(More excerpts from another source--besides this one--at
bottom)
This former chairman of the American Indian Movement (AIM) learned that he
has 17 thousand pages in his f.b.i. file when he was able to get 60 of them from
the Freedom of Information Act. He was a main spokesperson in the American
Indian take-over at Alcatraz Island, and led at least one march protesting
f.b.i. tactics against Indian people in the 1970s (during the height of the
f.b.i.'s illegal "Counter Intelligence Program" aka "COINTELPRO"). During the
angry protest, Trudell burned an American flag on the steps of f.b.i.
Headquarters. 12 hours later a fire killed his wife, his three children and his
wife's mother. The f.b.i., which has jurisdiction on federally mandated Indian
reservations, declined to investigate.
"...The only thing that has always bothered me about
revolution, every time I have seen revolutionaries, they have reacted
out of hatred for the oppressor. We must do this for the Love of our
People...We must never react out of hatred against those who have no
sense."
EXCERPTS FROM A SPEECH BY John Trudell as published in THE INDIGENOUS
VOICE, Vol.2; edited by Roger Moody in the UK;
comments and intro in
this style text
The following is exerpted from a man who, in 1980, spoke to
his Native American peers about the power of nature and how he believes that
people are connected with this power when they follow their personal truths.
Thinking non-American Indians (including we European-indigenous folks) can gain
an insight and realize our own connection which may be similar to those
Mr.Trudell spoke of, i took the liberty of inserting corresponding comments and
ideas, which invite John and readers alike, to enter an on-going
conversation.
While i myself have found great inspiration in the power of
nature (re: via long-distance bicycling solo and bushcamping) and can claim to
understand the imagery Trudell uses, i realize that most may have long been
deprived of such first-hand humblings in lives largely influenced by
institutional beliefs, and thus "civilized" (or, more like, even more heavily
*colonized*) as a result of uncritical city dwelling.
i hope that even
those of you with little or no experience with the Real Power of nature will
take the time to read John's words and imagine where we might be able to fit in;
don't be put off by what at first appears "wishy-washy"--because it is a
different approach than you're used to; anyway, sometimes it's good to change
gears in major ways!
In learning such new ways to look at challenges we
collectively face as human beings, we will find new inspiration and insight into
whatever we read, and thus subverting still further those who wish
to force us to give up hope or an ability to defend
ourselves.
WE ARE POWER
"...This is a survival gathering. And one of the things I hope
that you all learn while you are here is that you learn to appreciate the
Energy and the Power that the Elements are--that of the Sun, the Rain, and the
Wind. That you go away from here understanding that this is Power --and this
is the only true, real Power...
"...We must not become
confused and deceived by their illusions. There is no such thing as military
power; there is only military terrorism...That is all that it is. They try to
program our minds and fool us with these illusions so that we will believe that
they hold the power in their hands...All they know how to do is act in a
repressive, brutal way...They want us to believe in them and depend on them, and
we have to assume these consumer identities, and these
political identities, these religious identities and these racial identities
[not to mention sexual ones]. They want to separate us from our Power...from who
we are...
"...We must consider the Spiritual genocide that they commit
against us. The spiritual genocide that the white people have been
victimized by for thousands of years...
"We
must move to the time when we truly understand our connection to real power
because these people who deal with illusions and imitations...they want to keep
us confused with [the self-limiting concepts of?] sexism and ageism, racism,
class. They want to keep us in a confusion so that [we] will continue to believe
in one lie after another as they programmed them into our minds and into our
society...The ruling class...are going to lie to us and they are going to create
the illusions of change...
"We have to understand our role as a Natural
Power. We have to understand that when our oppressor treats us this way and does
these things to us, that we allow him to do it as long as we accept his
lies...We have been allowing it for too long...
"When I go around in America and I see the bulk of the white
people, they do not feel oppressed; they feel powerless... We see the
physical genocide that they are attempting to inflict upon our lives, and
we understand the psychological genocide that they have already inflicted
upon their own people...
"We must be willing in our lifetime to deal with reality. It's not
revolution; it's liberation. We want to be free of a value system that's being
imposed on us... Liberation --we want to be free. But in order for us to be free
we have to assume...our responsibility. We are going to have to struggle for it.
Wer are going to have to work [and be] committed to it. We must never
underestimate our enemy. Our enemy is committed against us 24 hours a day. They
use 100% of their efforts to maintain their ...status quo. 100% of their effort
goes into deceiving us and manipulating us against each other...
