Thursday, July 14, 2005
Truth and Reconciliation: Aoteoroa-style
I appeared on a panel of indigenous people at the Holocaust Museum in Los Angeles once to screen and discuss Spirit World Productions' 30-minute film American Holocaust. The producer of the film, Joanelle Romero, is Cheyenne, Apache, Spanish, and Jewish. Romero has raised her now 19 year old daughter, the actress Elizabeth Sage, in the Jewish tradition. As an Indian and a Jew, Romero's film is informed on Holocaust from all sides, down to where Adolf Hitler took inspiration for his government policies on genocide from the United States' treatment of Indians.
Many times during the panel discussion, many of the Jewish participants took great offense at the use of the term holocaust when referring to American Indian genocide. Ownership of a term becomes blurred in the crusade for truth and reconciliation. In a room of people who had suffered similar genocidal circumstances, we all couldn't even come to terms with appropriate terminology.
It is amazing to me that while in a room o almost 100 people, some of us were so attached to our anger and our pain over surviving holocaust that we couldn't even come to terms with what to CALL our experience! But yet, in a formerly British ruled country of 4 million people, there is a commitment on the part of the mostly white majority to make amends for the genocidal practices committed against its indigenous peoples. Commitment to a Treaty that is over 150 years old---what a novel idea!!! Yet the world's most "advanced" nation cannot even admit its own participation in a genocide that still continues today.
What will it take for truth and reconciliation to become a practice in the United States?
From Christian Science Monitor...
Tiny New Zealand's big role in restorative justice
the Jul 14, 4:00 AM ET
by Helena Cobban
New Zealanders are generally an unassuming bunch who've distanced themselves from the more belligerent policies of their close cousins, the Australians, and pride themselves on being low-key. But if they were the crowing sort, they could crow modestly about at least two aspects of their domestic policy: the commitment of the white majority to make serious amends to the indigenous Maoris, now just 15 percent of New Zealanders; and the country's innovative experimentation with "restorative" approaches to criminal justice.
One good example of the changing policies is the experience of the family of Mike Roberts, a successful news anchor on national TV. Mr. Roberts strongly self-identifies as a Maori and has, by his own account, "about one-third" Maori blood, but he can't speak much Maori at all. His father had grown up speaking Maori - until, at 14, he was sent to a residential school where Maori was forbidden. He almost completely lost his facility with the tongue. "That's one of my dad's biggest regrets," Roberts says.
Then in 1986, a high-level tribunal ruled that the Maori language certainly constituted one of the Maori "treasures" that the British had promised to protect in the seminal 1840 Treaty of Waitangi.The tribunal recommended several steps the government should take to revive the language and culture, including supporting Maori- language schools, as well as Maori broadcasting.
Maori radio stations have operated locally for some years and a nationwide Maori TV station started up just last year. Roberts's kids, ages 5 and 3, have both been to total-immersion Maori-language preschool programs. Does he think that Maori language and culture will survive in New Zealand?
"If you'd asked me 10 years ago, I would have said no. Now, I'm more optimistic. I think it will."
Signs abound of the commitment that the government and other major national institutions have made to respecting and strengthening Maori language and culture. Many government publications and websites are bilingual. Schools and businesses commission Maori-themed decorations and stage Maori-style ceremonies for key rites of passage. Government employees undergo mandatory training in the meaning of the Treaty of Waitangi. And it's not only Maori language and culture being saved: Steps have also been taken to restore some Maori land and fishing rights.
Maori culture has also been an influence in the use of New Zealand's restorative-justice processes to supplement and sometimes replace the essentially "retributive" processes of the traditional Western-style justice system.
Judge Fred McElrea sits on the District Court bench here in Auckland - home to a quarter of the nation's 4 million people and to one of its fullest crime dockets. One of Mr. McElrea's former colleagues on the Youth Court, Judge Michael Brown, a Maori, pioneered the Family Group Conference (FGC) method that the Youth Court now uses in place of the more formal criminal-court proceedings.
In a typical FGC, the offender and the victim - and their families - sit with respected community elders in a consultative circle in which the victim can fully express his or her pain and needs for reparation. The group then works to reach agreement on a plan whereby the offender comes to understand the seriousness of the offense and acknowledges this by making some reparation to the victim. This plan is reported to the court system, and all the FGC participants take some responsibility for monitoring follow-through.
In 1993, McElrea started campaigning for the FGC model to be used in adult cases, too. A recent Ministry of Justice evaluation of a one-year pilot project in which 539 adult cases were referred to FGCs found that most victims were very happy with the process. Also, re-offending rates for cases involving more violent crimes and more hardened offenders were noticeably lower in cases referred to FGCs.
"I find this exciting," McElrea said. "Apparently, the conferences managed to 'get through' to them in ways that the court system had not."
Now McElrea and his colleagues plan to continue and expand their use of FGC. They've kept in touch with parallel efforts elsewhere, including some that have also been informed by the cultural wisdom of indigenous peoples. McElrea also noted recent EU directives mandating that all EU countries make restorative-justice systems available by 2006.
