(i have to say that i notice that freedom of speech on this site is random or perhaps selective to the point of silencing. A piece i did that included important details about the failure of enviros to integrate mountain top removal with genocidal forced relocation of traditional Dine and Hopi peoples was not allowed. At least i should have been told why it was removed. Something is fishy and i do hope the following is allowed to be posted.)
Blessings All
I woke at 4 am. I am preparing to go to Big Mountain during the Thanksgiving work week that has been organized for many years now by Black Mesa Indigenous Support volunteers. I have not been on a caravan to Big Mountain since we organized an amazing first in 1985 that arrived at the survival camp in time for the Spring Gathering. It included a Uhaul filled with food and clothing donations. This was an unprecedented collaboration with AIM and Hippies from the mountains of northeastern Washington, Olympia organizers, nonIndian allies and many who joined along the way. The memories from that journey are priceless. Many who participated have passed on. May the story be told....
The optimism charging that long ago effort has been worn down by the ongoing reality of serious struggle silenced even by fellow activists. The resistance of traditional Native Americans is the longest and most ignored stand for sacred land and against long term resource extraction on the north and south of this continent. Such is the deeply rooted stubborn legacy of racist colonialism. It is a mental and physical illness i strive to address not only among my own people, but in myself as well. Changing such generation behaviors is difficult yet essential.
To advocate for the silenced is to take on a lifetime of self educating that includes systematic dismantling of my own inbred racism. Few seem to be willing to dismantle the privilege and sacrifice involved in facing what most white people continue maintaining. I have witnessed over the years how most drop the quest for justice like the hot potato it is. Oh, bloody, painful heart of genocide that burns one to the very soul...
It is no easy task to follow thru to completion the sacred duty involved in addressing the comforts enjoyed overwhelmingly by the invader nations who control, still, this country and it's wealth. I am ashamed of my people, even my precious Hippie people who populate the hills and valleys where organic food has a foothold. I see denial infecting all of us as the situation grows ever bleaker for our fragile planet and the coming generations. We, who had the chance to act with full, strong conscience, have failed. We can't even stand strongly against the warped hybrid war-into-global-genocide that stains all our hands with the blood of innocents.
Isolation is lethal and it is one of the most effective tools of divide and conquer available. Thanks to the judgments of privilege perpetrated by those whose fear prevents strong, committed and powerful action, we are a nation known globally as in disagreement with genocide, yet failing miserably to do a thing about it.
So it is with this heart heavy for many years now, that i embark on a journey. I have not seen Pauline since December of 2004. Her sheepherder Owen called in September leaving a message from her and asking me to joining this effort. I planned accordingly.
I have been laboring intensely to care for my youngest who has also been a recipient of hateful racism. It has taken us 3 years to find a home after leaving the mountains where we lived for most of her life when the bigotry, economics and family tragedy forced us out. To live in the dominant society with children forces one to conform to it's destructiveness in order to eat. At least working as i do gardening, cleaning houses and cooking allows more of my beliefs to remain intact, but it's capitulation to capitalism nonetheless. I feel the pull within my entire being to the lands of Big Mountain/Black Mesa, to the borderlands, to Mexico, to Juarez, to Chiapas, to the places where the most silenced caretakers of earth never stop defending ancient ways of life. To lose these ways is to the peril of all life, all of us, everything.
The vital energy i once had as i realized the importance of the struggle of traditional Dine and Hopi has decreased due to exhaustion, age and the lack of mass response. Too many just shrug and say they thought it was over, that relocation never really happened. The issue perhaps never grabbed hearts like mine was and is. So i see hearts must awaken when they do and i simply must continue as i am able. Finally, i can make this journey for a very short time to support Pauline Whitesinger, my life's greatest teacher in her lifetime opposition to Peabody coal and her defense of sacred land and life.
My daughter is almost on her own. When i am fully able to devote myself to the justice that must be done, i will be 60 years old hands, back, legs, gnarled with hard labor. My heart feels ageless driving me to carry out whatever instructions come thru in the quest for peace and justice due emerging generations.
In peaceful struggle,
swaneagle harijan
 frontlinemom@riseup.net
Amy Goodman just said her dad was the "original Hippie"! Sweet.
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