Christopher Columbus and the Original Proud Boys Gang

 

The Legend of Truth and the Doctrines of Power

Kings and Kingdoms:

Doctrine and Domination

 

The history of transition from a chartered colony of Christendom, to a territory ruled by force of violent invasion by the European American “white” colonizers, to the formation of a polity of statehood and subsequent admission into the union of states called the USA, also required a systemic mechanism to control the allegiances, nationality and citizenship of the constituencies of the new republic as a whole. In the absence of the absolute command of allegiance of the Sovereign, in this case King George of England, the colonies broke from the modus operandi of the cartel of the Divine Right of Kings (Christendom). It became necessary to format the public consciousness in a systematic manner, manufacturing consent for the rationalization and expansion of territorial dominion via political acts of allegiance to the Divine Right of States. It became necessary to manufacture the mythology of America.

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Verse and Versus

Challenging the Master’s Narrative

The bioregion surrounding El Paso is a territory of profound millennial and ecological significance for the Indigenous Peoples, as is the entirety of the watershed of the Rio Grande in its totality and sacredness.

This human bond of sacredness which is carried forward in the spirit of the World Water Ways of Mother Earth we saw emerge in the Dakota Access Pipeline fight: Water of Life, the Prayer Heard Around the World. And in the bloody carnage of the massacre on August 5, 2018 in El Paso at the hands of a D.Trump incited white supremacist, we are moved with the same spirit beyond the rain of tears to respond in compassion, empathy, and justice to bring about the necessary healing that the author Hill Fletcher invokes in her writings on American white supremacy as a social pathology.

Yet as in any form of pathology, a diagnosis of the nature and source of the pathogen is necessary to effectively move towards healing, and not just treat the symptoms. Critically, it must be acknowledged that the social pathology of European colonization of the Americas will require a multigenerational collective cultural response. The crime of colonialism requires decolonization. Colonization cannot be reformed; it must be ended. And although five centuries of colonization will not be brought to an end in one generation, the borders of colonization cannot break the human bond of sacredness which binds us still today as Original Nations of Indigenous Peoples of Mother Earth.

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United Nations

Preliminary Study on the Impact of the Doctrine of Discovery

This preliminary study establishes that the Doctrine of Discovery has been institutionalized in law and policy, on national and international levels, and lies at the root of the violations of indigenous peoples’ human rights, both individual and collective. This has resulted in State claims to and the mass appropriation of the lands, territories and resources of indigenous peoples. Both the Doctrine of Discovery and a holistic structure that we term the Framework of Dominance have resulted in centuries of virtually unlimited resource extraction from the traditional territories of indigenous peoples. This, in turn, has resulted in the dispossession and impoverishment of indigenous peoples, and the host of problems that they face today on a daily basis.

 

#DecolonizeTheLaw

Elements of Process: A Dismantling Methodology

1) Information: Search, Research, Intake, Absorb, Share.

2) Consciousness: Develop a personal critical consciousness on the issues which are pervaded by the institutionalization of the Doctrine of Discovery from the local-regional, continental-global context.

3) Reveal: Create a shared community understanding on how the dehumanizing principles of the Doctrine of Discovery are relevant today and continue to provide the cultural framework for the ongoing colonization and genocide of the Original Nations of this continent, the Great Turtle Island Abya Yala.

4) Take a position. Denounce and repudiate the Doctrine of Discovery and the underlying pathological schema of patriarchy: DOMINATION.

5) DISMANTLE: Take action, and follow through with inter-generational decolonization strategies.

 

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First Continental Encounter of Indigenous Peoples 1990

Declaration of Quito 

The existing nation states of the Americas, their constitutions and fundamental laws are judicial/political expressions that negate our socio-economic, cultural and political rights.

From this point in our general strategy of struggle, we consider it to be a priority that we demand complete structural change; change which recognizes the inherent right to self-determination through Indigenous self-government and through the control of our territories.

