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Ed Menard, Park Ranger
A United Nations official says sacred lands -- like the Black Hills of Dakota, which includes Mount Rushmore -- should be returned to Native American control.
The United States must do more to heal the wounds of indigenous peoples caused by more than a century of oppression, including restoring control over lands Native Americans consider to be sacred, according to a U.N. human rights investigator.
James Anaya, the U.N. special rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples, just completed a 12-day visit to the United States where he met with representatives of indigenous peoples in the District of Columbia, Arizona, Alaska, Oregon, Washington State, South Dakota, and Oklahoma. He also met with U.S. government officials.
"I have heard stories that make evident the profound hurt that indigenous peoples continue to feel because of the history of oppression they have faced," Anaya said in a statement issued by the U.N. human rights office in Geneva Friday.
That oppression, he said, has included the seizure of lands and resources, the removal of children from their families and communities, the loss of languages, violation of treaties, and brutality, all grounded in racial discrimination.
Anaya welcomed the U.S. decision to endorse the U.N. Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples in 2010 and other steps the government has taken, but said more was needed.
'History of oppression'
His findings will be included in a final report submitted to the U.N. Human Rights Council. While not binding, the recommendations carry moral weight that can influence governments.
"It is clear that this history does not just blemish the past, but translates into present day disadvantage for indigenous peoples in the country," Anaya said.
"There have still not been adequate measures of reconciliation to overcome the persistent legacies of the history of oppression, and that there is still much healing that needs to be done," he said.
Game hunt for sacred white buffaloes riles Native groups
In Alaska and the Pacific Northwest, where some Native Americans depend on hunting and fishing, Anaya said tribes face "ever-greater threats ... due to a growing surge of competing interests, and in some cases incompatible extractive activities, over these lands and resources."
"In Alaska, indigenous peoples complain about a complex and overly restrictive state regulatory apparatus that impedes their access to subsistence resources (fish and wildlife)," he said.
Native American tribe gets permit to kill bald eagles
Mining for natural resources in parts of the country has also caused serious problems for indigenous peoples.
"Past uncontrolled and irresponsible extractive activities, including uranium mining in the Southwest, have resulted in the contamination of indigenous peoples' water sources and other resources, and in numerous documented negative health effects among Native Americans," he said.
Mount Rushmore
He said indigenous peoples feel they have too little control over geographic regions considered sacred to them, like the San Francisco Peaks in Arizona and the Black Hills in South Dakota. Anaya suggested such lands should be returned to Native peoples.
"Securing the rights of indigenous peoples to their lands is of central importance to indigenous peoples' socioeconomic development, self-determination, and cultural integrity," Anaya said.
"Continued efforts to resolve, clarify, and strengthen the protection of indigenous lands, resources, and sacred sites should be made," he added.
How genocide wiped out a Native American population
Mount Rushmore, a popular tourist attraction, is located in the Black Hills, which the Sioux tribe consider to be sacred and have territorial claims to based on an 1868 treaty. Shortly after that treaty was signed, gold was discovered in the region. U.S. Congress eventually passed a law taking over the land.
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1980 that the seizure of the land was illegal and ordered the government to pay compensation. But the Sioux rejected the money and has continued to demand the return of the now public lands.
Anaya said he will make specific recommendations on these and other issues in a full report later this year.
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Seems like it's time to get the UN out of the US, and the US out of the UN.
I've always wondered why there is a black history month, but nothing like that for the natives.
F the UN and all of it's overpaid hacks. And get the f out of the US while you are at it.
Lets see, Florida, most of the East and North east, most of the north west, northern Texas, Oklahoma, most of the upper Mississippi Basin...hmmm I think the UN might be trying to give America the best gift ever
Yep, the point of this article seems to have been lost on you. America, the country advertised to be the land of the free and home of the brave is built on a legacy of oppression and cowardice. The US went to war with Sadaam Hussein in 1990 because he invaded Kuwait for its oil resources. How is what he did different from what the US did to the Native Americans in the west in the 19th century? All that stuff from the founding fathers about all men being created equal and having certain unalienable rights was just a bunch of wind not worth the paper it was written on. When it came time to apply that bold statement to black slaves and the native peoples, the ball was dropped. The US is no better than the country it rebelled against.
I would agree to give back the sacred lands. However, there must be an agreement that the Native Americans of TODAY do not turn those lands into a CASINO WITH PROSTITUTION and gambling allowed!!!
Long gone are the days of the Native Americans that respected the land. Now, they are like everybody el$e: Intere$ted in making a buck, not matter what....
Tough.
Actually a good many Indian tribes were nomadic. They didn't own any land. The one's that weren't, sold what they had for beads and trinkets. So there is nothing to return. Problem solved.
Will 109--And what noble country do you live in?? Black slaves were freed by us over 145 yrs ago and Indian people were not annihilated which is what many cultures/countries did after conquest. They were given land to live on (and it's true not the best land although some Cherokees in Oklahoma ended up on oil land!) and we've paid billions and billions to tribes over the years and the payments continue with no end in sight!! Most Indian tribes have casinos now which often aren't allowed on non-Indian land making billions more. What other countries have treated their "natives" way better???? Please tell us who else has!!
Native Americans were annihilated. They populated the entire United States of America. What smallpox didn't take care of, we did with guns. You need to read up on it a little bit. Start with "Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee"
All the crap in the middle east not to mention the pirate issue a little further south and let's not forget the nut in N Korea and this is what the UN works on?
Will-stop living in la la land. Every nation on the face of the earth at one time or another confronted indigenous people that didn't want to "give up" there land. Does this mean that now, all industrialized countries, as well as most of the 3rd world give up the land their ancestors fought for and gave their lives to obtain? Sheer nonsense, and to compare the history and founding of the USA to the colinialism of Britain that wiped out and assimilated countless cultures on 4 continents is just, well, stupid. That there are ANY native americans left in this nation is testimony to the mercy that this nation showed those that with indigenous people at a time when the Spanish and most other nations were wiping them out to a person. The story of the "native American" might not even be a story of Asian people that crossed a land bridge, since anthropololgy is starting to verify that anglo-europeans were most likey the first humans to set foot and colonize North America. WIth that said, the LEGACY of this country is built on courage, perserverance, and blood of those that forged the freedoms that millions of "oppressed" have sought to obtain in a destiny of greatness, not the typical America bashing BS that people like you always throw out when given the opportunity. I REALLY wish you folks would just LEAVE if you feel so strongly against this land, for this nation IS too good for people like you. I also suggest that before you do you stop at Ft Bragg, North Carolina and start callling some of the folks there "cowards" and "oppressers" for continuing to defend the freedoms that you so apparenty can't discern. Wake up Gomer - things were different 300 years ago, and the USA did not invent slavery - blacks did, and native peoples didn'have to make the mistake of trying to subjugate white folks just like they had always done with THEIR native american neighbors. Enough said.
The UN should continue doing what it normally does, nothing.
Almost a valid point until you blamed slavery on black people...wow
The U.N. should mind its own business and LEAVE THE U.S.A. NOW!!! The U.N. has always been and still is the most corrupt, useless and expensive organization ever created. It has NEVER completed anything worthwhile in its long history and is always looking to the U.S. Taxpayer for more money while it allows its employees and other countries steal what is given. IT'S TIME FOR THE U.N. TO DISAPPEAR FROM THE U.S. SHORES.
Give 'em back Manhattan, then al Quida can concentrate on bombing teepees.
It would be great to think that the current administration would tell the UN to butt out but that won't happen because President Obama requires UN and world approval ahead of Congressional approval on things. Out with the old in Nov.
Jack D--Annihilated means totally wiped out and that certainly isn't true of Indian tribes of North America! I have read "Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee" and live not far from there! I have many Indian friends but Russell Means and his radical nuts of AIM are not among them. Oh and by the way Russell couldn't even win an election on the Pine Ridge reservation!! Most Indian people know him for the nut case/wacko/ and being responsible for his movement killing of two FBI agents during the occupation of Wounded Knee years ago!! Obviously some radical left wing liberals love him and they can have him!! And by the way all cultures have had slaves including blacks and Indians long before we did!! Read your history please!!!!!!
Jack - "They populated the entire United States of America. What smallpox didn't take care of, we did with guns."
"We" did? No we didnt, Dont hold children to the sins of the father. If you shot some indians thats your thing. Your statement is asinine. This article is just outright silly. EVERY country has conquered some other peoples. Its ridiculous to say "Give it back" there would be no country for anyone then. Does it suck? yes, but deal with it. America won that war - deal with it and move on.
Is wondering what freeing blacks slaves means? Does it mean not being able to OWN them anymore? Does it mean NOT being able to hunt them down? Does it mean NOT being able to lynch them? Does it mean being able to drink at water fountains or eat where they want? Does it mean that they get to VOTE? (although right after reconstruction blacks did vote, not always in the wisest ways). Does any one see that some of these same issues are relevant today only in a different way?
Just asking questions?
Tired= Thank you!
To hell with the "socialist" UN, Americans want the meddling organization out of America! We are a sovereign nation and American taxpayers are being forced to pay the bill for many anti-american groups to attack and attempt to destroy our country, we should pull all funding for groups that push any agenda that could negatively affect the United States!
Legal, in groups attacking America, are you talking about ALEC and groups like those?
Hey United Nations............PHUCK YOU........GET THE PHUCK OUT OF OUR BUSINESS.
What was done to the Native Americans was genocide. They were here first, immigrants came from other countries, killed them, killed most of the forests and animals, and turned America into an asphalt jungle. Problem is, the Native Americans are now corrupted. They want the right to kill eagles, whales, run gambling casinos, sell cheap cigarettes, and rape "their" lands. Tribal leaders are corrupt; alcoholism, obesity and other stupidity is rampant among Native tribes. Watch the movies "Smoke Signals" and "Little Big Man." The UN can't solve anything, but anyone who denies that Native Americans were victims of genocide is heartless and just plain dumb.
This guy is a joke, just like the UN. Why do we continue to fund these creeps?
I'm sorry, nobody "owns" any land, we merely rent it until somebody with bigger guns or a bigger wallet comes along. People die. Nations change. Whole species die out and leave the earth to other life forms. The Native Americans lost. Boo. Hoo. We'll lose someday, too. And while both are sad, they're absolutely inevitable.
So no, we're not giving any land back, James Anaya. We modern Americans are "renting" it from the earth at the moment. You can have it back when we're done with it, if you're still around.
And give the cave men back their caves. Time to move on.
I say: "BRAVO!" It's about time somebody told us what's what and who's who. It's about time we face our own ugly truths. It's about time that we, the most meddling and manipulative country in the world for the last 25+ years like we're an empire or something, get a dose of our own medicine. It's about time we do what's RIGHT by and for the Native Indian tribes who were more responsible in managing Nature's resources and who, before the "savage" killing machine all but annihilated them, hunted, fished and farmed responsibly to ensure the land would always be fruitful. It's about time the noble heritage of Native Indians is restored. All that said, it will be difficult and take quite some time, considering the fact they've been put on reservations, disenfranchised, isolated, flooded with booze and drugs to keep them uncomfortable numb, and given the dubious honor of operating gambling businesses, like that's not destructive in its own right, and left to languish in the misery, muck and mire we created just for them. My only question is: "UN, you forgot about the South and the indigenous tribes of Florida, Alabama, Mississippi et al. What up with THAT?" Oh, and to all the people talking smack about "other countries did it too and stuff", we're not "other countries." We're supposed to be the beacon, the exception, and THE model of Democracy. . . you know, all that "All men are created equal" and "inalienable rights" stuff in our Bill Of Rights and all the other "stuff" in the U.S. Constitution . . .the document Americans claim to love, revere and swear to uphold, so help us God. . .'MEMBER???
It is amusing that someone who is part of an organization where 75% of its members are thugs, dictators, and uncivilized, thinks that they have any credibility criticizing the primary funder of the organization. But, we all know that reason the thugs are part of the organization is to squeeze money out of those who have money. Too bad our country doesn't do more to help these other countries. It's really easy. Just keep telling them that if they want the prosperity of the US then they have to behave like the US. That means creating a free society, locking up the thugs who prefer to rule by the barrel of a gun and changing economic system to a free market, capitalist system. It's the only system that has ever brought prosperity to the people. You'd think that the last 4 years would prove to people that moving towards socialism doesn't bring prosperity to anyone except the cronies of the politicians who control the nation' purse-strings.
As to "giving the land back," it can't be done. There is no one alive who had any land taken from them. All that can be done is attempt to preserve the history and try to maintain the sacredness of it. But, like those pushing for reparations for blacks, none of them are alive to compensate. If they want to be put in the position that they would have been in had slavery not existed then the only option is to put them on boats back to Africa.
Oh, and those calling whites actions against Indians as genocide, keep in mind that times were definitely different back then. Also, the natives weren't exactly saints either. Inter tribal rivalries were brutal indeed.
Time to look forward, not back.
I am 3/8 Cherokee. My family grandparents in the 1700s were indentured servants to those who paid their passage to America. Other grandparents were slave owners. My family have served in every war since the Revolutionary War. As a mixed culture, there is nobody left to blame. It happened and that is that. It is what it is. So many Indians wanting land back is not for Ceremonial reasons nor burial sites. The land is desired to have Casinos and be under laws more favorable to the Casino owners. It is beyond time to remove ourselves from the United Nations.
Face it, whether anyone should be proud of it or not, most every inhabited square inch of the earth has at one point belonged to another group who fought the group that lived there before them, who fought the group that lived there before them, that fought the group that lived there before them. Heck, we like to put all "Native Americans" in to one big group, but they were many tribes and even the different tribes fought and killed eachother over land. We will give the land back to the Native Americans when Europe gives all of its land back to the Romans, or is it the Germans, or should we give it to the French? How about Middle East, lets give it back to the Greek, or is the the Egypitians, or the Persians, or the Babylonians. How about Asia, lets give it back to the British, or maybe one of the many Dynasties, or maybe to one of the mongols. Getting the point yet?
We are the United States, the cultural and racial melting pot of the world, and we say E Pluribus Unum; Out of Many, ONE.
and when the USA tells the UN "MAKE ME!"... then what?
There is no "make me" to it. It's a statement intended to suggest a moral and ethical approach to righting the wrongs done to the Indian tribes across this great land. I highly recommend reading the article. It's amazing and all the facts of the matter are like right there in it. I KNOW! I COULDN'T BELIEVE IT WAS ALL RIGHT THERE UNDER MY NOSE NEITHER! *snark*
Actually a valid argument that black Africans invented slavery could be made. Slavery is one of the oldest institutions of the human race. Indeed it predates the existence of the human race. We know, for a fact, that several varieties of insects take and keep slaves (notably ants). Since human history began in Africa and the first humans were undoubtedly black Africans and slavery has existed since prehistoric times it would not be a stretch to think that slavery goes back to the beginning of the human species. Many slaves sent to the Americas during the 17 and 18 hundreds were convicts and captured warriors sold into slavery by the native African people themselves.
The only problem I have with the arguments being made is that there is no way that we can expect indigenous peoples globally to take back their ancestral lands nor should current populations innocent of the perceived crime be forced to pay for the sins of their forefathers that operated under different laws and customs that justified their actions. It would be a huge mistake on the part of the human race to decide to judge and punish the present for the sins of the past and fundamentally it is not justice to judge peoples of the past based on the culture and values of today. History is history and should be learned from and moved on from. Any hanging onto the wrongs and crimes of the past only breeds ill will and a feeling of needing revenge when such vengeance will only result in a return of ill will from the persecuted innocent and dooming us all to an endless cycle of repeating the history over and over and over.
I believe they said..
"US must return control of sacred lands to Native Americans"
Now I'm quite certain that isn't ll lands as its impractical and quite dumb... But sites promised to them which they hold quite a presence in, definitely I say more power to em. Black hills was a site we asked them to move to, and we violated that in every way.
