Yearly Archives: 2013

MURDER AT MEGANTIC

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MNN. 8 July 2013. On Saturday morning, July 6th, a bomb wiped out the center of the town of Lac-Megantic [Quebec] on Mohawk Territory. Over 60 of the French settlers for whom we are responsible were murdered and ‘disappeared”.

War zone on Mohawk land.

Bomb blast on Indigenous land.

  

According to the Great Peace of Montreal 1701 is under the protection of the Constitution of the Council of the Great Peace. We have a duty to protect all living things. We demand a full investigation of this criminal act of the multinational corporations. Montreal, Mine & Atlantic Railway Ltd., was hauling 73 substandard tankers and locomotives carrying toxic crude to Irving Oil in Saint Johns New Brunswick for the US market. Every train that goes through our towns and villages is loaded with enough ammunition to create a “war zone”. 

The train was parked in Nantes. Nobody was in the locomotive. The engineer had locked up and gone to sleep at a nearby hotel. At 11:30 the brakes of one locomotive was mysteriously released. It caught fire and billowed smoke. The fire department was called to put it out. The remaining cars were not checked. At 1:00 am. the remaining cars started moving directly downhill into the Lac-Megantic town center, about 11 kilometers away. A a social gathering was taking place. The train sped toward them, careened off the track, came to a stop near the middle of town and blew up like an atom bomb. The people and town centre were incinerated. The poisons ran into the lake. 

This is war in Quebec!

War on Mother Earth in Quebec and elsewhere!

Canada ships $73 billion in oil to the US every year, passing them through our towns and villages. Environmental regulations are constantly being removed and/or sidestepped. More shipping of crude oil is planned for the east and west coasts. 

The railroad tankers used in US and Canada are old and dangerous. By deregulation they don’t have to be replaced. Even more unsafe pipelines are being planned. Someone would have a strong motive for releasing those brakes. We Indigenous people should oversee any investigation of such criminal acts on our land. 

Foreign corporations normally cover their criminality by paying off all the corrupt politicians and law makers. They look for perpetrators before picking their “patsy”. The victims are forgotten. We will stop the destruction of Mother Earth caused by their toxic economy. These railroads, pipelines, roads and waterways are creating ecological destruction on our land. We are all at risk.   

There must be an immediate ban on transporting all war materials across Onowaregeh/Great Turtle Island. It violates the Council of the Great Peace, the law of the land. As Jimi sang in “House Burning Down”: “Look at the sky/turn a hellfire red. Somebody’s house in burning/down, down, down, down. I say, O, baby, why’d you burn your brother’s house down?” House burning down megantic map

Terrence Nelson on Warrior societies

MNN Mohawk Nation News kahentinetha2@yahoo.com Thahoketoteh@hotmail.com For more news, books, workshops, to donate and sign up for MNN newsletters, go to www.mohawknationnews.com  More stories at MNN Archives.  Address:  Box 991, Kahnawake [Quebec, Canada] J0L 1B0  For free download of Mohawk music thahoketoteh.ws

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

    

MAKE BELIEVE DEATH

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MNN. July 3, 2013.  In 1990 I was fired from Indian Affairs for being a Mohawk during the Canadian army siege of three of our communities. We had to move into a tiny apartment above a wild meat butcher shop in the middle of Kahnawake.

Soon we needed to build a house. The local bank offered mortgages. The application was turned down. “Equifax Inc.”, the credit reporting agency and personal-information clearinghouse, reported that I had died on September 10, 1991. A death certificate was on my file.  A copy could not be given to me without proof that I was alive. The bank manager could not authorize a loan to a dead person. 

Old Voo Doo Doll trick didn't work.

Corporate Voo Doo Doll trick didn’t work.

The President of the Toronto Dominion Bank, who heads Equifax in Canada, informed me they couldn’t provide the cause of death or who filed the notice. Local people had to vouch for my living breathing existence. A mortgage was issued to a dead person who never defaulted. 

american express“ChoicePoint”, spun off from Equifax, keeps over 19 billion public records in its massive database at its Alpharetta Georgia headquarters. Without our knowledge or permission information is kept on motor vehicle registration, license, deed transfers, military records, addresses, social security number, social insurance number, credit rating and who knows what else. 17,000 businesses buy the data. We can’t get a copy of our own credit report. “Creditors and thieves are given the key to the data base”, said Edmund Mierzwinski of the US Public Interest Research Group in California. 

