This is a continuation from “Myths, Monuments and Monarchies.” I wanted to make sure we heard a plain, clear statement from an indigenous (to “North America” aka in other terms “Great Turtle Island”) from a Mohawk woman who “gets it.” She speaks about the “fire within” and I know this fire, but I also know that it has to do with connections. And the way to dominate and expatriate any group is to break all those connections and re-establish them in a new form more friendly to the colonizing state.

The eagle sits on top of the tree of peace and screams when danger is coming. This image, The Tree of Peace was adopted as The Tree of Liberty, as was the eagle, into national symbols…

Me, I am a product of this state at the disintegration and exposure of its value system, and believe it’s time for the Us/Them dialogue to start to regain a little more REAL respect instead of the fake kind, with labels, of people whose religious (which are, whose ways of life) differ, and see it through their eyes for a change.

A Confederacy then was not an Empire, but a way of life that helped reduce the warring. This is different from the feudal system which is to accumulate massive wealth, which appears to (judging by those who set this up) somehow require the shutting and cutting off of women’s leadership and insight (as well as rights to property and participate in government, in short, women are cut off and limited to their biological functions, except those who seek to excel in the MODEL which is still based on the IMPERIAL FEUDAL SYSTEM which requires losers to support the continued aggrandizement of the WINNERS.

Whatever our country could’ve been when it started, and chose to take PART — but not the female participation part — of the models from the American Indians (specifically the Iroquois) — it diid not become and no longer is. We are now fully a debt-based, warfare model which incorporates lying, stealing, cheating, and as I believe the last post established, periodic genocides and constant instability — as a way of life. All who subscribe to this way of life MUST fiscally support it (either by being poor and becoming part of a social science demonstration part; plus “justifying” more taxes, or by being middle class, and not having enough free time to actually understand how the system works, or by participating in the religious institutions which control their women and believe in special status for religious institutions, in combination with being too “spiritual” to be subject to earthly powers (etc. etc.).

Perhaps Ben, John, and Tom all knew in advance, from the cultures they came from, that no one was going to ever treat the Indians as equals, or women as equals, unless they were dominated in warfare or by other force.

The Great Tree of Peace by David Yarrow, 1987. “New World Roots of American Democracy”

. . .It is no coincidence that the U.S. Constitution strikingly resembles, in both principle and form, the Great Law of Peace of the Six Nations Confederacy of the Iroquois League. When the Founding Fathers looked for examples of effective government and human liberty upon which to model a Constitution to unite the thirteen colonies, they found it in this New World society — not in Europe, usually considered the cradle of modern civilization.

The Great Law of Peace

The Confederacy arose centuries ago among separate, warring communities as a way to create harmony, unity and respect among human beings. Implicit in Iroquois political philosophy is commitment to the highest principles of human liberty. Iroquois Law”s recognition of individual liberty and justice surpasses any European parallel. Faithkeeper Oren Lyons, an Onondaga, states The Great Law of Peace includes “freedom of speech, freedom of religion, [and] the right of women to participate in government. Separation of power in government and checks and balances within government are traceable to our Iroquois constitution — ideas learned by colonists.”

The central idea underlying Iroquois political philosophy is that peace is the will of the Creator, and the ultimate spiritual goal and natural order among humans. The principles of Iroquois government embodied in The Great Law of Peace were transmitted by a historical figure called the Peacemaker. His teachings emphasize the power of Reason to assure Righteousness, Justice and Health among humans. Peace came to the Iroquois, not through war and conquest, but through the exercise of Reason guided by the spiritual mind. The Iroquois League is based not on force of arms or rule of law, but spiritual concepts of natural law applied to human society.

Iroquois and the U.S. Constitution

By the time the Declaration of Independence was signed, the Iroquois had practiced their own egalitarian government for hundreds of years. The Iroquois reputation for diplomacy and eloquence reveals they had securely evolved a sophisticated political system founded on reason, not on mere power. Accounts of the “noble savage” living in “natural freedom” had inspired European theorists John Locke and Jean-Jacques Rousseau to expound ideas that had ignited the American Revolution and helped shape the new direction of government.

But the Founding Fathers found their best working model for their new government, not in the writings of Europeans, but through their direct contact with the Iroquois League; for the Great Law of Peace provided both model and incentive to transform thirteen separate colonies into the United States.

George Washington, after a visit to the Iroquois, expressed “great excitement” over the Iroquois” two houses and Grand Council. Ben Franklin wrote, “It would be strange if ignorant savages could execute a union that persisted ages and appears indissoluble; yet like union is impractical for twelve colonies to whom it is more necessary and advantageous.”

At Cornell’s conference, Dr. Donald Grinde, Jr. of Gettysburg College presented evidence that Thomas Jefferson adopted the specific symbols of the Peacemaker legend. The Tree of Peace became the Tree of Liberty; the Eagle, clutching a bundle of thirteen arrows, became the symbol of the new American government.

Grinde also brought the revelation that “one of the framers, John Rutledge of South Carolina, chair of the drafting committee, read portions of Iroquois Law to members of the committee. He asked them to consider a philosophy coming directly from this American soil.”

The Great Law of Peace laid out a government “of the people, by the people and for the people” with three branches. The Onondaga, the Firekeepers, are the heart of the Confederacy. Similarly, the U.S. presidency forms an executive branch.

The League’s legislative branch is in two parts: Mohawk and Seneca are Elder Brothers who form the upper house, while Oneida and Cayuga are Younger Brothers, similar to the Senate and House of the United States Congress. The Iroquois” equivalent of a Supreme Court is the Women’s Councils, which settle disputes and judge legal violations.

Another resource: What Ben, John, Thomas, and Friends DIDN’T Adopt from the Iriquois, and why:

“The Birth of Frontier Democracy from an Eagle’s Eye View:
The Great Law of Peace and The Constitution of the United States of America.

by Gregory Schaaf, Ph.D.

(Later refs: in 2011, The Legacy of Los Alamos, Gregory and Angie Schaaf)

From the time of the signing of the Declaration of Independence to the ratification of the U.S. Constitution, the opportunity to create and to establish a new government challenged people to search for the roots of democracy. One of the little known secrets of the Founding Fathers is the fact that they discovered a democratic model not in Great Britain, France, Italy, nor any of the so-called “cradles of civilization. Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin and others found the oldest participatory democracies on earth among the American Indians.1

Representatives of the U.S. Congress met privately with ambassadors from the Haudenasaunee Six Nations Confederacy, as well as the Lenni Lenape, “Grandfathers of the Algonquian family of nations. For centuries these American Indian people were governed by democratic principles. Through wampum diplomacy, their traditional philosophy of liberty was advanced in a series of peace talks focused on the law of the land, the balance of power and the inherent rights of the people.2

American Indian Agent George Morgan and others served as intermediaries in these talks. His role as a diplomat demanded an intimate knowledge of the cultures, social structures and governments of the American Indians. He traveled safely through Indian communities and met with Indian leaders of frontier democracies. He witnessed societies where people were endowed with the right to speak freely, the right to assemble, religious freedom, as well as the separation of governmental powers into three branches.3

A system of checks and balances was firmly in place like the branches of the great “Tree of Peace among the Haudenausaunee, “People of the Longhouse. The United States government was structured surprisingly similar to their Grand Council.4

---

. . .
Why did the Founding Fathers choose to keep secret the original design of the United States government?