Interesting some of the comments, basically screw the Native Americans, but many of them probably demand freedom for Tibet from China.
Tron, what an ignorant statement, like "white people" are the only ones that ever took something in the past by force.
How about the various African warlords to this day who spend all their nation's economy on weapons to blow eachother up, how about the various middle eastern empires, Persian, Babylonian, Egyptian, how about the various Asian Dynasties and Mongol empires. Face it, as long as there have been land and people to live on that land various groups have fought eachother over it around the world. It may not be a bright spot in anyone's history, but no one group is due any reparation for something that happened in the distant past any more than anyone else.
trying again, eh, tron?
When the Europeans arrived here the Indians were living in the Stone Age. No Indian in the Americas had even invented the wheel!! Before 1800, American Indians led brutal lives and routienly slaughtered and enslaved other tribes. The Hopi who claim to be peaceful committed acts of canibalism up until the early 1900s. In the past 10 years the Federal government has been labeling BLM/US Forest Service/National Park lands as "Sacred". It is a ruse. The Indians are laying claim to these lands but they have no real interest other than selling mineral rights, drilling permits and turning Yosemite into an outdoor Disneyland. Indians own enormous tracts of land throughout the US. The land could be productive but the Indians want to continue living in the Stone Age. Enough is enough.
I wonder exactly where the time line is that all things must return to ? Some seem to say that because a piece of land once belonged to their people that it should be returned but where is the line in time that we should draw , 100 years ago ? 200 years ago ? 1000 years ago ?
Just who really owns the lands at any given time depends on who was the strongest at the time and has nothing to do with forever belonging to anyone . Yet it seems that now we are supposed to return to what , a line drawn over a hundred years ago ? screw that ! The native americans never really believed they owned the land in the first place so just what is it we would be giving away if not ownership ?
IMO we should just draw a line starting now no land should change hands without consent from both parties involved , it's either that or keep it the way it has always has been and who ever is strongest makes the rules but we can't keep trying to relive the past and somehow return to some point in history . because somehow someone will want a different time line drawn so the land goes to someone else .
The UN is a great one for suggesting this. NOT.
How about they sort out Eastern Europe and Africa first where BLOOD is still being shed over heritage and lands? Then follow that with the Middle East for Blood and Money problems......then the Far East where entire nations are forced to a foreign government, such as Tibet. Then we can talk.
This is the ONLY country in the world which seems to feel a need to apologize ..repeatedly...for the politicians and greed that occurred in the 1890's and resurged in some areas when Uranium became an issue in post 1900 years. All of this is making our nation look ridiculous.
The reason that Native Americans are isolated began in bad moves and was continued by ethnic hatred. The irony here is that they have their own national policies...within the lands they now control (why they have casinos) and yet they want to decide national policy for the rest of us. I respect their religious dedication and the heritage they came from, but if they will not become part of us then this is a choice they make.
No matter what....the lands that are considered specifically in this article are "public" lands. The cost of patroling and ensuring they remain that way is no small budget. Do any other Americans want to give it back, just so it becomes a resource faucet for a cash strapped indian nation?(which is still not united beyond tribal heritage..talk about ethnocentric!)
What was done may be a shame but how long does it have to be waved as a false flag for an illusion? Fine the people, pay the natives, and if they want the land let them buy it back. My family owned parts of the Shenandoah Valley....many years ago, do I sue? No, you go forward while looking with pride at the pictures behind. Quit riding the glory of the past and find a reason to make your own generation a generation to remember. Screw the guys at the U.N. who commit nothing but demand everything...that agency (including the Security Council) has long since ceased to do anything more than a Hollywood Act..it's all about the Flash Baby...when will they create substance in a united global event?
@Dex ----There IS a Native American History Month and their are National Events....and Asian American, and Black American, and even a Asian Pacific Heritage Month.....do some research.
@ Will----Keep in mind these tribes may isolate the lands and still fail to protect them. keeping monuments and historic records is fine but what about wildlife and theft prevention on such large tracts of land? If you think it is all about mineral rights and resources, fine.....but in MOST cases it seems obvious that the same will be done by Native Americans even if it is smaller scale. How else will those tribal councils find the cash to "overcome the economic disparity they have been subjected to."
They chose tribal law over our national law and think that was right. look at other cultures such as the Amish and ask yourself how wrong is it that they did not join and practice their own ways.
It may have been unacceptable in older times but today? I am tired of being made to feel ashamed for having a greater nation that accepts outsiders freely while the smaller isolationists look for PR. Time to re-NEGOTIATE for the last time and make everyone abide the results so we can move on.
LIVE in now, even while you salute the past. Otherwise, you create nothing of your own worth saluting. I think many of the historic leaders are most memorable for doing just that. Pragamatism? Maybe, but not without honor and a dose of reality.
The problem is the UN's mandate doesn't go back 2-6 centuries ago... There was a lot that was done, which was wrong and distasteful. It also hit when a lot of the native cultures were on the declinne (and we were on the rise). Case in point, the Maiyans; they had advancements at a time Rome was still collapsing and Europe fell into the dark ages. In like 1,000 AD, the Maiyans, Chinese, some people's in India represented culture on this planet; we represented a declining civilization who was yet to kill off cats "as the devil's familiar's", blaming them for black death based on superstition and fear of the devil in our midst...
The renisaunce came (and our own culture wasn't the only one to see advancements in their own day) and we were on the rise, when many cultures were facing a decline of their own... The difference in weaponry (something that mind you wasn't totally unique to us, and by this I mean the Chinese weren't without any hint of knowledge of gun powder) made things a bit of a sure bet... This said, many leaders of the time, also had their own thing (human sacrifices, among other things). And in this matter, I do find some of the contradictions of the Maiyans among others an odd (though not entirely unique) thing. On the one hand their astronomical and architectural knowledge suggested a culture advanced in it's own right (not that the conquistador's comming on on the decline could have seen this); on the other hand the practices of human sacrifice and the like suggested something different. And yet both were aspects of the same culture. There was an inscription about invaders comming from the north, and something to the effect of changing the course of their civilization, but who and how. If any text existed to answer that, I'm afraid it's long since destroyed; and yet perhaps it might give telling beyond just that culture alone, answers wrt human history itself.... Lets just say it might be a history which has been outplayed more then once accross the globe....
If our own progeny weren't so apt to play all sides against one another, and betray any trust, treaty, or what have you; history might have remembered things differently. It isn't as if everything that came before was always and entirely idealic "until we came along"... But blaming people for the past, and having to "balance the books" with the decendents far removed.... Aren't we seeing this play out in the Middle East with the Arab/Israeli conflict? I'd rather not see things turn that ugly.
Now, and this said, it doesn't justify taking people's kids away TODAY, as some accounts exist. We aren't guilty for the sins of our fathers, but we shouldn't add to them either... Giving up the country, and turning over all land, really isn't an option. But some talks (and leave the UN out of this) wouldn't be unwarranted. The problem is, due to double dealing of the past, issues of trust could enter into it. And the natives today, are not the natives of 3 centuries ago, and we are not the same people either.
In the end, and I have been to the Navajoo reservation, and seen how people live; I'm more concerned about the lack of opportunities moving forward, then about settling scores from 250 years ago and more.... It's funny, someone asked me what I thought, seeing how they live (I stayed on the reservation for a week, with the family of the girl my parents had sponsored, though she was grown up and graduated from high school many years before while waiting for dorms at UNM to open up), and what could I say? Sad in a word, but without much explanation... What was sad was seeing people, more hard working then most, stuck in abject poverty, where opportunity itself seemed denied. And it is that opportunity itself which should be possible; while we're all heading to whatever the future might hold for all of us....
1. U.N. go to Hell!
2. Native Americans, yes we broke treaties, I'm not proud of that. Is there a country that hasn't? That said, we're way beyond the point of giving land back. In the mean time, make your mind up as to who/what you are or want to be, assimilated into modern American culture, or live as your ancestors did, makes no mater to me. All I know is the rests of America does not owe you a lifetime of perpetual welfare. For what it's worth, be thankful another culture didn't inhabit America, they may have chosen to wipe out the natives.
3. To the African Americans, the vast majority of your ancestorswere brought here against their will, yes we get that. We did the best we could to right that wrong. Frankly, you need to look at things from a whole new perspective, am I (African Americans) better off here or back in my ancestral homelands. If here, buck it up and quit feeling sorry for yourself, if not go back.
Does every Nation have to go back and undo the past, and if they do how far do we go back, 100yrs, 500yrs, 1000yrs, 10,000yrs? Is every past victory in battle now void, are all land holdings in every country now under UN purview?
I would argue that perhaps the UN should look at how indigenous people are treated around the world. It's not much better in other nations.
Sacred places should be respected and restored to those to whom they are part of the soul. I concur that they should not be exploited by tribal governments but should be overseen by the tribal Elders who are the keepers of tribal beliefs. If these areas are returned there should be strong stipulations in place to that effect.
Zathrose, define "ownership". If you're going on the Old World model, no we Native folks didn't "own" the land but we lived in defined territories and used the resources. Some tribes were nomadic but most of us weren't. The majority of Native tribes lived in permanent villages, towns, and even cities of tens of thousands of people (such as Cahokia in Ohio, Natchez in Mississippi, the Anasazi city in Canyon de Chelle AZ, and Tanasi in Tennessee). We were primarily agriculturalists and in fact 3/5 of the world's food crops were developed by the Indigenous Peoples of the Western Hemisphere...which works out to about 85-90% of the food most Americans eat - including 1500 varieties of maize(corn), 2500 varieties of potatoes, sweet potatoes, tomatoes, all of the world's chili peppers, most of the edible squashes, cocoa, vanilla, avocados, papaya, and much much more. Where the hell do you think barbeque, chili, salsa, cornbread, and tortillas came from? There is no food plant native to the Western Hemisphere that we Natives didn't cultivate and use.
In addition to foods we developed the long-strand cotton that is now the basis for most of the world's cloth and clothing. More than half of the world's medicines - including penicillin (which we have been using for thousands of years before Sr Alezander Fleming) - were taught to your people by ours. And yeah, I DO know how to make penicillin the old way. Do you? There is no plant native to this land that my people didn't know the medicinal use of and use.
After the Articles of Confederation failed, the "Founding Fathers" sought to craft a better form of government, one that would be stable and they had a model right here...the Iroquois Confederacy. They spent several weeks among the (at that time) 5 Nations, learning the intricacies of the Great Binding Law which has been a contuinuous forms of governance for over 900 years. They used what they learned to craft the Constitution of the United States, except that they denied citizenship rights to women and in fact considered that allowing women to have equal status with men was a large part of what made Indians "ignorant savages".
I'll conceded that many tribal governments are corrupt and quite frankly fascist in some cases but no matter how much we complain to the US Government - who are supposed to oversee our governmental bodies just as it over sees those of the states - we get a deaf ear and cold shoulder. In fact the US Government is often complicit in the corruption so that private industries can make millions off tribal lands whilst paying the tribes next to nothing except for the bribes and kickbacks to tribal officials.
Not like anyone of the rest of you care either...except that what's been happening to us for the past 200 yrs is now starting to happen to you. At least we fought it despite being hopelessly outnumbered and out-gunned. You wimps are going down with little more than some excessive whining. Because what's happening on American Idol is just too important to interrupt for something like getting out there and sacrificing your time, resources, and talents to get the stranglehold of Wall Street and the multi-national corporations off of our Government, weed out the corrupt politicians, and engage in self-governance while you still can.
So before anyone denigrates Native Americans or relegates us to some inconsequential part of history and society, perhaps you might enlighten yourselves as to just exactly how much of your life we've made possible in the terms of foods, medicines, knowledge, and cultural/lingual inovations. There are two books by Jack Weatherford, Indian Givers and Native Roots, born of extensive research and in which he presents the facts showing the huge gifts we've given this Nation and the world. Try reading those and then see how snarky you feel towards us.
And no - America is NOT a melting pot. Its more of a stew where everyone has contributed to the flavor but still retain a great deal of uniqueness. There is no singular or homogenous American culture. Every region has its own cultures and subcultures, each with their own unique qualities. we are a land of many races, nationalities, faiths, and cultures. THAT is supposed to be our strength as Americans, not something to tear each other to shreds over.
Prosecute all that toook land.........oopsss they are all DEAD. Drop the UN in the middle of the Atlantic, get us out of that crooked organization. Sure the AI were mistreated just like the slaves were mistreated....one hell of long time ago...................... GTF over it.
What a load of bee ess... The UN telling us what to do with our land, and also, in other instances, telling us which laws we should enforce. It's time to get out of the UN and send them packing to one of their socialist strongholds.
Note how the communists posting on this site "collapse" all comments similar to mine, telling the UN where to get off. If you don't like this country why don't you get the f out? Go to Russia.
Would you all react the same if another country came and invaded the US? In 50-150 years would your descendants feel that whomever (hypothetically) took over the US that it's okay because all's fair in love and war? Their population wiped out and the descendants of the conqueror's saying, "Well that was all so long ago and we didn't have anything to do with it, our ancestors did." Sure, you would be long dead, but your descendants would live on. Just food for thought.
there are NO native Americans
"native Americans" came from Asia , they should give back any claim of land that the Mastadons and other indigenous life that occupied this land before they got here , after all animals have rights too.
not to mention that the tribes of people that were here when Europeans got here had a history of murdering each other and taking "slaves" as well , oh , and in case you forgot , Africans took other Africans as slaves for centuries , LONG BEFORE Europeans got there or here .
the French should get the F out of ANY place that they "stole" during their colonial escapades , and their are many , in other words , the French can shut the F up
Sorry, but no dice. Might makes right.
Pale Faces 1 Indians 0
End of story.
The United States was carved out of a vast wilderness, populated only by squatters, most of them savages still living in the stone age. It was only a matter of time before someone else came looking for land.
Ironically, the people who always bemoan the taking of "Indian lands" are the same ones who celebrate the "multiculturalism" and "diversity" that is turning the once great U.S. into another third world country.
Perhaps the message to those people should be: the European colonists brought diversity and multiculturalism to the Indians. So...they should be celebrating that, right?
I have never seen so many uneducated remarks in a thread. It must be a short-wave hater club commenting in mass. Most of you do not even know what the UN does or has done to promote peace and stick up for people just like you among the countries of the world. Mosat of you do not know why you hate the UN other than to oppose it because "your daddy was again' it" becausse the John Birch Society told them too. geeze, America doesn't have to worry about foreign threats - we are not shooting ourselves in the foot, we are killing ourselves with Pure IGNORANCE.
yep, Hitler thought exactly that way when he pulled Germany out of the league of nations. after all, "my country doesn't need to listen to all of those lesser countries" perhaps we need to show the world our "manifest destiny" to rule over them?
yet our country is the leader in interfering in the affairs of other countries around the world
Why is it that when whites got here the natives were still chipping arrow heads out of rocks? Wasn't the bronze age like 5000 years ago. Seriously, they hadn't even figured out the wheel yet. Thoughts? Ideas? Anyone?
Hhhhhhhhhhhhhaaaaaa HHHHHHHHHHAAAAAAAAAAAAA. Comments from the UN are a joke (as is the UN).
Hmmmm .... The Navajos have Mother Earth and Father Sky, a tradition that goes back at least as far as ancient Greece (Gaea and Zeus). So, according to James Anaya, Native Americans should control the earth. When I consider that, before the white man came, their days were spent hunting, fishing, and making more Native Americans, it doesn't seem like such a bad deal.
B. S. written by an overpaid @!$%#head. I guess that he cannot see the whorehouses and casinos that his daughters might be working in.
When the Europeans arrived here, the Indians were living in the Stone Age. No Indian in the Americas
had even invented the wheel. Before 1800, American Indians led brutal lives and routinely slaughtered and enslaved other tribes. The Hopi who claim to be peaceful committed acts of cannibalism up until the early 1900s. In the past 10 years the Federal government has been labeling BLM/US Forest Service/National Park lands as "Sacred". It is a ruse. The Indians are laying claim to these lands but they have no real interest other than selling mineral rights, drilling permits and turning Yosemite into an outdoor Disneyland. Indians own enormous tracts of land throughout the US. How about the Navajo giving lands back to the Apache and Hopi? The land could be productive but the Indians want to continue living in the Stone Age. Enough is enough.
