Broken treaties, cultural genocide and murder: Here are 5 ways the US has ‘given thanks’ to Native Americans

MICHAEL MOORE: It’s not envy, it’s war, and it is a class war, and it’s a war that has been perpetrated by the rich on to everybody else. I mean, the class war is one they started. The mistake they’ve made, just to deal with the racial part of this, is their boot has been on the necks of people of color since we began. This is a nation founded on genocide and built, built on the backs of slaves. Alright?
So, so we started with a racial problem. We went, we tried to actually eliminate one entire race, and then we used another race to build this country actually quite quickly as a new country into a world power. This country never would have had the wealth that it had had it not had slavery for a couple of hundred years. If it had had, if it had had to pay people, if it actually had to pay people to build America, you know, we might just be at that point in Utah where we’re joining the two rails together maybe at this point right now.

From the moment that Columbus “discovered” a place that already existed, Native Americans began to die. Whether from “Old World” diseases like small pox and measles, battles with government soldiers or outright murder, the population declined by 96 percent.

American historian David Stannard argued in his book American Holocaust that the annihilation of the Native Americans from 76 million on both American continents to just a quarter-million “in a string of genocide campaigns,” that killed “countless tens of millions” was by far the largest genocide in world history.

Sir Jeffrey Amherst, commander-in-chief of British forces in North America, wrote to Colonel Henry Bouquet at Fort Pitt:

“You will do well to try to inoculate the Indians [with smallpox] by means of blankets, as well as to try every other method, that can serve to extirpate this execrable race.”

The intentional use of “germ warfare” to “extirpate this execrable race” is nothing more than brutal, hateful and horrific mass murder. Our country should be ashamed.

Even hundreds of years later, tribes are still fighting many of these same battles. Just last month, the federal government raided a Native American university that was growing a legal hemp crop as part of a pilot project under the Farm Bill.

The Lakota Tribe has been particularly hard hit. They have been fighting to preserve their land against the threat of the Keystone XL pipeline which the tribe argues would have caused an increase in the number of health and safety problems.

They’ve also had run-ins with local law enforcement and liquor stores that locate just outside dry tribal lands. At the same time their children have experienced appalling and cruel racism and outright assault from fellow South Dakota residents.

What we owe the Native Americans is a more complicated question, but for sure it begins with a greater respect and extends well beyond the limited reparations we’ve given them over the years. Perhaps it begins with the reclaiming of holidays like Columbus Day and Thanksgiving which have done nothing but perpetuate stereotypes and gloss over the history of violence and broken promises.

Happy Native American Heritage Month!

Thank you  The Raw Story & SARAH K. BURRIS

American Indian Activist Russell Means Powerful Speech, 1989

Russell was an Oglala Sioux activist for the rights of American Indian people. He became a prominent member of the American Indian Movement (AIM) after joining the organization in 1968, and helped organize notable events that attracted national and international media coverage.

Russell Means has lived a life like few others in this century — revered for his selfless accomplishments and remarkable bravery. He was born into a society and guided by a way of life that gently denies the self in order to promote the survival and betterment of family and community. His culture is driven by tradition, which at once links the past to the present.

Russell Means was once called the “biggest, baddest, meanest, angriest, most famous American Indian activist of the late 20th century.”

He led a 71-day armed standoff in 1973 against federal agents at Wounded Knee, a tiny hamlet in the heart of South Dakota’s Pine Ridge Reservation.

It is considered to be one of his most famous act of defiance, however, occurred at Wounded Knee on February 27, 1973. Responding to the numerous murders perpetrated by puppet tribal governments and the extreme conditions of oppression, the takeover at Wounded Knee revisited the sight of the American Indian massacre at the hands of U.S. soldiers in 1890.

Ever vigilant for his cause, Russell has been lauded by the international community for his tireless efforts.

Later, he used film as a vehicle for his advocacy, thus enabling him to use different means to communicate his vital truths. Through the power of media, his vision was to create peaceful and positive images celebrating the magic and mystery of his American Indian heritage.

In contemplating the fundamental issues about the world in which we live, he was committed to educating all people about our most crucial battle-the preservation on the earth.

Means joined “The Longest Walk” in 1978 to protest a new tide of anti-Indian legislation including the forced sterilization of Indian women. Following the walk, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a resolution saying that national policy was to protect the rights of Indians, “to believe, express and exercise their traditional religions, including but not limited to access to sites, use and possession of sacred objects, and the freedom to worship through ceremonials and traditional rites.”

Russell Means has been called the most famous American Indian since Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse by the Los Angeles Times and recognized as a natural leader with a fearless dedication and indestructible sense of pride.

He took pride in having instituted programs for the betterment of his people: notable, the Porcupine Health Clinic (the only non government funded clinic in Indian Country) and KILI radio, the first Indian owned radio station.

Today, one of his principle goals has been the establishment of a “Total Immersion School”, which is based on a concept created by the Maori people of New Zealand, where children are immersed in the language, culture, science, music and storytelling of their own people.

Russell wanted to adapt this total immersion concept to the Indian way of life and philosophy which is taught from a perspective that will nurture a new generation of proud children educated in the context of their own heritage.

Russell Means has devoted his life to eliminating racism of any kind, and in so doing he leaves a historical imprint as the most revolutionary Indian leader of the late twentieth century.

Russell’s commitment to uplift the plight of his people escalated when he served as director of Cleveland’s American Indian Center.

It was there he met Dennis Banks, co-founder of the American Indian Movement, and embarked upon a relationship that would rocket them both into national prominence.

“If I want my people to be free, Americans have to be free.” –Russell Means

‘America is a stolen country’