Economic Aspects of "Love"

[American Dream]

[American Dream]

http://www.manataka.org/page1113.html

For All Those Who Were Indian In A Former Life
by Andrea Smith

The New Age movement has sparked a new interest in Native American traditional spirituality among white women who claim to be feminists. Indian spirituality, with its respect for nature and the interconnectedness of all things, is often presented as the panacea for all individual and global problems. Not surprisingly, many white "feminists" see the opportunity to make a great profit from this new craze. They sell sweat lodges or sacred pipe ceremonies, which promise to bring individual and global healing. Or they sell books and records that supposedly describe Indian traditional practices so that you too, can be Indian.

On the surface, it may appear that this new craze is based on a respect for Indian spirituality. In fact, however, the New Age movement is part of a very old story of white racism and genocide against the Indian people. The "Indian" ways that the white, New Age "feminists" are practicing have little grounding in reality.

True spiritual leaders do not make a profit from their teachings, whether it's through selling books, workshops, sweat lodges, or otherwise. Spiritual leaders teach the people because it is their responsibility to pass what they have learned from their elders to the youngest generations. They do not charge for their services.

Furthermore, the idea that an Indian medicine woman would instruct a white woman to preach the "true path" of Indian spirituality sounds more reminiscent of evangelical Christianity than traditional Indian spirituality. Indian religions are community-based, not proselytizing religions. For this reason, there is not ONE Indian religion, as many New Agers would have you believe. Indian spiritual practices reflect the needs of a particular community. Indians do not generally believe that their way is "the" way, and consequently, they have no desire to tell outsiders about their practices. Also, considering how many Indians there are who do not know the traditions, why would a medicine woman spend so much time teaching a white woman? A medicine woman would be more likely to advise a white woman to look into her OWN culture and find what is liberating in it.

However, some white women seem determined NOT to look into their own cultures for sources of strength. This is puzzling, since pre-Christian European cultures are also earth-based and contain many of the same elements that white women are ostensibly looking for in Native American cultures. This phenomenon leads me to suspect that there is a more insidious motive for latching onto Indian spirituality.

When white "feminists" see how white people have historically oppressed others and how they are coming very close to destroying the earth, they often want to disassociate themselves from their whiteness. They do this by opting to "become Indian." In this way, they can escape responsibility and accountability for white racism.

Of course, white "feminists" want to become only partly Indian. They do not want to be part of our struggles for survival against genocide, and they do not want to fight for treaty rights or an end to substance abuse or sterilization abuse. They do not want to do anything that would tarnish their romanticized notions of what it means to be an Indian.

Moreover, they want to become Indian without holding themselves accountable to Indian communities. If they did they would have to listen to Indians telling them to stop carrying around sacred pipes, stop doing their own sweat lodges and stop appropriating our spiritual practices. Rather, these New Agers see Indians as romanticized gurus who exist only to meet their consumerist needs. Consequently, they do not understand our struggles for survival and thus they can have no genuine understanding of Indian spiritual practices.

While New Agers may think that they are escaping white racism by becoming "Indian," they are in fact continuing the same genocidal practices of their forebears. The one thing that has maintained the survival of Indian people through 500 years of colonialism has been the spiritual bonds that keep us together. When the colonizers saw the strength of our spirituality, they tried to destroy Indian religion by making them illegal. They forced Indian children into white missionary schools and cut their tongues if they spoke their Native languages.

Sundances were made illegal, and Indian participation in the Ghost Dance precipitated the Wounded Knee massacre. The colonizers recognized that it was our spirituality that maintained our spirit of resistance and sense of community. Even today, Indians do not have religious freedom. In a recent ruling the Supreme Court has determined that American Indians do not have the right to sue under the American Indian Religious Freedom Act. They have also determined that if Indian religious freedom conflicts with any "compelling" United States interest, the government always supersedes Indian peoples' freedom of religion.