But New Zealand is definitely recognized as a leader in this field - as it also is in the attempt to make amends with its indigenous people. Not bad for an unassuming country of just 4 million people.
Õ Helena Cobban is writing a book about violence and its legacies.
Copyright é 2005 The Christian Science Monitor
Many times during the panel discussion, many of the Jewish participants took great offense at the use of the term holocaust when referring to American Indian genocide. Ownership of a term becomes blurred in the crusade for truth and reconciliation. In a room of people who had suffered similar genocidal circumstances, we all couldn't even come to terms with appropriate terminology.
It is amazing to me that while in a room o almost 100 people, some of us were so attached to our anger and our pain over surviving holocaust that we couldn't even come to terms with what to CALL our experience! But yet, in a formerly British ruled country of 4 million people, there is a commitment on the part of the mostly white majority to make amends for the genocidal practices committed against its indigenous peoples. Commitment to a Treaty that is over 150 years old---what a novel idea!!! Yet the world's most "advanced" nation cannot even admit its own participation in a genocide that still continues today.
What will it take for truth and reconciliation to become a practice in the United States?
From Christian Science Monitor...
Tiny New Zealand's big role in restorative justice
the Jul 14, 4:00 AM ET
by Helena Cobban
New Zealanders are generally an unassuming bunch who've distanced themselves from the more belligerent policies of their close cousins, the Australians, and pride themselves on being low-key. But if they were the crowing sort, they could crow modestly about at least two aspects of their domestic policy: the commitment of the white majority to make serious amends to the indigenous Maoris, now just 15 percent of New Zealanders; and the country's innovative experimentation with "restorative" approaches to criminal justice.
One good example of the changing policies is the experience of the family of Mike Roberts, a successful news anchor on national TV. Mr. Roberts strongly self-identifies as a Maori and has, by his own account, "about one-third" Maori blood, but he can't speak much Maori at all. His father had grown up speaking Maori - until, at 14, he was sent to a residential school where Maori was forbidden. He almost completely lost his facility with the tongue. "That's one of my dad's biggest regrets," Roberts says.
Then in 1986, a high-level tribunal ruled that the Maori language certainly constituted one of the Maori "treasures" that the British had promised to protect in the seminal 1840 Treaty of Waitangi.The tribunal recommended several steps the government should take to revive the language and culture, including supporting Maori- language schools, as well as Maori broadcasting.
Maori radio stations have operated locally for some years and a nationwide Maori TV station started up just last year. Roberts's kids, ages 5 and 3, have both been to total-immersion Maori-language preschool programs. Does he think that Maori language and culture will survive in New Zealand?
"If you'd asked me 10 years ago, I would have said no. Now, I'm more optimistic. I think it will."
Signs abound of the commitment that the government and other major national institutions have made to respecting and strengthening Maori language and culture. Many government publications and websites are bilingual. Schools and businesses commission Maori-themed decorations and stage Maori-style ceremonies for key rites of passage. Government employees undergo mandatory training in the meaning of the Treaty of Waitangi. And it's not only Maori language and culture being saved: Steps have also been taken to restore some Maori land and fishing rights.
Maori culture has also been an influence in the use of New Zealand's restorative-justice processes to supplement and sometimes replace the essentially "retributive" processes of the traditional Western-style justice system.
Judge Fred McElrea sits on the District Court bench here in Auckland - home to a quarter of the nation's 4 million people and to one of its fullest crime dockets. One of Mr. McElrea's former colleagues on the Youth Court, Judge Michael Brown, a Maori, pioneered the Family Group Conference (FGC) method that the Youth Court now uses in place of the more formal criminal-court proceedings.
In a typical FGC, the offender and the victim - and their families - sit with respected community elders in a consultative circle in which the victim can fully express his or her pain and needs for reparation. The group then works to reach agreement on a plan whereby the offender comes to understand the seriousness of the offense and acknowledges this by making some reparation to the victim. This plan is reported to the court system, and all the FGC participants take some responsibility for monitoring follow-through.
In 1993, McElrea started campaigning for the FGC model to be used in adult cases, too. A recent Ministry of Justice evaluation of a one-year pilot project in which 539 adult cases were referred to FGCs found that most victims were very happy with the process. Also, re-offending rates for cases involving more violent crimes and more hardened offenders were noticeably lower in cases referred to FGCs.
"I find this exciting," McElrea said. "Apparently, the conferences managed to 'get through' to them in ways that the court system had not."
Now McElrea and his colleagues plan to continue and expand their use of FGC. They've kept in touch with parallel efforts elsewhere, including some that have also been informed by the cultural wisdom of indigenous peoples. McElrea also noted recent EU directives mandating that all EU countries make restorative-justice systems available by 2006.
But New Zealand is definitely recognized as a leader in this field - as it also is in the attempt to make amends with its indigenous people. Not bad for an unassuming country of just 4 million people.
