Saturday, October 23, 2010

When Two Worlds Collide

In the apocalyptic film When Two Worlds Collide, the indigenous leader-in-exile from the Peruvian Amazon asks, "How will we organize ourselves to save the planet?"

Friday, October 22, 2010

Transforming American Culture

Walking away from farce, ridiculing the ridiculous, attacking fraud comprise components of rejecting an anti-democratic system. Proportional representation, like plurinationalism, is a different system, not a reform. Democracy entails a wholly different set of relationships and distribution of power than what our institutions presently promote.

To create a democratic society in the US would require transforming American culture to the degree that we would no longer recognize ourselves. In essence, we would have to experience a revolution of ideas as earth-shaking as 1968.

Wednesday, October 20, 2010

Media Indigena

Media Indigena looks promising.

Tuesday, October 19, 2010

Pandering to Christian Bigotry

The clear message in the Five Steps to Tyranny videos is that demonization is a political tool, used by politicians to suppress dissent and subvert solidarity. Two current examples not in the series are the US Department of Justice raids last month against peace activists by the Joint Terrorism Task Force, and the recent passage of legislation in Uganda mandating the death penalty for homosexuals. Even the calvinist Millenium Development Goals of the UN serve as pretext for ethnic cleansing of indigenous peoples. All of these examples are in synch with Christian dominionism, such as that promoted by President Obama's friend Rick Warren. Pandering to Christian bigotry is one of the fastest roads to tyranny in America, and is well documented on the Talk to Action blog. What the International Transformation Network of Christian fascists might be willing to do under a theocracy is perhaps best answered by Canadian author Margaret Atwood.

ATNI/USET

Affiliated Tribes of Northwest Indians and the United South and Eastern Tribes sign covenant of friendship, cooperation, solidarity and trust.

Sunday, October 17, 2010

Anarchy

Stateless nations do indeed have institutions to nourish and protect their indigenous societies. They may seem to some to be anarchic in demanding the freedom to be self-determinant, but they nevertheless operate within a political framework that recognizes distinct and compelling laws to accomplish their definition of order. Working at times in tandem with others who view subverting the dominant order behind globalization as morally obligating, they are sometimes characterized as anarchist, though they are no more so than any other revolutionaries seeking a more equitable order.

Thursday, October 14, 2010

Patronizing Bromides

The Orang Asli, the aboriginal people of Malaysia, are engaged in a fight for survival within an Islamic state that plans to enact a law depriving them of all their territory, economic independence, and possibly religious freedom. Ironically, all the patronizing bromides about the benefits of modern development emanating from the Muslim theocracy mirror those of neoliberal states worldwide. Part of the conventional cover story for states in converting the property of nations.

Wednesday, October 13, 2010

Perils

As the United States celebrates the mass murderer known as Columbus, Rose Aguilar interviews three Native women about the perils facing American Indians today.

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

Stripmining the Great Plains

Earth Portal examines the new fossil fuel boom in the Great Plains and Rocky Mountains.

Monday, October 11, 2010

Tragic Gifts

Michael Ondaatje, author of Anil's Ghost, and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, author of Half of a Yellow Sun, discuss the ethics and craft of creating fiction out of collective tragedies in their native homes of Sri Lanka and Nigeria. Listen in to their conversation.

Monday, October 04, 2010

Outside the Realm

Coast Salish nations gathered recently at Swinomish to discuss action on their international effort to restore the resources of the Salish Sea. Part of their discussion with each other, as well as with representatives from the federal governments of Canada and the US, was what strategies held out the most promise of success.

As one of the few international indigenous initiatives on environmental restoration -- one that includes the bays, sounds, straits and estuaries surrounding Seattle and Vancouver -- Coast Salish Gathering bears watching as a pilot project for harmonizing the interests of aboriginal and settler societies. Along with the usual political, economic and cultural difficulties involved in such an undertaking, healing the damage done by two centuries of wanton destruction will require confronting both overt prejudice and covert bigotry.

Preparing for this aspect of any holistic enterprise demands the dedication of academic abilities outside the realm of conventional scholarly involvement.

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