YouTube: Sacred Stone Camp Founder Remembers Whitestone Massacre
LaDonna Brave Bull Allard, the Section 106 historic preservation officer for the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe and the founder of the Sacred Stone Camp, explains why she is fighting the $3.8 billion Dakota Access Pipeline:
The U.S. government is wiping out our most important cultural and spiritual areas. And as it erases our footprint from the world, it erases us as a people. These sites must be protected, or our world will end, it is that simple. Our young people have a right to know who they are. They have a right to language, to culture, to tradition. The way they learn these things is through connection to our lands and our history. If we allow an oil company to dig through and destroy our histories, our ancestors, our hearts and souls as a people, is that not genocide? Today, on this same sacred land, over 100 tribes have come together to stand in prayer and solidarity in defiance of the black snake. And more keep coming. This is the first gathering of the Oceti Sakowin (Sioux tribes) since the Battle of the Greasy Grass (Battle of Little Bighorn) 140 years ago. When we first established the Sacred Stone Camp on April 1 to stop the pipeline through prayer and non-violent direct action, I did not know what would happen. But our prayers were answered. We must remember we are part of a larger story. We are still here. We are still fighting for our lives, 153 years after my great-great-grandmother Mary watched as our people were senselessly murdered. We should not have to fight so hard to survive on our own lands.Read More:
LaDonna Brave Bull Allard: Why the Founder of Standing Rock Sioux Camp Can’t Forget the Whitestone Massacre (YES! Magazine 9/3)
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