Oorspronkelijke bevolking VS en Mexico slachtoffer van afgesloten grens

Het hieronder opgenomen artikel werd geschreven door Christina Leza, 'taal antropoloog' en eerder gepubliceerd op The Conversation. Leza betoogt volkomen terecht dat de oorspronkelijke bevolking van de VS en Mexico, 'indianen', het slachtoffer zijn van getrokken grenzen en dat in grotere mate als Trump zijn zin krijgt en de hele grens met Mexico afgeschermd zal worden middels een 'border wall....'

De grens tussen de VS en Mexico is voor deze oorspronkelijke volkeren een denkbeeldige, een grens getrokken door de witte kolonisten en hun nazaten, die deze volkeren met een genocide voor een groot deel hebben uitgemoord....... De stamverbanden in het zuiden van de VS en het noorden van Mexico gaan ver over beide grenzen.....

Voor hun ceremonies zijn de mensen van deze volkeren aangewezen op stammen die over de grens leven en een groot aantal van deze mensen zijn zelfs voor de eerste levensbehoeften aangewezen op winkels over de grens.... Zo is een bepaald deel van een stam in Mexico voor de boodschappen afhankelijk van de dichtstbijzijnde plaats, in de VS...... Een veeboer van de O'odham nation moet voor het water dat hij nodig heeft, normaal gesproken op gezichtsafstand, nu mijlen ver omrijden om daar bij te kunnen....... (hetzelfde maken Palestijnen mee op de illegaal door Israël bezette West Bank, hoewel bijvoorbeeld veel boeren daar hun land in het geheel niet meer kunnen bereiken......)

Bij de grensovergangen worden deze mensen niet zelden getreiterd door grenswachten en het is altijd weer afwachten of ze wel doorgelaten zullen worden, zo twijfelt dit leeghoofdige psychopathische geteisem aan het feit of ze wel echt tot een stam van 'indianen' behoren en moeten ze dit aantonen door in hun eigen taal te spreken, of zelfs te zingen, bij weigering kunnen ze worden geweigerd.......

Zoals gezegd de witte kolonisten hebben deze oorspronkelijke volkeren bijna uitgemoord (in heel Amerika, de grootste genocide ooit....) en nog dagelijks worden deze mensen op alle mogelijke manieren dwars gezeten, neem ook de aanleg van oliepijpleidingen, die op zeker gaan lekken door rivieren en over voor deze mensen heilige gronden...... (een paar van die enorme en lange leidingen lekken al en dat binnen een jaar na in gebruik te zijn genomen.....)

Kortom de VS, de grootste terreurentiteit op onze kleine aarde, oefent niet alleen grootschalige terreur uit in verre landen, maar ook in eigen land, want een dergelijke behandeling, als bij de Israëlische blokkades op door hen illegaal bezette West Bank, kan je niet anders dan als terreur zien.......

Het hieronder opgenomen artikel nam ik over van Anti-Media, de foto's komen van The Conversation:

For Native Americans, US-Mexico Border is an Imaginary Line

March 19, 2019 at 8:09 pm

Written by Christina Leza, The Conversation

Christina Leza, Associate Professor of Anthropology, Colorado College

(CONVERSATION) — Immigration restrictions were making life difficult for Native Americans who live along – and across – the U.S.-Mexico border even before President Donald Trump declared a national emergency to build his border wall.

The traditional homelands of 36 federally recognized tribes – including the Kumeyaay, Pai, Cocopah, O’odham, Yaqui, Apache and Kickapoo peoples – were split in two by the 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo and 1853 Gadsden Purchase, which carved modern-day California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas out of northern Mexico.

Today, tens of thousands of people belonging to U.S. Native tribes live in the Mexican states of Baja California, Sonora, Coahuila and Chihuahua, my research estimates. The Mexican government does not recognize indigenous peoples in Mexico as nations as the U.S. does, so there is no enrollment system there.

Still, many Native people in Mexico routinely cross the U.S.-Mexico border to participate in cultural events, visit religious sites, attend burials, go to school or visit family. Like other “non-resident aliens,” they must pass through rigorous security checkpoints, where they are subject to interrogation, inspection and rejection or delay.

Many Native Americans I’ve interviewed for anthropological research on indigenous activism call the U.S.-Mexico border “the imaginary line” – an invisible boundary created by colonial powers that claim sovereign indigenous territories as their own.

A border wall would further separate Native peoples from friends, relatives and tribal resources that span the U.S.-Mexico border.

Homelands divided

Tribal members say that many Native Americans in the U.S. feel detached from their relatives in Mexico.

“The effect of a wall is already in us,” Mike Wilson, a member of the Tohono O’odham Nation, who lives in Tucson, Arizona, told me. “It already divides us.”