Many white New Agers continue this practice of destroying Indian spirituality. They trivialize Native American practices so that these practices lose their spiritual force, and they have the white privilege and power to make themselves heard at the expense of Native Americans. Our voices are silenced, and consequently the younger generation of Indians who are trying to find their way back to the Old Ways becomes hopelessly lost in this morass of consumerist spirituality.

These practices also promote the subordination of Indian women to white women. We are told that we are greedy if we do not choose to share our spirituality. Apparently, it is our burden to service white women's needs rather than to spend time organizing within our own communities. Their perceived need for warm and fuzzy mysticism takes precedence over our need to survive.

The New Age movement completely trivializes the oppression we as Indian women face: Indian women are suddenly no longer the women who are forcibly sterilized and tested with unsafe drugs such as Depo Provera; we are no longer the women who have a life expectancy of 47 years; and we are no longer the women who generally live below the poverty level and face a 75 percent unemployment rate. No, we're too busy being cool and spiritual.

This trivialization of our oppression is compounded by the fact that nowadays anyone can be Indian if s/he wants to. All that is required is that one be Indian in a former life, or take part in a sweat lodge, or be monitored by a "medicine woman," or read a how-to book.

Since, according to this theory, anyone can now be "Indian," then the term Indians no longer refers specifically to those people who have survived five hundred years of colonization and genocide. This furthers the goals of white supremacists to abrogate treaty rights and to take away what little we have left. When everyone becomes "Indian," then it is easy to lose sight of the specificity of oppression faced by those who are REALLY Indian in THIS life. It is no wonder we have such a difficult time finding non-Indians to support our struggles when the New Age movement has completely disguised our oppression.

The most disturbing aspect about these racist practices is that they are promoted in the name of feminism. Sometimes it seems that I can't open a feminist periodical without seeing ads promoting white "feminist" practices with little medicine wheel designs. I can't seem to go to a feminist conference without the woman who begins the conference with a ceremony being the only Indian presenter. Participants then feel so "spiritual" after this opening that they fail to notice the absence of Indian women in the rest of the conference or Native American issues in the discussions. And I certainly can't go to a feminist bookstore without seeing books by Lynn Andrews and other people who exploit Indian spirituality all over the place. It seems that, while feminism is supposed to signify the empowerment of all women, it obviously does not include Indian women.

If white feminists are going to act in solidarity with their Indian sisters, they must take a stand against Indian spiritual abuse. Feminist book and record stores should stop selling these products, and feminist periodicals should stop advertising these products. Women who call themselves feminists should denounce exploitative practices wherever they see them.

Many have claimed that Indians are not respecting "freedom of speech" when they demand that whites stop promoting and selling books that exploit Indian spirituality. But promotion of this material is destroying freedom of speech for Native Americans by ensuring that our voices will never be heard. Feminists have already made choices about what they will promote (I haven't seen many books by right-wing, fundamentalist women sold in feminist bookstores, since feminists recognize that these books are oppressive to women.) The issue is not censorship; the issue is racism. Feminists must make a choice either to respect Indian political and spiritual autonomy, or to promote materials that are fundamentally racist under the guise of "freedom of speech."

Respecting the integrity of Native people and their spirituality does not mean that there can never be cross-cultural sharing. However, such a sharing should take place in a way that is respectful to Indian people.

The way to be respectful is for non-Indians to become involved in our political struggles and to develop an on-going relation with Indian COMMUNITIES based on trust and mutual respect. When this happens, Indian people may invite a non-Indian to take part in a ceremony, but it will be on Indian terms.
I hesitate to say this much about cross-cultural sharing however, because many white people take this to mean that they can join in our struggles solely for the purpose of being invited to ceremonies. If this does not occur, they feel that Indians have somehow unfairly withheld spiritual teachings from them. We are expected to pay the price in spiritual exploitation in order to gain allies in our political struggles.

