So many big brains here!
I've got a lot to consider here but I'm going to do my best to respond to each point to the best of my ability. This is an absolutely massive post and I apologize, I'm not trying to overwhelm anyone here. I tried to condense it as much as I could but I feel like there's just too much to say. Please bare with me, I tried to write this up fairly quickly so some of my thoughts might jump around a bit. This will be revised over the next day or two but I'm hoping that any responses to this post will foster conversation that will help to elaborate on and clarify some of the following points.
Quote:From Wikipedia:
Quote:
Racial politics, i.e., whether non-natives can participate in peyote ceremonies, is a highly contentious issue that has been at the forefront of the peyote community for a long time. Looking at two current, major NAC chapters in the United States showcases this dichotomy: the Native American Church of the United States, the original umbrella incorporated church birthed in 1918 from which many other chapters are tied to, allows non-natives to participate, in regulation with state law. On the other hand, the Native American Church of North America, incorporated much later in the 1950s, only allows Native Americans with a 1/4 Indian blood quantum and CIB certificate to participate (Omer Stewart - Peyote Religion).
James Warren ‘Flaming Eagle’ Mooney is the grandson of James ‘Jamie’ Harvey Mooney.
Regarding the latter:
Quote:
James Mooney later, with the aid of other Smithsonian Institute personnel, stood up successfully in congress against the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) who was trying to instigate the Peyote Law that was designed to outlaw the American Native Spirituality. After successfully defeating this racist and illegal proposed law by the BIA and Secretary of Interior, James Mooney, along with his long time friend (who by then was deceased) Comanche Chief Quanah Parker persuaded Oklahoma American Native Spiritual Leaders to incorporate Oklevueha Native American Church of Oklahoma, with the intent to give First amendment protection to the American Native Culture. James Mooney drafted the by-laws for the Native American Church of Oklahoma that was incorporated in 1918.
More information here as well.
Quote:Regarding the quotes above, it paints an interesting picture for the history of the church and the strange grounds of the differing viewpoints. The first and original NAC was established in 1918. Keep in the mind the cultural and political climate around Native Americans at this time, the Bureau of Indian Affairs was seeking to outlaw all native spiritual practices. James Mooney (The grandfather of the James Mooney who currently heads ONAC) had "witnessed" (read participated in) native ceremonies and understood the value of in these practices and fought it out in congress to allow Native peoples the right to practice their traditions. He was instrumental in establishing the first and original NAC and it likely would not have occurred at all without his assistance, at this time a white man had a lot more political clout in these issues than a native. This being the case, one can ponder the question of lineage and whether or not Mooney has as much right to the title of NAC as do the indigenous peoples of North America who's traditional practices the church was implemented to protect.
The first thing that really stuck out to me was the statement that "
James Mooney, along with his long time friend (who by then was deceased) Comanche Chief Quanah Parker persuaded Oklahoma American Native Spiritual Leaders to incorporate Oklevueha Native American Church of Oklahoma..."
This might be a matter of semantics, but I'm wondering how Mooney could have worked with Chief Quanah in order to persuade spiritual leaders to incorporate ONAC when Quanah was deceased at the time? How could Quanah have been part of this process? I've also been looking pretty hard for other sources that cite a connection between Quanah and ONAC and I haven't found any aside from the claim on ONACs website (not to say that they aren't out there, I just can't seem to find them). I understand that Chief Quanah and Mooney were friends but Quanah was reportedly no longer alive at the time that ONAC became a recognized Church. I'm also wondering about the claim that Mooney is responsible for writing the by-laws of the NAC at the time that it was officially incorporated. If this is the case (assuming the information on the ONAC website is accurate) then I find it unsettling that it was a white person who wrote the policy which determines whether or not outsiders could participate in these ceremonies.
And to elaborate on your own words:
Quote:This being the case, one can ponder the question of lineage and whether or not Mooney has as much right to the title of NAC as do the indigenous peoples of North America who's traditional practices the church was implemented to protect
I don't think that gives him a right at all. If he had the express permission of indigenous people then that is one thing, but I don't think that simply because he did a good thing he is automatically entitled to claim the NAC. He was someone who had a lot of power over marginalized people, and he decided to use that power for something positive. That's great, good for him. But doing something good just because you want access to something doesn't sit right with me. Doing the right thing for the wrong reasons doesn't justify the reasoning. The ends do not justify the means.