In 2005 ChoicePoint admitted that almost 145,000 to 500,000 people may have been the victims of stolen information from the company’s data base. Thieves opened bogus ChoicePoint accounts, posing as legitimate businesses seeking data. The bandits then opened up 50 accounts, posing as check-cashing companies or debt collection firms with legitimate business licenses. They were given an access code and password into the consumer data. spying

Someone using our names can buy luxury cars with the help of an uncle with a stolen social security number and credit card. We could be arrested for theft. Between 1998 and 2003 over 17.3 million Americans had their identities stolen. The greatest sources for social security and social insurance numbers are the governments. More than 75% of documents we sign include our SSN and SIN exposing 94% of us to identity theft. 

If someone is denied an ID, then what? Some think they have no alternative but to twist information to protect themselves! Frank Zappa had it right in his song, “Plastic People“: “Take a day and walk around, watch the Nazis run your town. Then go home and check yourself. You think think we’re singing about someone else? But you’re all plastic people”. 

Eugenics today…

MNN Mohawk Nation News kahentinetha2@yahoo.com Thahoketoteh@hotmail.com For more news, books, workshops, to donate and sign up for MNN newsletters, go to www.mohawknationnews.com  More stories at MNN Archives.  Address:  Box 991, Kahnawake [Quebec, Canada] J0L 1B0  For free download of Mohawk music thahoketoteh.ws

 

 

    

CRIME DESIGN

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MNN. June 30, 2013.  In 2005 the RCMP published a “ground-breaking” analysis on, “Aboriginal Organized Crime in Canada”. [43 pages]. Academics E. J. Dickson Gilmore and Chris Whitehead of Carleton University Ottawa were the fiction writers. Using classic fake racial profiling and character assassination, they gave the RCMP labels to criminalize all aspects of Indigenous life. 

Real RCMP.

According to modern international law, the Charter of Rights and Freedom and the US Constitution, “There can be no crime without a law”. Everyone is entitled to a fair and public trial. To get around this Gilmore made up a new definition of organized crime: “An ongoing activity motivated by political, social and/or economic conditions [or some combination thereof], .. articulated through formal and informal cooperative social relationships with the potential for corruption an/or violence to facilitate the criminal process.” [page 13]. www.rcmp-grc.gc.ca/ccaps/research_eval_e.htm 

If that’s the case, all corporate government like Canada and US are “motivated by political, social and economic ends”; have “a network of both formal and informal cooperative social relationships”; and “have a potential for corruption and/or violence”. 

She invented four “Aboriginal organized criminal types”: 

1.”Activist/Nationalists” who join an organization to express their culture, history or rights. Canadian and US culture is based on extortion of funds from the people by Revenue Canada and the IRS.  global org crime

2.”Random/Opportunists” are less sophisticated and expendable, motivated by peer pressure. 

3.”Activist/Opportunists” start as Nationalist/Activists who try to become selfish like Stephen Harper and Barack Obama. 

4.”Criminal/Opportunists” are motivated by profit, like the multi-national mega corporations that are gulping our resources and ever growing $135 trillion Indian Trust Fund by enforcing illegal corporate by-laws. 

A strong connection exists between criminality and colonial governments. Illegal corporate by-laws are imposed on us, using genocide, murder, violence, corruption and lies. They are unconcerned about the massacre of the buffalo, starvation of the people, incarceration, kidnapping, killing and raping our children in residential school death camps. They complain we primitive people have a hard time adjusting to cities. 

Well-paid shills, Gilmore and Whitehead, provided no clear evidence of “Aboriginal organized crime” in Canada. Probabilities, assumptions and innuendo are outlined. Our nations are being systematically defamed for the career advancement and salaries of cops and their academic accomplices.ideologues 

The fear of mounties has to be promoted. As Nelson Eddy sang: “Look out for the Mounties (Here come the Mounties)/We come … somebody hide, somebody better hide! The Mountie.

