{"id":1038,"date":"2024-10-30T10:51:15","date_gmt":"2024-10-30T13:51:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thatfinalstraw.com\/?p=1038"},"modified":"2024-10-30T11:14:33","modified_gmt":"2024-10-30T14:14:33","slug":"bidens-apology-to-native-americans-makes-it-possible-to-walk-together-in-harmony","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/thatfinalstraw.com\/?p=1038","title":{"rendered":"Biden\u2019s Apology To Native Americans Makes It Possible To Walk Together In Harmony"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

On Friday, October 25, President Biden offered a formal apology to the Indigenous people of the United States of America for the government’s involvement in Indian Boarding Schools and similar forced assimilation projects. This marks the first time in American history that the U.S. Government has officially apologized for these programs. These programs separated native children from their families (often forcibly), and stripped them of their culture, their language, and sometimes their lives. The aim of these programs was cultural genocide. President Biden\u2019s apology is courageous. It is also only the first step on a long path to healing the suffering our people endured. <\/p>\n\n\n\n


Indian Boarding Schools and similar projects began in 1819 and lasted until 1969. Though they were wrapped in a veneer of bringing Western education to poor tribal children, these Christian schools were designed as a remedy to the \u201cIndian problem.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n


\u201cKill the Indian in him, and save the man,\u201d was how Richard H. Pratt, U.S. Army Captain and founder of the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, described his approach at a conference in 1892. <\/p>\n\n\n\n


Chief Manuelito, one of the great Navajo leaders of the later part of the 1800\u2019s, sent two of his boys to be educated at The Carlisle School in 1882. Manuelito believed in the benefits of education. Manuelito had fought bitterly against the Americans and settlers for decades. Manuelito\u2019s sichiee (wife\u2019s father) was murdered by an American over a dispute over a horse. Sending his boys to Carlisle was a gesture of peace and trust in the post-Bosque Redondo Interment Camp relationship. Both of Manuelitos sons died due to their attendance at The Carlisle School in 1883.<\/p>\n\n\n\n


Two generations of my Navajo ancestors were forcibly taken from their parents, and sent to Indian education programs. My grandmother was stolen from her parents when she was 8 years old. My grandmother was physically and sexually abused during her time in the Catholic boarding school. She ran away from the boarding school, on foot, when she was 11 years old. <\/p>\n\n\n\n


My mother and her 4 siblings were stolen from their parents while at school in Albuquerque in the mid-1960\u2019s. They were separated from each other, and sent to live with Mormon families in Utah. They had no warning or preparation. They did not see their parents or each other for two years. They had been enrolled in what was called the \u201cLamanite Program.\u201d Mormons believe that Native Americans are descendants of Lamanite people. Our dark skin was an indication of an ancient curse. My mother and her siblings were all physically and sexually abused. They suffered neglect and malnutrition while under Mormon care. My aunts were punished for speaking the Navajo language, or for expressing any part of their indigeneity. <\/p>\n\n\n\n


How many native children died, or were abused? We will never be known. The destruction of native people in the USA has informed genociders around the globe. The perpetrators of these crimes were careful to destroy most of the records. <\/p>\n\n\n\n


The pain of this history is immense. <\/p>\n\n\n\n


Today, mental illness rates are 2.5 times higher among Indigenous people than the rest of Americans. Native youth have the highest high school drop out rates of any group of Americans. Indigenous people suffer the highest rates of suicide, alcoholism and drug addiction in the country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n


Only in this millennium, has the US government and some of the church partners begun to acknowledge the extent of the damage they\u2019ve committed. In September 2000, Kevin Grover, speaking on behalf of the Bureau of Indian Affairs apologized to native people for the Bureau\u2019s part in \u201cethnic cleansing\u201d and \u201cefforts to annihilate indian cultures.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n


President Joe Biden\u2019s apology was courageous. <\/p>\n\n\n\n


The American government, in its apology, has evolved. It has the potential to become what us Dine\u2019 people would call a \u201cgood relative.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n


The appointment of Deb Haaland, a member of the Acoma-Laguna tribe has been a catalyst for positive change in the Biden administration. <\/p>\n\n\n\n


I hope that our government can continue to reconcile with our past. Even this amount of progress is unlikely to continue if Americans elect Donald Trump. <\/p>\n\n\n\n


If Vice-President Harris wins, however. here are a few more ideas of what could be done to start repairing the past injustices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n


Western education was a tool to used to complete the genocide of native people. Any \u201cCritical Race Theory\u201d subject bans in schools today are an attempt to erase native people again. The Federal Government should provide resources for Indigenous communities to create honest, accurate, and age-appropriate historical resources about Indigenous people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n


The Department of Education should provide grants to school divisions that incorporate these teachings in their curriculum. <\/p>\n\n\n\n


The Department of Health and Human Services should work with tribes to develop mental health and drug interdiction programs based in, or informed by, our traditional native practices. <\/p>\n\n\n\n


Now that our government is reflecting on the sad truth of our history, now is a good time to revisit the broken treaties. The US government should begin negotiations with sovereign tribal authorities to make good on past obligations, including returning land to the tribes. <\/p>\n\n\n\n


Christian churches who played active roles in the genocidal Indian education projects, perhaps now is a good time for you to finally step forward as moral leaders and pay cash reparations to indigenous tribes. This money should not be attached to any religious-based social services. Churches should take it upon themselves to ban religious proselytizing on all tribal lands.<\/p>\n\n\n\n


In the Dine\u2019 Bahane\u2019, aka the Navajo Creation Story, we as a people committed many terrible crimes the being, animals, insects of the lower worlds. After each transgression, we, the Dine\u2019, learned from our mistakes and evolved. We became better relatives to the other beings around us and to our Mother Earth. In the Dine\u2019 Bahane\u2019 we Navajo people learned many lessons. We moved through worlds evolving at each step to become better relatives. Eventually, we stepped into the light of the shimmering world. We held the knowledge we needed to walk in beauty and harmony with our relatives. <\/p>\n\n\n\n


That story has much to teach us and the other beings that we inhabit this country with. President Biden, apologizing on behalf of the American government, is showing us the evolution of the leaders of this country. President Biden described this change by saying, \u201cno apology can or will make up for what was lost during the darkness of the federal boarding school policy\u2026we\u2019re finally moving forward into the light.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n


One of the most important prayers said by Navajo people is the Beauty Way Prayer. In it, we say, \u201cHozho doo nashadoo shitzjli,\u201d this means, \u201cWith beauty before me, I walk.\u201d President Joe Biden\u2019s apology provides us an opportunity, as native people and Americans, to walk with beauty and harmony between us.

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On Friday, October 25, President Biden offered a formal apology to the Indigenous people of the United States of America for the government’s involvement in Indian Boarding Schools and similar forced assimilation projects. This marks the…<\/p>\n

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