STOP Lewis & Clark!

I don't think the citizens of Washington D.C. would care to have the Royal Marines march in to stage a reinactment of their invasion, nor would the good people of Hawaii care to have the Japanese Navy fly in to restage their 1941 air strike. So why do these wasicun think this kind of activity is welcome in NDN Country?

--ryan



Stop Lewis and Clark: Protest at the Bad River

By Debra White Plume, writing from the banks
of Wounded Knee Creek

Webposted October 3, 2004

On September 25 and 26, 2004 approximately 30 people from the Stop Lewis and Clark group from the Lakota country of Pine Ridge, Eagle Butte, Standing Rock, and Nebraska traveled in car caravans to Ft. Pierre, SD to protest the commemoration of the Lewis and Clark Reenactment. Floyd Looks For Buffalo Hand, spiritual man of the Oglala band of the Lakota Nation, offered prayers for the resistance group as they prepared for their departure.

The L and C Expedition reenactment stopped at the Bad River, near the place that is now the state capital of South Dakota, to reenact their meeting of 200 years ago with the Lakota Nation. Grandmothers, young children, high school and college students came together on their home reservations to organize a public resistance to the commonly accepted message of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, which does not acknowledge the destruction that followed them when they entered Indian Country.

A surprise at the Ft. Pierre, SD Lewis and Clark Reenactment
awaited the group of protesters when an elder of their own people
came out dressed in traditional regalia and asked the men in the
group if they came to shoot him. The elder said the protestors were
not invited there and not wanted there. Vic Camp, lead organizer for
the youth group, responded that the protesters were not there to
harm to anyone, they were there to engage in a peaceful protest
and had a right to express themselves.

"We come here not as militant people, but on a educational mission.
We want all people to understand history through more than one
perspective, we deserve to have our voices heard," said Vic Camp,
Ponca/Oglala Lakota, who is a college student and young father from
the Pine Ridge Reservation.

The people hired by the L and C Commemoration to act in the historic
role of the Lakota people shared their perspective: they were in the
reenactment to make money. Such is the poverty facing the reservations in South Dakota: Lakota people will hire on as actors in events that many indigenous people say in a travesty. The group of resistors wanted the Lakota reenactors to know that this protest will not devolve into an Indian against Indian issue.

"American policies have divided our people too long into two polarized
groups: the colonized and the freedom thinking, we will not contribute
to th at dissention," said Deb White Plume.
"The genocide of our people has been very thorough in many ways,
in many indigenous nations-look at how many of our own people have
had their Lakota spirits taken away -- they are no longer Lakota in
their spirits -- they have been colonized to think they are American and so they stand with Lewis and Clark. Native nations along the L and C route need to stand up and protest this torture of re-living our own
holocaust: what would people say if there were a reenactment of the
Jewish holocaust? Our native nations lost millions of people to the
aftermath of the L and C entry to our lands. No one would be asking why there was a protest if the Jewish holocaust had a reenactment."

Respecting the protocol of their people, the Lakota protesters had a
drum group with them to offer honoring songs to their ancestors, and the Creator for guidance and help. The children in the group of protestors played with the children of the Lakota enactors. The children of the Indian reenactors came straight for the drum, their parents had to come get them. The drum beat is a natural part of the Lakota Universe, and the young children responded to the hearts.

Although the resistance group advised Sheriff Pat Johnson that the
protest was peaceful, the protestors were soon surrounded by SD Highway patrol and Dewey County Sheriff's office. The heavy law enforcement presence took photographs of the individuals protesting, and recorded the license plate numbers of their vehicles.

Tourists and others who went to the reenactment program posed questions to the protestors: "Why are you doing this?" and "What do you hope comes out of this?" The resistance group said they wanted awareness and acknowledgement that destruction to their native nations really did happen, they wanted the American history books to tell what happened from everyone's side, not just the American side. One young mother answered by asking her own question, "Why just tell President Jefferson's story? Why do the books not tell the story of the people of Red Cloud and Sitting Bull?"

A woman tourist who attended the reenactment told the protestors she was sorry about the destruction done to Indians and that she was not there to celebrate the demise of Indian nations, she actually thought Indians were happy and didn't know that the Indians of today were not happy.

From his home in Manderson, SD, Alex White Plume said his tiyospaye
(extended family) stands firm in the resistance group and will continue
the protest throughout Ft. Laramie Treaty Territory.

"Our ancestors entered into a treaty with the U.S. and they have not
lived up to their promises. America and the world needs to know this,
and we intend to send this message out all along the way of the Lewis
and Clark reenactment of genocide." Carter Camp, in a telephone interview, said he has given his full support and involvement with the resistance. Both men are great-grandfathers and the patriarch of their family's. The resistance group has the support of their elders, who led the group at the Chamberlain, SD protest last week.

The resistance group of Lakota, Ponca, Northern Cheyenne, and Kiowa
people maintains their message: Lewis and Clark should turn around and leave Lakota Country. If the L and C Commemoration continues their river travel, the resistors will protest at every stop along the river, delivering their message to the general public: Lewis and Clark
Represent the Dawn of Genocide to Indigenous Peoples.

The next protest is planned for Mobridge, SD and the Kimball Bottom
stop in Bismarck, North Dakota. Vic Camp says his ancestors fought
and died for freedom to live the Lakota way and that the Lakota people of today will protest the reenactment as long as L and C are in their 1851 Ft. Laramie Treaty Territory.


The Stop Lewis and Clark group has a website:
www.stoplewisandclark.org