One clue may be related to a major difference between Iroquoian vs. U.S.’s judicial branches. The Iroquoian supreme court’ was entrusted to the women. Clan Mothers and Women’s Councils maintained a balance of power in their matrilineal society. Women nominated chief statesmen as political and religious leaders, lending a maternal insight into good leadership qualities. Their standards were set very high. While under the U.S. Constitution, qualifications of Congressmen were limited to age, citizenship and residency, Iroquoian women moreover required: 

All Royaneh (Chief Statesmen) of the Five Nations must be honest in all things. They must not idle or gossip, but be men possessing those honorable qualities.. .Their hearts shall be full of peace and good will and their minds filled with a yearning for the welfare of the people of the Confederacy. 

Women also held the power to impeach any leader who failed – after three warnings – to serve the best interests of the people. If the Founding Fathers had disclosed the political powers of many Indian women, perhaps women like Abigail Adams, wife of future President John Adams, could have effectively assumed positions as “Founding Mothers. White women could have argued they deserved, at least, equal rights with American Indian women.

In behalf of the people, women preserved title to the land through families and clans. This may be another facet of the Iroquoian system which some Founding Fathers may have preferred not to make public. In contrast, women in the United States were not permitted the right to own land, nor even to vote, much less control over the system of justice. Iroquoian women also maintained a sort of veto power to stop wars. If women across the land had known the truth about the power of Indian women, the call for equal rights could have been heard earlier, and American history might have changed over the past two hundred years.8

Two generations ago, Dr. Paul Wallace, a respected ethno historian in Iroquoian and Algonquian studies, traced the source of the first “United Nations .9 When I retraced these roots to Onondaga and then to Akwesasne, I was impressed by a stone monument to Dr. Wallace which stands before the Akwesasne Mohawk Longhouse. On the top was engraved the Tree of Peace followed by these words:

TO AMERICA’S OLDEST ALLY
THE IROQUOIS CONFEDERACY
“PEOPLE OF THE LONG HOUSE   Mohawks, Oneida, Onondaga, Cayugas, Senecas – To Whom Were Later Added
The Tuscaroras Constituting
THE SIX NATIONS

Founded by Deganawidah and Hiawatha who planted the Tree of Peace at Onondaga (Syracuse) sometime before the coming of Columbus.

   THEY EXCELLED IN STATESMANSHIP AND THE ART OF DIPLOMACY.  DURING MORE THAN A CENTURY OF INTER-COLONIAL STRIFE, THEY LOYALLY PROTECTED THE INFANT ENGLISH COLONIES, SHOWED THEM THE WAY TO UNION, AND SO HELPED PREPARE THE AMERICAN AND CANADIAN PEOPLE FOR NATION HOOD. 

IN MEMORY OF OUR BELOVED BROTHER TO-RI-WA-WA-KON (Dr. Paul A. Wallace) WHO, THROUGH HIS WRITINGS, SHOWED THE IROQUOIS CONFEDERACY AS IT TRULY EXISTED.

THANK YOU, TORIWAWAKON, FOR YOUR GREAT WORK.10

(Another source _- The U.S. Constitution: What our kids weren’t taught in School”

George Washington, Ben Franklin and Thomas Jefferson met frequently with the Iroquois and made themselves very familiar with the Great Law of Peace.

Washington expressed “great excitement” over the two houses and Grand Counsel.

Several delegates from the Iroquois Confederacy attended the Continental Congress in 1776 as it wrote the Declaration of Independence and drafted the Constitution of the United States, modeling it on the Iroquois Constitution. Three weeks later, the Declaration of Independence was signed, and the United States of America was born.

What got left out of the U.S. Constitution

In fact, just about the only parts of the Great Law of Peace that our founding fathers didn’t incorporate were these:

The Seventh Generation principle:  The Constitution of the Iroquois Confederacy states that chiefs consider the impact of their decisions on the seventh generation to come.

The role of women: Clan mothers choose candidates [who are male] as sachems [political leaders].  The women maintain ownership of land and homes, and exercise veto power over any council action that may result in war.  The women can also impeach and expel any leader who conducts himself improperly or loses the confidence of the electorate; then the women choose a new leader.

Imagine how different our world would be today if our government had included these principles from the start…

(there’s more at http://mollylarkin.com, including from this post).

NOW??

FEMALE in a FOREIGN LAND?

I learned as a woman and this culture that acceptance was conditional upon my accepting the submissive, sub-dominant position, or be beaten, robbed, and spat out for lack of “collaboration,” equality was off the map, or even thinking about it. I am not just talking about the marriage itself, which also didn’t occur in a vacuum.

I call that not collaboration but conspiracy. It should be no secret that sometimes women are doing this within our culture, in gangs. But, many of these women doing it are doing so as they have “bought” the concept of inequality based on gender already. They may have been hurt by it, and turned all bitter inside, and as a result to start feeling better, need to gang up on some others (i.e., “how good I feel” is directly related to “how much pain can I inflict, thereby feeling more powerful”), or others who have “bought” the male system and know quite well that if they identified (other than in a condescending, patronizing way) to the weak and outcast (by the same system) they too might be spat out. Either that, or in the process of success, they lost their souls.

(I am thinking of specific people in writing that). … I also note that one of the most healing experiences I personally had, apart from some terrific work ones, was having a relationship with my children. I can’t speak to what a relationship with a really good father or husband might be, not having had one available at the time; i.e., I was being assaulted pregnant, and coercively and economically dominated (i.e., the system was set up for further control) before then. Like a pack of wolves, there was not going to be any peace, until a pecking order was established (by this particular man), it was a war zone from the start. I was given the option of either crawling (lower and lower was clearly the plan) and hence becoming a dissociative stranger to myself, and others — or walking, standing up, which of course resulted in more abuse. There WAS nothing else in the marriage. THAT was my experience of marriage, in its essence. A decade later, this guy still thinks he has some hold on me, or cause to communicate, after everything… He had no life in him, all he had was to go forth and destroy. He has not created any work life, or professional life (before, during or after) and hasn’t figured out that most people would rather see a sermon than hear one. I don’t believe he’s gotten therapy or meds either. His one apparent hope of “redemption” is to force me (STILL!!) to engage in some sort of relationship; in some circles this is now called “stalking.”

Comment: Some of the meanest women towards other women are NOT active mothers of young children, and that hostility is sometimes meanest towards those who are; apparently seeing that confronts something they’d rather not, in their own lives. This should not be necessary if there were a normal equality between the sexes, and women weren’t culturally valued while they can “breed” and thereafter get spat out if they don’t stay married; or (alternately) get divorced and get rich, which is our culture.

So one reason, THIS post, is that it presents two quotes from a meaningful (to me, as a woman) site, in fact a Canadian site looks like. And because there’s times of a fire in the belly (which so many of us has) and then sometimes that is just grief. I very much know WHY any culture has to silence women if it is going to dominate a natural, and peaceful integrated way of life. While we are so much more than only “family” and have multiple capabilities while multi-tasking, and we can and collectively WILL, at times, charge full speed ahead to move an obstacle or danger from our young. We don’t, I believe, need slaves (or to be one) or empires to feel good.

Why Now?