The Tohono O’odham are among the U.S. federal tribes fighting the government’s efforts to beef up existing security with a border wall. In late January, the Tohono O’odham, Pascua Yaqui and National Congress of Indian Americans met to create a proposal for facilitating indigenous border crossing.

The Tohono O’odham already know how life changes when traditional lands are physically partitioned.

Verlon Jose, vice-chairman of the Tohono O'odham Nation, at the border barrier that traverses the Tohono O'odham reservation in Chukut Kuk, Ariz., in 2017. Reuters/Rick Wilking

By U.S. law, enrolled Tohono O’odham members in Mexico are eligible to receive educational and medical services in Tohono O’odham lands in the U.S.

That has become difficult since 2006, when a steel vehicle barrier was built along most of the 62-mile stretch of U.S.-Mexico border that bisects the Tohono O’odham Nation.

Previously, to get to the U.S. side of Tohono O’odham territory, many tribe members would simply drive across their land. Now, they must travel long distances to official ports of entry.

One Tohono O’odham rancher told The New York Times in 2017 that he must travel several miles to draw water from a well 100 yards away from his home – but in Mexico.

And Pacific Standard magazine reported in February 2019 that three Tohono O’odham villages in Sonora, Mexico, had been cut off from their nearest food supply, which was in the U.S.

Native rights

Land is central to Native communities’ historic, spiritual and cultural identity.

Several international agreements – including the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples – confirm these communities’ innate rights to draw on cultural and natural resources across international borders.

An 1894 map of indigenous North American languages shows how Native homelands span modern-day national borders. British Library (jammer overigens dat men niet eenzelfde kaart opnam voor Mexico)

The United States offers few such protections.

Officially, various federal laws and treaties affirm the rights of federally recognized tribes to cross between the U.S., Mexico and Canada.

The Jay Treaty of 1794 grants indigenous peoples on the U.S.-Canada border the right to freely pass and repass the border. It also gives Canadian-born indigenous persons the right to live and work in the United States.

The American Indian Religious Freedom Act of 1978 says that the U.S. will protect and preserve Native American religious rights, including “access to sacred sites” and “possession of sacred objects.” And the 1990 Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act protects Native American human remains, burial sites and sacred objects.

United States law also requires that federally recognized sovereign tribal nations on the U.S.-Mexico border must be consulted in federal border enforcement planning.

In practice, however, the free passage of Native people who live across both the United States’ northern or southern border is curtailed by strict identification laws.

The United States requires anyone entering the country to present a passport or other U.S.-approved identification confirming their citizenship or authorization to enter. The Real ID Act of 2005 allows the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) secretary to waive any U.S. law – including those protecting indigenous rights – that may impede border enforcement.

Several standard U.S. tribal identification documents – including Form I-872 American Indian Card and enhanced tribal photo identification cards – are approved travel documents that enable Native Americans to enter the U.S. at land ports of entry.

Arbitrary identity tests

Only the American Indian Card, which is issued exclusively to members of the Kickapoo tribes, recognizes indigenous people’s right to cross the border regardless of citizenship.

According to the Texas Band of Kickapoo Act of 1983, “all members of the Band” – including those who live in Mexico – are “entitled to freely pass and repass the borders of the United States and to live and work in the United States.”

The majority of indigenous Mexicans wishing to live or work in the United States, however, must apply for immigrant residence and work authorization like any other person born outside of the U.S. The relevant tribal governments in the U.S. may also work with Customs and Border Patrol to waive certain travel document requirements on a case-by-case basis for short-term visits of Native members from Mexico.

Since border patrol agents have expansive discretionary power to refuse or delay entries in the interest of national security, its officers sometimes make arbitrary requests to verify Native identity in these cases.

Such tests, my research shows, have included asking people to speak their indigenous language or – if the person is crossing to participate in a Native ceremony – to perform a traditional song or dance. Those who refuse these requests may be denied entry.

Border agents at both the Mexico and Canada borders have also reportedly mishandled or destroyed Native ceremonial or medicinal items they deem suspicious.

“Our relatives are all considered ‘aliens,’” said the Yaqui elder and activist José Matus. “[T]hey’re not aliens. … They’re indigenous to this land.”

“We’ve been here since time immemorial,” he added.

By Christina Leza / Creative Commons / The Conversation

De echte 'American Dream' was die van de oorspronkelijke volkeren van de VS

Gisteren was het in de VS 'Indigenous People Day' en niet toevallig dat Lewis Borck een artikel over deze volkeren schreef. Borck is dan ook de schrijver van het hieronder opgenomen artikel, eerder gepubliceerd op The Conversation (Creative Commons), waarin hij de 'American Dream' onder de loep heeft genomen. Borck kwam tot de conclusie dat de werkelijke American Dream, met o.a. gelijkheid en zelfbestuur (dus zonder een enorme overheid) al bestond onder de oorspronkelijke bevolking van Noord-Amerika.