Õ Helena Cobban is writing a book about violence and its legacies.
Copyright é 2005 The Christian Science Monitor
Saturday, July 02, 2005
ps...it's still ok to pick on Indians...
I am still amazed at what people can get away with in this world...
the "letter to the editor" below was forwarded to me from Marcus Lopez...first of all, where and when have Indians considered ourselves a race of "helpless victims"? I know of no Indian person who considers him or herself in that way. As we all know, "frontier terrorism" goes both ways...and it is Hollywood that often times inform how Indians are perceived of in this country and in the rest of the world as well. The frontier narrative in the American mind tells us that Indians imply faded away. While I'm thrilled that TNT is airing "Into the West" and that many of my friends received a decent paycheck for their work on that project, it s still quite disconcerting that Indians live in the western imagination either in the past or rolling in the dough in a casino.
-------
forwarded for your info and if you choose...action, p.s... you can find the author at aynrand.org where I also found opinion/editorial pieces that say diversity and multiculturalism is the new racism, etc. check it out for yourself....
No Apology to IndiansMonday, June 27, 2005 By: Thomas Bowden
Dear Editor:
The Senate Committee on Indian Affairs is debating whether the United States should formally apologize to Indians for a "long history of official depredations and ill-conceived policies." This proposal should be rejected.
Before Europeans arrived, the scattered tribes occupying North America lived in abject poverty, ignorance, and superstition--not due to any racial inferiority, but because that is how all mankind starts out (Europeans included). The transfer of Western civilization to this continent was one of the great cultural gifts in recorded history, affording Indians almost effortless access to centuries of European accomplishments in philosophy, science, technology, and government. As a result, today's Indians enjoy a capacity for generating health, wealth, and happiness that their Stone Age ancestors could never have conceived.
From a historical perspective, the proper response to such a gift is not resentment but gratitude. America's policies toward the Indians were generally benign, aimed at protecting them from undeserved harm while providing significant material support and encouragement to become civilized. When those policies erred, it was usually by treating Indians collectively, as "nations" entitled to permanent occupancy of semi-sovereign reservations. Instead, Indians should have been treated as individuals deserving full and equal American citizenship in exchange for embracing individual rights, including private ownership of land.
If the United States government were demanding that Indians apologize for the frontier terrorism of their ancestors, as if living members of a particular race could be guilty of their forebears' misdeeds, the demand would (properly) be rejected as racist. For the same reason, American Indians should refuse to be regarded as a race of helpless victims entitled to a collective apology from their fellow citizens.
Thomas A. Bowden
Ayn Rand Institute
the "letter to the editor" below was forwarded to me from Marcus Lopez...first of all, where and when have Indians considered ourselves a race of "helpless victims"? I know of no Indian person who considers him or herself in that way. As we all know, "frontier terrorism" goes both ways...and it is Hollywood that often times inform how Indians are perceived of in this country and in the rest of the world as well. The frontier narrative in the American mind tells us that Indians imply faded away. While I'm thrilled that TNT is airing "Into the West" and that many of my friends received a decent paycheck for their work on that project, it s still quite disconcerting that Indians live in the western imagination either in the past or rolling in the dough in a casino.
-------
forwarded for your info and if you choose...action, p.s... you can find the author at aynrand.org where I also found opinion/editorial pieces that say diversity and multiculturalism is the new racism, etc. check it out for yourself....
No Apology to IndiansMonday, June 27, 2005 By: Thomas Bowden
Dear Editor:
The Senate Committee on Indian Affairs is debating whether the United States should formally apologize to Indians for a "long history of official depredations and ill-conceived policies." This proposal should be rejected.
Before Europeans arrived, the scattered tribes occupying North America lived in abject poverty, ignorance, and superstition--not due to any racial inferiority, but because that is how all mankind starts out (Europeans included). The transfer of Western civilization to this continent was one of the great cultural gifts in recorded history, affording Indians almost effortless access to centuries of European accomplishments in philosophy, science, technology, and government. As a result, today's Indians enjoy a capacity for generating health, wealth, and happiness that their Stone Age ancestors could never have conceived.
From a historical perspective, the proper response to such a gift is not resentment but gratitude. America's policies toward the Indians were generally benign, aimed at protecting them from undeserved harm while providing significant material support and encouragement to become civilized. When those policies erred, it was usually by treating Indians collectively, as "nations" entitled to permanent occupancy of semi-sovereign reservations. Instead, Indians should have been treated as individuals deserving full and equal American citizenship in exchange for embracing individual rights, including private ownership of land.
If the United States government were demanding that Indians apologize for the frontier terrorism of their ancestors, as if living members of a particular race could be guilty of their forebears' misdeeds, the demand would (properly) be rejected as racist. For the same reason, American Indians should refuse to be regarded as a race of helpless victims entitled to a collective apology from their fellow citizens.
Thomas A. Bowden
Ayn Rand Institute