I am not blogging this for “fun.” I am blogging it because we are leading up to (this weekend) another orgiastic celebration of a declared national holiday called “Fathers’ Day.” I don’t have a problem with fathers’ days or mothers’ days, except that I note that by the time something has to become a “holiday,” it’s probably an artifact in the culture. The root word of “holiday” being “holy” we are supposed to revere these things.

The becomes a problem when the clout of the entire welfare system (which is itself a factor of a corporate system, a.k.a. empire, a.k.a. wealth-accumulator) is re-tooled to saturate itself with the theology of “Responsible Fatherhood/Healthy Marriage,” which is designed to perpetuate an INequality between the sexes on the basis that there have been single mothers raising children and some of these were on “welfare.” etc.

I can’t hang with that, or shut up about it.

As a religious survivor of domestic violence (that’s at least one of my descriptions that fits) and as a conscientiously-objecting (that menas non-attending) Christian (although traditional Christians wouldn’t call me one because I don’t “go with the flow” surrounding the Trinity. Sorry, but I read (Bible and history), that’s just how it goes. And it’s time to take a closer look at the background of the national myths, as well as the collective corporate myths that comprise “Christianity” today.

For one, we have a United States Congress which is 98% showing a religious affiliation and the main one is Christian. Only 6% Jews as of the 113th Congress, and very few anything else. The question comes up, why are Christians (protestant, esp. Baptist and Catholic both) so drawn to positions of authority, control, and ruling at public cost over large provinces (states) and their budgets and laws? I’m particularly concerned about why there are so few Jewish Congressmen (or women) in light of, we went to war to prevent extermination, or so the story goes, and in large part is (not including about where we went to war to protect Bush and other family fortunes when Poland nationalized a multi-national business interest, etc.) [[I’ve linked before, or you can look, not doing the honors for that last paragraph… I also have an impending part in draft which discusses this.]]

That said, the religious abusive marriage I was part of allegedly wasn’t Trinitarian. However, so what? — being theologically more accurate doesn’t particularly deter domestic violence at all. Some of the most vicious abusers, and some murderers and criminals, have done so with Bibles in hand. And being in regular contact with a non-religious community at large was no deterrent either. Apparently people create private spaces in their mind (or something else does) which justify these things. There ALWAYS is some kind of “justification” upstairs somewhere in the mix.

I can truthfully say, it’s engrained throughout our culture not to “approve of it” (if people were be to quizzed: “Do you approve of assault and battery in order to exercise manly Christian leadership,” or, “if someone is REALLY provoked, is it all right to throw a woman around, slap her, straddle and choke, hit and threaten, destroy personal property and in general terrorize her (with or without little kids nearby), for being uppity?” — most people would SAY, to your face “No! of Course Not” (some may not, but many would)” and go about their normal lives, which may or may not include those behaviors, or codependently enabling them the next time it shows up as a live, in-your-face situation for lack of a safer option, of for not giving a damn.

I have eventually concluded people tolerate it because they have not themselves carefully thought through their priorities, and have taken for granted, or at lesat accepted, a world in which paying tribute to government means — someone else is supposed to prosecute.

In which they don’t have a clear understanding of the fiscal structure in which their lives have been built, or which their parents were. Not the extent and the depth of the wealth-transfer strategies, or the institutions which do this (of which one is obviously the welfare system, and another, the family /conciliation court system; another is their own houses of worship (if that applies) and yet another is the public school system. MOST of these are on the corporate model and that particular model doesn’t give people who don’t play to win (by its rules, or taking advantage of how easy it is to simply break them)

I know I didn’t. I can’t “spiritualize” abuse any more. I don’t believe the “domestic violence industry” is moral or ethical. But people are still suffering from it, and particularly mothers — and yes I CAN say this (you battered men), even as I know plenty of very abusive women. In the bigger picture, the male corporate model is a hierarchy (strict) which, when adhered to and not challenged too much, works very efficiently, particularly at dominating other cultures and countries. However, it’s not a very HUMANE model, and for that we need more equality between the sexes throughout the system, AND we need to pay better attention to those cultures the Europeans wiped out while establishing commerce and trade, etc.

Incidentally, I found this site while looking up (in re: AFCC, Kinsey Institute, Stanley Cohen Awards, etc.) this Nazi war criminal; child-rapist murderer wanted by interpol, but protected by Alfred Kinsey of Indiana University as he was sending scientific information (sexual responses of kids he raped) to him, over what looks like a 30-year period. Such a science, we don’t need,. but it’s still around today. Another woman (related) came out as an adult and narrated how Kinsey paid her father to rape her (starting age 7) and send in the results, and was paid for it. This payment comes from grants and federal funding. (See Stunning Validation post). The heritage and history of this entire field is a dark one; it is dishonorable, which is why it has to be hidden and re-framed as noble, or beneficial.

Mohawk Nation News “Kahntineta” wrote how that type of perversion is intentional, to re-direct the sexual energies (from a young age). She related it to also how indigenous children were taken away to schools to be programmed out of who they were for the white way. This was also done in Africa, as I have repeatedly referenced (See Klaus Dierks/Namibia). It is how to dominate another culture — you have to dominate the women. You have to take their children, who they would otherwise raise to respect themselves, and who they would NOT subject to rapists or batterers.

This somehow spoke to me (perhaps because it was from a different source) in a way that made sense. Here’s that section. MNN stands for “Mohawk Nation News.” I have quoted almost the entire short article (I notice she has also referenced Judith Reisman’s page). It’s well-said.

By the way, I’m thinking it’s the same person described HERE:

Kahn-Tineta Horn (born 16 April 1940, New York City) is a renowned Mohawk political activist, civil servant, and former fashion model.[3][4] “Since 1972 she has held various positions in the social, community and educational development policy sections of the federal Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development.”[5] She is a member of the Mohawk Wolf Clan of Kahnawake.[6]

---

In the 1960s and early 1970s, Kahn-Tineta Horn became widely known for her criticisms of anti-native racism and government policy regarding First Nations peoples, and for her advocacy of native separatism. “She was involved in the 1962 Conference on Indian Poverty in Washington D.C., the blocking of the International Bridge at Akwesasne in 1968, and other indigenous rights campaigns.”[7] Kahn-Tineta caught the attention of the media in 1964, when she was “deposed as a Director of the National Indian Council, and as Indian Princess of Canada.”[8] By 1972, her separatist views had appeared in the pages of The Harvard Crimson*** and The New Yorker,[9][10][11] and she had been interviewed by The Webster Reports of KVOS-TV, a Bellingham, Washington station which broadcasts to Vancouver, British Columbia.[12]

***SPEAKING OF WHICH (notice: about 53 yrs ago…)

“Indian Criticizes White Civilization
NO WRITER ATTRIBUTED
April 24, 1970
“Everything connected with the white man is bad for the Indian,” Kahn-Tineta Horn-a member of the Caughnawaga reservation in Quebec-said last night at Harvard.

“We want as little integration with white people as possible,” Kahn-Tineta added. “We must keep to our reservations and develop them to remedy the damage done by the white man’s intrusion.”

Kahn-Tineta is touring the U.S., Canada, and Britain to raise funds for suits against the Canadian government, which, she says, is trying to abolish the Indian’s reservations and special legal rights.

Paradise
“Students in higher education have a prejudice: they say everyone is equal,” Kahn-Tineta adde. “The truth is that the Indians are very different. They are a people who lived in a permanent paradise, where there was very little competition.