Our problems will not be resolved through the self-serving politics of governmental entities which seek integration and ethno-development. It is necessary to have an integral transformation at the level of the state and national society; that is to say, the creation of a new concept of nationhood.

In this gathering it has been clear that territorial rights are a fundamental demand of the Indigenous Peoples of the Abya Yala [Americas].

Based on these aforementioned reflections, the organizations united in the First Continental Encounter of Indigenous Peoples reaffirm:

 

 

The Treaty of Teotihuacan

2000-2020 

IZCALLI ABYA YALA

YOHUALPAPALOTL

22 September 2020

Equinox

 

It is time to pierce the mantle of darkness and pathology of a system of relationships between human beings and the natural world of Mother Earth that has led us all to the climate crisis which has overwhelmed the planet. The Covid-19 pandemic has its origin in the deforestation caused by the overextension of the human habitat of domination over the other life forms of the earth.  The loss of a common consciousness among all human beings as being integral and responsible to the laws of the natural world is the root of the problem.

But the power of equilibrium is not lost. It is simply that the collective consciousness of humanity has become disoriented with a geopolitical, economic and social model that pretends to be dominant of nature, reducing us to being consumers of the goods of Mother Earth instead of being her respectful children. The schema of materialism is a psychological pathology that produces fragmented and maladaptive social relationships, not synchronized with the rhythms of Mother Earth and the cosmos. 

 

 

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 Original Nations Day

 

So, let’s suppose there is a successful campaign to change “Columbus Day” to “Indigenous Peoples Day” but the ongoing system of domination is not made a focus of that campaign. Suppose the domination system does not get addressed as the problem that needs to be rectified and ended. The day after “Columbus Day” has been changed to “Indigenous Peoples Day” it will seem as if some significant shift has occurred, when, in fact, the underlying system of domination will not have been touched or even brought into focus.

If we continue to use the language that merely reinforce the existing framework of domination, then what have we truly achieved? Now is the time to begin identifying the framework of domination, while at the same time challenging the false claim that the claim of a right of domination is valid.

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TIME is NOW
Architectures of the States and the Territorial Integrity of Mother Earth

 

As Peoples of Mother Earth, we collectively determine to regenerate our relationships among ourselves within a Cultural Climate of Mutual Respect, Inclusion, Complementarity, and Self Determination beyond the existing constrains of the international systems of state sovereignty and in responsibility to the well-being of the future generations;

Recognizing that unless this fundamental dimension of international relationships among human societies at the planetary level is first recognized, established and affirmed, there will be no sustainable progress in addressing effectively and in timely manner the Climate Chaos scenario that now befalls all of Humanity due to the impacts on Global Climate exacerbated by greenhouse gas emissions by industrial society and extractive industries in particular in complicity with national government states and existing international monetary systems and institutions.

Therefore we proclaim and hereby reaffirm in collective Responsibility as Peoples of Mother Earth, in Equality with all Peoples, our collective Right of Representation and Self Determination in addressing the issues before the COP20 beyond the constraints of the architectures of the States and their agreements;

We further affirm and proclaim in Full, Effective, and Complete exercise of our equally shared Right of Self Determination as Peoples of Mother Earth, that our Sacred Mother Earth is subject of the Right of Self Determination beyond the limited juridical constraints of the Westphalian System of State Sovereignty represented in the UN system and its international architectures of personality and procedures of negotiation and agreements;

WorldWater
ONE

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The Legend of Truth and the Doctrines of Power

Original Nations Day

Original Nations Day

Steven Newcomb, Indigenous Law Institute

 

 

 

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More and more cities are switching from Columbus Day to “Indigenous Peoples Day.” This trend is partly due to an increasing awareness of the fact that Columbus was a heinous figure in world history. For many, his name now evokes a bloody imagery of injustice, colonization, and destruction for the Original Nations of the hemisphere that lies across the Atlantic Ocean west of Europe.