MNN Mohawk Nation News kahentinetha2@yahoo.com Thahoketoteh@hotmail.com For more news, books, workshops, to donate and sign up for MNN newsletters, go to www.mohawknationnews.com  More stories at MNN Archives.  Address:  Box 991, Kahnawake [Quebec, Canada] J0L 1B0. To download free Mohawk Music, go to thahoketoteh.ws 

 

 

 

 

 

 

ANTIS & WARRIORS

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MNN. July 1, 2013. Twenty-three years ago Akwesasne was mired in controversy supposedly over gambling. The two sides were dubbed the “Antis” and the “Warriors”. The antis would invite the press in and stage shootings. They falsely claimed gangs of marauding youths with semi-automatics were roaming the streets. The Warriors pledged they would never fight against our own people.HORNUNG AKWE   

The real issue continues to be sovereignty and jurisdiction. New York State and the FBI have no authority to come into Mohawk sovereign territory.  

The condoled Confederacy chiefs feared the Men who maintained the Great Law. They began a false campaign that Warriors no longer existed in Haudenosaunee society. Conflicts were ignited in our communities. 

NY State Governor Mario Cuomo had a weekly radio show on current events. One night he spoke about the issues at Akwesasne. Two calls came in. One during the show and another afterward. A man wanted Cuomo to send in the National Guards against the Warriors. The caller asked, “What is it going to take for you to send in the National Guards?” 

akwe casinoCuomo replied, “Dead bodies”. Within hours two men were killed, Harold J.R. Edwards and Matthew Pike, both shot in the back. The caller accused a well-known individual and the Warriors of the murders. The Governor knew that the accused was far away from Akwesasne at the time, that the caller was lying.  

The Warrior Society asked NY State Police to enter Akwesasne to investigate the two killings. They did not come in. 

A well-known native reporter was arrested and jailed based on eye-witness testimony. The witness was visited by unnamed persons. He recanted his statements. The charges were stayed. There was not enough evidence.   

friendly fireToday no proper investigation has been done. No one has explained the strange timing of the killings. Was this a product of organized crime? If so, who were the organizers? So far the Grand Council of Onondaga has never cleared this up, which is a violation of the Great Law.  As Gene Pitney sang about gunslingers: “Everyone heard two shots ring out, a shot made Liberty fall/
The man who shot Liberty Valance, he shot Liberty Valance/He was the bravest of them all.” The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance.

Read the 2006 story attached: UNSOLVED MURDERS IN AKWESASNE REVISITED: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/indigenous_peoples_literature/message/18603?var=1

http://www.amazon.com/One-Nation-Under-Rick-Hornung/dp/0679412654 describes how the killing of two Mohawks during a staged fire fight in Akwesasne in 1990 led to a conflict set up to bring in the outside police forces, NYS Police, RCMP, Quebec SQ, Ontario Provincial Police, National Guard, etc.   

MNN Mohawk Nation News kahentinetha2@yahoo.com Thahoketoteh@hotmail.com For more news, books, workshops, to donate and sign up for MNN newsletters, go to www.mohawknationnews.com  More stories at MNN Archives.  Address:  Box 991, Kahnawake [Quebec, Canada] J0L 1B0  For free download of Mohawk music thahoketoteh.ws

 

 

LOSERS, WEEPERS

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MNN. June 29, 2013. The mayors of four Montreal South Shore communities are blocking Quebec’s decision to give back a 300-acre plot of stolen land to the Mohawks of Kahnwake. It was taken to build Highway 30 on unceded territory. The mayors said “two wrongs don’t make a right”. Returning stolen property is just wrong! They have big plans for this prime real estate, which is presently zoned for agriculture. highway 30

The Mohawks have seen Kahnawake shrink to make way for railroads, highways and bridges. During construction of the St. Lawrence Seaway, thousands of tons of clay were dug up and dumped onto Kahnawake, making it useless for agriculture. No consultation ever took place. 

Farmland.

Farmland.