“The Indians can’t identify with a teaching system that trains people for competition,” she said. . . . ( a section saying, no, no alliances with “the Negro” — don’t call us, we’ll call you and we don’t have a phone)
Kahn-Tineta attacked the role of the woman in white society. “I think the Indian woman should stay home with the children,” she said. “You see what happens to the over-educated women in America.”

[[She’s got that one right in more than one sense!!]]

(More WIKIPEDIA):

Horn and her daughters were notable participants in the 1990 Oka Crisis.[13][14] Her daughter, Waneek Horn-Miller (born 1975), was stabbed in the chest by a soldier’s bayonet while holding Horn; a photograph of the incident, published on the front page of newspapers, symbolized the standoff between Mohawks and the Canadian government.[15] Waneek became a broadcaster, and captain of the Canada women’s national water polo team at the 2008 Summer Olympics.[16] Horn’s youngest daughter, Kaniehtiio Horn, also present at the Oka Crisis, is a film and television actress.[17]

Kahn-Tineta Horn has appeared in two short films, Artisans de notre histoire, Volume 2: Les Explorateurs (1995) and David Thompson: The Great Mapmaker (1964).[18] She has served as publisher of the Mohawk Nation News.[19] She has served as Director of the Canadian Alliance in Solidarity with Native Peoples and coordinator of the Free Wolverine Campaign.[20] In 2002, she gave a speech at the “You Are on Native Land Conference” at McGill University titled, How Canada violated the BNA Act to Steal Native Land: The Forgotten Arguments of Deskaheh.[21] In 2006, Kahn-Tineta Horn was one of two women who submitted a “notice of seizure” to the developers of the Melacthon Wind Farm near Shelburne, Ontario on behalf of the Haudenosaunee,[22] and taught a history class at Concordia University in Montreal.[23] In 2008, at age 68, she suffered a heart attack while “handcuffed in a police stress hold” at the Cornwall/Akwesasne border crossing.[24][25][26]
Quotation[edit]

“The root of the word ‘society’ is ‘friendship’ and ‘companionship’. This concept is the basis of the Kaienerekowa, the Great Law of Peace, the Constitution of the Five Nations Iroquois Confederacy. The Great Law is a way of life that was given to us as we saw it. It’s how we are to relate to the universe, which is the way that I have tried to live.”[27]

FROM a 2011 Interview. By the above, at this point she is about 71 years old…

***** therapy instead of prosecution for criminal behavior is the whole premise behind the establishment of specialized courts to treat the “family” which had previously been broken up by other institutions, by the same government interests who designed and programmed the schools (pre-school working on through universities), and urban areas with inferior school systems for the corporate workers, etc…..) AND who designed the prisons… Same general idea; She has said it well “education changed from analytical thinking to the dog training rote learning method.” I saw this happening as a mother and as a teacher, and when I protested, some proselytes helped take my kids. Obviously, it’s a little difficult to reprogram an adult mother who has been paying attention to what’s affecting her own children, and who has already stood up to a batterer. The only way to “get” people like (me, like us) is through threat, force, and an attempt to break us. I know many mothers, and we don’t break that easy — but the problem is, the systems are in place to keep it up for as long as possible, including for a “siege.”

How? Because we are not a nation of self-sufficient for food, transportation, housing, or almost anything people. We are dependent on buying and selling. So, income is a large deal. This is why we have to look at the discrepancies between those setting policy and those who will be subject to it.

More discussion (a few paragraphs), then another quote from this woman (who I’ve never met, or even heard).

Women in the church can’t protect their kids from this behavior, because too many of the men are obsessed with their own leadership position; the larger world (which is trending a different direction) FRIGHTENS them, and as with the home, some (many) churches are placaes where their headship is not supposed to be questioned. In exchange for sticking up for their headship (the wrong kind) over their own women, they as men are often willing to submit to pastoral headship (quid per quo male bonding) which ends up in an entire culture which is, in a word, HEIRARCHY. This culture then is placed and exists as a landowner or leaser of property, sometimes with paid leadership, and with tax-deductible contributions which attracts money from the wealthy, and accepts it from the poor in exchange for “social services” or at least a sense of community.

Women who break this by standing up to their abusive husbands, and/or evicting them legally (as I did), or who in short don’t come submissively to the pastor and ask to please, intervene, are breaking unspoken (or spoken) protocol and threatening the commercial viability of the church, which needs them for that commercial (and social) viability.

I cringe when I see this still going on — women want to stand up, but still continue to give men the megaphone and equal status in addressing abuse WITHIN the church…. This is, at some level, a slap in the face to those who have been murdered by their religious husbands; it’s in my opinion dishonorable. However, it took me actually trying that (along with other reach-out methods) and almost being killed as a direct result of the “come into our office for joint counseling” approach from a large, multicultural church.

If Christianity is going to keep its nose clean (or clean out is closets) it is probably going to have to face its historical corporate structure HONESTLY — and take a lesson from some other cultures… Who are not engaging in genocide and levelling the landscape to get to the real culprits. This movement I believe, should it take place, is going to have to come from women willing to just quit the churches as “old wineskins” and figure out something different, once the heads are clear of the rhetoric. I don’t believe that means, abandoning the Bible — but it may require a little more immersion of it in a different place. How about outside, like in a beautiful natural setting, and in a quiet place for a while?

This, however, is part of an interview which talks about the relationship between the sexes.

I’m putting in most of it, because it is in such contrast with the concept of expanding EMPIRE and owning it all. Another chief difference is respect of nature. Compare and contrast with what we know of the Roman Empire, which concluded its days with huge “bread and circuses,” and decimated animal populations for the gladiatorial contests and show, at huge expense. In short, it was a culture that celebrated death, and a lot of it. Roads, trade, aqueducts, plumbing (remember the baths) — and death. Such a deal — if you submit…

After finding the Wikipedia article (on this woman), I looked up some of the footnotes. It is a good explanation of the difference between “The Great Law” and a bastardation of it, with a “native indian” flair, but lacking the essence (and the self-sufficiency) of it. Well said; it’s also what I’ve been trying to say. I have known since my own marriage that abusive religions produce abusive marriages; we were hardly the only ones around. But cowed and controlled and monitored by the (protestant evangelical church that we had gone to for a period — the one where I almost got killed while in counseling; HE almost killed in retaliation for speaking WITHOUT him present to a pastor; he shouldn’ve have worried; if they were mandated reporters, looks like they didn’t, and they didn’t refer to any outside source of help either)… the women are allowed to have “women’s fellowships.” They are empowering, however they are also controlled. So while people (including other women) KNEW of the home abuse from this sector — they did not stand up to anyone for me or my kids. They did not speak out. Nothing substantial was done except by one leader, who was later fired. Guess she got too “inspired.” Hence, only a few men can control hundreds of families… and raise funds for more buildings.

1997:

THE MAIN DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE
GREAT LAW / KAIENEREKOWA AND THE
HANDSOME LAKE CODE / GARI’WIIO

Kahn-Tineta Horn
Kahnawake Mohawk Territory
July 15, 1997
 Distributed by Mohawk Nation News Service
Tel: 514-635-8696
Fax: 514-635-8693
Email: mohawkns@cyberglobe.net

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A request was made by political prisoner, OJ Pitawanakwat, who is a Gustafsen Lake defendant awaiting sentencing, for an explanation of the Great Law. He is defending himself. The following explanation was sent to him.