Men dacht dat met een dergelijke vorm van zelfbestuur, men geen grote bouwwerken kon maken, anders dan over een periode van honderden jaren. Deze mythe is intussen doorgeprikt daar men een groot bouwwerk vond dat in een paar jaar tijd werd gebouwd, door samenwerking van stammen, die in feite nog jagers verzamelaars waren.

In aanvang was de macht nog verdeeld onder elites en deze macht was gebaseerd op religieuze gronden. Echter deze vorm van bestuur werd losgelaten, waarschijnlijk daar men inzag dat een dergelijke machtsuitoefening onrecht en (zware) corruptie in de hand werkt. Daarop werd de religieuze leiders hun macht afgenomen, hetzelfde gebeurde met die elites, waarna voor een vorm van zelfbestuur werd gekozen, die in feite nog steeds te zien is bij de oorspronkelijke volkeren van de VS (althans de afstammelingen van degenen die de genocide van de witte kolonisten hebben overleefd). Volgens zeggen zou men elke vorm van machtsvorming door elites en religie met succes hebben bestreden.

Kortom er zijn wel degelijk veel voorbeelden die aangeven dat (lokaal en regionaal) zelfbestuur op basis van een roulerend leiderschap dan wel een wisselend collectief wel degelijk werkt.......

Onlangs werd hetzelfde gezegd over een stad in Mexico waar men de corrupte politici, al evenzo corrupte politie en georganiseerde misdaad verjaagde. Intussen werkt dit zelfbestuur geweldig en is de stad welvarend geworden......* 

Indigenous People Invented the American Dream — Columbus Invaded It

(let op de eerste gekleurde persoon aan de rechterkant van de psychopathische veroveraars 'ontdekkingsreizigers', gezien diens houding is deze afgebeeld als een aap, al werden deze oorspronkelijke volkeren een enorm stuk slechter behandeld dan apen, althans als je dierproeven op deze arme dieren niet meerekent......)

October 7, 2018 at 10:34 pm

Written by The Conversation

(CONVERSATION) — When President Barack Obama created Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, the 2012 program that offered undocumented young people brought to the U.S. as children a path into society, for a moment the ideals of the American Dream seemed, at least for this group, real.

We call these kids, many of whom are now adults, “Dreamers,” because they are chasing the American Dream – a national aspiration for upward economic mobility built on physical mobility. Fulfilling your dreams often means following them wherever they may lead – even into another country.

The Trump administration’s decision to cancel DACA – which is currently on hold while it is litigated in the courts – and build a U.S.-Mexico border wall has endangered those dreams by subjecting 800,000 young people to deportation.

But the notion underlying both Trump’s DACA repeal and the wall – which is that “illegal” immigrants, most of them from Mexico, are stealing U.S. jobs and hurting society – reflects a profound misunderstanding of American history.

On Indigenous Peoples Day, it’s worth underscoring something that many archaeologists know: Many of the values that inspire the American Dream – liberty, equality and the pursuit of happiness – date back to well before the creation of the U.S.-Mexico border and before freedom-seeking Pilgrim immigrants arrived at Plymouth Rock in 1620.

They originate with native North Americans.

A Native American Dream

The modern rendition of the American Dream can be traced back to 1774, when Virginia’s governor, John Murray, the fourth earl of Dunmore, wrote that even if Americans “attained Paradise, they would move on if they heard of a better place farther west.”

The actual term “American Dream” was popularized in 1931 by the businessman and historian James Truslow Adams. For him, its realization depended on not just being able to better oneself but also, through movement and human interaction, seeing your neighbors bettered as well.

The first peoples to come to the Americas also came in search of a better life.

That happened 14,000 years ago in the last Ice Age when nomadic pioneers, ancestors to modern Native Americans and First Nations, arrived from the Asian continent and roamed freely throughout what now comprises Canada, the United States and Mexico. Chasing mammoth, ancient bison and the elephant-like Gomphothere, they moved constantly to secure the health of their communities.

The indigenous communities of the Americas knew none of these modern-day national borders. USGS

A more recent example of the power of migration reappears about 5,000 years ago, when a large group of people from what is today central Mexico spread into the American Southwest and farther north, settling as far up as western North America. With them they brought corn, which now drives a significant part of the American economy, and a way of speaking that birthed over 30 of the 169 contemporary indigenous languages still spoken in the United States today.

The Hohokam

This globalist world view was alive and well 700 years ago as well when people from what is now northern Arizona fled a decades-long drought and rising authoritarianism under religious leaders.

