(noon. – promoted by ek hornbeck)
Read dogemperor’s “Palin, dominionist intimidation, and actual witch-hunters”
Sarah Palin, who has attacked Alaska Native Languages and Alaska Tribal Sovereignty, gave a speech at the Master’s Commission on September 2nd, 2008,
It has only one mission, to throw defeat in the face of the Devil and see God’s people freed.
and the Master’s Commission has a branch that Christianizes Alaskan Natives.
Although the Native Reservations of the lower 48 states may be off the beaten path, these tribes are easily accessible compared to the Native tribes of bush Alaska. Forgotten? Not by God! But the reality is reaching the indigenous people of this state is very difficult and very expensive!
Let’s look at the speech and how she’s attacked Alaska Native Languages and Alaska Tribal Sovereignty after briefly looking at the history of Missionary work in Alaska (edited version of this diary is here).
Crossposted at Native American Netroots
The Master’s Commission that Palin spoke to is continuing the old practice of Christianizing Indigenous People, and more than one denomination has proselytized Alaskan Natives since 1867.
http://books.google.com/books?…Russian missionaries remained most successful among he Aleuts, although with the sale of Alaska to the United States in 1867, the status of the church suddenly changed. Its missionaries continued to work among the Native people of Alaska even after it became a foreign land, but their influence declined in the late nineteenth century, as other denominations began proselytizing.
Hence, Palin is now a very small part of the timeline of cultural genocide, which in this day, is being perpetrated against Alaskan Natives by the Master’s Commission.
Before proceeding, an even more serious tone must be set. To set the tone, I offer the words of Dr. James Luther Adams, a man who “was not a man to use the word fascist lightly. He was in Germany in 1935 and 1936 and worked with the underground anti-Nazi church, known as The Confessing Church, led by Dietrich Bonhoeffer.”
The Christian Right and the Rise of American FascismDr. James Luther Adams, my ethics professor at Harvard Divinity School, told us that when we were his age, he was then close to 80, we would all be fighting the “Christian fascists.”
The warning, given to me 25 years ago, came at the moment Pat Robertson and other radio and televangelists began speaking about a new political religion that would direct its efforts at taking control of all institutions, including mainstream denominations and the government. Its stated goal was to use the United States to create a global, Christian empire. It was hard, at the time, to take such fantastic rhetoric seriously, especially given the buffoonish quality of those who expounded it. But Adams warned us against the blindness caused by intellectual snobbery. The Nazis, he said, were not going to return with swastikas and brown shirts. Their ideological inheritors had found a mask for fascism in the pages of the Bible.
– snip –
He saw in the Christian Right, long before we did, disturbing similarities with the German Christian Church and the Nazi Party, similarities that he said would, in the event of prolonged social instability or a national crisis, see American fascists, under the guise of religion, rise to dismantle the open society.
He despaired of liberals, who he said, as in Nazi Germany, mouthed silly platitudes about dialogue and inclusiveness that made them ineffectual and impotent. Liberals, he said, did not understand the power and allure of evil nor the cold reality of how the world worked…
It is most understandable, given the time in which Dr. James Luther Adams lived, that he would have had that opinion. It is unclear precisely what he meant how American Fascists would “rise to dismantle the open society;” however, arguing from definition, this is the main idea that he was referring to.
”A form of political behavior marked by obsessive preoccupation with community decline, humiliation or victimhood and by compensatory cults of unity, energy and purity, in which a mass-based party of committed nationalist militants, working in uneasy but effective collaboration with traditional elites, abandons democratic liberties and pursues with redemptive violence and without ethical or legal restraints goals of internal cleansing and external expansion.”
But whatever means Dr. James Luther Adams was referring to for now, this much is true today in terms of the severely under reporting of Indigenous issues, whose very history of annihilation helped to inspire Hitler.
His critique of the prominent research universities, along with the media, was no less withering. These institutions, self-absorbed, compromised by their close relationship with government and corporations, given enough of the pie to be complacent, were unwilling to deal with the fundamental moral questions and inequities of the age. They had no stomach for a battle that might cost them their prestige and comfort.
Truth Commission into Genocide in Canada. p.6The term “Final Solution” was not coined by the Nazis, but by Indian Affairs Superintendent Duncan Campbell Scott in April of 1910 when he referred to how he envisioned the “Indian Problem” being resolved.
(It is worth noting also that the Fuhrer from time to time expressed admiration for the “efficiency” of the American genocide campaign against the Indians, viewing it as a forerunner for his own plans and programs.)
I said all that to draw your attention to this.
(bold and underline mine)
It was hard, at the time, to take such fantastic rhetoric seriously, especially given the buffoonish quality of those who expounded it. But Adams warned us against the blindness caused by intellectual snobbery.
