la petite indienne

queerindigenology asked: Your tagline 'I look more authentic in sepia' needs to be mine also. Maybe it would shut people up about blood quantum and cherokee princess stories.

:)

I had a longer tagline bio, but I decided that about sums it up.

I think it’s funny and sad how natives constantly confront the idea of “authenticity” as a direct contrecoup of Edward S. Curtis.

I am Indian by blood; American by (Manifest) Destiny.

(Or: Of Obama, Osama, and… Geronimo: y u mad?)

I hate the deficit approach. You will not read this blog and find GIFs of land loss, or those staged Edward S. Curtis photographs. I will not couch every position on the atrocities committed upon my ancestors by the United States Government. Do I think what happened to us was wrong? Absolutely. But the more that it defines me, the more prescriptive history becomes for my identity as a modern Dakota/Lakota woman, the more ammunition I lend to those who would question what authenticity is retained through centuries of assimilation. Those who think being Indian is like joining the Boy Scouts (or the Hipster Scouts, as it may be). And quite honestly, I’m not interested in that. I know who I am, who my people are; we persevere.

That said, let’s talk about Osama bin Laden: codename “Geronimo”.

The only similarity? That they were both targets who long evaded “capture” by the shining white knight, the United States government. And no, that is not a compliment to Geronimo.

This perspective requires that your current pro-America stance translates all the way back to 1858, when the United States was well in the grip of Manifest Destiny. That the pursuit of Public Enemy #1, bin Laden, was in the same spirit, with the same intent, and within the same context, as the Apache Wars. That simply existing, let alone fighting to preserve a way of life under constant encroachment in the name of western expansion, is just as reprehensible, just as abhorrent, just as punishable as being the direct and indirect cause of the death of innumerable people of all faiths and colors.

This BBC article quotes Allan R Millet, a retired Marine Corps colonel and Ohio State University professor:

“It’s like shooting missiles at Geronimo… you might get a couple of Apaches, but what difference does that make?”

Well, Professor Millet, I’d say it makes quite a bit of difference to the Apache. Or to the families of the hundreds of thousands of civilian casualties in Iraq and Afghanistan since our engagement began. In fact, isn’t that sort of apathetic attitude about the value of human life what we have so effectively (and, make no mistake, justly) condemned Osama bin Laden for?

But that quote is from 2001, right? Perhaps this is a vestige of the old west / Bon Jovi mentality of the Bush administration. After all, Osama was “Wanted: dead or alive.”

But are you telling me that the Commander in Chief cannot change the codename of an enemy target? I’m sure it was undoubtedly thrown around during the numerous meetings surrounding this operation. It’s not as if it’s a surprise to anyone with a certain level of security clearance. Nobody thought that the countless American Indian servicemembers in Apache helicopters (which, incidentally, are made by Apaches) might feel a little… weird about hunting for Geronimo? That indian country at large, to which this President has made a strong commitment, would not appreciate being compared to Al Qaeda?

Because that’s the ultimate implication, isn’t it? Geronimo, one of the best known American Indian leaders, is a hero. As is bin Laden to some. The latter “some” just happens to be a violent extremist group that are, by all accounts, the enemy of the United States of America. Indian people are not that. Yes, we have a troubled history with the US. But you hunted us, remember? Kill the indian, save the man; forced assimilation for all. Yet we’re still here. And beyond that, we guard this country, serving in the military at higher per capita rates than any other group. That bald eagle, America’s symbol? He’s sacred to us. You’ve never seen patriotism like that which pervades the small reservation community where I grew up.

It’s a shame that these ongoing contributions to the fabric and security of America are so easily forgotten or discarded when it’s convenient to think of American Indian people as near-mythic savage expansion-opposers confined to history; to assign and appropriate our names, our heroes, our symbols, to even the worst, least deserving ideas.

—AYR (email me)