When non-Indians say they will help us, but only on their terms, that is not help - that is blackmail. We are not obligated to teach anyone about our spirituality. It is our choice if we want to share with people who we think will be respectful. It is white people who owe it to us to fight for our survival, since they are living on the land for which our people were murdered.

It is also important for non-Indians to build relationships with Indian communities, rather than with specific individuals. Many non-Indians express their confusion about knowing who is and who is not a legitimate spiritual teacher. The only way for non-Indians to know who legitimate teachers are is to develop ongoing relationships with Indian COMMUNITIES. When they know the community, they will learn who the community respects as its spiritual leaders. This is a process that takes time.

Unfortunately, many white feminists do not want to take this time in their quest for instant spirituality. Profit-making often gets in the way of true sisterhood. However, white feminists should know that as long as they take part in Indian spiritual abuse, either by being consumers of it or by refusing to take a stand on it, Indian women will consider white "feminists" to be nothing more than agents in the genocide of their people.

OUR SPIRITUALITY IS NOT FOR SALE!




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[American Dream]

“Rayna Green further elaborates that the current Indian “wannabe” phenomenon is based on a logic of genocide: non-Native peoples imagine themselves as the rightful inheritors of all that previously belonged to “vanished” Indians, this entitling them to ownership of this land. “The living performance of ‘playing Indian’ by non-Indian peoples depends upon the physical and psychological removal, even the death, of real Indians. In that sense, the performance, purportedly often done out of a stated and implicit love for Indians, is really the obverse of another well-known cultural phenomenon, ‘Indian hating,’ as most often expressed in another, deadly performance genre called ‘genocide.’ ” After all, why would non-Native peoples need to play Indian— which often includes acts of spiritual appropriation and land theft— if they thought Indians were still alive and perfectly capable of being Indian themselves?”

—Andrea Smith, “Heteropatriarchy and the Three Pillars of White Supremacy; Rethinking Women of Color Organizing”

“Any liberation struggle that does not challenge heternormativity cannot substantially challenge colonialism or white supremacy.”

Andrea Smith, The Color of Violence: Violence against Women of Color

“The project of colonial sexual violence establishes the ideology that Native bodies are inherently violable— and, by extension, that Native lands are also inherently violable”

— Andrea Smith, Conquest

If we were to situate Native women at the center of feminist theory, how would feminist theory itself change? Such a project moves from a narrowly-defined identity politic that ascribes essential characteristics to indigenous womanhood to a revolutionary politic emerging from the nexus of indigenous praxis and the material conditions of heteropatriarchy, colonialism, and white supremacy.

Andrea Smith, Against the Law: Indigenous Feminism and the Nation-State

Andrea Smith wrote,
“…Heteropatriarchy is essential for the building of US empire. Patriarchy is the logic that naturalizes social hierarchy. Just as men are supposed to naturally dominate women on the basis of biology, so too should the social elites of a society naturally rule everyone else through the nation-state form of governance that is constructed through domination, violence and control.”[ii] In a speech, she said, “This is why in the history of Indian genocide the first task that colonizers took on was to integrate patriarchy into native communities. The primary tool used by colonists is sexual violence. What sexual violence does for colonialism and white supremacy is render women of color inherently rape-able, our lands inherently invadable, and our resources inherently extractable.”[iii]

[i] “By heteropatriarchy, I mean the way our society is fundamentally based on male dominance—a dominance inherently built on a gender binary system that presumes heterosexuality as a social norm.” Smith, Andea. [i]Dismantling Hierarchy, Queering Society (2010)

[ii] Smith, Andrea. “Indigenous feminism without apology” http://www.awid.org/eng/Issues-and-Anal ... e-feminism

[iii] US Social Forum 2007 Liberating Gender and Sexuality Plenary http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x5crWlrksZs

…the capitalist system ultimately commodifies all workers—one’s own person becomes a commodity that one must sell in the labor market while the profits of one’s work are taken by someone else. To keep this capitalist system in place—which ultimately commodifies most people—the logic of slavery applies a racial hierarchy to this system. This racial hierarchy tells people that as long as you are not Black, you have the opportunity to escape the commodification of capitalism. This helps people who are not Black to accept their lot in life, because they can feel that at least they are not at the very bottom of the racial hierarchy—at least they are not property; at least they are not slave able.