 

Columbus is now being generally associated with a multi-century legacy of death, enslavement, genocide, and domination. As James A. Loewen states in Lies My Teacher Told Me (2005),

“The way American history books treat Columbus reinforces the tendency to not think about the process of domination.” (p. 35)

He continues:

"The traditional picture of Columbus landing on the American shore shows him dominating immediately, and this is based on fact: Columbus claimed everything he saw right off the boat. When textbooks celebrate this process, they imply that taking the land and dominating the Indians was inevitable if not natural."

 

Changing “Columbus Day” to “Indigenous Peoples Day” makes it seem as if we are switching the focus away from that process of domination. But it is sensible to ask ourselves in what context is the term “indigenous” being used? I have a dictionary from the 1940’s that lists the word “indigenous” as meaning “something natural to a given place, native.” A particular variety of plant or an animal might be considered “indigenous” because it occurs naturally in that place and is not invasive. In that sense, Indigenous Peoples Day could be interpreted as meaning Natural Peoples Day or Original Peoples (Nations) Day. 

 

 

 

Sometimes what is left out of focus and not mentioned is more important than what is focused upon and made explicit. Certainly we want to focus on what it was like for nations and peoples when our ancestors were living their free existence before the dominating empires of Christendom reached this part of the planet. Think 1491. But we also have to talk about the oppression and abuse that our nations have been experiencing ever since the invasion that began in 1492, which is an existence lived under Christian European domination.

 

Decades of work in the United Nations system by nations and peoples that have experienced colonialism at the hands of “states” (of domination) has placed a global focus on the word “Indigenous” in the international arena. That work at the UN has not adequately focused attention on the background context of the international working definition of the word “indigenous.” Hardly any focus has been placed on the system of domination that was established by the States of Christendom on top of the original nations and peoples of this continent and this hemisphere located across the Atlantic Ocean, west of Europe, and in other parts of the globe such as the islands of Oceania, Australia, and Aoteroa (“New Zealand”).

 

Domination occurs and is maintained when a free nation or people is forced to exist beneath and subject to a dominating system established on top of them, when the people are made to live subject to a will external to their own. As will become clear below, when Original Nations get reduced from their original free and independent life to an existence lived under domination, they are called “indigenous.”

 

The term “conquest” is typically used as a cover-word to draw attention away from ongoing, persistent, and traumatic processes of domination, typically called “civilization.” The word conquest is used as a way of making domination seem acceptable. “Hey, we won, you lost, you’re conquered, now get over it!” Here’s my response to that flimsy logic: What you’re calling “conquest” is your claim of a right of domination, and we do not accept the argument that you have “the right” to claim a right of domination over nations and peoples that were existing free and independent before a system of domination was coercively imposed on them.

 

To be defined as “indigenous” in the context of the United Nations is to be defined as being “the descendants” of a People that had been living free in their original territory, when “persons of a different culture or ethnic origin arrived [invaded] there from other parts of the world.” The invading people then “overcame them, and by conquest settlement or other means,” and “reduced them to a non-dominant or colonial situation.” (Khan and Talal, Indigenous Peoples: A Global Quest for Justice (1987)). The opposite of non-dominant is dominant, which is simply another word for domination.

 

Eventually, after WWII the terms “colonial peoples” and “indigenous peoples” began to be used synonymously. After the 1960’s, the term “colonial peoples” was dropped in favor of Indigenous peoples. Here’s the point: Neither of those two phrases specifically names domination. As a result, the issue of Indigenous peoples being “peoples” that have been forced to live under and subject to a system of domination has not been identified as the primary problem needing to be solved. The international working definition of the term “indigenous” effectively hides the context of the domination system.

 

Those of us who trace our existence to Original Nations and Peoples are able to think back to the pre-invasion existence of our ancestors. That was when our ancestors were still living free and independent of the colonial powers from Western Christendom. The international working definition of the term “indigenous” gives the barest acknowledgment to the original free existence of our ancestors. But it then immediately moves away from that free existence by placing “Indigenous peoples” in a context of domination by means of a contrast between those who are considered “dominant” (i.e., the dominating society of the state”) and those peoples considered “non-dominant.”