“In the Handsome Lake Code and other Christian-based religions there is a hierarchical order of the spirit forces outlined in the opening thanksgiving address, as well as a hierarchy of offices in the Long House and a hierarchy of medicines arranged according to power. (Shimony: 290). There is no hierarchy in the Great Law. It is instead an interdependent system of relationships of all elements of nature which are equal. These relationships are outlined in the opening thanksgiving address called the ahenton kariwatekwen, “the words that come before everything”.

Tekarontake, a Mohawk, who is fluent in the Mohawk language and who interprets the Great Law in both Mohawk and English, provided some insights.

 The opening, the ahenton kariwatekwen, “the words that come before every matter”, begins by paying respect to the people who still follow the Great Law. The people are reminded of the necessity of good relations between themselves in order to be more productive and happy.

 Then they extend their respect to the earth, which is their mother, and how their own functions parallels the role of the earth. A person is born from their mother. The immunities and medicines they inherit come from living on her. Their mother is one of the family, not more important than any other member of the family. She has a specific role and way of doing things.

 The waters are the cousins with whom each person associates everyday and are a necessary part of their lives. From there respect is extended to the contents of the waters, the fish, plant life and other beings. Food and medicines needed to live healthy come from the waters. The plant life is referred to as the “sisters”, such as corn, beans and squash, strawberries and other foods. They are given the same respect as the mother and cousins. Then respect is given to their brothers and sisters, the animals, insects and birds, who too are beneficial to the people. The people grow up with their relations, they constantly help one another, and are all part of the continuation of life.

 Then respect is extended to the grandfathers, the four winds and thunderers who too are part of the family. They help to renew elements of nature for the people and continually show their natural and beneficial functions. The grandmother is the moon which has a lot of knowledge, particularly for the females. From the moon the people learn the best time to put seeds into the ground, to pick medicines, it controls the cycle of the women and when new phases are coming onto the earth.

The sun is the eldest brother who is the example for the men to follow. The sun gives support to the earth by warming it so things can grow. He helps give support and reinforcement to the people. He beautifies everything that has been put on the earth. The men too protect and support the people, particularly the women. They help raise the children and ensure their well being and continuation of life.

 Then respect is given to the distant cousins, the stars. They were used by the people’s ancestors for direction as they traveled. The people do not always see them but when they do they are at their brightest. They have a lot of knowledge and strength should the people ever need their assistance.

All elements of Creation are an important and necessary part of everything else in the world, not above or beneath anything. Every individual in the family has a different function. In the raising of the names in the long house, every child is a child of the people, who, together must support that child and recognize and develop their natural abilities. Thus the natural world is the family and respect is given to all the relatives equally. There is no hierarchy.

The big one created everything. “Now let us turn our direction to the Gasatstensera kowa, the “big natural power” that is great and natural. We shall never know the face of this power, nor the name of this power nor where this power dwells. All we will know is the creation of this power and that it is logical. It is neither male nor female.

 Kaienerekowa comes from the word “kaienere” which means the “great, good path”. Royaner, the word of chiefs, mean “he has a path”. “Yakoyaner”, the clan mother, means “she has a path”. In other words, a natural direction has already been set for everyone to follow which is good and beneficial to everyone. There is an eagle that sits at the top of the tree which will scream a warning if we go off that path. The 50 chiefs are equal in power. None are higher than the other. Some nations have more clans, more territory and larger populations, but all have an equal place. The people were not rulers but have a specific path set for them. Yotiyanaien, the path they must follow is the great path which is the Kaienerekowa, the Great Law.

 Tekarontake asks, “Is one part of the natural world more important or deserving than another? No one in the family can be put higher than another. All come from the same creation – mother, father, grandmother, grandfather, sisters, brothers, cousins, nephews, nieces, uncles and aunts. How can there be peace and harmony when others are above the rest?”

 The Kaienerekowa is real democracy based on natural righteousness, which acknowledges all that is real. Kariwiiostonsera, man made righteousness, creates devils, angels and unproveable nonsense to scare and control the people. Mystery is created to confuse the people. According to the Great Law, everything is reality. Kari-wiio means it is real.

 Said Tekarontake, “There are some things that are not understood and unexplainable, such as Creation. It wasn’t meant for us to understand. People have mixed the European-Christian school of thinking with the understanding of the Great Law. This is seen as an abuse of this unexplainable power or phenomenon. They are just as abusive and exploitative as those who abuse nature like the strip miners who rip out elements of the earth which were meant to remain there. Confusion, inequality and inferiority complexes are created through unsubstantiated explanations for unexplainable powers. Creation has been made perfectly with all forces and facilities necessary to help the people. Praying or paying homage to unexplained spirits will not resolve their problems. Facing reality will.

Abusing these elements of Creation harms the people. Those who promote pseudo native spirituality are exploiting the fears and harming people by making them dependent on their guidance rather than making them self-reliant and self-sufficient. These bogus ‘healers’ pacify the Aboriginal people and take away their spirit to survive. They promote unprovable dogmas and doctrines and convince the Aboriginal people that they must live in peace. Yet the authorities who promote peace use their armed police and soldiers to force native people into doing their bidding. In nature any animal or creature that does not have any defenses to ensure their survival become extinct. The Aboriginal people too will become extinct if they rely on this nonsense.”

2008 — she and her daughter? (both grandmothers) were attacked and beaten by Canadian border guards returning from the United States. She had a heart attack when handcuffs in a stress hold cut off her circulation. The story says it all:

Kahentinetha Horn attacked at border
Kahentinetha Horn, beaten at border by officers and hospitalized after heart attack; Katenies beaten and jailed

By Brenda Norrell (@ Censored News)
Human Rights Editor
U.N. OBSERVER & International Report at the Hague
http://www.unobserver.com/

Update: Telephone interview on Tuesday afternoon with Katenies, beaten by Canadian police and border agents. Kahentinetha remains in the hospital, condition unknown, after suffering a heart attack in custody

AKWESASNE — Mohawk grandmothers Kahentinetha Horn and Katenies were in custody at the US/Canadian border, when the two women were handcuffed and beaten by gangs of officers and border patrol agents on Saturday, June 14, 2008. Eight officers beat Kahentinetha, 68 years old, and five officers beat Katenies. Kahentinetha, publisher of Mohawk Nation News, suffered a heart attack and is in a Canadian hospital. Katenies has been released from a Canadian jail and is in seclusion.

Katenies, in a telephone interview on Tuesday afternoon, described the police attack on the women at the border. Katenies said the women were returning to Canada from a visit in the US, when they were stopped at the border. After the women showed their Haudenosaunee identification, they were told the IDs were not sufficient and they were detained.

Katenies was told she had an earlier warrant. She had refused to recognize the authority of the Canadian government over her. In the earlier case she had stopped at a border check and was granted permission to pass, but border agents later claimed she was not cleared to pass. When she refused to recognize the authority of the Canadian government over her, a warrant resulted.

On Saturday, when Katenies refused to get out of the car, five huge Canadian officers and border agents jumped on her, dragged her out and threw her to the concrete, grinding her chin into the concrete.
“I went down so fast, they had knees in my back and kidneys. They were like a football team on me and they acted like they had no boundaries.”