Aww, some Americans can't seem to embrace the policies their own gov't used against others such as Serbia having to cede Kosovo to the KLA muslims, allowing Israel to continue to steal land without paying for it, and the ethnic cleansing the US policies caused in Iraq against Sunnis and Christians.
Reading some of these comments makes me feel ashamed to be an American. Very ignorant comments made by people who know nothing about Native Americans. All they have to go on is TV and all that crap. They're not asking for all the land in America as some people have claimed, they're asking for certain areas back that were sacred. It's true they do have casinos and get money from the tribe SOMETIMES not all the time, but it's also true that only 5% of the 500 some federally recognized tribes (all with different treaties) make these "millions" some people have said. and it's also true that these casinos can create up to 1300 jobs. It's just sad when a 14 year old acts more mature then these so called adults. These "role models" for the future generation.
In the 17th century, the Souix were in the Minnesota area, with tribal lore saying they had migrated there from the northeast.
In the 18th century they migrated into the Black Hills - kicking out the Kiowas and Cheyenne that was there before them.
The US then displaced them.
The US is prepared to pay compensation for these lands, but the tribe has refused.
It was an idiotic move by the Obama Administration to sign this UN treaty which gives ankle biters like this guy to actually have a say.
Tough cookies - try enforcing it.
It makes me ashamed to be American also. After raping and pillaging 100's of tribes. Making promises of land and minimal sovereignty, for 200 years we have time and again reneged, obfuscated and dishonored our country and the Native Americans.
It represents to the world just exactly what and who we are. While we complain about human rights in others country's, we fail to make any effort to honor our own agreements inside our borders.
America's largest Corporation has the most appalling human rights record all over the world and we wonder why respect has been lost. Take a hard look at the fine policy's that the rest of the world gets to see.
It really is time for us to grow up and present ourselves to the world as adults who honor our contracts and commitments.
It's about time! I know you white, yellow and black Americans can't conceive of this, but this land you all make your living off of belongs to SOMEONE ELSE. The people that were here FIRST. So much for American concepts of liberty, it really means, we are free to take what others cannot stop us from taking......
First do away with the Bureau of Indian Affairs. Then, give them all their sacred lands. No strings attached, no Federal gov. BLM oversight, then, remove all the welfare checks and other government provided goodies. Let the Native Americans do what they will, on their land, and see what happens. I have a sneaking suspicion that they would be far better off without the government intrusions.
I remember when I was growing up that I would always see these billboards that read " The U.N. Get Us Out " , these were put up by the John Birch Society. The reason we are all of a sudden seeing all this action by the U.N. in the United States is on account of the current administration and their desire to become part of a one world government and the advancement of their socialistic control of the citizens of the U.S.A., this is also why Obama is spending us into bankruptcy and devaluing the dollar. This country is on the downhill slope and the only hope is to vote this idiot out of office and get rid of all these people like Hillary Clinton and Holder and the rest of the stinking bunch while there is still a chance to save the country. Just ask yourself why did Obama have to whisper to the Russian president.
While we are at it lets return Manhattan that was an unfair trade agreement. Also all people in N. Carolina, South Carolina and a lot of that region should be moved due to the Cherokee being force relocated to Oklahoma. Oh and by the way we would have to relocate most of the people from Minnesota to be able to give the Souix back their homeland. The Missouri river region was controlled by the Arikara and the Mandan. The Black Hills would be split between the Cheyenne and Blackfoot. Unfortunately the Arikara were wiped out by the Souix so hard to give them back their area. Also the poorest county in SD is a reservation that has 20 million yes 20 million federal dollars go through it every year plus approximately 3-4 million from their casino. As a South Dakotan I am tired that it is put forth by people that this is the only area that Natives were mistreated. I have many friends that are native and had the privilege of attending a funeral for a native veteran who was a paratrooper in WW2.
This nation genocided twice as many Native Americans as Hitler killed Jewish. One Nation Under God, right?
The most brutalized and most pushed extinct were the Native Californians, who didn't war. Thus, they had no war weapons to defend themselves against the whites. Tribe after tribe was wiped out in CA.
In Humbolt Cty., California, the whites set up a slavery market. After they massacred the parents and small babies, their Native children were sold as young as two years old as sex, field and house slaves.
None of the Native Americans were researched and studied, so much folktales exist about their lifestyle and worldview. The only Natives ever scientifically researched were the Native Californians, including Ishi, the last free, wild Indian in this nation.
Shell mounds in CA indicated, these native peoples lived multi-thousands of years without warring, epidemics or famine, and lived and played in paradise.
Unless you specifically did all of those things why would you be ashamed? This whole thing is just getting out of control. We cannot undo what has been done. We cannot give back (reasonably) what was taken without displacing even more people. It's insane. Has the government done some pretty awful things? Yes. What government hasn't? Seriously people... get a grip! Does that make every German responsible for the Holocaust? No. Just because your ancestors do bad things doesn't mean you have to take responsiblility. Focus on the now. If you really feel bad about it, how about volunteer or start a Habitat for Humanity project to improve housing on the reservations? Do you feel bad enough to donate time and effort? Think carefully about your answer.
I wish everyone that is "So Ashamed" would try to find one country that hasnt done some dirt in order to take land and establish a new territory.....wars and taking things by force is what happens when people are trying to make a better life for them and their families.
The people that cant compete with the force either physically or mentally will be taken over. Going the "Peace" route hasnt proven to be very effective either. This type of stuff goes on in the world still today, we just dont seem to hear about it.
It is hard to image that these so called educated people would say such harsh things to people who have endured the hardships since the first European settler came to America. If the roles were reversed I am quite certain that they would cry. You can judge the Native American of this county til you have walked in their shoes for as long as they have!
Steve Streeter "While we are at it lets return Manhattan that was an unfair trade agreement."
Yes, by all means force the Indians to give back that $24 worth of trinkets that they conned from the Dutch.
What's funny about that whole 'story' is that the Indians that 'sold' Manhattan to the Dutch didn't have any claims to the Island - It was owned by another tribe, who was never compensated.
I thought this was settled by the Cobell vs Salazar case, wherein $3.4 Billion was agreed as compensation for Native American claims, with $2 Billion set aside for repurchase of lands for the Native American tribes.
When you really get down to it, at what point do you determine 'ownership' of land, since it changed constantly throughout history?
It's the 21st century. Do these people really still believe in "sacred land"? And they're still dependent on hunting and fishing? Move on people. That was centuries ago.
@ Skor154...
This nation genocided twice as many Native Americans as Hitler killed Jewish.
That would make it about 14 million to 16 million people. That figure is hard to believe. (Unless you are one of those holocaust deniers) And smallpox killed far more than bullets, cannon, and swords, but can you really blame the disease when we actually knew little about it at the time? And if you are trying to blame us for what happened in Mexico and Peru, think please: The US did not exist at the time. The invader was Spain and Portugal. Spain was responsible for some of the California persecution as well.
Can you really damn people today and make them suffer for something done last century? Most People in the Dakotas had nothing to do with the Lakota-US conflict. They simply bought or homesteaded the land after the fact from the government at the time. As most spoke German and Russian, and were from persecuted peoples as well, it seems a bit harsh to punish some of them as they had their own trials as well.
Please think about what you are saying. Thank you.
From someone who is 50 percent Mestizo and 6 Percent Omaha.
James Anaya is an American professor at UNM. This whole things smells pretty self serving to me.
i feel conflicted about this subject. on one hand, the conquering of native peoples is something that has gone on since the dawn of man and the native americans are just as guilty as any other group of people. i have read much on the history of indians in this country and raiding other tribes, pushing people out of their lands and taking over, enslaving other tribes, etc. has been a part of their history, so they can't really condemn us for that. when the europeans first came here, the mind set was radically different than it is today and although we find it abhorrent today, we can't be held responsible for their way of thinking or even their actions. the past is the past and we should all be looking at the future.
so, what do we do now? i think the answer is compromise. the native americans have to be willing to compromise with the government as well as the government compromising with them. all or nothing is just not going to work. the sioux want the black hills but we have mount rushmore there. how can we retain our control over that monument what has become 'sacred' to us, while giving them %100 over the land? we offered them compensation and they refused. they want all or nothing and that's unreasonable. so, allow them control over the lands EXCEPT for mount rushmore and the the area around it, so that people can have access to it. they want yosemite back, well, forget it. that is a national park that has been set aside to preserve the natural wildlife and land. perhaps we can offer them inclusion in how the park is run, so they work with us to help preserve the park.
i know in wyoming there is the wind river reservation which is huge taking up a good portion of the western part of the state. i don't know how successful the people there are, but it has been there a long time and the state has managed to flourish over the last century and a half. i know what during our summer rodeo celebration, the navajo would come and help celebrate the wild west with us and everyone loved them.
i think most people love indians and indian culture and would have no problem with them having more control over their 'sacred lands.' but, i have to say to them, at some point, you need to start looking forward. the world is never going to stop moving to the future. living like your ancestors did is something that will probably never come again. so, you need to start preparing your children to live in a busy world where they will need good educations to compete and succeed. look at the japanese. after WWII they sitting around licking their wounds and complaining. they got going, got educated, became inovative and now look at them. they owned half the major companies in the u.s. they conquered us with our own idea-capitalism. i'm not saying you should do that, but if you want to control more of your own destiny, then take your destiny in your hands and go find it.
what the government owes you( besides some of these lands) is a fair chance as that education and those job opportunities and the right to be part of the process that is now the united states. THAT'S where you live. it isn't going to change. the rest of us aren't leaving and we aren't going to turn control of our country over to you, i'm sure you understand that. so, yes, demand that you be allowed more self determination, but instead of continuing to try to separate yourselves from us, keep your history, keep your heritage but join us to be a part of what runs this country. i'm sure that native americans would be more than an asset to making this a better country. we have some native americans in congress, but why not more? make your voices heard by voting for people who truly represent you. you can't be heard if no one is there to listen and fight for you.
Get the UN off of our sacred lands
Some people "just love Indians" but judging from the comments here, it seems that there is much disrespect for their culture, for what we have done to their culture and for their beliefs. No doubt this is all coming from the new version of the Xtian "Golden Rule" which now means money over personal integrity.
I'm ready for someone to start doing something for the "Old White Man's" culture. Come on Old White Men let's go to the streets and protest for being discriminated against.
I can't help what my ancestors did or didn't do. I have ancestors that owned slaves but I can't help that, it's not my fault. My great, great grandfather ran cattle on thousands of acres of unclaimed land, so I believe I have the right to claim that land. All we can do is quit living in the past and quit blaming others for your problem.
And besides, UN, stay out of our business.
Give them back what is legally theirs. The Native American people were almost wiped out by the White Man who came and stole and killed to claim what was not theirs. The Native American people have respect for the earth, water and the sky. They take care of their home, unlike the people who came and have desecrated this planet. Let them have their holy places, and do what is right by giving back what was stolen.
Anyone remember the Last Yahi? The white men wiped out this entire tribe and the last Yahi lived in California until the early 1900's. He was a marvel of society because him, and about 25 other members of his tribe HID in a remote region and survived for many years, while the rest were wiped off the planet. This is a lesson for the people of America. Give back their holy lands to these people and make right, what was wrong. Americans have gotten very spoiled and self centered, and the bigotry towards the Indians, and the Muslims needs to stop. Grow up and recognize that YOU are not that important in the larger scheme of the universe.
Slinger
You are living in fantasy land.
They lost the war.
Just as the indigenous people of Great Britain did when Rome wanted them.
There have always been conquerors and the conquered.
The Native Americans did the same to each other. In fact they did WORSE to each other.
skor154 You are right "Ishi" was the Last Yahi. There is a documentary out about him and what happened to his people. It is called The Last Yahi. I was ashamed at what people did to his tribe, and Ishi, forgave them.
How do you figure this? The Yahi did not even fight, they were slaughtered. In California the Yahi tribes were wiped out completely, except for one, who was named Ishi he was Yahi......... They had lived in the California region for thousands of years.
Sorry there was NO WAR, there was a GENOCIDE AND ETHNIC CLEANSING. Did you study History?
I've studied Dakota Indian history for 26 years. What I have found is the Dakota people in Mn don't have a clue about the complete history of their ancestors. Before "white" contact, all American Indians lived by the rule survival of the fittest. They were all warrior societies. There was a system set in place to train all males to become warriors. The more brave deeds were done in war the higher the elevation in status among their tribe. The more coups counted, the more scalps taken, the more they killed of their enemies the more priviledges among their tribe, including the right to marry. Dakota Inidans never payed for their lands they took from the Iowa, the Shienne, Crow, Fox, Ojibway, Winnebago, Hidatsa, Cree,Assiniboine, etc. They killed, they captured and took slaves, women and children. Sometimes they would let go a captured man if that person showed bravery or just to let them spread the word of their deeds. Dakota broke every treaty they signed or made with other tribes as well as other tribes to them. In Mn, first treaty signed with U.S.Pike treaty, the Dakota broke by fighting with the British in 1812 war against U.S. Dakota broke same treaty again when Chief Wanata attcked Ft Snelling unsucessfully about 1822. In 1838 Dakota chief made plans to attack U.S. after another treaty signed, this time killing Ojibs who would not agree to attack with them against whites. U.S. Governement helped make numerous treaties between Dakota and Ojibs and other tribes. Every one was broken by one side or the other. In 1862 Dakota Indians broke earlier signed treaty by attacking innocent whites, killing 650-700 and another 500 dying of wounds and exposure. Ojib leader Hole in the Day was asked his thought on Fort built among Dakota in Minnesota, he answered, if not for that fort, he would have had his village there by now....U.S. Gov officials were slow to pay annuites and money owed to Dakota during Civil War period. it was a good time to attack and try to take back lands they sold to U.S. So when you think, or hear people talk that Dakota, or any other tribe, is above any other kind of man, no matter what the color of skin, mankind is all the same. No color of skin is any better than the other, no other color of man can claim the moral high ground over another. Other tribes and location do have valid claims, again, quit the usual rhetoric and deal with facts. United Nations have no clue as there are too many variables ionvolved. Deal court matters in court if there is a claim and be done with it. It is the way of man, and will, never, never change.
The romantic view of Native Americans held by some is rather silly. Pre-Columbian natives were not peaceful residents of the land who lived amicably with all others. They warred with each other and dispossesed other tribes of their lands. They enslaved other Indians and some practiced canibalism. Further south into Mexico they practiced ritual human sacrifice. They are no better, no worse.
Slinger, if we give the Black Hills back to the Sioux, will they give them back to the Cheyenne they took them from?
They are only asking for their sacred holy sites back Cassandra-923471, not the entire US. Your question is silly.
Anaya seems to be "sponsored" by Mr. Obama to make this request to return lands to "indigenous peoples". Sheeesh, one Harvard graduate "soliciting" another Harvard graduate to stir up the pot.
Yep, the U.N. is nothing more than a money laundering terrorist organization and are trying to use their "lame" authority to "oversee" their radical World agenda.
Looks like the $ 1,000,000,000 settlement was not enough:
The following was pulled from a different thread:
Guess it is high time I found a Harvard lawyer.
Exactly when did the U.N. get the right to tell US what to do?
I don't think so!! Iran is on their Human Rights Council; what a joke!!
That is how war usually goes.
Did you think Genghis Khan went looking for people that wanted to fight?
Rome sat around mailing invitations to battle?
HERE is a list of great empires. How many do you figure got there without killing and destroying people that never wanted to fight, and many that never even fought.
What the US did was actually rather Amazing. Native Americans have all the freedoms and rights of every American and more. That is not usually an outcome of losing a war.