 

The international working definition of the term “Indigenous” presumes that the right of our nations and peoples to live free and independent of domination was ended as soon as the domination system from Western Europe began its dominating (“civilizing”) process of violently and semantically subjecting our original nations to the words, metaphors, meanings, and behaviors of Western Christendom and successor states of domination. The mission of Christendom was to use brutal processes to work toward the genocidal uprooting and dissolution (elimination) of our free nations.

 

So, let’s suppose there is a successful campaign to change “Columbus Day” to “Indigenous Peoples Day” but the ongoing system of domination is not made a focus of that campaign. Suppose the domination system does not get addressed as the problem that needs to be rectified and ended. The day after “Columbus Day” has been changed to “Indigenous Peoples Day” it will seem as if some significant shift has occurred, when, in fact, the underlying system of domination will not have been touched or even brought into focus.

 

If we continue to use the language that merely reinforce the existing framework of domination, then what have we truly achieved? Now is the time to begin identifying the framework of domination, while at the same time challenging the false claim that the claim of a right of domination is valid.

 

We have the mentally difficult task of interpreting the colonizers’ words, texts, and metaphors in order to reveal deeper truths. Here’s a concluding point I wish to make, “Original Nations Day” is preferable to “Indigenous Peoples Day.” We could use “Original Nations Day” as a point of contrast to the domination system which is still being used against us, while making the argument there is no such thing as a right of domination. In other words, our nations still have the inherent right to exist free and independent of domination and dehumanization. This would be a step toward the explicitly stated goal of bringing an end to the claim of a right of domination and the resulting system of domination.

 

 

Steven Newcomb (Shawnee, Lenape) is co-founder and co-director of the Indigenous Law Institute, and author of Pagans in the Promised Land: Decoding the Doctrine of Christian Discovery (Fulcrum, 2008). Pagans is the basis for the documentary movie, The Doctrine of Discovery: Unmasking the Domination Code, directed and produced by Sheldon Wolfchild (Dakota), with narration by Buffy Sainte-Marie (Cree).

 
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Links:

Framework of Dominance:

UN Preliminary Study on the Doctrine of Discovery

 

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First Continental Encounter of Indigenous Peoples 1990: Declaration of Quito

 

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#AbolishColumbusDay

Western Shoshone

Inter-American Commission on Human Rights

TO: The Honorable Mike Pompeo Secretary of State

VIA His Excellency Carlos Trujillo

Ambassador, Permanent Representative of the United States to the Organization of American States

Washington, D.C.

 

August 18, 2020

RE:      Mary and Carrie Dann Case 11.140

United States

Follow-up on compliance with recommendations

 

Excellency:

 

I have the honor of addressing Your Excellency on behalf of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), in order to request information about compliance with the recommendations set forth in Report No. 75/02 issued in the case cited above on December 27, 2002, in conformity with the provisions of Article 48{1) of the Commission's Rules of Procedure, with the purpose of including this information in Chapter 11.E of the 2020 Annual Report.

 

In this regard, I would like to request Your Excellency to provide updated and detailed information on the actions undertaken by the State during this year to comply with each of the recommendations issued in relation to the above cited case, which were not declared to have been fully complied with by the IACHR in its 2019 Annual Report. In addition, taking as a reference the information provided in previous Annual Reports, I ask Your Excellency to inform in particular on the following aspects:

 

1.          Considering that Mary Dann passed away in 2005, inform whether the State has taken actions to provide Carrie Dann with an effective remedy from the State for the human rights violations that she suffered, including the adoption of legislative of other measures to ensure respect for the Danns' right to property in accordance with Articles II, XVIII and XXIII of the American Declaration in connection with their claims to property rights in  the Western Shoshone ancestral lands.