Many migrated hundreds of miles south to southern Arizona, joining the Hohokam – ancestors to modern O’odham nations – who had long thrived in the harsh Sonoran desert by irrigating vast fields of agave, corn, squash, beans and cotton.

When the northern migrants arrived to this hot stretch of land around the then-nonexistent U.S.-Mexico frontier, Hohokam religious and political life was controlled by a handful of elites. Social mechanisms restricting the accumulation of power by individuals had slowly broken down.

For decades after their arrival, migrants and locals interacted. From that exchange, a Hohokam cultural revolution grew. Together, the two communities created a commoners’ religious social movement that archaeologists call Salado, which featured a feasting practice that invited all village members to participate.

As ever more communities adopted this equitable tradition, political power – which at the time was embedded in religious power – became more equally spread through society.

Elites lost their control and, eventually, abandoned their temples.

America’s Egalitarian Mound-Builders

The Hohokam tale unearths another vaunted American ideal that originates in indigenous history: equality.

Long before it was codified in the Declaration of Independence,, equality was enacted through the building of large mounds.

Massive earthen structures like these are often acts of highly hierarchical societies – think of the pyramids of the ancient Egyptians, constructed by masses of laborers as the final resting place of powerful pharaohs, or those of the rigid, empire-building Aztecs.

But great power isn’t always top-down. Poverty Point, in the lower Mississippi River Valley of what’s now Louisiana, is a good example. This massive site, which consists of five mounds, six concentric semi-elliptical ridges and a central plaza, was built some 4,000 years ago by hunter-fisher-gatherers with little entrenched hierarchy.

Poverty Point: a city built on cooperation. Herb Roe/Wikipedia, CC BY-SA

Originally, archaeologists believed that such societies without the inequality and authoritarianism that defined the ancient Egyptian, Roman, and Aztec empires could not have constructed something so significant – and, if so, only over decades or centuries.

But excavations in the last 20 years have revealed that large sections of Poverty Point were actually constructed in only a few months. These Native Americans organized in groups to undertake massive projects as a communal cooperative, leaving a built legacy of equality across America’s landscape.

The Consensus-Building Haudenosaunee

The Haudenosaunee, or Iroquois, offer a more modern example of such consensus-based decision-making practices.

These peoples – who’ve lived on both sides of the St. Lawrence river in modern-day Ontario and the U.S. Great Lakes states for hundreds, if not thousands, of years – built their society on collective labor arrangements.

They ostracized people who exhibited “selfish” behavior, and women and men often worked together in large groups. Everyone lived together in communal longhouses. Power was also shifted constantly to prevent hierarchy from forming, and decisions were made by coalitions of kin groups and communities.

Many of these participatory political practices continue to this day.

The Haudenosaunee sided with the British during the 1776 American Revolution and were largely driven off their land after the war. Like many native populations, the Haudenosaunee Dream turned into a nightmare of invasion, plague and genocide as European migrants pursued their American Dream that excluded others.

Native Americans at Standing Rock

The long indigenous history of rejecting authoritarianism continues, including the 2016 battle for environmental justice at Standing Rock, South Dakota.

There, a resistance movement coalesced around a horizontally organized youth group that rejected the planned Dakota Access oil pipeline.

Native American pioneers continue to fight for the same ideals that inspire the American Dream, including equality and freedom. John Duffy/Wikimedia, CC BY-SA

The movement centered on an environmental cause in part because nature is sacred to the Lakota – and to many other indigenous communities – but also because communities of color often bear the brunt of economic and urban development decisions.

Standing Rock was the indigenous fight against repression and for the American Dream, gone 21st century.

Redefining the North American Dream

Anthropologists and historians haven’t always recognized the quintessentially Native American ideals present in the American Dream.

In the early 19th century, the prominent social philosopher Lewis Henry Morgan called the Native Americans he studied “savages.” And for centuries, America’s native peoples have seen their cultural heritage attributed to seemingly everyone but their ancestors – even to an invented “lost” white race.

America’s indigenous past was not romantic. There were petty disputes, bloody intergroup conflicts and slavery, namely along the Northwest Coast and American Southeast.

But the ideals of freedom and equality – and the right that Americans can move across this vast continent to seek it out – survive through the millennia. Societies based on those values have prospered here.

So the next time a politician invokes American values to promote a policy of closed borders or selfish individualism, remember who originally espoused the American Dream – and first sought to live it, too.

By Lewis Borck and D. Shane Miller / Creative Commons / The Conversation / Report a typo

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* Zie: 'Anarchie werkt: corruptie is uit te bannen >> in de Mexicaanse stad Cherán zijn de politieke partijen en politie aan de kant gezet >> stad floreert!'