Do you understand War?
I just heard about UN puppet Obamas new slogen, FORWARD, then I heard him say in his cheerleader voice, "We will finish what we started"! Holy $h!t we are min trouble. What I see is that he is taking this country down illegally. Selling US out. The UN should not have a say as to any land uses, policy powers, and generally not any damn thing we do. This all about world domination of all of US by a few like the queen, vatican, rothschilds and the UN elites. If we allow this criminal takeover to happen, there won't be anything left for US, so let them have it, they will get it stolen from them again anyway.
Here in Minnesota, I started preservation of land that led to it becoming a National Park 2 yrs ago. Coldwater Unit. A group of people were trying to stop highway from going through a local park next to this Now National Parl Camp Coldwater. When they lost their case, white women made up stories of Dakota sacred trees nearby(nonsense) and then made up stories of sacred spring. Then a group of mixed people made up the continueing story of sacred spring to get the land to build a casino on. I have this documented who said what and when. So I have studied 26 years on this subject, if land was so sacred why then did the natives sell it in treaties? Because it never was sacred until they need a casino, in Minnesota. Graves are protected just as all graves are now protected. Again, if land was sacred....was did they sell that little spot someplace, somewhere....?
Do you understand peace and giving back holy sites that were taken?
Skort: Sorry to say but you have been immersed in the revisionist lore that has been pumped out by
the California schools for the past 50 years. Whatever education you may have paid for at Humboldt State
was, unfortunately, not worth a dime.
Using a classroom to incite emotional outrage in young people using a process that includes withholding facts and distorting the historic record should be a crime. Do some research outside of your post hippy bubble and then come back to the forum. Since they ripped you off, you should also consider filing a lawsuit against the University. You need to hold them responsible for their farce and make them reimburse you for the tuition and living expenses you paid over the years.
NC: Use yourbrain. In the last century almost 100 million Armenian, Chinese, Hungarian, Somali, Vietnamese, Cambodian, Congolese, Nigerian, Indian, Iranian, Mongol, Lap, Russian, French, Palestinian,
Turk....well you get the point...have come to this country, They and their children and their grandchildren are Americans. They are AMERICANS and proud of it. They took nothing from you. The land apportioned
to the tribes to date exceeds the percapita allocation of land that is used by all of the other AMERICANS. Indian claims to whatever they might deem "sacred" is nothing more than a manifestation of greed. The tribes get billions of dollars each year yet the families and clans fight endless battles to make sure that a neighbor and tribal member does not get his or her share. What goes on today in the Indian communities is shameful. Take care of business at home before you start accusing others.
Lulz at the people who are pissy at the UN for making a suggestion. The US gets in everyone's business. Funny how when the tables are turned people get mad.
The tribes get billions of dollars each year yet the families and clans fight endless battles to make sure that a neighbor and tribal member does not get his or her share
That is a stereotype. The Native Americans in my area are very fair about wealth distribution. They put the needs of their communities above the needs of the individual. The casinos will actually give all the Natives on the Reservation a huge cut of their profits. But you can continue believing that all natives are greedy, evil people.
Wow the irony here is rather special.
Let me get this right, people are against illegal immigrants because they take what is not theirs.
However. the moment someone suggest we give back control to someone who were here before Europeans some people balk, insult the organization giving the advice and insult native Americans.
Wow whats the word I am looking for? Oh hypocrites.
Slinger
When you LOSE a war you don't usually have any rights to anything sacred or not.
The reason the Native Americans want these sites is because they have been given so much they feel entitled.
Very few Native Americans have any affiliation with their native religious beliefs, unless it gives them the right to chew Peyote - - another right the losers of the war have that the victors do not.
You obviously have no idea what war is about. You obviously were never taught what the outcome of war is.
This isn't a subject Sesame Street deals with very well, and unfortunately that is the type history our schools seem to be giving out.
JOregon
You're right, we should just kill all of them. We are morally justified since they lost. Nevermind that 90% were killed by smallpox and that we slaughtered the rest. It was not a war. It was a massacre.
I really hope all of you people that are posting at this time, understand about this subject, agreeing that genocide is okay because we won. That it is okay to exterminate a people that have live here maybe 14,000 years (Paisley caves) before, because we wanted their land and mineral resources, and could take them. I hope you all are so agreeable when the Chinese, or the people from India show up on our doorstep and say, "move over, if you please"! Not to mention the space aliens, when they land in force, and plant their flag of conquest on our planet (Ronald Reagan) and exclaim, "all this land is now ours, thank you very much." Yes, I hope you all are agreeable, because sometimes karma is a bitch!!
I am one quarter Cherokee, and I declare western North Carolina sacred land from this point forward. I need wampum to feed my papooses, dental work for the squaw, and a bunch of quarters for the slot machines. Step up to the plate UN or we have'um heap big Powwow on the East River.
Slinger, the area belonged to the Cheyenne and Kiowa before the Sioux pushed them out. My question stands - if the US returns the Black Hills to the Sioux, should the Sioux then give it back to the Cheyenne and Kiowa?
just like every other "minority" gimme, gimme, gimme.
stfu and get on with your lives!
toss the un out of the us along with all the diplomats that can virtually get away with murder due to diplomatic immunity. what a friggin joke!
Hi Barlow,
I don't think anyone has said, or even implied, that genocide is appropriate. The point if I can briefly write for those you are responding to is that you and I and all of them didn't do any of the bad things to the Indians which you and people like you are claiming. That said, it is a fact that world history is replete with examples of one group of people defeating another group of people, taking their land for their own, altering culture and customs, and so on. The question is what, if anything, we today should do about it.
The first thing we should STOP doing is trying to canonize Indians. They aren't the pure force for good their sychophantic supporters claim. They waged wars, they enslaved, they expropriated land and wealth. Which ought to help answer your point about what we would do if we were conquered. Shouldn't those Indians you fret about have the same question applied to them, or does it only apply to white people of European descent? My answer is that if we operate our nation in such a way as to become weak enough for the Chinese to make a play on us that we probably deserve what we get. Same answer for aliens, though I find it hard to believe that the kind of alien invasion depicted in Independence Day is the norm.
Anyhow, the point is that the Indians themselves did bad things, and so their bad things must, using your flawless logic, mean that they ought to accept the negative consequences of them, just as you imply what would happen if the Chinese conquered the USA. Of course, there is an alternative outcome possible. Had the Indians done anything to modernize themselves so that they could be strong enough to repel the Europeans, then like the USA wiping out millions of invading Chinese, the Indians would have been just in doing so. Yes?
So what can we learn from this little exercise in navel gazing? It's that if you value your culture, your language, your history, you should be prepared to kill as many people as necessary to protect it. I hope we maintain sufficient military prowess to send all the Chinese necessary to hell should they invade. Because this world was and is and likely will be for the foreseeable future, governed by the use of violence to stop your enemies from wiping you out.
Or we could do things your liberal kind of way. A sternly worded letter might work. And if not we can always fall back on the ever reliable group hug.
Sata...
We aren't at war with our own citizens. The war is over.
As far as small pox goes - yep it happened. It was never US policy.
There was a rumor that the British tried to use Pox infected blankets against the French and their Indian allies during the Siege of Fort Pitt. It is unknown if this was ever successful.
Ward Churchill has made the claim that the US Army gave Mandan Indians Smallpox infected blankets, and then suggested they pass them around. He has never given evidence of this claim and has changed the story several times, sort of how he has changed his percentages of Native blood several times.
Churchill claimed US Officers from Fort Clark handed the blankets out. Problem – Fort Clark was a private fort for fur trading. The nearest US Army unit was 800 marching miles away.
According to historians the Small Pox outbreak of 1837 was brought accidentally on the Steamboat 'St. Peters'. The boat was owned by the Fur company and the outbreaks followed it's path. The fur company traded with the natives.
Certainly there were people that wanted to kill every Indian. What individual Settlers or Miners did is not an indication of US Government Policy.
There were Settlers and Miners that would seek to kill entire tribes, just as there were tribes that would seek to kill entire groups of Settlers or Miners.
It's called WAR, what part of War do you not understand?
A paragraph from the U.S. Declaration of Independence: He(the king) has excited domestic Insurrections among us, and has endevoured to bring on the Inhabitants of our Frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known Rule of Warfare, is an undistinguished Destruction, of all Ages, Sexes and Conditions.
I'm sure at least a few of you will find this interesting.
This is the 150 commemorative year of the Dakota 1862 war with the U.S. The Dakota who signed treaties for money and annuities were split into 2 factions. The" friendlies" who thrived and were doing well by farming and changing to white practices, and the "Blankets" Dakota who took the money and annuities and just went right back to the villages and hunting grounds they sold. After 10 years, they were being croweded out by settlers, Nice gig, getting paid and trying to keep the land 10 yrs. Eyanktons were not part of the treaties. They declared if not given share of annuities they were going to kill all whites and friendly indians in the Minnesota river valley. That is called GENOCIDe. 4 young men several months later murdered whites and this was the turning point starting war where Dakota killed 650 women and children and men, putting babies in bread pan and tossing in oven, cutting baby out of Preg mother and nailing to tree while mother had to watch, then her arms and legs cut off. Her brother watched and lived despite being axed across the head. Hundreds of people killed this way. Little Crow the leader called these men who wanted war ...drunk ....in his speech. It was only about 100-150 young men who wanted war. In the end another 500 whites died, and 38 Dakota were tried and hung. One was innocent and should not have been put to death. All 37 denied partaking in war despite a number of them seen in scalp dances bragging. The friendlies became scouts for the U.S. they had their homes burned and lost everything because of the Blankets wanting war. THAT difference between Friendlies and Blankets is still going on. This war lead to much of the problems for indians further west for years to come. War was not needed. Whitemen had left for the Civil war, and the Dakota tried to take their land back after signing treaties and getting paid for it.Ref www.archive.org Minnesota in the Indian and Civil War 1890 vol 1 and 2. Genocide was declared by Dakota and Genocide was committed. Little Crow the war leader put bounty on scalps of white leaders before battles. Later, whites put a bounty on Dakota to retaliate. One or two paid then stopped. War Dakota did not stop the practice. Today all that is taught is bad whites. Enough...history is history, it is the past. Tell the whole truth......so history will not be repeated.
Yes Rich, That was part of my point if we believe it is right and proper to destroy people that are in our way with superior technology, then we have to be okay if that happened to us. The Native Americans had been living in a sustainable culture for over 10,000 years before we got here. We have lived on the same continent for about 400 years and there much discussion about whether we will make it for another 50, so I'm not sure who has the most modern technology. The last thing I would like to say is it is my understanding when the first immigrants, from England, got here the Native Americans helped them survive the first winter. As a result there are almost zero large Native American presence on the east coast. I guess that's okay once you understand how America deals with thing of this nature, it seems our overriding principle action is "you play ball with me and I will shove the bat right up your a$$. Peace and Aloha!!
Barlow. You make a poignant statement regarding advocacy for genocide. It is naive to think that some other party will never advocate for genocide against us. After all, America has a long history of genocidal advocacy. Many here were on board with the Holocaust's aims to destroy the Jews. We have long been a supporter, and even instigator of Eugenics worldwide. We have even participated in the coercion of native populations to undergo unnecessary sterilization surgeries in this country. Sterilizing the poor and the "mentally unfit"- these are all forms of genocide. To understand the nature and methodology of genocide; it's principles and methodology; is to understand that, given the right set of circumstances, all populations are vulnerable, including us.
There is a great documentary that discusses the mechanics of genocide. "Worse Than War."
Many would like to believe that genocide is defined by the "races" of the groups involved, but really whenever one group of people seeks to qualify the humanity of another, that designation, in and of itself, can set the stage.
I was going to post a derogatory remark about how useless the UN is and how it should be dissolved and only be remembered in history books and maybe a few other choice words. But hey, after reading the above comments I think you all have it covered and the message has been acknowledged.
To be just a tad on the real side, there is very little throughout history the greedy white man has to be proud of and the horrors visited on the North American Indians are not among them.
To all Native American Indians I am truly sorry and I ask you to please accept my apology. You were not the first peoples to suffer at the hands of the white man nor are you the only ones and you are not the last either.
Having said that I must also say what happened to your people was not the fault of anyone alive in America today. To hold a nation bursting with people who have come here from every nation in the entire world, who probably didn't even know what a Native American Indian was until they came here responsible for the actions of those who lived hundreds of years ago is not different, in it's essence, than what was done to your ancestors. Righting a wrong wrongfully is not a righteous thing to do.
You are a proud people, a beautiful people whose ancestors suffered a great tragedy which you will always carry with you in your hearts and souls. You are a Nation of people with a love and respect for the earth most white men will never have or may ever know. I for one will always have a great and deep respect for you, what you lost, and who you are.
ALL people have committed genocide. ALL.
The Native Americans did it too.
ALL people have committed genocide.
The genocide angle is absolutely stupid as it was never US government policy or action commit genocide against the Native Americans.
Were there citizens that did? Yes, but it went both ways.
Slinger-958418
Sorry there was NO WAR. Did you study History?
Slinger,
Obviously you haven't studied history. Yes, there was a war just as there is a war going on today. History is littered with war, it is littered with one race/society being wiped off the face of the earth. Even the American Indians fought with one another with the results being the complete destruction of another tribe and the forced assimilation of the survivors into the winning tribe. The image of the "noble" redman is only partly correct. Yes they were an agriculture society for the most part but there were also tribes very skilled at war.
The simple fact (whether you like it or not) is we won, they lost.
UN mind your own business. How about doing something about Sudan or Seria? Fools.
UN ' R Us
How exactly is this not their business?
It is another example of how hypocritical the Indians really are. Before 1800, American Indians led brutal
lives and routinely slaughtered and enslaved other tribes. The Hopi who claim to be peaceful committed acts of cannibalism up until the early 1900s. In the past 10 years the Federal government has been labeling BLM/US Forest Service/National Park lands as "Sacred". It is a ruse. The Indians are laying claim to these lands but they have no real interest other than selling mineral rights, drilling permits and turning Yosemite into an outdoor Disneyland. Indians own enormous tracts of land throughout the US. How about
the Navajo giving lands back to the Apache and Hopi? Wake up people. This is not a noble endeavor and can only be viewed as an attempt by the criminals in the UN to cause more dissent within the US.
I am not inclined to speak ill of native Americans or U.S. policies during the 19th and early 20th centuries as this was another time in history.
I am, however, very much inclined to speak ill of the UN and its agenda for meddling in the affairs of this country. This meddling is being made possible and encouraged by the current administration that has a disdain for American culture and history.
Michael, you are wrong and a liar to boot. Get to know the People before you rip them up. You're no better than any other indian-killer.
@asknreceive1-1054310
I suspect you'd be signing a different tune if YOU owned a home in the Black Hills. Well, actually, I suspect if that were the case we wouldn't here anything from you at all.
The US should withdraw from the UN. It would save us a lot of money and lives since we wouldn't have to go to all the war zones where they say there are problems. NY would save a fortune in police protection if they were gone from the city. Let another country have the joy of all the expense that the UN costs.
Yes! Get the UN out!
Michael, you do realize, that no Native Americans were researched scientifically, except the Native Californians. This nation was interested only in genociding them to steal their land and push the few survivors into concentration camps. Much was fictionalized about their worldviews and lifestyles. They were also viewed as the enemy, and to lather folks up to commit murder, they always have to demonize the conquered to assuage guilt and supply reasoning.
As a whole, our current worldview and societal voices view the small scale hunters and gatherers as mindless, stupid, killing machines; however, social scientists consider small scale hunting and gathering the most successful lifestyle as they didn't have to work so long and hard for the basics of food and shelter, and possessed 80% more free, leisure time.
They weren't slaves to the job and slaves to a boss. They lived the majority of their lives with their loved ones and children, not their majority existence spent on the job, away from home and family. And, they lived and played in paradise.