— Andrea Smith, “Color of Violence”

[American Dream]

http://vintage-ads.livejournal.com/4061101.html

[American Dream]

Love is profoundly political. Our deepest revolution will come when we understand this truth. Only love can give us the strength to go forward in the midst of heartbreak and misery. Only love can give us power to reconcile, to redeem, the power to renew weary spirits and save lost souls. The transformative power of love is the foundation of all meaningful social change. Without love our lives are without meaning. Love is the heart of the matter. When all else has fallen away, love sustains.

bell hooks, Salvation: Black People and Love

[American Dream]

http://juliosalgado83.tumblr.com/post/2 ... -oxymoron/

[American Dream]

Best viewed after licking your pet Sonoran Desert toad.
(Via Dose Nation)

[American Dream]

--Silvia Federici’s Caliban and the Witch

[American Dream]

http://chaka85.wordpress.com/2010/12/31/sarah-baartman/

Sarah Baartman
Posted: December 31, 2010 | Author: chakaZ |



Dark skin
wide hips and lips and
large behind.
This is my body but my body ain’t mine.
Stolen from Africa and put on a show
body parts commodified for that money flow.
Landed in the South to build that Amerikkkan dream.
Bred, raped and beaten for that dirty green.
You see as a black woman in this country
my sexuality has never been just for me.
First forced to reproduce to keep the slave population strong.
Then sterilized and told having children was wrong.
My hips and lips don’t belong to me
my thighs, breasts, punannay don’t belong to me
Im unfeeling, a robot
some say un-rapeable, you see.
Hoodrat, jezebel, hoe is my legacy.
Because living in this world ain’t nice to colored girls
trying to get free.

[American Dream]

http://kalisherni.tumblr.com/post/41571 ... boo-gulati



BROWN & LOVELY- By Khushboo Gulati
August 2012~ acrylic on wood

Reclaiming & celebrating our brown luster & all shades of our Kala fierceness.
Skin bleaching/whitening products like Fair & Lovely & White Beauty are promoting messages of colorism/shadeism throughout South Asia, as well as globally. Their commercials suggest that fairness equates to beauty, self worth, & opportunities, while dark skin is undesirable & shameful. This thinking has led to self-hatred & internalized oppression in our South Asian communities & other communities of color. Colonialism has fueled the teaching and practice of this mentality, as it is perpetuated through our own people.

Let’s reclaim our skin as dark as mama earth & our roots
Let’s practice self-love & build community with all our dark skinned comrades
Let’s decolonize our mind, see dark as beautiful
Let’s tell our stories, rewrite our hxstories
I ain’t fair but I’m still lovely
spread this message on our streets
-painter khafeel font-

to see more of my art, click Khushboo ki artverk
to all my kala/ kali warriors
reminder for self love
deconstructing aint easy but it has to happen!!

[American Dream]

I think the problem is that many people in America think that racism is an attitude. And this is encouraged by the capitalist system. So they think that what people think is what makes them a racist. Racism is not an attitude.

If a white man wants to lynch me, that’s his problem. If he’s got the power to lynch me, that’s my problem. Racism is not a question of attitude; it’s a question of power.

Racism gets its power from capitalism. Thus, if you’re anti-racist, whether you know it or not, you must be anti-capitalist. The power for racism, the power for sexism, comes from capitalism, not an attitude.

You cannot be a racist without power. You cannot be a sexist without power. Even men who beat their wives get this power from the society which allows it, condones it, encourages it. One cannot be against racism, one cannot be against sexism, unless one is against capitalism.

— Stokely Carmichael (Kwame Ture) answering a question about racism, sexism, and capitalism.