Now I'll concede the fact that so far my points have been speculative. To be honest I don't know much about the full history of the NAC and I wasn't aware of the divide between the two. I've been looking and I can't find any more reference to this divide, with the exception of the elusive quote on wikipedia that you provided. Do you have any more information about this? And just to clarify, (because sometimes it can be hard to tell if someone is being sarcastic on the internet) I'm not trying to be snarky here. I would absolutely love any more info that you have which specifically pertains to how the original NAC regards the issue of race/appropriation as opposed to the post-1950's NAC.
Quote: The implications of this policy are interesting to examine however, since only members of US federally recognized tribes are allowed to participate in ceremony this would exclude the Huichol and Tarahumara peoples of Mexico who, according to historical records, have a much longer and more established relationship with peyote than the tribes of North America. Likewise, these policies would exclude the First Nations peoples of Canada. Fortunately both these groups have protections under their countries governments for peyote use. A visiting ayhuascero from South America would be prohibited from participating in a ceremony with NACNA but the grandson of a Navajo who was born in Europe would be allowed to participate in ceremony. The policy of NACNA is racist in the truest sense of the term, and while somewhat understandable in the cultural climate of the 1950's when it was established, in the 21st century it's simply backwards and archaic.
I have to ask, why would US law protect someone in Mexico or Canada? The US government only recognizes its own borders, it does not recognize the ties between different indigenous groups who are separated by these borders; it has never recognized the sovereignty of the nations which existed here long before expansion...Mexico used to be nearly twice the size that it is today, and now entire cultures and communities are separated by an artificial border between Mexico and the so called United States. If the purpose of the NAC is an attempt to decriminalize the use of peyote for Native Americans, they have to fight for that right in the US courts within the framework that the federal government provides. And the federal government is going to make a ruling that only applies to those within the borders that it recognizes. It doesn't recognize the connection between Canadian natives and those in the northern territories of the States, and by its own authority it doesn't have to. Why would the US government give Canadians the right to take peyote if they are citizens of a different country? I believe that to be a "federally recognized" Native American by the US government means that you're affiliated with a culture/tribe that resides in the United States. From what I understand (and correct me if I'm wrong), the US government doesn't recognize Canadian or Mexican indigenous peoples as federally recognized Native Americans because they aren't within US borders. This isn't a decision of the NAC. From what I can see they have to work with what they are given, and I would venture a guess that there are many within the NAC who are frustrated by the bureaucracy of it all.
Furthermore, I don't think it's racist by any stretch for indigenous people to protect their own culture. To illustrate why I think this I want to explore some history.
Like most things in history, we tend to think of the past as a distinct period of time. The past is just the past, we can forget it now because now it is the present. We don't think of historical events as connected and we don't see our current structures, institutions, and culture as a culmination and continuation of history. I think Snozz said it well here:
Quote:Atrocities are ongoing, they have not passed.
The importance of acknowledging our differences is that it gives us the ability to identify the atrocities, locate our shared strengths, support each other's weaknesses. As long as we pretend that everything is unified and we have transcended hitory (and present), we will be unable to take action against that which is currently destroying us.
The socio-political landscape in which we live is not even ground and it is not static. We could think of this landscape like a topographical map, it has high points and low points. The high/low points are geographical formations which have arisen out of the conditions of the past. All of the formations we see on the map exist as a result of ongoing relationships which are constantly in flux. Likewise, we live in a world defined by power-relations. Instead of living on a flat world in which everyone can see each-other at eye level, we live in a world where some of us are sitting atop the highest mountains, protected by our height advantage, while everyone else is stuck at the base of the mountains. Not at all of us chose this position, but nonetheless we inherited positions of power as a result of the cumulative events of history. The terrain is continuing to change, but it's not going to even itself out if we keep ignoring the fact that the ground is not even in the first place. We can't disregard that our perspective of the world is from the top of a mountain looking down. We have to acknowledge the conditions that led to the formation of the mountain, and we have to acknowledge that our perspective of the world from atop the mountain is not the same as the people at the bottom. Any action that we take which does not take our height advantage into account is only going to create further disparity between the people at the top and those at the bottom. If we don't understand
why we can't hope to figure out
how.
Native American people are still here. They are still fighting. This is still their land and we are still colonizers. Over the course of the last 500 years or so, indigenous people have had their land and culture stripped away from them by force. They have had to fight tooth and nail for each aspect of the traditions that they still retain, all the while having to cope with the implications of being assimilated into colonial culture. Native people were taken from their families and shipped off to boarding schools where they were subjected to unspeakable abuse. The purpose of these schools was to strip indigenous children of their traditional culture and instill into them the values of dominant society. The last of these schools was shut down in the 1990's. Yeah...the 1990's.