The researched Native Californians did not war. Shell mounds in California indicate, for multi-thousands of years, they experienced no major events, like war, epidemics or famine. They had more access to fresh produce than modern supermarkets. Many days passed, and they had nothing to do. As everyone had about the same, the crime rate was very low.
Have you read, "Ishi Last of His Tribe"?
A young journalist wanted to save the Earth from the industrial society. He visited a library for his research, and every book in the library that could save the Earth from man -- was about the lifestyle paradigm and worldview of the Native American!
Is the United States the only country the UN is portraying as evil?
Does this mean that all people originally from Europe, Africa or Asia will now need to leave the United States?
Will the Spanish conquerors be asked to leave or pay billions to the oppressed native tribes of Mexico and the rest of South America?
Will the French be asked to leave Canada or compensate the natives there? Etc., Etc., Etc.
It amazes me that there are so many people that "know so little about so much."
You all are aware that "reservations" are classified as prison camps, right? Good.
Have you ever subscribed to Human Rights Watch? No, the US is NOT the only country that the UN is pointing a finger at.
Why do Americans get so offended when they are being looked at for Human rights crimes? The US is no better than a lot of other countries and in actuality is quite worse when it comes to receiving criticism for their violations on Gitmo, and holding prisoners indefinitely without even being charged with a crime...... Use this as a learning tool, and recognize that the US is no better than a lot of other countries and the International Crimes Court, looks at ALL COUNTRIES that violate human rights.
Wake up and take a look around and educate yourself about what is happening with the World not just your little city in the US. The US could do so much better, with its treatment of humanity.
WOW!!!
I have never in my life seen so many hateful comments against Native Americans. Its awful.
Just think, we can have a war between the Indians and the environmentalists. I hope they both lose.
If they do, then there goes your clean, AIR, WATER, AND FOOD. Do you really hope they all lose? Hmmm.
Skort: Sorry to say but you have been immersed in the revisionist lore that has been pumped out by
the California schools for the past 50 years. Whatever education you may have paid for at Humboldt State
was, unfortunately, not worth a dime.
Using a classroom to incite emotional outrage in young people using a process that includes withholding facts and distorting the historic record should be a crime. Do some research outside of your post hippy bubble and then come back to the forum. Since they ripped you off, you should also consider filing a lawsuit against the University. You need to hold them responsible for their farce and make them reimburse you for the tuition and living expenses you paid over the years.
NC: In the last century almost 100 million Armenian, Chinese, Hungarian, Somali, Vietnamese, Cambodian, Congolese, Nigerian, Indian, Iranian, Mongol, Lap, Russian, French, Palestinian,
Turk....well you get the point...have come to this country, They and their children and their grandchildren are Americans. They are AMERICANS and proud of it. They took nothing from you. The land apportioned
to the tribes to date exceeds the percapita allocation of land that is used by all of the other AMERICANS. Indian claims to whatever they might deem "sacred" is nothing more than a manifestation of greed. The tribes get billions of dollars each year yet the families and clans fight endless battles to make sure that a neighbor and tribal member does not get his or her share. What goes on today in the Indian communities is shameful. Take care of business at home before you start accusing others.
I am, however, very much inclined to speak ill of the UN and its agenda for meddling in the affairs of this country. This meddling is being made possible and encouraged by the current administration that has a disdain for American culture and history.
You are so funny. The rest of the world knows that America would never even think about meddling in the affairs of another country. Funny how pissed off people get when the tables are turned. I hope the UN makes some more suggestions, just to piss people off. The comments on this article make me sick. Hypocrites and racists abound.
I have a suggestion for the UN. Get the hell out of the USA, you are America's enemy.
Most of you people don't get it about the UN. Our country is called the UNITED STATES! We have 50, very different judicial districts called states, where all our people live and work and have all of these various ties that hold us together, commercial, social, financial, educational, cultural. We have a central government that tries to sort out all the various differences as we all try to live together. Sometimes not doing it very well, especially during an election year. The UNITED NATIONS has the same function on the international level. It is not very strong because the member nations want as much control as they can keep, without seeding to much, if any, to international control, (we had a civil war about that issue). It should be known that we are more united as a planet now, than we have ever been before. When finally the rulers and people of this planet grow emotionally and intellectually to a more mature level, and realize we all are really one planet, then the United Nations will come into it's full flower, it will be a forum where everyone of us will have a voice.
When finally the rulers and people of this planet grow emotionally and intellectually to a more mature level, and realize we all are really one planet, then the United Nations will come into it's full flower, it will be a forum where everyone of us will have a voice
Sorry Barlow, but that's about the dumbest thing I've read so far. The UN is not like the United States of America. Further, many, of not most, of the member states are authoritarian, and do not espouse the same individual rights and liberties Americans enjoy. Thanks, but, not thanks. I'll keep the US Constitutio and Bill of Rights.
floyd,
you are very close to being correct. these people that are squaking without knowledge of how the people that still survive in their enviorment. some of us did not ask to be incorporated to be organized to be civilized with the roman form of government. in our case, the federal government (fish and wildlife service) came in and made our primest hunting areas into a wilderness area to save a goose. that is one of the incedents, they came in without even a hearing (so much for democracy) and made it into a wildernes, if you took a @!$%#, you need to pocket your @!$%# paper in order not to polute the land because its foreign.
You bury it or pack it out because believe it or not we spread disease. The animals lick it for the salt. Animals will eliminate their waste over water, sending it back to us. That is why you need to purify your water even in the wildest of areas.
Plus idiots will relieve themselves in areas where it affects the water anyway.
just like the US is the number one meddler in the affairs of other countries. but I guess it is OK when we do the meddling, isn't it?
Yes it is ok if we are doing the meddling cause we the baddest meddlers around.
Might makes right. Always remember that.
remember,
"we're meddling in their affairs for their own good"
"they don't know any better"
yep, I guess all that "freedom" also means acting just like the "evil, socialist government" that certain flag-waving hypocrites don't want telling them what to do
What the UN does not know is that these "sacred lands" were stolen from other tribes by genocide. Indian-on-Indian wars were typical of North American tribes for a thousand years before white men got here.
While I do think that the USA owes special protection for our native Americans, I also feel that they should not claim whole states as "sacred lands".
Most of these "Sacred lands" have no native villages or archeological remains. This is just a claim to get rich by modern gangs who run the reservations.
Most Indian tribes are like private mafias now, strong-arm tactics that squeeze all the wealth to the powerful, at the expense of the weak.
well sic, it really depends on which tribes, when and where. some were pretty peaceful, and others were in a near constant state of war with their neighbors. many tribes were wiped out over the millenia, others stayed to themselves and were lucky enough (sometimes simply by virtue of natural barriers to easy conquest) not to have been overrun by more aggressive tribes
the same holds true for the nations/tribes of today
If you knew anything about Native American history, you would know that all tribes made war against each other, killing each other, torturing and mutilating each other, and taking taking captives/slave of each other. Indian lifestyles all were based upon survival of the fittest, where all males were raised to kill as many enemies as they could. The more kills/coups of the natives the higher the status was among the tribe/band, which gave them certain rights like marrying. The U.S. was not perfect...however the Native Americans were much worse between themselves the the U.S. government.
The Sioux have claims of ownership to the Black Hills, and they want all land rights returned to them. Ask the Kiowa, the Cheyenne, and the Crow Indians how they feel about the Sioux taking the Black Hills from them by force, no treaties, just all out war taking all and any land they could. This is quite well documented. The Sioux originated from the Mille Lacs Lake region of central Mn at first white contact. Spreading east and west attacking all tribes they came in contact with. Eastern tribes like the Ojibway eventually took over northern Mn from the Sioux while the Sioux took over southern Mn from the Ioway, Otoe, Cheyenne and others. All of this by force, no treaties. All treaties made between Sioux and Ojibway were broken by one or the other.
So the question really is...how far back should we go to give lands/payments to original owners of the land? The Sioux would be owing a lot of money to the tribes they defeated. Settle it in court.....and move on. Would world courts wish to attack this ownership problem of land to same arguments in Europe? I want payments from Asians for Genghis Khan attacking my Slovak ancestors....Pay up...!
skor74. Hunter/Gatherers are archaic in by human evolutionary standards. Those people had no problem hunting and gathering humans if they were hungry. Our evolutionary ancestors of which the native american isolation peoples were significantly behind, were still stuck in the stone age not less than 300 years or so ago. They were evolutionarily well adjusted to their land for sure and it might seem like it was a more peaceful existence but if you look at old photos of those people from the late 1800's. They were a very leathery hard people. This life wasn't easy. Eating meal to meal is not an easy life. The "white" man was much more evolutionarily adapted for the world and much more well adapted for warfare for sure. In the evolutionary arms race the American Indian didn't hold a candle to the Europeans advanced intellect. You are still assimilating into our culture but you no longer have any rights to your "sacred" lands. This is my land too. I was born here, plaid cowboys and Indians here and I will die here. We purchased the land from the Indians in a fair trade and we are not just going to give it back because the american Indian now decides they want more of their pie. I think it is long overdue that they pay their fair share of taxes and give the rest of "their land" over to the US government like good citizens should. Or should we lay down and let you scalp us some more like you did when our innocent ancestors migrated here. The central plains Indians were barbaric. How much has changed in 100 years?
First thing in order is clarification of what is sacred land and reason it is such. If it is off reservation land. If the land was acquired by breaking a treaty ie mining, drilling for natural gas and was part of the treaty then give it back. More so if it is reservation land. A lot of paperwork needs to be gone over and clarifications set in place. If its reservation land then its the Native Americans not ours. As far as the U.N. whats wrong with them sticking up for Native American rights our government sure hasnt.
First thing in order is to get the United Nations off our sacred land.
Hey Roc, the first order of business it to stop thinking that the UN has any business telling any country what their business should be. Then they can get the hell out of the USA. Totally worthless organization.
Its Okay and often praised when the U.N. goes to other countries and stands up for human rights but when its our own back yard a different story?
Human rights? This is another shot at segregation. Time to get over it.
Those treaties were meaningless then and are meaningless now. Our government only honored them as long as they wanted to. The conditions by which they were "signed" was nefarious as well.
@Roc1960
Are you an idiot??...Reservation land is just that...reserved land for Native Americans. It was designated for them to live there AFTER we kicked them out of the black hills or wherever else. It's not like ..ohhh that's reservation land...that belongs to the Native Americans...the rez came after the fact...and by the way...it's the crappiest, most worthless land you've ever seen...why do you think the US govt. assigned it as such? Also, have you ever been to a region that was stolen from the Native Americans?? There are now towns, cities, farms, business that have poplulated the entire region.. I'm from South Dakota, I would know. So how do you or the UN propose that we move the town of, say, Rapid City, which is 55,000 people and located in the Black Hills??? Hmmm...might be kind of difficult. I'm not saying that what we did back during the gold rush was right....it wasn't...but it's near impossible to make up for the wrong. It's like killing someone...how do you make up for that?...can't bring the person back...can't go back in time...no matter how much jail time you do..you still haven't made up for it...maybe that's a bad analogy...but whatever...what's done is done...
roc1960 - Yeah right - further reduce current energy resources, displace hundreds of thousands of non-native americans, close their businesss, and generally take away economic stability in those areas so Indians can build casinos, hunt and fish and CHARGE WHITES to do the same, and pay no taxes. Put the kool-aide down.
So native american's are not US citizens? I think our govt. in the past on this issue did wrong....no one ever promised me a rose garden, time passes, things happen, cards are dealt and played, lies are made, yet we need to move forward.....as far as a person from the UN telling us what we should do.....Disband the UN now!
Like I said, First establish a criteria for what is sacred land. Two is it on or off reservation would make a big difference. Common sense says if a city (off reservation) is built on what could be called sacred well off course city stays common sense. As off this time unless something changes reservation land belongs to the Native Tribe etc. there and they should have totally say on what goes on in the reservation. The reservation is deeded to the tribe by the Federal Government its theirs. If a company wants to drill for gas on a reservation then that tribe should establish a lease or what ever but its their land. If one says those treaties are now worthless for they were written hundreds of years ago then what, who gets the land just divide it up by who's living there? Just because a Federal Document gets old means we don't need to honor it any more? How old is our constitution? Just because the government didn't honor parts of the treaty in the past does that mean we don't honor it now? Just because someone wants to mine on reservation or whatever do we just take that land so a company can make money?
The majority of our society encourages diversity, equality, and acceptance of minorities including the minorities themselves.Why is it that it seems like the minorities always want to be treated different, yet demand on being equal?
Roc 1960,
Yes the rez land is crap. Yes we broke treaty and HAVE tried to amend that, which they declined (bravo for principles). Choices have been made. It is a fool who wants to undo what has already been done. Especially when it is spoken by someone who will have no vested interest in the outcome or commitment to seeing it done with justice.
Do you tink America would be the nation we are or that we would have been able to win wars based solely on a nation created by the Lousianna Purchase, Seward's purchase of Alaska, and our founding colonial states?
The true democracy is a majority, sometimes mob, rule. When the injustices occurred it was a shame brought on by mob rule then fed by greed. Intervention was loosely done because of politicians sitting in Washington D.C., not unlike the people sitting in the UN. Only a few people even wanted to see native Americans get any treatment above extermination, usually people not affected or families of soldiers who fought and died. It would be just as wrong to bow to a mob rule mentality from a minority to displace a majority today. The actions we take today are best suited for today, it is a fool who thinks that yesterday, tomorrow or centuries past were any different.
To create modern events only considering distant past choices, especially when looking at only a single side of the equation, is building a foundation on dust and ashes, which any wisdom says will fail.
They are building on economics and not ethnicity today, even the Native Americans. Even without accusing of prostitution, (that is just inflamtory and has little value here!) the most educated and successful tribes have moved past the injustices of the past to become stronger in the present.
Besides....to salute my past...My Dad Always Said: "Two Wrongs Do Not Make A Right." They can have their day in court or even in Congress, but there has to be an end to this pity party. Feeding it from a foreign advisors "12 day" view of over 200 years is in a word absurd.
The core sites in most of these areas are still held for the benefit of everyone, including native Americans. Would they be able to say the same?? Did I forget to mention they pay none of the cost for that?
They had a War with us and lost, even though they won battles. The end was never much in doubt even if the causes were. Today they are respected as foes and as unique Americana and valuable heritage. They are allowed to come and go freely from reservations and even pay nothing in tax to our nation and are given sovereign control beyond all jurisdation. There are more "inalienable rights" special to those tribal lands. How many other nations that lost wars can claim the same? You cannot ONLY look at the negatives. Turning any blind eyes can get you a heck of a pain, one you deserve. The world does not exist on a single philosophy or religion or set of values.
They trusted Washington DC thought like them, blindly, and then were enraged while soldiers were blind to wrongs done by settlers and scoundrels (in many cases the evidence was tainted, on both sides.)......Do we add to that by being blind to current realities? All the world goes blind then maybe it will all be fair? Ooops, not when the others have technology....oh well, reality again.
While you are at it, imagine the nation and our impact on the world events of the past if we had not become a nation that stretched from "sea to shining sea", (Spanish American War, WW1, WW2, The Cold War against communism.)
<who knows exactly where an Indian Nation would have sided on any of these?>
Tell you what Rusty, you live our lives for a week or two, put up with bigotry and institutionalized racism and other crap we have to deal with and then get back to me about how equal you feel. Asking for stolen land to be returned is not demanding different treatment but asking for justice. But with the expansion of eminent domain seizure of the lands and assets of private citizens for private corporations to exploit and develop, your people are already getting a taste of what you've been giving us forthe past 519 years. Good luck with that.
Let me get this straight. We give back to Mexico all of Texas, Arizona, New Mexico and Calif. We give back to France all of the Gulf Coast States and most of the Eastern States to the American Indians and make the capital of the 'United States' in Butt Hole South Dakota. Nah, that probably wont work...Im sure somebody, somewhere will lay claim to that place also.
now you all know how isreal feels!!!!!!!!!!!
