themselves. So when someone is honestly being targeted they may not be listened to. I wish I could say I know how to fix that but I don't. Of course, in the small communities in the Bush it can actually work the opposite because it is hard to judge against people you know.
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RE: Sarah Palin's Record On Native Alaskan Issues - 9/17/2008 2:47:45 PM
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rgsoundguy
Posts: 398
Joined: 4/12/2005
From: Pottstown, PA
Status: offline
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quote:
ORIGINAL: iluvatar
Wow. I don't know why I'm even bothering to respond to this. Howsabout I steal your house one day while you're at work? You come home at 6:00 one day to find me sitting on your couch, cuddling with your wife, helping your kids with their homework and I say to you, "Welcome to my house." Wouldn't you find that just a bit... not right?
-Dan.
Dude, that was right on! I could not have put it better myself.
_____________________________
Albert Einstein said that insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. That convinces me that our nation is insane because we continually elect republicans and democrats expecting change and get none.
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RE: Sarah Palin's Record On Native Alaskan Issues - 9/17/2008 2:50:17 PM
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rgsoundguy
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