Manifest Destiny

Manifest Destiny by Dave Kitchen 

Once upon a time in a place called Turtle Island there were people who were very spiritually, administratively and socially evolved. After many thousands of years of developing on this continent, some people began to wander over from other continents.

They usually came on ships. But some came across the Bering Strait. Some say all Indigenous People of the Americas came that way. But they didn't. And DNA can prove it.

Some came from what is known as Asia, Africa (Moors), Iceland (Leif Ericson nearly 500 years before Columbus) and finally from lower Europe. 

Now the earlier folks did not do much but settle and trade a little.

Then came Columbus and the Spaniards. The first thing Columbus did to greet his new Indigenous friends was build a gallows and hang some for no other reason than to instill fear of him into their hearts so they would obey his oppressive and murderous regime. It got so bad that he was recalled to Europe by Spain for his inhuman actions and cruelty. 

Not a very nice fellow.

But supposedly he "discovered" America. 

Putting aside Leif as being 500 years his senior, the Moors before that, and the Asians thousands of years before that, how do you discover a place already occupied?

The people here were told by their ancestors that this land was where the Creator planted them from the very beginning. Sure those Asians wandered over here. But guess what? They were met by people already here. Then they intermarried and cultures mixed, especially out west where even language is an example of the inter-weavings of different cultures. The word in some Indigenous languages that means sun and moon is very similar, except in one language; one means sun and in the other language the same word means moon. 

Then you had the Moors who came and traded with Indigenous People, but did not invade Indigenous People. Some intermarried and lived on the Barrier Islands off the east coast, south east of Turtle Island or as it is now called, the USA. But they weren't crazy like Columbus.

Some of them could have been part of the Geechee Gullah culture of the Southeast Coastal USA. Also, I am sure many of the Geechee Gullah culture were brought here by Europeans as slaves.

Leif Ericson founded a colony in what is now Greenland and one is thought to have been founded in what is now Canada by him.  

After Columbus, came the Spaniards. They loved to engage in genocide of large numbers of people and give them diseases that decimated populations that were in the millions down to the lower numbers that were left when the British arrived.

Actually Columbus thought he was in India. So some say he called Indigenous People "Indians" because of that. Others say that the name Indios or Indians came from what the Spaniards called the highly spiritual Indigenous People of the continent: the Una Pueblo Indios.

Roughly translated that means a People of God. 

I honestly don't know if they respected Indigenous People enough to call them that.

But I do know that the invaders were technologically advanced in the art of war with guns. They appeared to be morally bankrupt by their actions. Of the two cultures clashing, one looked originally on their white brothers as being sent by the Creator because of legends from different Indigenous cultures about either the four colors of the four directions coming together or, of a bearded savior who would come. And there were other legends.

The Europeans on the other hand, most of them, no all, immediately saw the Indigenous People as "savages' who were less than them as humans and were to be controlled and conquered.

This arrogance has carried the concept of Manifest Destiny forward and made the genocide of a much more spiritual people okay in the eyes of those who but for their arms, were barbarians. 

Let me first explain the concept of Manifest Destiny. To put it simply, certain members of the USA as it was forming decided that it was their God given right to do whatever was necessary and by any means possible to take possession of all the continental lands of what is now the USA, no matter what they had to do to those who were already there. They looked on those who were not them as lesser human beings or less than human. And felt it was their right to destroy the rightful owners of the lands if necessary to accomplish their goals. After all they were "savages" just like they were portrayed (or mis-portrayed) in "Westerns" from the old "Hollywood Westerns."

There was and is this big misconception that just because a civilization didn't have the same technological advancements for making war (gunpowder), it does not mean that they were not socially and/ or spiritually advanced. Violent/ aggressive people are not advanced people. People who want to steal and destroy entire cultures of people are not advanced people. 

The Cherokee People were not moved from their land because they were "savages" who attacked their neighbors. On the contrary, their white neighbors had intermarried with them and most of the food that is traditionally called "Southern Cooking" is simply food that was the every day staples of the Cherokee Nation.

What got the Cherokee sent on a forced march that killed many of its people was a very primitive emotion.

Greed. When gold was found at Dalonega, Georgia, the greedy whites, not all whites, wanted it for themselves.

And this same scenario has repeated time after time even to the present time. 

The funny thing about it was, when President Obama became the first U.S. President to sign the U.N. Declaration for the Rights of Indigenous People, certain conservative blogs and newspapers where spreading fear by saying that Indigenous People were going to try and take their lands back now. I am still laughing about that one. Hey, it would be nice to get the stolen lands back or for someone to pay back rent on all that time that they illegitimately took the lands, but this document only protects future violations it's not retroactive. Ha! Gee does someone feel so guilty that they fear losing what their ancestors took illegitimately? Sorry for the bad humor. 

Recently many people have asked my wife and I why we don't move away from McIntosh County, Georgia because of all the persecution that my wife and I have received because we were found to have Indigenous heritage in our family. And I will attempt to explain why were stay using the concept of Manifest Destiny that is still pervasive in much of the mentality in McIntosh County, Ga. whether these folks know where they got their attitudes or not.

When we moved here, it was going back in time to the 1960s before Civil Rights. The African Americans here are afraid to stand up to the bad guys. And when they tried the same intimidation techniques on my wife and I, it not only didn't work, the bad guys or gals, as the case may be, got to feel a little upset themselves. 

You see the only way that Indigenous People have survived on this continent is not by running away. But taking stands when they could, pulling back and going underground, then coming back up when the bad guys least expect it.

You see this is OUR homeland. Right or wrong our people have fought for freedom all over the world. And by the Creator we will stand up for it in our homeland.

But even the above reasons pale in comparison to the major reason that we have taken being shot at, horses poisoned, private property destroyed, and many other harassing things done to us is this. 

We had no plans to move here. But somehow when I was very sick The Creator or God if that is what you want to call the Supreme Being opened a very distinct door to come here and gave a sign that this is where we were to be. And neither Manifest Destiny, nor gunshots, nor our very lives if we have to give them matter to us, until the Creator says it's time to go, we have to stay because that is our way. That is our tradition. That is life to us. That is what has been handed down for a thousand generations or more. That is our connection to our people and to the divine. If we break that line, we are lost as a people and might as well be dead.

But these trials that we have been through here were made through by two very sick and older people. So only the Creator could have made us survive and thrive.

And we have learned much. We now have learned to have compassion for some of the very families who we harming us. When their loved ones were suffering and dying with cancer or whatever, we go and pray for them. We help their elderly. When they were in need of wheelchair ramps we helped get them built for free. 

The Christian Bible says this will heap burning coals on their heads. But our tradition says that what you do to another comes back to you. The Christian Bibles says what you sow, you reap. And that is the same as our tradition. 

I have grown because of this place. At first we fought them by fighting back in physical ways. But things just got worse. So then we went to the Spirit. And who knows. maybe what needs to change to bring peace to this world is in all of us, if we just look hard enough. 


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