In a great deal of GWS classes we learn of the different process of colonization and how it has had long lasting affects on different groups of people around the world. Reading this essay, it defiantly helps the argument that colonization is still very much alive, just in different forms. The United States government continues to use different tactics in an effort to keep Native nations reliant on them, which includes weakening their justice systems and forcing their own ideas of "justice" on the Native peoples. The United states has done this through implementing laws restricting tribal laws, imposing their own health care in which people are abused, and by continuously ignoring the violent crimes that occur while sipping tribal nations of their own justice systems.
While the U.S government stripped tribal governments of their authority to handle what is seems to be becoming any crime, not just felony crimes, they rarely actually investigate crimes that are brought to their attention. It strikes me as a form of abuse and neglect that the government takes the right s of tribes to handle their own issues, but leaves them with nothing because they don't do anything to hold anyone accountable either. In essence, the U.S government is just letting criminals inflict violence upon Native women and children without any repositions, which makes them a larger target for others, which Deer discusses in her essay.
These issues have been brought up again and again. In 2015, the U.S Supreme court agreed to hear a case in which a young Indigenous boy was assaulted by a white manager. The issue was whether or not the man was subject to tribal trial since it occurred on their land. Indigenous people are fighting to have their own trials and actually have justice since the U.S government ignore their issues and when they do actually do something, it is often ineffective in helping the victims heal.
https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/bnpb73/native-american-women-are-rape-targets-because-of-a-legislative-loophole-511
My question is : How could the U.S government give Indigenous Nations back their sovereignty without completely destroying the nations? Do you think there are ways non-native people can aid in the fight for Indigenous people in their quest to regain sovereignty and fight the extremely high levels of violence?
I think the article you cited with your blog post was a really great addition to Sarah Deer's reading. The statistic "80% of sexual assaults on native women are perpetrated by white men" is really not shocking, but still so heartbreaking. It was important for me to read about restricting laws and then actually read about a specific incident where a native woman was sexually assaulted by her ARMY RECRUITER. This made me think about the coalitions women in the military could potentially have with women of color in countries where the American military is present.
ReplyDeleteIt feels to me like Native American government officials are being treated like the toddler in a car seat with her parent, using a toy steering wheel to mimic the act of driving. Never actually controlling the world around them, but instead being praised for PRETENDING to do something as important as the adult. This is, put simply, an embarrassment to the Native American community. They are not taken seriously, and when thinking about the fact that tribal governments aren't being taken seriously, i cannot imagine how female Native American victims are treated when they see help. Your picture says it all: "They trespass our bodies like they trespass our land".
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