 

On August 17, 2008, the Women Title Holders of the Mohawk Nation issued a Notice of Objection to the illegal construction of Highway 30 on Kahnawake. It was sent by registered mail to Canada, Quebec and their puppet Mohawk Council of Kahnawake. 

Mega city dreams.

Mega city dreams.

The northern “Keepers of the Eastern Door” of the Iroquois Confederacy have the duty to protect the territory, old villages, burial sites and waterways. The colonial Quebec construction permits are illegal. The Mohawk Council of Kahnawake is an entity of the Canadian Corporation. They cannot make decisions for the Mohawk Nation.  

According to WAMPUM 44 of the Great Law of Peace, the Women are the caretakers of the land, water and air for the future generations of Great Turtle Island. Foreign laws, the usurpation of Kanionkehaka territory and resources have always been resisted.  

These rights are affirmed in the British North America Act, 1867, Sections 109 and 132; the international Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the Convention on the Prevention of Genocide, United Nations Convention on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and other international legal instruments that Canada has signed. 

General Assembly Resolution 1541 [XV] requires the informed consent of the people before they are included in another state; the international Court of Justice affirmed this in the Western Sahara case; and the Indigenous people never consented to be part of Canada; 

Canada, Quebec, the Mohawk Council of Kahnawake and all their agents violated inherent Mohawk authority. The Mohawk Nation is the legal authority as confirmed by the law of the land, Kaia’nere:kowa. All individual or foreign entities wishing to discuss issues must go through proper diplomatic channels.   

Mohawks want Kanion'ke:haka back.

The visitors can come to one mind with us by following the white roots to its source and to sit under the shade of the tree of peace. This cycle of abuse, enforcing illegal jurisdiction over Mohawks, illegal construction must end. Dignity, equality and a voice to all peoples is extended. The Mohawks are taking back some of our land. As the Beatles sang, “Get back, get back, get back to where you once belonged. Get Back, get back, go home”. Get Back

Iran defending Native Canadians rights

MNN Mohawk Nation News kahentinetha2@yahoo.com Thahoketoteh@hotmail.com For more news, books, workshops, to donate and sign up for MNN newsletters, go to www.mohawknationnews.com  More stories at MNN Archives.  Address:  Box 991, Kahnawake [Quebec, Canada] J0L 1B0 Download Mohawk music for free at thahoketoteh.ws

 

 

 

  

HIGH STEEL

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mnnlogoMNN. June 26, 2013. The Haudenosaunee ironworkers “Ratiristakehron” worked on nearly all the big structures of greater New York: Empire State Building, George Washington Bridge, Chrysler Building, World Trade Center, Triborough Bridge, Verrazano Bridge, Pulaski Skyway and West Side Highway. They worked all over the world, even helping to rivet the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco and the Panama Canal. Mohawks were sent to California to teach ironworkers how to erect with a guy derek. 

Ratiskerakete, our men.

Ratiskerakete, our men.

 

In 1886 Dominion Bridge of Montreal was building a cantilevered bridge over the St. Lawrence for the Canadian Pacific Railroad. It was partly set on the Kahnawake Mohawk community on the south shore. The Mohawks demanded jobs. Dominion Bridge agreed – assuming they would unload box cars and do other menial tasks. The Indians climbed all over the bridge, “as agile as goats”. They wanted to try riveting. As the work progressed, the Mohawks were found to be at ease at great heights. 

Keepers of the Eastern Door of Great Turtle Island.

Keepers of the Eastern Door of Great Turtle Island.

Riveting is difficult and dangerous. Rivets were heated until they were red-hot, tossed thirty to forty feet through the air, then caught and forced through steel beams with a pneumatic riveting gun, all standing on a narrow beam 500 feet or more above the ground. 

Soon 70 iron and steel riveters were working projects throughout Canada. Men from all Six Nations joined. Mohawks worked 10 years before the international Iron Workers Union was formed. They had always adapted to highly skilled building trades. They were guides for fur trappers, rode rafts for lumber companies, shot the rapids, circus performers and even ‘snake oil’ salesmen. 

In 1907 the Quebec Bridge collapsed, killing 96 workers, 35 of them Mohawks. Instead of quitting, Mohawk boys became even more determined to become steelworkers. Construction companies preferred Iroquois iron workers.

