Reject and Protect: The Cowboy Indian Alliance held a series of protests in Washington, D.C., in April. Everything is Illuminated/Pool Photos
Pipeline mirrors wrongful taking of sacred Black Hills
By Olivya Caballero A few weeks ago the people from the Cowboy Indian Alliance led a march on Washington in protest of the proposed Keystone XL pipeline. The pipeline is reported to contaminate the surrounding land and ruin the areas water source with oil crude. Aside from the environmental dangers, the Keystone XL pipeline presents another danger by entreating upon the sacred Black Hills. Although the tribes that protested the KXL pipeline are from the Oglala, (Pine Ridge), Sicangu, (Rosebud), Cheyenne River, Standing Rock, and Yankton reservations, Tar Sands pipelines have affected First Nations in Canada from an environmental perspective and all Indians in a cultural perspective. From an environmental perspective, the KXL pipeline would affect an already impoverished area on the Pine Ridge and Rosebud reservations. These environmental effects have been observed on Canadian First Nations land by the presence of contaminated drinking water and the appearance of arsenic in moose meat. Various health problems already plague those living on both reservations. The related health statistics are as follows, eight times the United States rate of diabetes, four times the national rate of teen suicide, and double the rate of heart disease. Additionally, the per capita income is $4,000 per year accompanied by an unemployment rate of 80-90 percent. The issue of the proposed KXL pipeline mirrors an old, but relevant issue of the wrongful taking of the Black Hills through the continuing motivation to remove Native Americans from their land and infringe upon their rights. In 1868 the Treaty of Fort Laramie was written in order to settle the land disputes between the United States government and the Lakota tribes, wherein it was agreed that land rights would be guaranteed for the Black Hills. However, due to violent conflicts the Black Hills were again seized by the U.S. government from the Lakota Nation, which resulted in many legal battles for the return of the Black Hills with the most recent notable breakthrough occurring in 1980. In the court case United States vs. Sioux Nation of Indians the Black Hills were valued at $105 million. As of 2014, the value has climbed to over a billion dollars. However, the Lakota tribes refuse to settle and sell their rights to the Black Hills even for such a large price. While the KXL pipeline is controversial in its environmental risk factors what has been largely unexplored by this controversy is its encroachment on the sacred land of the Lakota including the Black Hills, and the federal government’s longstanding encroachment. To better understand this controversy, we must first explore the different ways in which land is valued. Louise Erdrich, an Ojibwa author comments on the duty of Native American authors, in contrast to Anglo-American authors, by suggesting that the removal of Natives from their homelands affects Native Americans in all aspects, including writing. She iterates that Native authors “must tell the stories of contemporary survivors…[a]nd in all this there is always the land,” reinforcing the additional historical value land still holds to many Native Americans across Indian Country, including the Lakota and the Black Hills. In direct relation to the Black Hills, it is important to mention its direct significance in one of the most foundational stories to the Lakota people, the creation story. The creation story tells that the Lakota people first emerged onto the surface of the Earth through the Black Hills. The value of land transcends those of physical meaning, i.e. monetary and resource value to more conceptual ones of cultural, spiritual, and historical value. Author William Cronan summarizes the colonization of Native North Americans onto reservations when he says, “Once set aside within the fixed and carefully policed boundaries of the modern bureaucratic state, the wilderness lost its savage image and became safe: a place more of reverie than of revulsion or fear.” Although Cronan speaks specifically of land, the idea is reflected by the efforts to civilize Native Americans to standards that were more pleasing to the colonizer. Such efforts are still forced in a contemporary sense by both refraining from returning the Black Hills and by forcing an unsafe KXL pipeline. While the values and culture may seem foreign and unfamiliar it is essential to recognize that this situation is not about fully recognizing or tangibly defining a nation so much as it is about a simple exercise of restraint, of not forcing similarly unfamiliar ideals on a group deemed as Other. It is important to recognize these nations and respect their wishes. In regards to the Keystone XL Pipeline it becomes essential to then support the proposal to put KXL down because it would negatively affect the physical and spiritual well-being of the Lakota people. Olivya Caballero is an enrolled member of Northern Arapaho Tribe and also identifies as Sicangu Lakota. She is currently studying Bio-Medical Engineering at Columbia University, at the FU School of Engineering and Applied Science. She can be reached at Osc2109@columbria.edu Copyright permission Native Sun News
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