“They told me if I didn’t cooperate, they would break my arms.”As officers attacked Katenies, Kahentinetha was on her cell phone calling family members and authorities for help.

When Kahentinetha refused to hang up, eight officers attacked her.

Katenies was placed in a cell and could hear the officers bring in Kahentinetha. Katenies could hear Kahentinetha yelling for them to loosen the handcuffs. By the screams of pain, Katenies said it sounded like the police were continuing to tighten the handcuffs as Kahentinetha cried out.

Kahentinetha was handcuffed in a stress hold. The handcuffs cut off Kahentinetha’s circulation and she suffered a heart attack. A family member arrived at the same time and was able to get an ambulance immediately for Kahentinetha and she was transported to a hospital.

Katenies was transported to jail in Cornwall, where she remained from Saturday until Monday evening. Katenies said the women were not charged, but were told they would be charged at a later date.

Kahentinetha remains in the hospital, with family present, and her condition is unknown.
A member of the Mohawk Warrior Society said, “They did this because we have the greatest weapon, the truth, and what Kahentinetha writes is the truth. They are terrified of the truth. What they are trying to do is provoke the Mohawks.” He said ultimately what they want is to provoke the Mohawks into a confrontation so the Mohawks who are resisting will be shot and killed. He said the Canadian government’s plan was to assassinate Kahentinetha.

Monday
By Brenda Norrell

Kahentinetha Horn, publisher of Mohawk Nation News, was beaten by special forces at the US/Canadian border and suffered a heart attack. Kahentinetha is currently hospitalized in Canada. Katenies, who was accompanying her, was taken to prison at an undisclosed location. Please read the following message, which has been confirmed as true, and contact the leaders of Canada and demand both women be released and justice served to the perpetrators.

Kahentinetha’s articles on sovereignty, mining on Indigenous lands, corruption and border rights have made her a priority target of the Canadian government for assassination. While on the Arizona border in November, at the Indigenous Border Summit of the Americas II, she challenged the Tohono O’odham Nation’s incarceration of Indigenous migrants in the outdoor “cage,” construction of the border vehicle barrier through the ceremonial route and the digging up of O’odham ancestors for the border wall by the contractor Boeing.

As the borders were increasingly militarized by Homeland Security and Canadian corporations increasingly seized Indigenous Peoples lands for mining, Kahentinetha and Katenies, were targeted with death threats.

Posted: Mon Jun 16, 2008 4:42 pm Post subject: Kahentinetha Horn, Katenies attacked at the border!
ONE ELDER SAVED BY A HEART ATTACK – ANOTHER ELDER MISSING IN ACTION: MOHAWK GRANDMOTHERS ATTACKED AT CANADA-US BORDER CROSSING ON UNCEDED HAUDENOSAUNEE LAND
Monday, June 16, 2008Mohawk Elder and Grandmother, Kahentinetha Horn suffered a heart attack, Saturday, June 14, 2008 during a vicious, unprovoked assault by OPP and border agents at Cornwall, in Akwesasne community. She had been beaten and handcuffed when she collapsed. Earlier when she was pulled over, Kahentinetha immediately contacted her brother, a lawyer, on her cellphone. The entire incident was being filmed as her brother rushed to the scene just in time to call an ambulance for her.Meanwhile, Elder and Grandmother Katenies of Akwesasne was beaten and taken prisoner to an as yet undisclosed location. We are very concerned about her safety. We demand to know of her whereabouts and that she be> released immediately.

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A few months ago, Julian Fantino put out the word, warning Kahentinetha not to set foot in Ontario or else. She is the publisher of MNN and regular internet reports that are very critical of police and government actions toward Indigenous people. Her articles often clearly state the legalities/realities of the situation that Canada is a corporation plundering unceded Turtle Island. The land and resources belong to the Ongwehoneh people. Canada’s huge debt to us will bankrupt them forever.

The other day, while Stephen Harper was making a public apology to Indigenous for the crimes of the residential schools, he was also preparing to send the army in at 6 nations. Brantford city mayor has requested it, stating his city police cannot handle another “Mohawk uprising”, in other words, peaceful protests against housing development where non resident, non Natives attack the protesters while the police watch.

The Ontario Conservatives call for military intervention every day. On Saturday, border agents were pulling over every Native person. Kahentinetha and Katenies were traveling in Akwesasne in the course of their regular activities and were caught up in the dragnet. Did Fantino set up a trap for the two outspoken, Mohawk grandmothers? We suspect that Kahentinetha would have been killed at a secret location had she not had a heart attack and been taken to hospital. Immediately following this incident, many Mohawks and supporters started to gather at Akwesasne. Kahentinetha and Katenies’ attackers want them to accept being Canadian or else they will kill them and anyone else who resists colonization. This low level warfare is playing out on the “border” between Canada and the US, an imaginary line drawn right through the Mohawk community of Akwesasne and through Haudenosaunee territory which is a vast area on BOTH sides of the Great Lakes. This Great Lakes area is also a proposed center for the NWO.

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Many military plans are underway including nuclear submarines in the Great Lakes and JTF2, Aerospace Warfare Center and NATO FOB (Forward Operating> Base) at a new base being built at Trenton, near Tyendinaga Mohawk community. Tyendinaga was attacked by OPP/SWAT in April when Mohawks protested housing development there.

If Canadians are so damned sorry about the abuse of Native people, why is this still happening? Why do people remain silent when Mohawk elders and grandmothers are attacked like this? We are under constant surveillance> and threats and attacks while our land continues to be plundered and pillaged. Was this a failed assassination attempt ordered by Julian Fantino, commissioner of OPP and head of the biggest gang in the area? We must demand answers and get answers. This attempted genocide must cease. We will never give up.>> Call or write to politicians, media, action lists including international. Get the word out now!!!

K….. will be speaking with Kevin Annett on live radio today at 4:30 pmMontreal time.

Iakoha’ko:wa Sharbot Lake, Haudenosaunee Territory PLEASE SEND YOUR OBJECTIONS TO: QUEENIE ELIZABETH II, Buckingham Palace,>> LONDON UK; Governor General MICHAELLE “Haitian-Against-the-Nation” JEAN, 1>> Rideau Hall, OTTAWA, ONTARIO info@gg.ca; Canada Prime Minister STEPHEN>> HARPER, House of Commons, OTTAWA, ONTARIO harper.s@parl.gc.ca; Ontario Premier DALTON McGUINTY, Queen’s Park, TORONTO, ONTARIO mcguinty.D@parl.gc.ca; United Nations unat@un.org; Indian Affairs Minister Strahl.c@parl.gc.ca; Brantford Mayor Michael Hancock 519-759-3330 nborowicz@brantford.ca; Ontario Attorney General 416-326-2220 or 1-800-518-7901; Minister Ontario Aboriginal Affairs Michael Bryant % Lars.Eedy@ontario.ca, Neil Smitheman, Brantford ambulance chaser n.smitheman@fasken.com 416-868-3441; Aaron Detlor adetlor@sympatico.ca; Bev Jacobs bjacobs@nwac.hq.org; Julian Fantino OPP Commissioner julian.fantino@jus.gov.on.ca; s “Paul Leblanc of \”Indian\” Affairs” , Sylvia McKenzie Justice Canada , Emanuel Chabot Public Affairs 7 Emergency Preparedness, Louis-Alesandre Guay “Justice Canada lguay”@justice.gc.ca, Gilles Rochon Aboriginal Policing> , “Chuck Strahl Minister of \”Indian\” Affairs” See http://www.mohawknationnews.com/