2Much:
Ahhhh. The "ends justifies the means". A true Machiavellian America. Should we be proud of that? I think not!
That kind of thinking is what fueled Nazi and Communist propaganda. Do we always have to forgive the sins of our fathers? Some sins shouldn't be forgiven. You almost make it sound as if Native Americans have it really good. Would you tell people whose families survived the Holocaust that at least they have Israel now and a homeland so they should not talke about Nazi atrocities?
@roc1960
Indians receive more "assistance" from the Federal Government than any other group in the history of our nation has. It's essentially made them dependant and is the reason for most of their problems. Some here like to mock the casinos but at least they have given Indians a chance to make their own way and become successful on their own merit.
And what does your "common sense" say about the hundreds of homes in the Black Hills that are not in a "city". And what exactly is your definition of "city"? Most of the Black Hills are incorporated into Townships, how is your "common sense" going to deal with that?
@Jack Dulouz
Would you tell them to go back to where ever their ancestors came from because someone else lived in that area before them?
First thing one must establish is was that reservation land in the beginning then taking for the gold mining etc.? Its a tough call. It was deeded to the tribe if it was reservation land. That would be like a private person dumping "worthless" land to someone cheep but the new owner lets say finds oil so the previous owner just takes it back for now its worth a fortune? What if Russia wanted Alaska back, do they just take it back? There have to be some definitions and criteria set first before anything.
Today, this practice is called "multiculturalism", "diversity" and liberalism, but this time the destruction of culture, way of life and language is aimed at the "white guys".
Do you think future people will build reservations for whites to preserve their culture? Didn't think so. It sounds like the Indians got a not-so-bad deal after all by comparison.
Jeez people!! They are ONLY ASKING TO HAVE THEIR SACRED SITES back not the entire US. Did anyone even read this article? Sheesh. What is wrong with returning some of their holy sites back to them?
There would be nothing wrong with returning said sacred sites to the Indian tribes but white men just don't like to share. Ever tried to pick a morsel of food off of one's dinner plate? You'll hear a diatribe starting with the words "MINE, MINE, MINE!"
@Slinger-958418
Jeez I don't know, maybe you should pose that question to the thousands of people who live in those areas.
Jeez Slinger, they stole those sacred sites from the Cheyenne and Kiowa a couple of hundred years ago.
@asknreceive1-1054310
Is that so? What exactly is your definition of "share". Giving something to someone else is not "sharing", it's "giving". We "share" all of these sites now with every American regardless of their race. The Black Hills is a National Forest, it's there for everyone and anyone to use.
TRON and others need a history lesson on facts. It is documented at first contact and before all tribes, were warring against each other. Killing in the most brutal ways to make a statement and to honor their way of life/superstitions/warrior society needs to be met. All tribes captured and made slaves of women and children. Many times to replace natives in their own tribes. Sometimes men were kept as slaves. Read Pierre Radissons account of his capture by Iroqouis indians mid 1600's. Torture, killing of hundreds of captured women and children and also canabalism being practiced quite frequently. Cases documented where tribes roasted the flesh of their victims and made them eat their own flesh before they killed them. Your romantic visions of "Dances with Wolve" is fiction. It was survival of the fittest. Sitting in the woods making dreamcatchers and playing flutes was not the norm. Scalp dances provided retribution over past members of a tribe losing members of their tribes. Celebrate the killing of your enemy. Scalp dances provided a way for men to rise up in rank among their tribe members. Romantic huh?
This isn't about how romantic of unromantic the Indian Tribe(s) history is or isn't, it's about their sacred grounds and the UN's strong suggestion that said sacred grounds be returned to them by the U.S. Government. I can pick up any history book and read about the atrocities visited upon makind by their fellow man since the beginning of our time, but it doesn't change the subject of this particular report. You're off topic. . .again.
None offered, none given.
So go take your guilt trip somewhere else.
asknreceive...hard line of thought to follow, or is it you don't want to face facts. Natives stole land from each other since the beginning of time. You do not want natives to return land to each other they "stole" by killing, rape, slaughhter and making slaves, and chasing tribes to lands that were not liveable on. You only want "whites" to return lands to natives. This is the topic........giving back lands to rightful owner. What the hell do you mean by again?.....Too hard for you to follow logic and facts? I agree that Native Americans have been cheated in many ways, mistreated, diicriminated against in many ways. I fully support righting the wrongs, as soon as Natives learn their own history first and realize, no color of skin is any different from the others. Bring the court cases forward asap. I even started the thought process on a a tribal lawsuit currently going on in court as we speak. Tribal membership issue. Hundreds of millions of dollars . Tribes need to take care of their tribes instead of locking them out, keeping lands, casino money to themselves. The same things you blame "whites" for doing, natives do to each other. I have a history of preserving native history, including Indian mounds and burials, and village sites, and finding lost knowledge and sharing it with tribes. Way ahead of this story with actions while some just whine.
Tell the UN official to bite me. Time for the US to say goodby and good riddance to the UN.
How else could the US invade other countries, sanction other economies as Iraq's, Iran's, Serbia, Libya, Afghanistan, sit idly by during a genocide as in Darfur or then suddenly decide to intervene in Uganda or Yemen? The US is the UN- duh.
Short and to the point: Tell that guy from the UN to go phuck himself. The UN does NOTHING except spend our taxpayor money and criticize the U.S.A. - but just ask the member nations (with few exceptions) to actually DO something and they hide under their desks.
The land on which the UN building is on in NYC is ancient Mohawk Indian sacred site. How about we return that parcel back to one of the NY tribes (remember we have already seen "The Last of the Mohicans" ) perhaps the Huron Indian tribe. They could turn it into another gambling casino/hotel and make another fortune.
Didn't we purchase that from the Indians?
"Last of the Mohicans" is your basis for there being no members of the Mohawk tribe. I would be interested in your opinion of "Star Trek" LMAO
Manhattan Island was not part of Mohawk land, and neither was any of the land upon which New York City now resides. Manhattan was named after the tribe that lived there. Check your history books.
And no the land was not "purchased" according to the Native view of it. You can't sell the land or the water or air. The beads were probably seen as a gift of good will for sharing the land as that would have been exactly how any Native tribe would have seen it.
Well, if the Indian view is "you can't sell air, land, water" bec ause the eearth belongs to everybody, then why the hell should the Indians be able to"claim" prior ownership to the whites? Seems to me it belongs to everybody and nobody according to their folklore. So where do they get off saying it's theirs? It really belongs to the animalss, the plants, the earth air, and sky. Not a bad idea, really. But this crap gpoing back to revisit old history when everyone involved did not personally have anythiing to do with what happened, is a waste of time and is for the birds. Common sense is lost here, might as well be a bunch of Teapublicans.
Let's go back to the beginning, Adam and Eve owned all the land. Did they have Indian blood coursing through their veins.
Allison,
You believe that fairy tale about selling Manhattan for beads?
In 1640 the Huron tribe travelled all the way to Minnesota trying to escape the Iroqouis and set up a village on an Island in Mississippi river. Dakota allowed them to live there for a year, then Huron killed several Dakota hunters. The Dakota then slaughtered the remaining Hurons except for one man, they sent him packing to remind other Hurons not to mess with Dakota. At least whites in Mn paid for the land. The Dakota and other tribes broke every treaty/smoking peace pipe event that they made with everyone. Not once did Dakota keep a treaty pledge. Then you blame whites with that statement , "whites broke all treaties"....learn your history, you were men, same as any man of any color. There is no difference.
Allison writes..".And no the land was not "purchased" according to the Native view of it. You can't sell the land or the water or air." Nice spin, this revision history nonsense. Natives went thousands of miles to trade, trading among enemies even, they knew the value of trade. If they did not like the trade they went elsewhere or took it by force. Dakota gave land to Ojibs when Ojibs brought them trade. After the Ojib middleman was no longer needed because of direct French trade, Ojibs still lived on the land and began to spread out collecting furs etc themselves. War eventually broke out between tribes. Land could not be " "purchased" is new history , and repeated often enough so some ignorant people believe it.
While I totally agree with the finding, it troubles me that the UN is dictating to the USA what should be done.I would prefer that our government take these actions simply because it is just and right; not because the UN said we should.
So we give back everything except the Statue of Liberty???? Try that, and 300 million americans will start playing the most popular action game of the 18th and 19th Century in American - Cowboys and Indians!
It "troubles you" that the U.N. is telling U.S. what to do. Oh, that's RICH! Does it "trouble you" that the U.S. is running all over the world telling E'ERBODY else what to do? Does it bother you that we've been on a pillage and plunder mission for decades without being held responsible for the damage, destruction and civilian deaths we've caused? DOES IT BOTHER YOU THAT WE ARE NOW THE MILITARY INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX WE WERE WARNED OF BY DWIGHT D. EISENHOWER AND EVEN OUR FOREFATHERS????? Oh, and am I'm "troubling you" with the facts, Jack?
I cannot agree more. We need to quit being the police of the world and turn back toward a more domestic focused policy. We have the technology to reach every country swiftly if need be. Lets use this technology and start shutting down all these bases across the world, stop country welfare, and use these savings to develop more fuel options. Lets drill, but at the same time look at making alternative fuels more cost effective so average Joe's/Janes like me can buy it.
Sorry for my numerous inputs, community, but I have wanted to get rid of the UN for years. If this blog is any reflection of what the American Citizens think of the UN....priority end the UN. Oh but I guess our representatives know better than us......yeah that is why we are in such a mess and they keep kicking the can down the road....DA'S. reps/dems NEED TO START LISTENING.
I'm not sure how much land we could feasibly give back to the Tribes, but it's about time the U.S. ended its hypocritical policies. How many times have we sent our military to another country to defend the rights of their indigenous people while we treat ours like dirt?
Reminds me of these NIMBY jackwagons. Most of them don't have a problem with clearing out someone else's land, but when it's their own, all of a sudden you start hearing a chorus of voices saying "Not In My Back Yard!!" :P
Ironically, I notice a few of the same people who are telling the UN to STFU also don't have a problem with "turning the Iraqi desert into a glass ashtray." Americans are so selfish and conceited it's pathetic. I think they took lessons from the generation of "GIMME THAT, IT'S MINE!!"
To Justin B,
We can't totally make up for what happened 200 years ago. Remember, the Native Americans owned the entire US (different tribes owned different regions, but a Native American is a Native American) even before we came in on our rickety boats. The only way I could see that would totally heal 200 years of broken promises, butchery, oppression, etc. would be to simply move back to Europe, where we came from. That's not to say I don't have sympathy for these people - I do. I'm just saying I don't see anything we can do realistically, with the possible exception of just sharing what we've got. I know a few Native Americans - the ones I know are willing to do that, and let the past stay in the past. They don't seem to believe it's worth holding us responsible for the actions of our ancestors.
I'm inclined to believe you as to your statements about your Native American friends, C.J. They're not savages anywhere CLOSE to what we've become. Sad, nothing but sad.
Any Indian can go thru college cost free, but my kids have to pay their own way. They don't have to pay for land on the reservation. They don't have to live in a trailer, and never ever maintain it, or even pick up the crap in their yard. They are getting just like another minority here in the US.
Further proof that stripping people of their dignity, culture and rights destroys their dignity, culture and rights, along with their Give A Damn. The proof of this statement is all around you, so why doesn't it resonate with you as to how wrong these destructive policies really are? Treating people like trash isn't good for anyone concerned and, eventually, affects us all. Let us learn from past mistakes, mmmmkay?
asknrecieve......so either you know nothing about native precontact and their relationship of total war against each other...or you do know......and choose only to support getting something from "whites" and not having native tribes return land they "stole"( is the term being used)from other native tribes. Example... the middle and north half of the state of Mn once belong to the Dakota, but taken by force by the Ojibway indians.Ojibs should apologize and give the land back...yes or no?
There is no such thing as sacred native American land. What we call native Americans are invaders that crossed the Siberian land bridge. The UN official that made such a dumb comment needs to die a painful death.
I completely agree. I'm a native American -- I was born here; my parents were born here; just because my ancestors were smart enough to build steam ships and come over in the 1800's doesn't make me any less a native American.
If the people who where here prior to 1492 want the land back, then they can fight us for it.
That... Is stupid. If you want to get that technical about it, everyone that isn't living in Africa (or if you're religious, the middle east) is an invader. They lived here for thousands of years before any European settlers came. They are considered indigenous and since they were the first people to settle North America, they can be considered native. In a perfect world, they could have these sacred sites. As it is, they'll never get them.
I think it might come down to the treaty we made giving them their land and then promptly proceeded to break the treaty. What was it they said, "White man speak with forked tongue"?
Rigsson , remember the brain washing of evolution you got in the public school system. Remember Darwin's "Natural Selection". The population of of one group of humans were displaced by another group of humans. Get over it.
The thing is though that their not Native Americans. Before British colonials showed up America didn't exist. They were all separate peoples who lived in separate nations, and different cultures and ways of life. They were the Cherokee people and the Navajo people, and so on. They never considered themselves American.
Big Jim from Texas exactly, that is what happened in Tibet, but we continue telling China to give it back, see the hypocrisy on that.
Bi Jim, being as you'refromTexas I can presumethat you are white and Christian. You probably tell everyone that GOd'slaws reign supreme over man's and that as a "Christian" nation, America should follow the teachings of Jesus Christ. So tell me where Christ ever supported ot sanctioned Social Darwinism or the strong/technologically advanced exploiting/enslaving/exterminating the weak/"stone age".
What would Jesus do? How would He deal with this issue? Shrug it off and say what's done is done, get over it? You and I both know He has never done that. The Bible teaches that every treaty is held sacred by God no matter how fraudulent the intentions of any of the parties involved. His Law requires that that which was stolen be returned...period. Every treaty broken is a major sin that He does not forgive or forget until the wronged party forgives the party that wronged it. That being the case, this nation will have hell to pay come Judgment Day.
Big Jim: Are you quite sure that the North America n Continent was TOTALLY unpopulated these invaders crossed the Siberian land bridge?
@Rigsson
That is not as certian a fact as we once thought it was.
Indigenous Americans crossed the land bridge up to 40k years ago. This pretty much makes this their land (that's why they're referred to as indigenous. duh!) Waaaayyyy before any written language and way before Christianity. The Europeans only came here 500+ years ago and have repeatedly screwed the indigenous population up to today!!!! We may not be able to turn back the clock and restore, but we'd better own up to it. For the "experts" who claim knowledge of the barbarism of the indigenous peoples, there was no known written history except in Central America until the Europeans came and much of the savage behavior was learned from them ie "scalps". For the doofases who asked should we just give back to the French, Mexico, etc. They had no claim either. Mexico only succeeded in becoming their own nation after kicking out Maximilian and the French in the 1850s.
The UN would be nonexistant without the USA, and not to mention UNFUNDED.
This is more of the pansy a- - crap that the UN specializes in. Screw the UN, arrest the turd who who wrote the report, toss him in jail, and throw away the key. Indigent peoples my butt. There are none of them left alive that remember the land being their's, it is just legend. Move on. Leave history behind, learn from it, but leave it behind. Political correctness in action.
Ignorant redneck, the reason there are none of them left is we gave them smallpox and wiped them out. The invading white Europeans that murdered their tribes who now invade still other countries in the name of "Freedom" are unbelievably hypocritical and should give back that which was stolen. Where ever white European races go land is taken, resources pillaged and the indigenous peoples are oppressed to literally to death.
Great reputation to have, I for one agree with this finding.
A more advanced society spreading its wings and putting aside those who would remain in the stone age and prefer not to advance. Not unlike middle east radical muslims who want to remain in the past and drag others back with them.