Intellectual snobbery has a price attached to it, and what it may cost with the Military Commissions Act as law and a Dominionist Vice President, are the peaceful yet firm measures needed to prevent that rise to power. “In the event of prolonged social instability or a national crisis,” as Dr. James Luther Adams said, “American fascists, under the guise of religion, (will) rise to dismantle the open society.” Bullying and violence are not being openly perpetrated on American citizens by the state and the necessary intent is not with it to be applicable for the use of “American fascists” in the context I assume Adams used. However, the lion of the energy crisis is stalking as the invisible line between natural resources and genocide has been made visible by events across the globe. That line and the implications thereof remain invisible to many Americans in the United States on this soil. So, what is the desired character of the individuals of the two highest offices in the land? Statesmanship is required, not feigned belligerence as the trophy for ignorance.
Palin said in her speech to the Master’s Commission, whose goal is “to throw defeat in the face of the Devil and see God’s people freed,” “your job is to going to be to be out there reaching the people, hurting people throughout Alaska, and we can work together to make sure that God’s will be done here.” In addition, she has attacked Alaska Native Subsistence Hunting, attacked Alaska Native Languages, attacked Alaska Tribal Sovereignty, and attacked Alaska Native Subsistence Fishing while saying an international pipeline is God’s will. Consequently, that pipeline will run through sites that are sacred, but then again it’s “God’s will.” The Master’s Commission has a specific branch that Christianizes Alaskan Natives; we can safely assume that is also under her umbrella of “God’s will.” To summarize, christianizing Indigenous People destroys the identity of that people so that their land can be stolen; and, that’s easier on the consciences of the predators.
Those predators need no longer kidnap innocent Indigenous children and force them into Boarding Schools, they need only wait to be the only alternative as their culture fades with climate change since their traditional means of survival have been extinguished, and as their very voting rights have been attempted to be denied. The military isn’t necessary for genocide anymore.
Truth Commission into Genocide in Canada.p.53Genocide means extermination, by relocating and segregating a whole people into permanent conditions of poverty, disease and death; conditions which require and breed violence, but which more basically are part of a system devised to kill off not just some but all of the condemned people. Simply being placed or born into such conditions is equivalent to a death sentence. And the laws, attitudes, and arrangements of the dominant culture that creates such a system of death are the executioner’s tools, regardless of how legitimate or legal these arrangements are, or how seemingly “removed” they are from the slaughters of yesteryear.
Opinion Palin attacks Native peoples of AlaskaPalin has refused to provide language assistance to Yup’ik voters residing in southwest Alaska.
These Yup’ik Eskimos live on frozen tundra with no road system. They cannot plant gardens but can pick berries. The only way to get staples is by air or barge.
If not allowed to dry and freeze food ahead of long Arctic winters, many people will starve.
The military isn’t necessary for genocide anymore, because the Christian fascists who are attacking the language while Christianizing them after their traditional survival means have been extinguished do just fine without it.
(for justification of my use of the word Christian fascists, see here)
Mr. BAER said Governments tended to be highly unaware of the effects had by the loss of language — indigenous languages were a vessel of traditional knowledge on biological diversity, for example. Many did little to reverse the trend.
– snip –
Some States were indeed promoting the use of indigenous languages, but many programmes were under-funded.
– snip –
He said the international community should begin to view the violation of language rights as a crime against humanity. Many indigenous children were not getting access to education. Most State education policies forced indigenous children to learn in the dominant State language, causing a “language shift”. It encouraged a change in attitude towards indigenous languages, in that those languages were thought to be less “worthy” than dominant language. Losing their language meant children became socially dislocated, ultimately leading to economic and social marginalization. Indigenous children tended to have the lowest level of educational attainment. They also suffered high rates of depression and teen suicide. Violation of language rights was a form of cultural genocide, or “ethnocide”, and amounted to a crime against humanity. The Forum was encouraged to consider appropriate action.
“In the event of prolonged social instability or a national crisis,” Dr. James Luther Adams said, “American fascists, under the guise of religion, (will) rise to dismantle the open society.” The Christian fascists have had their needed “national crisis” in this instance.
Global warming: The Inuit were the first to highlight Alaska’s Aug 19, 2005The indigenous people of Alaska could become the first global warming refugees as their frozen homeland goes through the quickest defrost since the end of the last Ice Age, some 12,000 years ago.
Much more could be said about that and “prolonged social instability” in other cases as well, of Christian fascists taking advantage of terrible situations to bring the “Good News.”
Indigenous peoples from the Arctic have long argued that global warming was having a dramatic effect on their environment. In 2002, villagers in the remote Alaskan island community of Shishmaref voted to relocate to the mainland because rising sea levels threatened to overwhelm their community.
And all the Christian fascists have to do, is what they’ve always done – commit cultural genocide, so the indigenous people won’t go to hell they can steal their land.