The fact is, sounds like they ARE a sovereign nation…. And that they know this is a real problem. Imagine if the word spread…. (From 1991, Studies in Political Economy/”Beyond Oka: Dimensions in Mohawk Sovereignty” an Interview with Kahn-Tineta Horn (standoff over expansion of a GOLF COURSE into their lands; siege, cut off supplies, etc. Sounds like WACO in some respects…)

Check this out: from “Matrix Cultures: In the Web of Life (Max Dashu, listed “forthcoming”), In the context, they are talking, literally, about women’s rights (recognized) to stop wars, and gave some example:

The Haudenosaunee had a saying, “Before the men can go to war, the women must make their moccasins.” The Cherokee had a similar tradition. Men could not go off to war without the dried food, moccasins, and other supplies provided by women. (Both these traditions also formally designated offices, such as the Ghigau or Beloved Woman of the Cherokee, with authority in political, diplomatic and military affairs.)

Kahn-Tineta Horn led a group of Mohawk women in invoking this female power as the the U.S. was threatening to invade Iraq in 2003. Their email, Moccasin Makers and War Breakers: a call to action by the women of the world, streaked around the Internet. It began, “We have the power to stop the war! ‘Before the men can go to war, the women must make their moccasins.” This saying meant that the women’s approval was necessary for an undertaking that affected them so deeply. The Mohawk women recapped how the Haudenosaunee Confederacy began by overcoming violence and war with the Great Law of Peace, and how the United States Constution, and later the United Nations Charter, were based on principles originated by the Six Nations of the Iroquois. “Our law is the basis of modern international law.”

They went on to say, “Our ancestors recognized the sovereignty of all men and women by solving community conflicts through discussion in a People’s Council. In our tradition, three criteria must be kept in mind through all deliberations.” These are Peace, which must be kept at all costs; Righteousness, “taking into consideration the needs of seven generations to come,” and Power, “meaning the power of the people must be maintained including the equal sovereignty of all men and all women.”

Respect for different customs of other nations is a must, and war should only be a last resort. “We ask the women of the world to come forward and play their rightful role as the progenitors, the creators of all men, of all humanity, the caretakers of the earth and of all that lives upon it.”

Copyright 2005 Max Dashu

Want to change a nation and dominate it? It’s not always necessary to resort to extermination ONCE dominance has been established. Change the cultures, eradicate the self-sufficient lifestyles, force the people then to either work for the corporate complex (make railways roads and skyscrapers. See Rockefeller, Carnegie, etc.) Make them dig for diamonds (See Rhodes/Oppenheimer) and then control the market.

Slave labor came from the concentration camps, including Auschwitz, and it came for railways, in German Southwest Africa (Shark Island was only one of several, but pretty well says it all)**. They built until they died, men and women together. It was witnessed and documented, then covered up when the Germans and Brits made peace for other international purposes.

Take their kids for state indoctrination into the new way of life. I just quoted a woman (and an elder in the Bear Clan it says) who claims she spoke only Mohawk til she was 10. (Understanding this is also Canada).

BELOW is another point of reference for a way of LIVING, not a way of “doing business.” WHEN CENSORSHIP IS INVOLVED, YOU KNOW THEY KNOW IT’S WRONG:

Words Cannot Be Found: German Colonial Rule in Namibia (Apparently you can read it free, on-line, here).

Synopsis
The 1918 Blue Book Report on the Natives of South-West Africa and Their Treatment by Germany, is based on the voluntary statements taken under oath of no less than 50 African witnesses. This testimony was combined with numerous German colonial documents to produce, not only a stinging indictment of German colonial policy in German South West Africa, but also the first detailed eyewitness accounts of the first genocide of the twentieth century. However, within ten years of being printed, orders were issued for the destruction of all copies of the Blue Book within the British Empire. The editors have investigated how the Blue Book came into being, provided background information to the events and people described, and sought to discover the original German documents upon which so much of the Blue Book material is based. The particular usefulness of the book lies in the fact that it gives voice to African testimony regarding the first genocide of the Twentieth Century.

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Regarding “Words Cannot Tell” which is a 1918 “Blue Book” put in context for the centenary of the Namibian war (of Herero and Nama against the Germans), as follows:

Jeremy Silvester, Jan-Bart Gewald, eds. Words Cannot Be Found: German Colonial Rule in Namibia: An Annotated Reprint of the 1918 Blue Book. Leiden: Brill, 2003. xxxvii + 366 pp. $49.00 (paper), ISBN 978-90-04-12981-8.

Reviewed by Meredith McKittrick (Department of History, Georgetown University)
Published on H-SAfrica (July, 2007)

This famous report was republished in honor of the 2004 centenary of the 1904-08 Namibian War–in which Herero and Nama fought, and were defeated by, German colonial occupiers at a horrific cost. The editors, Jeremy Silvester and Jan-Bart Gewald, intend it as “a memorial to those who died” (p. xxxvi). They have added to the original Blue Book a substantial and informative introduction that places the document in its historical context, exploring its creation, its near-destruction, its importance to Namibian history, and its significance to a larger history of colonialism and genocide. They also include a thorough bibliography and an index, helpful to readers overwhelmed by the report’s 356 pages.

The republication of this important source–and its placement within a broader historical framework–is most welcome. It is useful not only for scholars of Namibia, but also for those interested in comparative colonialism or genocide studies. Indeed, I have even used the Blue Book in undergraduate classes as a primary source for discussing topics as diverse as colonial discourse and African resistance. This edition, with its careful introduction, will make it both more accessible and more valuable.

The Blue Book’s origins lie in the First World War, when South African forces under British command invaded German-controlled Namibia. After defeating the German army, the colony was governed under a South African military administration. British and South African officials were aware that a case would have to be made for retaining control of Germany’s colonies. When the British government requested “a statement suitable for publication” that “natives” of these colonies were anxious to live under British rule, officials in South West Africa were already prepared, having translated German documents and collected additional information on “the treatment received by native races” under German rule. The resulting document, according to Silvester and Gewald, “served to scuttle any attempt by Germany to retain control over Namibia” (p. xix).

The 1918 Blue Book offers a history of German occupation and rule of Namibia; ethnographic information on the colony’s various “tribes”; narratives of various examples of African resistance; long descriptions (textual and photographic) of German atrocities toward Africans, committed by both settlers and military men; and an explanation of the German legal code for Africans. It makes for grim reading even for someone familiar with descriptions of colonial violence.

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. . . .
The editors argue that this African testimony constitutes a valuable source on “the particular features of colonial genocide,” and they are right. The Blue Book is also “a key text in the production of colonial discourse” (p. xxxiii) in which “German” vs. “British” identities were constructed alongside a white supremacist, paternalist ideology (in the form of derogatory terms for Africans, among other things).