I do not want to hear all this politically correct B.S. about how oppressed all these indigenous tribes are. Go out to Connecticut and see what kind of "oppression" we are really talking about. Tribes with casinos paying $100k/year allotment checks to tribe members, money which also happens to be excluded when those same tribe members, who readily admit they are not citiizens of this country, walk into an American welfare office then walk out with a food card, a medical card, a school voucher, and a check. Only time that allotment seems to count for anything is when these same people buy a house even though they've never held a job. And, by the way, one of those casinos is about to default on $2.3b of debt and may attempt to try the BK route even though they are not eligible because they are their own country and, therefore, are ineligible to file under US bankruptcy law. Even worse for the debt holders is that they may legally be prohibited from physically seizing assets in the event of a default. Don't see the UN saying anything about this.
Hey, Rat. . .guess who force fed them booze and forced them into the casino business in order to keep them uncomfortably numb? It's starts a "G and ends with a "overnment." You don't get it and you never will. I just LOVE me a heaping pile of Smells To High Heaven Ignorance first thing in the morning!
askn,
Got that right.
Blacks and Latinos yell that they are being discriminated against by others. They don't have an opportunity for a better life. Perhaps so but I DON'T SEE THEM FORCED TO LIVE ON A RESERVATION. If that were a "solution" they would be screaming their collective heads of about segregation, discrimination and every other ---tion they could think of! But it is ok for Native Americans to be restricted to these reservations without the chance of an equal opportunity.
I keep reminding myself of how America is so righteous about other countries and their violation of human rights. Ya right.
Just pointing it out there... I don't see any other race required to have a tribal registration number along with a social security number. I've always thought it strange (since I have both). Why not just tattoo it on our forearms? (Sorry I leak cyinicism when I'm sleep deprived.)
Rodentwarrior...1924 Amwerican Indian Citizenship act makes us US citizens while also recognizing that we have dual citizenship with our tribes. So yes, we ARE US citizens with the same rights/responsibilities as everyone else. I have to pay taxes on my house, my income, my car, and everything I buy. Even on reservations, earned income is taxed by the federal government. Just like the rest of the US, interest income from shares and dividends (percapita and gaming checks) is usually exempted from taxes...which is how most rich folks - the ones who claim that they shouldn't pay taxes because they are vital to the economy - make their income if you haven't noticed.
Minkie...Native Americans and Native Hawaiians are required by federal law to prove our blood quantum of Native ancestry to even be considered Native. No other ethnic group has to do that. We are subject to laws most non-Natives wouldn't tolerate, such as the fact that even if we live off-reservation our assets - home, vehicle, bank account, business, personal effects - can be seized by the federal government and put into a trust to be adminstered by a government-appointed trustee for our "benefit". This includes selling our assets off and deducting a hefty "adminstration" fee if the trustee feels we aren't competent to appreciate our assets. This has been the law since the late 1800's so its not "new" socialism.
I don't know that the Native Americans are restricted to the reservations (I hope not). One would think they have the opportunity to earn a living elsewhere. At least, I would hope they have the same opportunities as everyone else. If they don't, that needs to change. But it is important that their culture and language be preserved.
The one reservation I have seen and been on was mostly sand and sagebrush (Warm Springs Indian Reservation in Oregon).
BOOHOO, Lets give back your land and you can go back to living in teepees and hunting with bow and arrow and having no technology. Then every last one of you with a free college education because you were Native American needs to pay back every bit of that tuition. You speak of poverty now?
wow, arresting people for saying things that annoy you. how "politically correct"
(talk about hypocrisy)
You only saw a small part of the reservation. I'm guessing you went to Kah-Nee-Ta resort. Those warm springs are nice. Or you went to the casino.
The reservation is very large, about half is forest. They have run a successful, sustainable, timber operation for many years.
The main source of income for the tribe is selling hydroelectric power, so there is access to the river.
They also have their traditional hunting and fishing rights.
You are correct that I saw only a small part of the reservation. I was in 5th grade on a camp out with Camp Fire Girls (yes, it was Camp Fire Girls, a very long time ago). We slept in some tee-pees and cooked our own breakfast over camp fires the next morning. I don't recall more than that.
Thanks for the additional information!
You're welcome.
See that mountain in my Avatar?
That is Mount Jefferson. Second highest mountain in Oregon. The Reservation owns the east side of the mountain right to the peak.
I grew up in Oregon, but left before I was 18. I came back and lived in Linn County for about 6 months, so Mt. Jefferson actually was not far away. It really is beautiful. In time, I ended up moving to another state (again!).
Hope the state you are in now also has some scenic areas near by.
In my 60 years I have seen quite a few states and have usually found some place that was uniquely beautiful.
I won't mention those places where I didn't find a special place since there probably were some if you knew where to look.
I'm sure there are people who feel the Indians should be given 'more'. I don't. But for you who do, there is nothing stopping you from gifting what ever land you own to whatever Indian Tribe you want.
Great idea -- I've never seen anyone who thinks we did wrong by the people who here prior to 1492 offer to buy land and deed it to the ancestors of the pre-1492'ers. It seems they always want to give someone else's land back.
It's much easier to be liberal when spending other people's money.
here we go with the whole "spoiled" indian trope.... how about this, trade lives with a Native American- you get to live in poverty stricken lands and be ignored, maligned and dehumanized and they get your nice house on stolen land and high paying job..... you now what forget it, you will never ever get it because you cannot admit you did wrong, we can't even admit to the genocide we committed against them
LISTEN UP ALL LIBERAL DEMOCRATS , your president allowed his representative to sign onto this treaty !!! Was it just political and he won't return any lands or otherwise help our Indians with their complaints ??? This Barry "Barack " Obama is an EMBARRASSMENT to every American and should be denied a chance to completely destroy our America !Just another example of the LEFT WING LIBERAL IDEOLOGY at work, come on people look at him for what he is !!!!
You are unbelievable! You are part of the greatest theft of all time. Your ancestors stole this country and killed the people that lived here. You think that's the fault of liberals?! You have no morals, ethics or a backbone. When someone steals from you I'm sure you demand immediate action. This is no different. The fact is that there were too many Europeans to stop the settlement of America. It doesn't mean it was right. One day you'll understand but first you have to learn that you aren't the only person on the planet. Yes, you right-wing self-serving greedy pigs think about one thing: yourself. I can only hope you need someone else to survive and you don't get that help.
Think about this - These Indians got the land when they came across the Siberian land bridge, does that make it theirs ? The whole thing ? Greedy Liberal Injuns !!!
For all you "believers" out there, it says in the "book" that the sins of the father can be passed down ten generations. Let's see, we did as a nation discuss and plan in our hallowed halls of congress how to wipe out whole tribes with biological weapons, and as a nation proceeded to do so. What would happen to someone today who actually used biological weapons? The Hague and possible execution?
And then along comes the dude Jesus and talks about redemption of sins, but I haven't seen many out there, if any, who even feel a national guilt about what has been done.
Special today! Free smallpox blankets! Come get them while they last!
Um... what of the tribes that went to war against one another for territory and won? Were they expected to give it back? Which was the original tribe that owned it? Since time began land and people have been conquer and others have gained control. What happened to the vikings land? the barbarian land called EUROPE. Incas or Mayans? yes they were conquered and at one time they were the conquerors..
You are unbelievable! You are part of the greatest theft of all time.
Wrong. That honor would probably go to the Roman Empire.
Yes, the different Native American tribes fought and killed eachother over land and resources before anyone from the West ever showed up. Face it, proud history or not, almost every inhabitated inch of this earth has been fought over by the ancestors of the people who live there, who fought the ancestors of those who lived there before, who fought the ancestors of the people who lived there before. Europe, the middle east, Africa, Asia, all of them have at some point been conquerored or owned or inhabited by people or empires or tribes or influences who don't live there today. Whether what happened all those hundreds or thousands of years ago, depending on the land in discussion, to the people who used to live there was deplorable to modern civilzation doesn't really matter. It happened a long time ago, no one alive today could even be considered slightly responsible for it, and we just need to move on.
Soooooooooo, Johnny, I guess if aliens show up and murder most of us and take the land, it's ok !!!!
To CorporateShill,
Yes - they would have conquered the land from us. We didn't defend our home adequately, so that makes it theirs.
(Oh, except for me. I'm speshul.)
;)
Here's another one; Lets say Cuba decides to nationalize everything and takes properties from corporations that are doing business there.
They were conquered so it's ok ?
It's not whether it's ok or not , people have taken land or won land in wars though out history. The Indians themselves did it and very brutally also ! This is life and haven't evolved out of it and probably wont .
I guess it time for most (other than Indians) to move back to wherever the Hell we came from.You think?
@james-4251462 - Minnesota? That's where I came from. when Tibet, the Falkland Islands, Chechnya, Kashmir and all other "territories" are returned, I'll advocate returning native lands. Until then , the UN can get stuffed.
And when GE, Exxon, the Koch brothers, and the rest of Wall Street and corporate elites stop taking US taxpayer-funded subsubsidies and tax breaks and start paying their fair share for the privilege of living and doing business in this country, then I'll agree that Native tribes should stop accepting government funding. Oh and those Government-controlled trust funds are OUR money not yours, and I'm sure you'd want us to have that.
Yeah lets give the big middle finger to the UN; along with most of the rest of the world. There are one hundred and ninety three member countries in the United Nations and most of them already have a low opinion of America because of idiots who act exactly like, well nearly every poster above me. Especially Big Jim; who probably doesn't believe in evolution but does believe the Siberian land bridge existed anytime after THE LAST ICE AGE.
Maybe we should ship this guy to Alpha Centauri?
Good catch on the game reference. But uh, who should go to Alpha Centauri. Me or Jim?
Prokhor, I read quite a few of your comments, and can't help but wonder... Where do you live? If you live here in the US, then why are you trying to turn it into the Soviet Union? Wouldn't it be just easier for you to go back to Russia? I left Soviet Union to be free and to live in the democratic, non-socialist society. And it pains me to watch Obama destroying the country I love, trying to turn it into the country I left. As far as the UN is concerned, it's useless. It always was and always will be. The Security Counsel is not able to come to any common decision with China and Russia standing on the way to democracy. The Human Rights commission is being presided, at one time or another, by Iran, Libya, Syria, etc. Are you kidding me? And you... Who gives you the right to call people "idiots", because they disagree with you? Typical "Russian" way of debating. I suppose if you could send all of those who disagree with you to the Gulag you'd gladly do it. Right?
While you may disagree with everyone's post above you -- you are the first to insult people posting. Kinda diminishes your point
Yes I want to turn the United States, the land of religious freedom, cultural freedom and freedom in general into the Soviet Union. That is exactly what I'm getting at here. It's not the fact that most of the known world is involved in the UN. It's not the fact that religious freedom, which probably should encompass the Sacred Lands of the Native Americans, is being stomped all over here. It's also certainly not the fact that most of the sacred land they deserve to be given back isn't actually settled and wouldn't really hurt anyone one way or the other if we were to give it back. Also keep calling me Russian, I like it.
PZ you aren absolutely correct that Americans are considered ignorant in any other country in the world. They just don't know how ignorant of worldly knowledge they are. Most Americans have no idea of true justice. I know this because I was stationed in Germany and saw GI's make a fool of themselves routinely in bars. They acted like everyone should speak to them in English no matter that they were in someone else's country.
This is an extension of that same ugliness. No compassion for those with less or those that have been screwed by the forces of history. If there were justice we'd all be in prison for some crime or another.
The comments on this board are truly sickening. Fat white guys with their guns and gas guzzling cars thinking they can defy the world cause they're Americans. Sickening!
That's the problem, my man. You like to be called "Russian", because regardless of you living in the US you've never liked this country. You remained "Russian", and as such you hate the US, trying to change it into something similar to what you used to - Russia. You keep patronizing everyone ("Does anyone understand how UN work?"). Hey, you might think you are very smart, but you aren't any different from the rest of us. You just have a huge size ego. It would have helped if you had a bit more tolerance. But then again, it would be against being "Russian", which you like so much.
Yup. 100% Russian. Want some Vodka. See now I'm just doing the same thing you're doing which is talking nonsense. Drink up my Russian friend.
It was a bunch of "white" and "black" and "red" and "yellow" Americans who went all over the world with their guns and gas guzzling "cars" to free it from the oppression of dictators in wars we could have ignored but the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave was built on the blood of people who cherish freedom more than anything else - not just for us but for the rest of the world.
True justice: what country in the world has a level of justice to match the United States? NONE! We are not perfect but I've seen the "justice" of most other countries-cultures where even to this day entering their "justice" system can mean years without anything but incarceration in the harshest of conditions.
I doubt the Germans want to speak of justice for at least another 1000 years: paid any restitution to my family for the blood, sweat, frostbite, horrors they faced while freeing you from your foolish actions as the most educated country on the planet in 1940.
Where I live we have 1000's of European college students here for summer work and I can tell you, they are not all model citizens: Russians girls arrested for prostitution, drinking and drug issues, fights, vandalism, tax cheats and so on...so take a good look at yourself before you accuse the one country that has done more good in the past 100 years than all of Europe or Asia's history combined.
If you so hate America, crawl back to Europe into the crap pot from which you came. Otherwise, shut up and get to work! Have a nice day!
Well, to be fair, the US has a low opinion of most of those 193 countries because, let's face it, they deserve that low opinion. They're jokes.
But, I don't really care about the UN report. It can only be enforced through the Security Council, and we have the veto. Game over.
Skeeter you said it best...I am native American, my mom's grandmother was 100% and English. My last name is English (via, my ancestors came over on a ship in 1634 as land granties for the King of England). History in every country was placed by just that HISTORY. Christopher Columbus was no Saint nor were his crew (rape, pilag and massacre....ie. Yet we celebrate HIM, for example TIANO Indians in Hispaniola. Morals, Laws and everything else were refined by evolution which is history! Can we change it, NO. Can we maintain and abid the laws, Yes. Every civilization has history, period end of it. I don't think we need the U.N. in on this one or we will have to point the finger too every civilization and really keep them busy. Just saying.....
Hello, Veg? You were stationed in Germany because we had defeated the Germans in WWII. I don't think that makes us their inferiors.
Screw that. I'm not going to stand by and let the United States be fractured just to soothe the ruffled feathers of displaced and mistreated Natives who aren't really Natives seeing as they got here by crossing a land bridge in the Bering Strait. Hey natives, you lost your lands, get over it. You're Americans now and you're in the same boat as the rest of us. Get used to it. Adapt and prosper.
Very well said
You stupid moronic rednecked fool. Do you have any idea how the BIA treats the true Native American? No I"m sure you have no idea what so ever. Prosper? You must be joking. You're sitting on their land, if you paid for it maybe they could prosper.
Yeah the US is going to be completely fractured and broken up and fall apart as a country if we do anything morally upstanding ever.
You stupid moronic rednecked fool. Do you have any idea how the BIA treats the true Native American? No I"m sure you have no idea what so ever. Prosper? You must be joking. You're sitting on their land, if you paid for it maybe they could prosper.
I'm not sitting on your land. My ancestors conquered it from you. It's mine now. BTW nobody is forcing you stay on the reservation. Maybe if you branched out and assimilated you would be doing a little bit better economically.
Really Jonathan? Why should I assimilate? My people have been here for more than 12,000 yrs and we adapted very well to this land. Hell I can walk around in your culture quite well but choose to practice my own. In fact it's the upright morals learned in my Native culture which taught me to be honest at all times, to be generous and patient with others (especially those weaker than myself), to seek wisdom and knowledge, to stand up for what's right no matter that I might stand against everyone else (and lose my life or freedom because of it), to be faithful and loyal to my family, people, community, and nation, and to understand that we human beings all stand as equals in the Creator's eyes...meaning that none of us is better than anyone else no matter how different we are.
Watching the selfish, arrogant, greedy, bigoted, hypocritical, pedantic, and morally/socially irresponsible conduct of most "average" Americans...no thank you to the assimilation invite. I prefer to stick my people's "primitive" traditions.