United Nations Commission on Human RightsGeneral comment related to Article 7
In response to state government comments that the terms “cultural genocide” and “ethnocide” are undefined in international law, the ICC would like to draw the attention of states to the Declaration of San Jose, drafted at a UNESCO Meeting of Experts in 1981. On the matter of cultural genocide, the Declaration states:
“Ethnocide means that an ethnic group is denied the right to enjoy, develop and transmit its own culture and its own language, whether collectively or individually. This involves and extreme form of massive violation of human rights and, in particular, the right of ethnic groups to respect for their cultural identity, as established by numerous declarations, covenants and agreements of the United Nations and its Specialized Agencies, as well as various regional intergovernmental bodies and numerous non-governmental organizations….We declare that ethnocide, that is cultural genocide, is a violation of international law equivalent to genocide, which was condemned by the United Nations Convention on he Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide of 1948.”
– snip –
General comment related to Article 8
Identification as indigenous is directly related to choice. Because indigenous institutions are different and function differently, the right to choose and define institutions of indigenous origin is critical. Examples include the work of indigenous justice or judicial systems, like that of Alaska Native tribes or the Navajo Nation. The customs, practices and institutions for social control, justice and judicial systems within indigenous communities are dependent upon the collective values. Likewise, an individual indigenous person must be able to choose to identify himself or herself with an indigenous people and have the ability to choose recourse within the judicial institutions of the peoples concerned.
Missionary Conquest By George E. Tinker. p. 10http://books.google.com/books?…
Our understanding is certainly deficient if we overlook the relationship between missions and the Euroamerican economic interests. It was the interest of the fur trading companies, for example, to support the missionary enterprise, since the missionaries contributed to the pacification of Indian Nations, thereby aiding and abetting the companies exploitation of Indians, Indian lands, and Indian resources.
Concluding, those “state government(s)” who claim “that the terms “cultural genocide” and “ethnocide” are undefined in international law,” who thus want to sidestep the issue of which this election has provided an opportunity to bring to light have little to worry about. Hate crimes against American Indians, the fact the leading Republican candidate has no respect for sites sacred to Indigenous People, and who has in the past enacted legislation resulting in the forced removal of the Navajo have been ignored in the “main” media.
No hate crime charges for men in ‘dirty Indian’ attackThree men who yelled “dirty Indian” and other slurs at an Indian county commissioner won’t face additional hate crime charges for the September 20 attack in Great Falls, Montana.
Consent decree signed in Maine hate crime caseAUGUSTA, Maine-Five people accused of threatening and assaulting a group of Native Americans in eastern Maine have been ordered to stay away from the victims as part of a consent decree.
– snip –
The defendants are accused of getting out of their car armed with two-by-fours, sticks and pipes, yelling racial epithets and assaulting some of the Indians.
Men attacked members of Passamaquoddy Tribe“Come on, let’s get the Indians,” one of the men said, according to a complaint filed by the state. Other anti-Indian slurs were yelled during the attack.
Now, onto John McCain when he entered politics in 1981 in Arizona in relation to the forced relocation. It was easy for him, for it all was set in place. The gun was loaded and all McCain had to do was keep pulling the trigger with S1973-1 and S.1003.
(underline & emphasis mine)
ACSA has determined that the law in question (25 U.S.C. 640d-11) has been amended many times, since it’s introduction by Congressman Wayne Owens, and signed into law by President Gerald Ford in 1974. Among the key amendments introduced by Senator McCain were the organization of a Hopi-Navajo Resettlement Commission (a Commission actually charged with relocating the Dineh-Navaho) and modifying the Settlement allegedly agreed to by the Hopi-Navajo to remove any Dineh who sought sanctuary legally under their membership in the Hopi “parent culture” of all Indians in America. These and other amendments were introduced by Senator McCain as public law in 1996 through 1999, and some were submitted to the Senate and House in 2005 as PL S.1003,
subsequently incorporated into the language of the 2005 amendment of 25 U.S.C. 40d-11, all to rig the situation for the Senator’s sponsors, Peabody Western Coal Company (Peabody Group today) and Bechtel, who operates the Mohave Generating Station, so they could more easily remove the coal from the Dineh-Navaho’s rightful properties.Within the legal maneuverings of Senator McCain, the non-existent tribal counsel, called: the “Hopi-Navajo Counsel”, made up of Peabody Group proxies of local Kayenta, Arizona area origin, surfaced false claims of prior ownership and eminent domain, and then successfully testified before the Senate (the Dineh were not invited to testify about their own fate before the Senate by Senator McCain, leading to a hue and cry in 1999)
and demanded the removal of the rightful landowners, the Dineh-Navajo, claiming “encroachment on lands granted us by President Chester A. Arthur.” They demand completion of the removal of the Dineh-Navaho from the Black Mesa and Big Mountain.
Sturgis students study Bear Butte controversyThe group’s proposal addressed an ongoing controversy surrounding Bear Butte outside Sturgis that has pitted developers against members of several American Indian tribes that consider the landmark a sacred place of worship.
If it bleeds it leads, unless it’s the blood or culture of the American Indian or the Native Alaskan.
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it’s hard to get your expectations low enough to avoid disappointment. They keep reaching new lows.