 

 

2.          Considering the information provided by the State in the working meeting held in the 169^th IACHR's Period of Sessions, inform the process' progress of reforming regulations and procedures to ensure that the property rights of indigenous persons are determined in accordance with the rights established in the American Declaration, including Articles II, XVIII and XXIII of the Declaration. Also inform whether there has been progress in the Federal Government's initiatives to protect the rights of Indigenous peoples, including the actions to inform State agencies about the principles contained in the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

I kindly request that the Government of Your Excellency present the information in accordance with the methodology set out in Annex 1 of this letter which includes the guidelines indicated by the General Guidelines for the Follow-up of Recommendations and Decisions of the IACHR, approved on September 30, 2019.

 

The report on the status of compliance with the recommendations of the IACHR and approved friendly settlement agreements for the year 2019 is available in the 2019 Annual Report of the IACHR, Chapter 11.E, on the website bit.ly/ CasesAn nualRe port2019

 

I request that Your Excellency take the steps that you deem necessary to ensure that the Commission receives the information it is requesting within one month from the date of transmission of the present communication. In addition, I inform you that the Annual Report must be approved by the plenary of the Commission prior to December 31, 2020 and consequently, a deadline of October 15, 2020 has been set to receive information from the parties for it to be considered in the 2020 Annual Report. In the event that the parties submit information after the date indicated,  said information  will  be considered in the 2021 Annual Report ofthe IACHR.

 

Please accept, Excellency, the assurances of my highest consideration,

 

 

By authorization of the Executive Secretary

 

Enclosure

Inter-American Commission on Human Rights

 August 18, 2020

 

Ms. Julie Cavanaugh-Bill Attorney & Counselor at Law Cavanaugh-Bill Law Offices, LLC

401 Railroad St. Suite 307 Elko, NV 89801 julie@cblawoffices.org

RE:      Mary and Carrie Dann Case 11.140

United States

Follow-up on compliance with recommendations

 

Dear Madam:

 

I am pleased to address you on behalf of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), in order to request information about compliance with the recommendations set forth in Report No. 75/02 issued in the case cited above on December 27, 2002, in conformity with the provisions of Article 48(1) of the Commission's Rules of Procedure, with the purpose of including this information in Chapter 11.E of the 2020 Annual Report.

 

In this regard, I would like to request you to provide updated and detailed information on the actions undertaken by the State during this year to.comply with each of the recommendations issued in relation to the case cited above, which were not declared to have been fully complied with by the IACHR in its 2019 Annual Report. In addition, taking as a reference the information provided in previous Annual Reports, I ask you to inform in particular on the following aspects:

 

1. Considering that in the working meeting held in the 169^th IACHR's Period of Sessions the petitioners proposed to the State to organize a workshop with State agents about inter­ American and international standards regarding Indigenous peoples, and to establish a national working group to review Federal Indian law and policy in light of contemporary human rights standards, has it been any response from the State on these matters?

 

I kindly request that the information be presented in accordance with the methodology set out in Annex 1 of this letter which includes the guidelines indicated by the General Guidelines for the Follow-up of Recommendations and Decisions of the IACHR, approved on September 30, 2019.

 

The report on the status of compliance with the recommendations of the IACHR and approved friendly settlement agreements for the year 2019 is available in the 2019 Annual Report of the IACHR, Chapter I1.E, on the IACHR's website / bit.ly/CasesA nnualReport 2019

 

I request that you present the observations which you deem to be relevant for the Commission to have all of the necessary information regarding the case cited above, within a period of one month from the date of the transmission of the present communication. In addition, I inform you that the Annual Report must be approved by the plenary of the Commission prior to December 31, 2020 and consequently, a deadline of October 15, 2020 has been set to receive information from the parties for it to be considered in the 2020 Annual Report. In the event that the parties submit information after the date indicated, said information will be considered in the 2021 Annual Report of the IACHR.

 

I take the opportunity to greet you attentively,

 

Sincerely,

By authorization of the Executive Secretary

 

Enclosure

 https://drive.google.com/file/d/1XrK3gkW1NFaDpqEufxn352vOGOzeLk9A/view?usp=sharing

 

 Inter-American Commission on Human Rights

Annual Report

2019 

CHAPTER II

THE PETITIONS, CASES, AND PRECAUTIONARY MEASURES SYSTEM