"...We are going to have to start working more realistically with
a
resistance consciousness
, a resistance, something we can pass on as
strength to the coming generations--a resistance where organizational ...[and]
individual egos don't
get in the way, a resistance where the infiltrators and the provacateurs and the
liars and the betrayers...do not get in the way. We will not get our liberation
if we do not seriously analyze the experiences of our own lifetimes.
The other side ...has studied. They understand what we were up to in
the 1960's. They understand what we wanted in the early 1970's...They
create certain events, and they manipulate the economics, and they
manipulate circumstances because they want us to react the same way that
we did in the 1960's so that they can come in and they can smash our
movements. We must become of a resistance consciousness. We must say that
we will not allow you to smash us. Even if it means that we have to deal
with the part of you that you have planted in
me...
"...It takes more than good
intentions. It takes committment. It takes that in some point in our lives we
are going to have to decide that we have a way of life and we are going to live
that way of life. Even when our enemies totally surround
us, even when [they] act against us with brutality and harshness, with lies and
bribes, we are going to have to stand with our way of life. ...We cannot reach a
point in our lives [where] we're going to sit back and say: "Well, we will make
this compromise with the
other side..."
some comments about what John said: IDENTITIES: why must we accept ways which keep us rigidly divided
away from e ach other? These labels which define only a part of us, and
which have a broader way of keeping us all divided from the kind of unity of
awareness which could really make a difference! Granted, identities help us
obtain a kind of comraderey during *crisis* and when we know of few others whom
think similarly; let's look into the consequences of rigid barriers between each
other!
EGO: i've been accused of having "too much" ego,
myself. But what i wonder about is exactly what John and others mean when they
use this word. i equate "ego" with the self. The self that doesn't allow itself
to become a number, a unit, or some other commodity; the self that helps sustain
our private hunger for sanity and ability to think independently. Perhaps what
John means is the ego that drives the authoritarian (who KNOWS all the truth,
etc.). Or perhaps Mr. Trudell is talking about how self/ego mind-sets shouldn't
be allowed to consume groups who organize for survival. (what then would that
mean? We should all want to resist, and a sober contemplation of our
self/ego ought to be a part of that)
THE USE OF THE WORD ENEMY: i don't like it (i note in John's later ideas that he is
focused on making enemies out of concepts, instead of individuals). i think it
is irresponsible and self-destructive to use a provacative word like "enemy"
because it plays the game of de-individualizing broad, diverse groups, and seems
to just "do unto the other as one has had done unto them". Demonizing also works
to take away the potential human beings have of having their mind-set bridged
and moved towards grey areas of value. Instead, in my view, demonizing assists
in keeping different sides ignorant and in fear of each other, and thus
alienated in heightening gradations. i think it is important to always "hold the
door open" for those who misunderstand or have been taught to hate and fear us,
and somehow promote the kind of spirit which brings the John Stockwells and
Ramsey Clarks from their highly misled camps.
COMPROMISE WITH THE OTHER SIDE: This seems to be true through-out
the 20th century. We should try to understand why oppressed groups/individuals
do it, and what the consequences are.
John Trudell: "We are going to have to talk to all the people who
will listen to us...We're going to have to find ways to talk to the people we
can't talk to now...
"...We must always deal with reality. They have been able to use the
element of fear to control their masses of people... We must not be
drawn into their traps... It is time for us to think...We have to learn
to put up and deal with the hard times just like the good times... We
have to learn and underderstand that they want us to be lazy in our
minds and lazy in our spirit and lazy in our body. They want us to be
able to give up hope easily. They want us to quit thinking. (just obey,
work, consume, and fear and hate when told) But the nature of the People
on Earth has always been one of struggle...If they stop us one way then
we must find another way... We have to take the initiative. We can no
longer become and remain reactionary...
"And
if we have gotten it into our consciousness to accept [the interference we've
had since the time we were born], then we have got a lot of work to do...But
we have the ability to do it because we are a Natural Part of the Earth...the
Earth did not put useless things here...
"[The opponent mind-set] has been attacking the Indigenous People
and they have been misusing the white people, and they are trying to
push us into a position where all we think about is ourselves...They
want to isolate us and call us names (labels, identities, etc.). They
want to attack us. They want to use terrorism to intimidate. We must
build a resistance in our hearts that says we will not accept it, we
will not accept it.
To get a
better understanding of exactly what kinds of challenges John Trudell and his
Indian contemporaries have faced in their modern struggles for liberation, read:
STICKMAN by Paola Igliori; Inanout Press; NY 1994
(More excerpts from another source--besides this one--at
bottom)