To this day, Native people are struggling with continued dislocation, poverty, disproportional arrest and incarceration, and unemployment. When Native people engage in their traditional practices, they are doing so in a context which brings together community and instills a sense of pride and self determination. The practices are meant to empower communities to be resilient in the face of a racist mainstream society which continues to marginalize them. When these traditions are taken out of context, particularly by dominant culture, the practices and culture become diluted. The more that these traditions become assimilated into the mainstream the more they strip indigenous people of their self-identity and self-determination as a people. Spiritual traditions like peyote ceremonies are a small part of an entire cultural-matrix which emphasizes the inseparable relationship between community and land, and when they are removed from this matrix they can create harm not only to Native people but to those who are seeking their practices for spiritual purposes. When you strip these ceremonies of their cultural context you also strip them of their meaning; you cannot separate the two. Native people absolutely have every right to determine who can or who cannot participate in their traditions when their culture and well-being is at stake.
When we take these traditions for our own use, whether we have permission or not, I think e need to ask what we are giving back. In light of the fact that Native peoples are still oppressed by colonization, why should they offer us their medicines when we aren't giving anything in return? We are happy to take their traditions so that we might better ourselves, but what are we doing about our status as settlers on colonized land? What are we doing to uplift our Native brothers and sisters? How are we challenging the status quo which allows us to take without giving back in the first place, which oppresses the people who we are taking knowledge from? How are our actions different from the pattern of systematic extermination and assimilation that Native people have been fighting since 1492? In short, if we expect for this medicine to be shared freely, what are we offering in return?
So here you might be thinking that not all Native people are opposed to sharing their traditional knowledge and you're absolutely right about that. I was previously unaware of the distinction between the NACNA and the original NAC and it's something I need to learn more about. But with this in mind I want to make the point that I don't think it's respectful to pick and choose those people who are most friendly to your own personal desires. I think this especially true in the cases where there is a strong presence of Natives who are critical of sharing their traditional knowledge with outsiders. IMO, being supportive and respectful means acknowledging that the community is divided by this issue. It is critical to recognize those voices which might not be supportive of your desires. Culture and community is complicated; we can't just waltz in and demand something and then expect everybody to agree unanimously. And I don't think we, as outsiders, have a right to decide for an entire community on the pretense that some of them don't mind. A community having self-determination means it can make decisions for itself, and if a community is divided then I think we need to acknowledge that there are boundaries, and we need to give the community space to work the issue out amongst itself.
To provide an analogy, call to mind the rules which the DMT Nexus has established for new members. We have certain protocol which we expect new members to follow. We expect when people come to the DMT Nexus that they acknowledge that DMT is an incredibly powerful drug and it should not be taken lightly. We expect for them to educate themselves properly about extraction methods, techniques for administration, and we expect that they will respect moderators and those who clearly have extensive knowledge and experience pertaining to DMT. We take these expectations, and our unquestioned right to enforce them, for granted.
Quote:We demand respect for our territories, our indigenous medicine and our traditional healers or Taitas. We ask the world to acknowledge that our medicine is also a science, although not in the same way Westerners understand it. We, the Taitas, are real healers and for many centuries we have effectively contributed to the health of our villages. Furthermore, our medicine looks beyond the physical and seeks the wellbeing of the mind, the heart and the spirit.
Source:
UMIYAC Declaration If you read the quote above it is clear that the Taitas of the Amazon are very clearly expressing their right to self-determination. If we say we respect the cultures from which Ayahuasca comes from, how can ignore their right to self-determination? How can we ignore the customs and practices that they have established in regards to the proper handling of sacred medicines? They have been using it for thousands of years and all they are asking is for us to acknowledge that we can't just waltz in, take it, and pretend we know better than they do about how to use it.
This is exactly why some parts of the forum are off-limits to new members, because the DMT Nexus recognizes that when someone comes to this website and then misuses DMT it implicates the Nexus in a negative way. We want to control how our community is seen and how we present ourselves, so we don't share everything here with just anybody. People have to prove that they are accountable and responsible before we trust them. This is self-determination, which we at the DMT Nexus have the privilege of possessing without even having to think twice about. It's a great thing when we have it, but when marginalized groups of people fight for the same right to self-determination we call them racist and exclusive.
And this is what I mean by saying the terrain is not even ground. The 21st century is built off of the same system that colonized the Americas 500 years ago. We are still at the top of the mountain looking down at everybody else.
Phew.....ok I'm almost there.
Quote:It's the opposition to the ongoing push of capitalism into indigenous culture. The young people on the rez or in the village may be more interested in ipods and levi's than in ancestral languages and botanical healing, but there is an endless line of disillusioned gringos who want nothing more than to sit at the feet of the maestro and learn the songs and the stories to help restore and reconnect their tribe and their village to the wisdom path. The next generation of curers may be fair skinned but they may be the only hope for the last 10,000 generations of wisdom to find their way to the next 10,000 generations.
