Last week, while most IU students spent their break reconnecting with family and old friends, Dakota Access Pipeline protesters in North Dakota were sprayed with water cannons despite freezing temperatures, shot with rubber bullets and sprayed with tear gas.
If you aren’t already aware of the situation in North Dakota, here’s a rundown: Dakota Access is a company constructing a 1,200-mile oil pipeline that will run from North Dakota to Illinois.
This past July, the Army Corps of Engineers gave Dakota Access the green light for constructing the pipeline through water crossings the project proposed to cross. This includes the Missouri River crossing, which lies just north of the Standing Rock Indian Reservation.
Members of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe began protesting the pipeline because if it were to leak, it would pollute the tribe’s main water source.
Additionally, the land on which construction would take place is considered sacred by the tribe and was taken from the tribe in 1958. Sections of the National Historical Preservation Act specifically stipulate that before construction on such a project can begin, it is the responsibility of federal agencies to “consult with Indian tribes when they attach religious and cultural significance to a historic property regardless of the location of that property.”
The tribe sued the Army Corps of Engineers because of this breach, but a federal judge ruled that the Army Corps had properly consulted with them, despite the tribe disputing otherwise. Since then, several halts on construction have been mandated and removed, but as of Tuesday afternoon, law enforcement officials will begin to prevent all people and supplies from reaching the protest camp and construction is slated to continue as originally planned.
I distinctly remember celebrating Thanksgiving with my elementary school classmates. Half of the class would dress up as Pilgrims, and the other half as Native Americans. Then, we’d all come together for a feast reminiscent of the one we were told took place in Plymouth, Massachusetts.
Of course, this is a narrative perpetuated through countless retellings, and it’s one fitted with a rose-colored lens.
Historians dispute what qualifies as the “first Thanksgiving,” but they do agree that soon after colonists arrived, the mass genocide of millions of Native Americans commenced. That was a detail never mentioned during my elementary school Thanksgiving feasts.
It’s no wonder we still have gross violations of the rights of Native Americans today when our children are indoctrinated with a false history about the very nature of this country.
Some might argue that to do otherwise would be unpatriotic. I argue it is patriotic to acknowledge our country’s dark and bloody past, because in doing so, we are taking the first step in moving past it. Taking the first step in fulfilling the ideal set forth but left unfulfilled by our founders that all men are created equal.
With this knowledge in consideration, we can perhaps see the cruel, bitter irony set forth by these two paradoxical events that took place last week. In this light, it seems silly to have celebrated a union of two different communities when one is still persecuting and mistreating the other.
acgroove@umail.iu.edu