But the German-British opposition was to some extent a temporary one, a product of a particular historical moment. Britain never investigated any of the Blue Book’s allegations. Once South Africa was awarded Namibia as a mandated territory in 1920, a new agenda came to the fore: unifying the divided white settler community of Germans and recent, mostly Afrikaner, immigrants from South Africa. The Blue Book very nearly did not survive this process of reconciliation. In 1926, orders were given for its destruction. All known copies of the Blue Book in Namibia were destroyed by 1935; the circulation of those copies that remained in British hands was tightly controlled.

The editors persuasively argue for the urgency of making information on the nature of German colonial rule in Africa more widely available. Namibia is now a tourist destination and “the majority of tourists will be impressed with the legacy of German imperialism” in the form of the country’s food, drink, architecture, and religion, among other things. They will be unaware that, for example, that “in the coastal resort of Swakopmund, tourists gamble money in a converted railway station built by slave labor, drink coffee overlooking the site of a concentration camp, and ride dune buggies over the mass graves of Herero P.O.W.s” (p. xxxv).

The SECOND genocide of the 20th century apparently was of Armenians and Assyrians. What is it with genocides, and since when was it not directly tied to religion?

The Assyrian Genocide of 1915
<

Today the ethnic category Assyrian is used for indigenous Christian peoples living in Kurdistan and northern Mesopotamia who speak (or once spoke) an Aramaic Semitic language. They were among the first peoples to become Christians and have kept ancient theologies, which came to differ very much from European Christianity.

(4-18-2009 from the Seyfo Center)
By David Gaunt

Of all modern genocides, that perpetrated on the Assyrian peoples of Kurdistan during World War I is one of the most obscure and little known.[1] Somewhere between 250,000 to 300,000 Assyrians, about half of the population, were killed or died from starvation or disease in a series of campaigns orchestrated by the Ottoman Turkish government. Despite considerable attention at the time, it has fallen from memory and is passed over in surveys of the history of genocide. The aim of this article is to simply narrate the story and its aftermath, but doing this necessitates dealing with the complicated ethnic and geographic background as well as contrasting this mass-murder with the better-known genocide of the Armenians, which took place at the same time. One of the lessons of the Assyrian genocide is that their enigmatic ethnic origins coupled with internal divisions into a labyrinth of religions compounding highly disputed national identity contributes greatly to the neglect of the Assyrians. The Republic of Turkey is famous for denying the Armenian genocide and it also rejects the similar claims of the Assyrians. However the International Association of Genocide Scholars has deemed what happened to them genocide.
 
Today the ethnic category Assyrian is used for indigenous Christian peoples living in Kurdistan and northern Mesopotamia who speak (or once spoke) an Aramaic Semitic language. They were among the first peoples to become Christians and have kept ancient theologies, which came to differ very much from European Christianity. Because of language and religion they are distinct not just from their Muslim Kurdish, Arab, and Turkish neighbors, but also from the Armenian and Greek Christians with their Indo-European languages.
[[para. added]]
By the start of World War I there were an estimated 600,000 to 700,000 Assyrians who mostly lived inside southeastern Anatolia, but also in the closest Arab provinces and along the Iran’s side of the Turkish border. The Assyrians were much less numerous than the several million Armenians. Taking one or two subgroups to represent the whole, many synonyms have been used by western writers to describe the entire group: Syrians, Jacobites, Chaldeans, Assyrians, Assyro-Chaldeans, Chaldeo-Assyrians and so on. Quite naturally this causes overwhelming confusion among those who today unprepared begin to study older documents. By the time of the First World War, the British and Russians used the term Assyrian, while the Americans and French used Syrian.

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The genocide also absolutely did relate to their religion.

There have been so many genocides, that there are conferences on genocides; Here’s one from this past May, in Skokie, Illinois, and while it seems all or most speakers were reviewed, I picked out two to quote. I notice it is from the same source, “aina.org” (Assyrian International News Agency) I quoted earlier, posted 6/14/2013)

Conference on Assyrian, Armenian and Greek Genocides Held in Chicago

Skokie, IL — The largest academic conference ever held focusing on the Armenian, Assyrian and Greek Genocides concluded on Saturday, May 11 [2013], after two days of presentations by over a dozen scholars from Armenia, Australia, England and across North America. Attended by over 120 participants each day, the conference was filled to capacity with an enthusiastic and inquisitive audience.

The conference, entitled The Ottoman Turkish Genocides of Anatolian Christians: A Common Case Study, was organized by the Armenian National Committee of Illinois, the Asia Minor and Pontos Hellenic Research Center and the Assyrian Center for Genocide Studies, and was held at the prestigious Illinois Holocaust Museum and Educational Center in Skokie, IL, on May 10 and 11, 2013. The assessments of the conference, both by the presenters and the attendees, were overwhelmingly positive.

[[Please note: Women spoke up to an American Admiral, who turned them away, about sparing the lives:]]

The next speaker was Dr. Robert Shenk, Professor of English at the University of New Orleans. Speaking on the topic “American Women, Massacres, and the Admiral: Deep in Anatolia during the Turkish Nationalist Revolution,”

Dr. Shenk described the devastating role American Admiral Mark Bristol*** played in the post-war period as America’s chief diplomat in the area, and how despite pleas from numerous female American missionaries and even his own officers, he placed the interests of American commerce ahead of protecting the remnants of the Christian populations in Anatolia from ongoing destruction, censoring reports of massacres from information relayed back to Washington. Dr. Shenk praised the women missionaries for their bravery, working in a foreign and often savage land, with no guarantees for their physical safety.

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The final presentation of the conference was provided by Dr. Suren Manukyan, a Fulbright Scholar on Sociology of the Armenian Genocide at Rutgers University and Deputy Director of the Armenian Genocide Museum & Institute, Yerevan, Armenia. Dr. Manukyan’s topic was “Cultural Preconditions and Process of Social Indoctrination: Socio-Psychological Dimension of the Ottoman Genocides.” Noting that the ability to participate in mass murder is not an inherent human characteristic, he described how the state conditioned the Ottoman Muslim population to be able to murder the Christians through propaganda via the mosques, by altering the legal system, and other methods. He contrasted the Armenian Genocide with the Holocaust, pointing out that many Armenians met violent deaths, sometimes at the hands of their neighbors, rather than the more industrial process encountered in Nazi concentration camps.

http://www.seyfocenter.com/index.php?sid=7. Sword, Order, and Deportation. Before — 33%. After 0.1%.

***I looked up the Admiral and found a site with detailed letters (including from him) which calls the above genocide a “Tall Tale” and to be fair, it should be included. I”m not reading it all just now, but it has source material: http://www.tallarmeniantale.com/BristolPapers.htm

http://courses.washington.edu/otap/archive/data/arch_20c/niles_suthr/Americans_Investigating_Anatolia_Final_to_OTAP_rev_1.pdf (Above my pay grade, but historical notes from the time, including commentary on the American missions board that was in the area, spreading the Protestant Faith and operating schools, hospitals, etc. ) THey weren’t given access to Muslims (for these purposes, obviously) and so would’ve and were identifying more closely with the Armenian Christians. Notes from “Niles and Sutherland” who were going through the area (assessing damages) indicated that the Armenians were also committing atrocities, and judging by the property left standing, possibly more. (pp. 15-16). The word “carnage” was used, in describing Armenian behavior. This is regarding assessments for purpose of humanitarian aid. (ACRNE and ABCFM=the mission board, which had been established in Massachusetts in 1812).