Haudenosaunee hands in NYC skyline.

Haudenosaunee hands in NYC skyline.

 

By the 1910s they arrived in New York. In the 1930s over 700 Mohawks lived in the old North Gowanus neighborhood of Brooklyn. Local Italian grocers carried their favorite cornmeal. They hung out at the Spar Bar and the Wigwam Bars. It is said there was a sign, “The Greatest Iron Workers in the World Pass Thru These Doors”. 

Their ties to their families and communities were very strong. On Friday nights the steel workers made the twelve-hour trip home to a joyous reception and drove all night back to the city on Sunday nights to be on the job on Monday morning. 

Eagles at the top of Tree of Peace.

Eagles at the top of Tree of Peace.

Their skill remains a mystery. Some thought it was genetic. Others said they knew how to deal with fear. By the late 1960s riveting had all but disappeared. The Brooklyn community dissolved. The lure of high steel did not disappear. The graves of men who died on the job are marked with steel girders. By the 1990s 20 to 25 percent of Mohawk men were in steel work again. Men who want to do it are rare and men who can do it are even rarer. 

As Joni Mitchell sang, “Little Indian kids on a bridge up in Canada, They can balance and they can climb, Like their fathers before them, They’ll walk the girders of the Manhattan skyline … Song for Sharon.

MNN Mohawk Nation News kahentinetha2@yahoo.com Thahoketoteh@hotmail.com For more news, books, workshops, to donate and sign up for MNN newsletters, go to www.mohawknationnews.com  More stories at MNN Archives.  Address:  Box 991, Kahnawake [Quebec, Canada] J0L 1B0. Download free Mohawk music at Thahoketoteh.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

ORGANIC SOVEREIGNTY

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MNN. June 27, 2013. Our spirituality is based on giving greetings and thanks to the system that makes life on Mother Earth possible. Our people always had natural economics, all coming from the land, water and air. We first need nourishment to sustain ourselves. Our people were hunters, fishermen, trappers, gatherers and farmers. We always had a predictable steady supply of food. Then we could conduct other matters. Our ceremonies are based on this natural economy. 

Inca and Aztec grew crops on island sized floating rafts.

Inca and Aztec grew crops on island sized floating rafts.

Today it is impractical. The animals have been slaughtered. Our lands have been divided up and polluted. Plants, medicines and trees have been sickened since the coming of the Europeans to our shores. Many of the fish cannot be eaten because they are poisonous. 

Genetically modified organisms GMO is an organism whose genetic material has been altered. Through modern biotechnology plants and animals can be changed through insertion and deletion of genes. Genes are being inserted from another species, supposedly to repel infections, grow larger more quickly, change color, or whatever. This looks like the beginning of genetically modified human organism to replace the natural people. No one can confirm the long term damage altering nature. Our Mother Earth will clean it all up!

To weaken us, we have been made dependent on the European people for modified food, artificial support and life-ways. To strengthen our bodies and minds we have to relearn how to provide for our people in the normal natural way. Creation gave us a mind to think so we can survive.  

hydroponicsToday very little of our land is under our control. In Haudenosaunee territory economic enterprises have been formed to look at old, new and emerging technology. Hydroponics is the growing of food with water without use of soil, developed by the Aztecs 2,500 years ago. One acre of land can grow 400 acres of food, using green houses and the power of the sun, without pests, insects or genetic modification.  

Technology can produce foods which do not conflict with our principles, culture or traditions. If we can survive to the 21st Century, we can become one with our land and all our relations again.  

Economics is important. Let us be thankful for what has been given to us and ask for nothing. With the good memories that our ancestors passed down to us, we can help ourselves, our children and unborn generations. United we are powerful. 

monsanto salmonMonsanto Corporation represents the unnatural. We will put them out of business when everyone remembers how to use their memories. We will all become natural again. 

“Onkwehonwe” means ‘human beings forever’. When we are long gone our memories will continue. Our minds can create a world in which they will survive. They will look back at us with respect for doing the right things. Or they can see Indifference, failure or shame because we did not have the courage or conviction.  Let us not be guilty of neglect. They will look back at us with pride. Joni Mitchell reminds us of the true goal of the natural way; “Now they stood beside the treasure, on the mountain dark and red. Turned the stone and looked beneath it; PEACE ON EARTH was all it said.” One Tin Soldier

Video: GMO A Go Go!