See my comments regarding assimilation and identity. What is left of Native culture when those practicing its traditions are mostly white people? What would it mean to be a Native person in such an environment? Why do you think that indigenous youth is more attracted to dominant culture than their own traditions? Does this give others the right to claim this culture?
Quote:I say it's time stop dividing ourselves up and to begin to let go of the atrocities of the past. We are all in this together and we are becoming increasingly more connected into one global village. On one hand it is extremely important we preserve the ancient wisdom traditions as much as possible, because as amazing as google is, it cannot replace the 300,000 years of human experience in our collective cultural memory. On the other hand, we cannot remain rooted in the past, for example the finer points of hunting dodo through the forests of Mauritius isn't exactly pertinent to our current cultural predicament, so it's important we begin to forge our own traditions relevant to the world we find ourselves in. It's time for the scientist to sit with the shaman, it's time for the ancient wisdom keepers and sit with the upstarting technological innovators, it's time to integrate the wisdom of the past with the technology of the future into the vision of a new planetary civilization.
Again, I don't think we can do anything about the future if we don't take the past into account. We wouldn't be where we are now if it weren't for things done in the past, and things done in the past are reverberating into the present.
I agree with what you said here about forging our own traditions. And I think that means a lot of things. For one, I think it means recognizing that as a white person you have European ancestors who have wisdom to offer. You have your own roots, your own Earth traditions, and they are valid and just as relevant to the world as any Native American Earth religion. Because of the slave trade I unfortunately don't know too much about my ancestors, but I can make educated guesses and I can work to bring alive the vision of various African traditions. We are all looking for truth in a world that seems meaningless, but we can't take that truth from other people without their consent and we can't force people to share with us if they aren't ready to do it.
As we all know, DMT and psychedelic compounds are almost everywhere in nature. I don't see why we so often feel the need to reach out and grab peyote and ayahuasca simply because it's within our grasp. To me it means a lot more to connect with plant spirits that are connected to my culture and my ancestors, that are native to the ground upon which I stand. This might mean more research and harder work, but I think that the authenticity of it all will be rewarding inofitself. After all is it not authenticity that we're all seeking in a culture that gets more plastic by the day?
Now don't get me wrong, this doesn't mean that we can never learn about other cultural perspectives...but I think we need to be careful how we choose to integrate that knowledge into our own practices. Appreciating Buddhism or Hinduism from a Western perspective doesn't mean you can't meditate, but maybe think twice about wearing traditional clothing or symbols. I personally don't have a problem if a white person wants to learn about African spirituality and culture; but it makes my skin crawl when I see white folks with Ankh tattoos who may also happen to be wearing kente cloth and/or the proverbial red, yellow, and green; as if these things are a brand that erase your social privilege and somehow make you "exotic" or further removed from the exploitation of Africa. It doesn't matter if you've done your research and you're only trying to "respect the culture". When you're offending people and attacking their sense of self-identity you are not being respectful.
I want to try and wrap it up here....
In response to:
Quote:Do Native Americans own peyote? Do natives of the Amazon own ayahausca? Do natives of Africa own Iboga?
Yes, they do. And they've been pretty vocal about their right to intellectual property:
Quote:There are those who take our seeds to patent them, to own them. Others want to declare yagé a narcotic plant and prohibit its use for the good of humanity. We also denounce those anthropologists, botanists, business people, doctors and other scientists who are experimenting with yagé and other medicinal and sacred plants without taking into account our ancestral wisdom and our collective intellectual property rights...
...We declare that yagé and other medicinal plants we use are the patrimony and collective property of the indigenous people. It’s use in the name of mankind must be carried out with our participation and we should enjoy any other benefits that derive from its exploitation.
It might not be what you want to hear but being a good ally doesn't mean that we get everything we want. It doesn't mean that we have to agree. If we want to be allies it means respecting that other cultures have worldviews that don't fit into a modern, 21st century, white, neo-liberal box.
Again...what are we bringing to the table? How are we being accountable? How are we giving room for indigenous people to participate in their own self-determination? Just like we expect outsiders to be behave a certain way when they come to the Nexus, how might be we expected to behave when we seek out knowledge from indigenous cultures?
Quote:If retreat center X brings in Don Maestro Curandero from upriver to hold a paid ceremony for a bunch of Gringos is that disrespectful of indigenous culture?
Who owns the retreat center? Who is the Curandero acting on behalf of, on who's authority?
Quote:If ONAC has a trained and initiated Lakota medicine man freely dispense peyote in the tipi to their membership is that disrespectful to indigenous culture?