Source: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tug8RJyLoz0

[American Dream]

“The awareness that we live in a system or, better, that our lives and livelihoods are articulated through systemic forces, does not need to lead us to despair. Knowledge of these forces does not make us weaker; on the contrary, it makes us stronger, because the system reveals its Achilles heel by showing what it must do in order to survive: it must promote enclosures and it must pit producers, both waged and unwaged, against each other, thus creating the appearance of abundance, but instead reproducing scarcity.”

— Massimo De Angelis. The Beginning of History. (2007, p. 225-226, emphasis in original).

[American Dream]

[American Dream]

http://decolonization.wordpress.com/201 ... rita-wong/

J28: A poem by Rita Wong

JANUARY 28, 2013


last year, i never imagined we would be



round dancing in Glenmore Landing

round dancing in Chinook Centre

round dancing in Olympic Plaza

round dancing in Metrotown

round dancing in West Edmonton Mall

round dancing outside the Cayuga courthouse

round dancing on Akwesasne

round dancing on Strombo



huychexa!

mahsi cho!

welali!




drumming at Waterfront Station

drumming at the United Nations

drumming at Columbia University

drumming at Granville & Georgia

drumming at Dalhousie University

drumming at the Peace Arch

drumming on Wellington Street

drumming on Lubicon lands

drumming in Owen Sound

drumming in Thunder Bay

drumming in Somba K’e

drumming in Chicago

drumming in Chilliwack

drumming in Kitimat



taking a much needed pause for thought

on tarsands Highway 63

on the 401

on CN rail tracks

with Aamjiwnaang courage

a human river on Ambassador Bridge

time to stop & respect

remember we are all treaty people

unless we live on unceded lands

where rude guests can learn to be better ones

by repealing C45, for starters



we have to stand together in many places all at once

J11, J16, J28

Indigenous spring

Eighth Fire summer

autumn wisdom

winter sleep to

renew Indigenous spring

again & again



it is Gandhi we need to align ourselves with

Gandhi and Gaia and Vandana and Maude and marbled murrelets and mycorrhizal mats

Winona and Ward and Jaggi and Arundhati and phytoplankton and peregrine falcons

Naomi and Oren and Toghestiy and Jeannette and Lee and bittermelon and bees

Percy and Shiv and Jack and Elizabeth and chrysanthemum greens and canola, now radiated

Yoko and Yes Men and Chrystos and Dionne and dolphins and prairie dogs

Theresa and Melina and Pamela and Rosa and salmon and cedar

Wab and Harsha and Clayton and Eriel and eider ducks and water bears

Takaiya and Roxanna and Glen and David and wolves and whales

there is a time for pies and there is a time for rocks and beavers and snowy plovers

there is a time for poems and a time for rifles and coral reefs and caribou

there is also a time for the Haudenosaune Wampum Belt

two rivers running side by side

(as long as one party doesn’t try to dam and mine and kill the other’s river)

and a time for spinning wheels

it is Super Barrio, who stopped 10,000 evictions in Mexico, who I look to

it is the Zapatistas, the Mohawks, the KI, the Lhe Lin Liyin

the Mother Earth Water Walkers, the 20-year-olds suddenly in Parliament, the grannies and the grandkids

it is the children I will never see, but who I hope will live and drink clean, wild water



with gratitude to Chief Spence, whose life I celebrate and honour

_________________________________________________________________

Rita Wong is the author of three books of poetry: sybil unrest (co-written with Larissa Lai, Line Books, 2008), forage (Nightwood 2007), and monkeypuzzle (Press Gang 1998). She is an Associate Professor in Critical + Cultural Studies at the Emily Carr University of Art + Design, where her work investigates the relationships between contemporary poetics, social justice, ecology, and decolonization. She is a member of the Editorial Review Board of Decolonization: Indigeneity, Education & Society

[American Dream]

Dead Prez- We Want Freedom