MNN Mohawk Nation News kahentinetha2@yahoo.com Thahoketoteh@hotmail.com For more news, books, workshops, to donate and sign up for MNN newsletters, go to www.mohawknationnews.com  More stories at MNN Archives.  Address:  Box 991, Kahnawake [Quebec, Canada] J0L 1B0

 

 

ELSIPOGTOG RESISTING FRACKING

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MNN. June 26, 2013. Tensions are rising at the Highway 126 anti-fracking camp near Elsipogtog First Nation in Kent County, New Brunswick (Wabanakik). By June 23, on National Aboriginal Day, twenty-nine had been arrested. One is in hospital. 

NB FRACKINGWarrior Chief John Levi is calling supporters to help resist seismic testing by US corporation, Southwestern Energy (SWN), and the provincial government. Their bosses are the bankers who own the corporations of Canada and the US. 

The Mi’kmaq, Maliseet, Passamaquoddy, Acadian and other Indigenous peoples of Wabanakik refuse to give their consent. Aggressive RCMP and SWN private security forces are protecting the testing and stirring up confrontations. Protesters are threatened by undercover RCMP who steal SIM cards from cell phones and physically assault elders. 

FRACK ARTResistance continues. Peaceful roadside pickets, blocking trucks and surrounding SWN vehicles are underway. Arrestee Gilogoetj Dedam explained: “They’re destroying our land … If we got off that road, those trucks will drive right by”. 

The cops are becoming more violent, shoving, denying water and bathroom access and tightening handcuffs to cause blood stoppage and bruising. 

A sacred fire, a line of open tents, a communal kitchen, gathering space, singing and drumming creates an inviting environment for supporters and visitors. 

FRACKEDThe resistance is against environmental destruction. All businesses bend the rules. Now they openly break them with impunity. Corruption and violence is how business is done at every level of the corporate system. The “owistah” disease is in full bloom. The corporations want us out of the way to get our resources.   

Hear the wind blow. Feel the breeze in your face. Watch from the tree of peace. The hierarchical monetary system is crumbling. Canada sits on top of the New World Order pyramid. The preferred model is ownership of everything and everyone by a few bankers.  

FRACK WORLDAll war is about printing money and controlling how it’s spent. All wars are banker wars. We only need one more war to bring peace to the world; the people against the bankers and no one needs to get bombed. We remember Buffalo Springfield sang; “There’s something happening here/What it is ain’t exactly clear. There’s a man with a gun over there/Telling me I got to beware. I think it’s time we stop, children, what’s that sound/Everybody look what’s going down” For what it’s worth


Dangers of fracking. FRACKING: Drilling and injecting fluid into the ground at a high pressure to fracture shale rock to release natural gas. Ground water, environment and health are destroyed.

War Chief Levi speaks.

Elsipotog Story. 

MNN Mohawk Nation News kahentinetha2@yahoo.com Thahoketoteh@hotmail.com For more news, books, workshops, to donate and sign up for MNN newsletters, go to www.mohawknationnews.com  More stories at MNN Archives.  Address:  Box 991, Kahnawake [Quebec, Canada] J0L 1B0

 

 

 

MNN: SMALL CONDOLENCE

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MNN. June 25, 2013. Indigenous people can be manipulated in front of their peers by ridicule. It activates the  fight or flight syndrome. In native culture everyone is equal and we each have our own individual strengths. We use this for the good of the people. Disrespect of one is a threat to the rest of the group. Those who conserve the integrity of the group survive. Those who do not are ostracized. anxiety stress

A public insult can cause someone to become so angry that they go blank and react instantly. They can strike or leave to avoid a confrontation. It looks completely irrational. 