Again, just because some Native people don't mind sharing I personally don't feel comfortable disregarding the concerns of the rest of the community. The Lakota medicine man could very well be pissing off a lot of people in his community and they are just as representative of the culture.
Quote:If I go to a yoga class at the fancy new yoga center down-town am I being disrespectful to Vedic culture?
If I practice mindfulness based therapy with my psychologist is that being disrespectful to Buddhist culture?
I feel like I touched on this already, but I think it depends on a lot of circumstances. Who is teaching the yoga class? Are they simply teaching yogic poses/stretches or are they claiming to be a spiritual teacher? I personally don't feel qualified to answer this but I will say that there are a lot of different opinions and you might be surprised by what you hear. I'd suggest
this blog for questions pertaining to Eastern spirituality.
Quote:One of the things that makes STS so great, imo, is that it presents a peer-to-peer model for obtaining/working with these plants. Is it possible to accuse STS of engaging in biopiracy? Sure, but no one is actually deriving profit or exploiting people outright via the STS network. While indigenous farmers/wildcrafters may not be gaining anything from this trading of plants used traditionally where they are from, no one is actually exploiting an indigenous workforce for wage labor, selling herbal compounds at increased markups, or generally contributing to the commodification of these plants. For me, that is significant when compared to the general landscape of online vendors and people from the global north flocking to Latin and South America to open up "retreat centers" and other businesses.
STS is an incredible resource, and you're right that it circumvents any kind of physical exploitation of indigenous workers. But what about the effects of assimilation? When dominant society has integrated indigenous traditions into its own paradigm, what is left of the Native people? On what do they base their cultural identity? I think that before we start trying to assimilate these medicines into a Western framework, we need to do a lot of back-peddling and undo some of the damage that has already been done. Which leads me to my next and final point.
I don't disagree that we all have a right to pursue a connection with the Earth, with the universe, with reality. We are all seeking meaning in our lives. But harm has been done. We cannot go forward until we reconcile with the past. If we lived in a perfect world, in which the playing field was level, then I think it would be easy to say that we all have a right to experience these medicines. But we don't. We don't live in a world that's anywhere near functional, and so if we would like the opportunity to one day work with these medicines it is my belief that we need to start repairing our relationships with the people who are being harmed right now. Until we restore those relationships we cannot expect the people we've marginalized to just forgive and forget. They are still dealing with colonization. They don't owe us anything. I think that with healing comes reconciliation, and we can't work towards healing until we've reconciled with the fact that we've inflicted a deep wound that needs attention.
Wooooh....okay I think I'm done. I'm sure there are things I'm forgetting to mention and things I didn't explain as well as I would have hoped, but I am pretty sick of writing this and I want to hang out in chat.
Let me just end by saying that I am speaking for myself here, and how I've come to understand things. There are a lot of things I'm not knowledgeable about and I don't want to give the impression that I'm trying to speak for Native people. A lot of these questions I don't have the knowledge or authority to answer, but I would encourage folks to look around and do some digging; this isn't a new topic and people have been talking about it for a long time. Indigenous people on this side of the world been standing up and speaking out since 1492, and to be frank I'm not really sure what else to say about it. For me it boils down to a personal choice. Do I ignore the wishes of people who feel they have been harmed by my participation in these ceremonies or do I hold myself accountable for my actions? These are of course my own personal sentiments and I understand every person reading this has their own choices to make and their own outlooks on life. I can't tell you what is right or wrong and I can't judge you for your decisions, but the best I can hope to do is offer a perspective you may not have considered in the hopes that we might come to collectively reduce the amount of harm that we do (and we
all do harm) as a community. I firmly believe that we cannot move forward until we have reconciled with the harm that has been done. We need to be humble if we wish to reconcile. We need to be open and honest, unafraid of getting our hands dirty, and courageous in the way that we choose to engage with the world.
I know I've linked it a few times now, but I want to post the UMIYAC declaration for folks to read. To keep the size of this post manageable I'll just include their main points and not the intro or conclusion. The Taitas acknowledge that the world can benefit from this medicine, this isn't the issue though. They want to be a part of the process and they want their traditions and knowledge respected. It has to be on their own terms, not on ours, and before they are willing to share there needs to be a process of reconciliation and accountability. I highly recommend that everyone reads these words and considers how their own actions relate to the wishes expressed herein: (This post is too big so the quote will be a separate post)
"Consciousness grows in spirals." --George L. Jackson
If you can just get your mind together, then come across to me. We'll hold hands and then we'll watch the sunrise from the bottom of the sea...
But first, are you experienced?