BTW, I hold a degree from and Ivy League college (paid for out of my own pocket along with the same grants and loans that non-Indians use), hold down a f/t job, own a home and have an interest in our family's farm. I'm sober, participate in the community I live in, and endeavor to uphold my responsibilities as a citizen, tax-payer, and educated/responsible voter. How about you?
Allison do the "upright morals" you rag on about allow you to lump together all Americans in a group then insult them all? Looks like the Ivy League degree was a waste of money.
From your words you fit the definition every insult you just hurled at "average" Americans.
Your probably just another one of those "Cherokee Princesses" certain women claim to be after a few too many beers anyway.
Allison, I like how the natives alsways pick and choose those "native values" of honor and wisdom concerning anything good, then pretend they had only those values and not the same as all other nations. Every native has had every flaw that every other color of man has had.....The NOBLE REDMAN syndrome is alive and well...in some minds, until they take the time to learn their past.
We have already paid billions to native Americans for the lands through the native claims settlement act. We have paid for this land many times over. The UN needs to police the rest of the world and stay out of US affairs. This lame organization needs to disband and we need to drop our membership. of course this will never happen with our current UN A** Kissing administration.
Billy boy, our President uses the UN to justify the United States invasion of other countries. What would the defense contractors do without the UN? They'd go broke.
So Bill your people paid less than a penny on the dollar for each acre taken from us and nothing for the resources. Your people passed laws and designed programs to destroy our families and cultures. Your people still treat mine worse than stray dogs, and refuse to even acknowledge our contributions to your life. Your government allows private indistries to use our reservations as toxic waste dumps and uses the FBI and local non-Indian law agencies to intimidate, harass, and get rid of those of us who try to make these industries follow the same federal laws they have to follow on non-Indian land. Your people use the federal government to strip tribes of water, land, and other resources even now.
And you think this nation's debt to us has been paid? Not by a long sight. But tell you what, abide by the treaties, treat us fairly according to the law and standards of social justice, stop taking our lands, water, and resources, and quit damning us for being Indians and we'll be happy to mark that debt paid in full.
Move to Mexico and conquer the cartels. Then pee on a tree and claim it sacred. You keep ragging on us people. Us people live with our parents until we are adults and then buy the property that our ancestors won in battle from whoever owns it at the time. Its not like land is given to us. If you want some of the land back that your ancestors lost in battle then do the exact same thing we do. BUY IT! DAMN INDIANS!
Allison, and your people took the land from other tribes and captured their women and children and raped and killed them Whatever tribe you think you are..you are not. You are a mix of every other tribe , your tribe came in contact with. Just last year I found Dakota indian documentation of the actual battle places in Bloomington and Eagan Mn where Dakota defeated Iowa Indians and sent them packing down the river to the Iowa River. Now Dakota......give the land back to the Iowa indians right now. Give them the whole half of lower Minesota to the Iowa, you never paid for it....Ya sure you betcha that will happen there then ok!
What's good for the goose...is good for the gander. Funny how it sounds when America is judged by the same standards they judge other countries.
Well said Nanette
Hypocrisy replaced Baseball as the American pastime. Live with it, and move on. They seem to. ;)
really? isnt there a limitation on how far back you can go in the law? get over it. Its hundreds of years in the past. I dont see Spain making it up to the Mayans after enslaving them. Just more people looking for free money
So is slavery but that race card is still being played today.
I think they tried the whole "giving it back to the indigenous" people experiment in Africa, hows that working out, the ones who arent slaughtering each other are starving. In Zimbabwe under white rule they were exporting food, now they are starving to death.
That's not a direct result of not having white rule. That's the result of having Governments that won't do a damn thing for their people - kinda like what we have here. And ironically, I see some of the same things happening here, though on a smaller scale. We don't have people killing each other over land (it's more over drugs, property, petty disagreements, and the like), but we do have people starving and homeless.
While I agree we should, it is not the business of the UN to come here and tell us what to do. Why are they not going after other nations such as Serbia and the Sudan or China and The issues with Tibet? With people like Hillary and Obama forcing the laws of the UN on the people no wonder we have issues. If it was up to the UN and the quack pots there, Our Constitution would be striped(not like it is getting any better). Among other things as a Veteran I swore to protect the US people not the world. The UN is nothing but a bunch of old men/women trying to push laws they have no business putting on a sovereign nation. I am not saying we do, but it is all because of us trying to please everyone else, and not help the people here.
If it is not their business to come here and tell us what to do how is it their business to go to Serbia, Sudan or China and tell them what to do?
Well, if this is the case there is a 20 mile blockof land in San diego, or maybe it's malibu Beach... yeah that's it. Well it's very sacred to me!!!
If they want us to go that route, then they can force the Vatican to return all the gold and silver they stole from the Europeans years ago heh heh. I would want reparations from Italy and the catholic church lol
Dear Mr. Anaya,
You fail to mention the annual tax free subsidies our federal government gives to each indian person tax free. You fail to mention in Washington State alone they are entitled to half of all seafood harvested on public or private lands. You fail to mention all cigarettes, liquor, fireworks and casino profits along with property they pay no taxes. Please go back to wherever you came from. They make millions tax free while us real Americans pay the bills.
Concerned, it would be nice if for once you were as informed as you are opinionated; getting half the seafood in Washington state is a result of a treaty WE signed for taking THEIR land. Why the hell would one nation pay taxers to another? The only "real Americans" in this scenario are the Native Americans - the rest of us are interlopers.
Thank you for educating the ignorant! They also have their own laws and get other subsidies from mineral rights.
Don't you feel ANY shame about how these people have been treated? AT ALL????
They are entitled to those things because this was their land that we manipulated from them in many ways.
Maybe you've never had your home stolen, or your community decimated by land grabbers.
Clearly you don't care about anything but the marginal taxes the government makes you pay.
Real Americans care about freedom and justice, something we started taking from these people 300+ years ago until the present day.
That you could be so petty as to make this a tax issue is disgusting.
Dear Mr. Concerned Citizen,
I am a native "American" and let me just enlighten you a little. 1.Yes there are tribes that recieve an annual subsidie but not all tribes do. 2. I pay taxes just like you, property, sales, social security and federal income, state income and who knows how many more.
I have never asked the government for anything except for what they promised. The right to live peacefully, the right to observe my traditions and to feel safe. To raise my children knowing their history as a pround people.
I want you to think back to your days as a school child and remember what the pilgrams suffered thru when they came to this country and what they put the natives thru. Had it not been for the natives they would not have survived a harsh and cruel land.
I agree that there are some who try to push the government into giving more than is necessary but don't include all the rest who only want as I do what was promised.
CHEROKEE and PROUD of who I am.
Nope. Didn't do a thing to them. Had nothing to do with it. Come to think of it, are you holding all immigrants who came to this country in the 19th, 20th and 21st centuries responsible? Go tell them they have to give up their hard earned land and homes.
Doofus.
Thank you RavenWind. I agree with you. My direct family ancestors were forced off their land by armed US soldiers and forced to go on a long march. The Cherokees had their own language, published their own newspaper and had a constitution based on the US constitution. They were and still are a progressive people. The way they have been treated by our government all these years is shameful. I too, am proud of the Cherokee nation and its people.
Concerned, you are very ignorant. you must also realize there is over 500 federally recognized tribes, with their own treaties and in different places. And the fact only 5% of tribes make the "big bucks."
Source: Midwest Regional Director of Bureau of Indian Affairs.
This is worth looking at. Atonement can be made in a responsible and realistic way. In the end a moral authority is the only authority. We'd be better to honor that.
Where did the simultaneous right-wing talking points come from? Fox? Limbaugh? Both? What's the source of this particular mind-programming?
Whose "moral" authority? Yours? Mine? Putin? Obama? The Untied Nations? Oh, maybe, but...no, I can't even think it.....maybe...God's moral authority????
Atonement means to be "at one" with God. Biblically, that comes through forgiveness and the Bible (horrid book that it is) says that once sins are forgiven, they are also forgotten.
Better Careful
I cant think of anything I need to atone for, I havent done anything to anybody.
The problem with "moral authority" is that morals are subjective, and subject to change at the whim of whoever happens to be our "moral" leader.
That might all be well and good 10 million years in the future, when we're living in a "perfect" society, but it won't fly today. Put power in the hands of the wrong person, and anarchy ensues. Learn from the myriad examples - Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin, Fidel Castro, Saddam Hussein, Kim Jong Il, the two Bushes, the list goes on.
Oh, and by the way, I don't think there are many Americans that are too fond of people pushing their moral beliefs on others. It didn't work out too well with the Native Americans, and it never works out well in church or politics. In fact, I believe that goes against the very basis of freedom.
Does anyone here actually understand how the UN works or are you all just talking out your tack hole; cause I don't think I've seen the UN force a law on anyone anywhere. In fact reading that article I see the only laws being passed were the ones where, well where we took over the lands in the first place.
Laws are made by the ones with the force, i.e. guns. Rules are made by the victor not the vanquished. The white man has shown in the past to push back and push back hard when he is messed with. Come on, keep on pushing and see where it leads. All of the UN hind tit suckers can bite it. When they tell the Jews to give back the lands they took from the Arabs then we can talk about other issues. I can see that happen when a snowball can exist in hell.
PZ: Set a good example. When you use the word "we" regarding taking the lands from the native American's, are you including yourself??? If so, you go ahead and give everything you own back to those "you" stole from as an example to the rest of us.
Once you "put your money where your mouth is," then the rest of us will have a shining example of moral authority to follow. Otherwise, you are just another hypocritical voice similar to the UN (Un Necessary).
Look at that. The same argument I've seen over and over again. Shut you pie hole seems to thinks the white man is the right man and that guns are the way you solve everything. So; Racist? Skeeter seems to forget his history lessons because I'm obviously using "we" as a stand in for the UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. The place where you live and where I live. If I were living on the Sacred Land of some Native American tribe I'd most certainly give it up for the cause but I'm not. Most of the Sacred Land that was stolen was used for mining or the removal of trees or for drilling -oil.- No one really lives where most of these Sacred Lands are. So what's the big problem with giving them back empty land again?
You are right. I know how the UN works and its a "recommendation". They have no authority to force anything. And, besides they are ONLY recommending that they give back the SACRED sites NOT THE ENTIRE US.
Wow, practically everyone on this thread is a hater. What the US can INVADE a country that has done nothing too us, stick a massive military froce near China, have military bases in countries all over the world and push our weighrt around but God forbit ONE guy from outside the country SUGGESTS how we might improve things in our own country and everyone on this thread @!$%#s themselves. Listen up dumb @!$%#s I love this country but I KNOW were far from perfect. If you @!$%#s can't handle one outside opinion which is ment to be helpful then your truely @!$%#ing pathetic. Oh ya incase you forgot the NATIVE Americans were hear before us and YES we have @!$%#ED them over for centuries and YES we are still in one way or another @!$%#ING them over.
Sorry, can't help it. It's "forbid" not forbit... "to" us not Too...."yeah" not ya...."here" not hear...."truly" not truely... where did you go to school? I'm really worried about the future of this country.
Forgot...were, s/b ("should be" for domewars) we're. Ment = meant. LMAO!
If you feel that strongly about how we treated the pre-1492'ers, then why don't you start buying land and give it to them.
We took the land by Right of Conquest. This is how things have been done for thousands of years. Even the pre-1492'ers took the land from somebody. If they want it back, let them take it back.
We don't owe them squat.
No we took the land by right of germ warfare, lying through our teeth and in general being very bad people. Tell you what; here's this blanket for you. It's covered in small pox rubbings so that when you sleep in it and eventually die we'll just be able to come and throw your body in the river and take over your land and no one will ever know or care.
Oh cry me a freakin' river little man.
Prokhor Zakharov,
No, you don't know your history mister. The Spanish did that to the natives in South America, i.e. give them blankets infected with small pox. The American Indians got sick by being in contact with the white men at the time. Simple isn't it?
So do the English have to get out of Northern Ireland? I would still be in Ireland if the English had not practiced genocide against my ancestors. Where's my reparations?
Good post Domewars, but however much sense you make it won't/can't change the minds(?) of the troglodytes that think the U.S. white population is somehow exceptional and superior to all others. They make me ashamed to be an American.
www.standford.edu/dept/HPS/MayorSmallpox.pdf
Shutyerpieholedude,
My reading on the matter was that they discussed in Congress how to get the land west of the Mississippi by giving the Indians smallpox blankets. Very calculated. Today we call that biological warfare. Methinks you should study your history, not Zakharov.
Interesting article. But it seems to me that all it did was indicate that the preponderance of evidence points to the "smallpox blanket theory" as being anecdotal more than completely factual (eg. mentioning Heracles in the same breath as Dr Quinn, Medicine Woman. Too funny).
Still, we cannot give everything back. History is full of winners and losers. Of rights and wrongs. All cannot even begin to be set right or be undone.
We have to get over this inclination that all can be made whole and move forward to ensure future history can be made as fair as possible.
This latest spewing from the toothless U.N. will be as successful as their last spewing trying to contain the violence in Syria.
General Phillip Sheridan is the one who came up with the idea of driving the Indians onto reservations by killing off their food supply.
They didn't purposely infect them. That is germ warfare.
Actually there are first-person historical references about infected blankets were given to Indians by the Pilgrims and early colonists. Benjamin Franklin advocated using booze to weaken and demoralize Indians to make exterminating us easier. Sheridan promotedwholesale extermination of the bison as well as confiscating and killing Natives' horses.
Beginning in 1880, Native AMerican children were removed fromtheir parents at gunpoint and shipped to government-funded, church-run boarding schools to destroy Native culture by forced assimilation of the children. In these boarding school the children were separated from siblingsandby genderand subjected to some of the most horrendous physical,emotional, verbal, and sexual abuse you can imagine. At least 25% of them died from the abuse or were murdered. Many if not most of the girls were repeatedly raped by the staff and the babies conceived of said rape were almost always murdered at birth - usually by throwing them down the latrines or into the furnace. Even up through the 1990's pedophiles knew that if they wanted easy access to children they could work at one of these schools as neither the administration nor the government were going to prosecute them and the families were usually threatened into not filing charges. And white law enforcement wasn't going to prosecute a white man or woman for the rape, abuse, or murder of an Indian, not even if the victim was a small child.
Up through the 1980's Native girls and boys, men and women were involuntarily sterilized. Today social service agencies still remove Native children from homes without even a court hearing or formal charges of any kind against the parents. And they do so in violation of federal law.
If you think this kindof thing isn't coming down the pike for your people...think again. Crackdowns against dissent were seen here as local law enforcement employed excessively violent tactics against the Occupy protesters. Outbreaks of disease can be used to get rid of whole communities seen as problematic and you'd better believe the Government has stuff to do the job. The NDAA gives the Government the right to imprison you and seize your assets without any formal charges even being filed, denies your right of habeus corpus and legal representation, and allows you to be tried by a special military court where you can be convicted without any evidence and executed the same day. Don't think for one minute that our elected officials are actually serving our interests - they are going to do as their corporate/social elite masters tell them and those folks wouldn't care of the lot of us dropped dead except for those they need to work the jobs that keep their lifestyle and infrastructure going. The rest of us are trash well rid of as far as most of the1% controlling most of the world's wealth and power are concerned. Especially those of us who have the notion that all people stand as equals and have equal rights under the law.
Geeez Allison, Skort says that there is no recorded history for the Indians before the 1900s. What is up with that??
I'm wondering if what Allison said was true, or if it's, at least in part, embellished in some way. If it is true, it's no wonder the UN are trying to step in. That would definitely give them the authority.
Got any reputable sources to back that up Allison? That's a rather serious accusation to make.
Allison again...whatever tribe a native says he/she is, they are not. All tribes captured other natives from other tribes,... killed , raped the women and kept women and children as slaves becoming members of that tribe. Toss in cannalbalism to boot. FACT! This was still practiced in Mn until mid 1800's.
Yes..I fully support the United States having to pay all claims to Native Americans ASAP after courts have been exhausted of all appeals. ASAP!!!!