Those usurping our rights take advantage of this phenomenon. A strong adversarial atmosphere is created. Insults are hurled to upset and confuse the target. The youth are inexperienced in dealing with such indignities in front of our people. Some can break down or react sharply and swiftly. The attacker gains power by getting others to publicly attack their enemies. 

anxiety-symptomsThe attacker loses their power when the target stands there calmly and does not fall apart. They sometimes say something degrading to their victim like, “You are the most horrible Indian on the face of the earth”. This is an incredible violation by an older person who wants to destroy a young Indigenous person. 

Our people developed a way of dealing with this phenomenon. At a meeting, especially over a contentious issue, we do a “Small Condolence” ceremony. Because we are aware of our volatility, ground rules are set down which we all follow to resolve an issue. 

A piece of soft doeskin wipes the eyes of each person so they may see issues clearly; an eagle feather wipes around the ears so they may listen and hear what is being said; and a glass of clear water is drunk so their words will be as clear as the water, without sharp edges. 

Meetings begin with Ohenton Kariwatekwen and Small Condolence.

Meetings begin with Ohenton Kariwatekwen and Small Condolence.

 

The higher our Indigenous students go academically and competitively, the more pressure they face. They will find themselves in situations of hostility, aggression, being yelled at, insulted and treated unfairly. Today they cannot respond as normal warriors to fight back or leave the situation. They have to understand and deal with it. As the Artists Against Bullying say, “When you need anyone to talk to, someone is always there”. Artists Against Bullying.

MNN Mohawk Nation News kahentinetha2@yahoo.com Thahoketoteh@hotmail.com For more news, books, workshops, to donate and sign up for MNN newsletters, go to www.mohawknationnews.com  More stories at MNN Archives.  Address:  Box 991, Kahnawake [Quebec, Canada] J0L 1B0

 

 

 

 

 

She No Speak

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MNN. June 24, 2013. Why did Kanienkehaka/Mohawk power break down? Our men were weakened by the deliberate social and political breakdown, alcoholism, war, poor physical and mental health, teachings of pacifism, movement restrictions, loss of lands and economic rights. Traditionally Haudenosaunee women speak out and question everything.  We are the inherent holders of the land for the coming generations. We create peace by regulating war. None can be called until the women try three times to achieve a peaceful solution. We appoint the warriors, define the conflict and negotiate peace. When the newcomers realized that Haudenosaunee chiefs acted on the recommendations of the women based on the consensus of the people, they set out to break these power bonds. A policy was developed to deal with men only on land, political and trade issues. 

Indigenous women face cultural & lifestyle changes. They dispense wisdom and reason.

Indigenous women face cultural & lifestyle changes. They still dispense wisdom and reason.

The tie to the earth is through the women. The men protect these connections. The strong female role as the foundation of Haudenosaunee society was uprooted. The male dominated hierarchical system took its toll on all the people. The invaders are educated to not hear or see us. Women as the progenitors of the soil were forced by policy to be subservient to the men. will not reform

European men felt uneasy about dealing with women, especially in relation to land and resource holdings. Indigenous female power bonds were a major obstacle. The matrilocal communal land holding system was targeted for destruction. A new regime of land held by a few foreign bankers and corporate entities was set in place to conform to the European hierarchical world view. 

To oppress our women is to oppress all of us. The “She No Speak” colonial system is rigid, punitive, demeaning and self-deprecating towards women. We are not supposed to question male authority. 

Europeans broke the women’ power through non-native religious influence and the Indian Act and Federal Indian Law passed by the colonists. These violations of the rule of law forced us in a subservient position to our men in our relations with the colonists. The major underpinnings of Kanienkehaka sovereignty were undermined.  

she no speakWe survived a holocaust. Our views, duties and responsibilities do not need to be validated by their foreign  tribal and band council Injun accomplices. The balance between men and women is the ultimate reason we are still here and an important people today. As Aretha Franklin points out: “I get tired [just a little bit], keep on trying [just a little bit]” even though everybody knows who we are! “Respect”

Indian Country Today article.

MNN Mohawk Nation News kahentinetha2@yahoo.com Thahoketoteh@hotmail.com For more news, books, workshops, to donate and sign up for MNN newsletters, go to www.mohawknationnews.com  More stories at MNN Archives.  Address:  Box 991, Kahnawake [Quebec, Canada] J0L 1B0