Sometimes I think we think too much. Sometimes I think we don’t think very clearly. Usually I think it’s both at the same time. Our thinking, which so often isn’t thinking, makes us crazy, ties us in knots. This is not accidental. It is common to abusive situations. As Lundy Bancroft, former codirector of Emerge, the nation’s first therapeutic program for abusive men, writes in his book Why Does He Do That? Inside the Minds of Angry and Controlling Men, “In one important way, an abusive man works like a magician. His tricks largely rely on getting you to look off in the wrong direction, distracting your attention so that you won’t notice where the real action is. . . . He leads you into a convoluted maze, making your relationship with him a labyrinth of twists and turns. He wants you to puzzle over him, to try to figure him out, as though he were a wonderful but broken machine for which you need only to find and fix the malfunctioning parts to bring it roaring to its full potential. His desire, though he may not admit it even to himself, is that you wrack your brain in this way so that you won’t notice the patterns and logic of his behavior, the consciousness behind the craziness.” 426
As I tried to make clear in Language and Culture, nearly everything in civilization leads us away from being able to think clearly and from being able to feel. If we were able to do either, we would not allow those in power to kill the world, to kill our nonhuman neighbors, to kill humans we love, to kill us. And once we have been inculcated into this thinking that is not thinking, this feeling that is not feeling, the culture does not need to do much to continue to confuse us. We will continue to confuse ourselves with all of our not-thinking and not-feeling. We will do this gladly, because if we did not confuse ourselves, if we allowed ourselves to think in a way that really was thinking and to feel in a way that really was feeling, we would suddenly understand that we need to stop the horrors that surround us, and we would suddenly understand that we can stop the horrors that surround us, and we would suddenly understand what we need to do in order to stop the horrors—the problems are not cognitively challenging—and we would start to do it.
I do not think the nonhuman mothers I mentioned earlier entered into philosophical debates on the purity of their motives.427 They just knew in their bodies what they needed to do. As we know in ours.
The Chinese poet Sengtsan wrote, “The more talking and thinking, the farther from the truth.”428 I sometimes think he was talking about us.
Several thousand years of inculcation and ideology all aimed at driving us equally out of our minds and our bodies, away from any realistic sense of self-defense, have gotten us to identify not with our bodies and our landbases, but with our abusers, with governments, with civilization. This misidentification is a marker of our insanity, and it is one of the things that drives us further insane, that leads to further confusion, that leads to further inaction.
Break that identification, and one’s course of action becomes so much clearer.
SHOULD WE FIGHT BACK?
Kind-hearted people might, of course, think there were some ingenious way to disarm or defeat an enemy without too much bloodshed, and might imagine that this is the true goal of the art of war. Pleasant as it sounds, it is a fallacy that must be exposed.
Carl von Clausewitz
A BIG ARGUMENT BROKE OUT RECENTLY ON THE DERRICK JENSEN discussion group, between those who believe that civilization must be brought down now by any means necessary—and they mean any means necessary—and those who “will not budge,” to use their phrase, from the belief that no human blood should ever be shed, and especially, to once again use a phrase of theirs, no “innocent” blood. Members of this latter camp state—again and again—that if only we feel sufficient compassion for those who are killing the planet, then they will, by basking in the reflected glow of our own shining and munificent love, come to see the error of their ways and stop all this silly destruction. The pacifists say that no one should ever under any circumstances, for example, kidnap Charles Hurwitz, nor especially his children, even if that could somehow force him to stop deforesting. The others counter by asking about all the nonhuman innocents murdered so Hurwitz can make a buck. They ask as well about the humans whose water supplies are trashed by Hurwitz’s activities. Where, they ask, is accountability? How do we stop him?
I’ll tell you the part of the discussion I’ve found most interesting: I’ve been imagining the thousands of somewhat similar conversations—some even more heated than this one—held around thousands of campfires and in thousands of longhouses by members of hundreds or thousands of indigenous tribes as they desperately strove (and strive) to figure out strategies and tactics that would (and will) save their lives and their ways of life. I see them standing around fires in forests in Europe, preparing as a people to face down Greek phalanxes or later the legions of Rome or still later priests and missionaries (and still later merchants and traders: what would now be called businesspeople and resource specialists) carrying the same message: submit or die. I see them in the forests and plains of China choosing whether to fight against an encroaching civilization—is there any other kind?—or to be dispossessed, then given that same choice of assimilation (submission) or death. Or maybe they’ll move away, then move again, and again, each time being pushed away by civilization’s insatiable lust for land, for conquest, for control, for expansion, each time being pushed onto the land of other of the indigenous. Or maybe their choice will be to simply disappear, evaporate like mist in the heat of this other culture.
I see them standing outside the forts of the Dutch or Portuguese in Africa, wondering whether they should try to talk these strange people from across the sea into stealing no more of their land—as they have tried time and again to talk to them, all to no end—or if they should attempt to stop them by force.
I see and hear these conversations in Aotearoa,429 Mosir,430 Hbun Squmi,431 Chukiyawu,432 Yondotin,433 iTswani,434 and in thousands of other places whose real names are not now remembered. I see and hear people having these conversations in great communal gatherings in maraes and longhouses, and I see them having these conversations singly, with friends, brothers, grandmothers. I see men (and women) sharpening their arrowheads and honing the edges of their tomahawks. I see them preparing for war, and I see the determination in their eyes and in the set of their jaw. I see also sorrow, for what’s been lost, and joy and exuberance, excitement and clarity at the prospect of finally fighting back. They are of all races, from all places, getting ready to fight to defend their lives and the land they love. I see others wrapping their weapons in skins, putting them away, vowing to bring them out again only to hunt, but to fight the civilized no more forever.
I can hear those who argue against fighting back. I hear the Choctaw Pushmataha, for example. The night is warm. Fall has not yet fully arrived in this land. The fire is low. It is late. Pushmataha says, “The question before us now is not what wrongs they have inflicted upon our race, but what measures are best for us to adopt in regard to them; and though our race may have been unjustly treated and shamefully wronged by them, yet I shall not for that reason alone advise you to destroy them, unless it was just and expedient for you so to do; nor, would I advise you to forgive them, though worthy of your commiseration, unless I believe it would be to the interest of our common good. We should consult more in regard to our future welfare than our present. What people, my friends and countrymen, were so wise and inconsiderate as to engage in a war of their own accord, when their own strength, and even with the strength of others, was judged unequal to the task?”435 We should not fight, he says, because we cannot win.436
Now I hear another also argue against fighting back. It is the Santee Sioux Taóyatedúta. His people are starving to death because his tribe has been forced onto a reservation—forced into dependency—and the food they were promised in exchange for giving up their land has (of course) not arrived. Most of the Santee are ready to go to war. Taóyatedúta warns against this, for reasons as pragmatic as Pushmataha’s, though in language more
direct: “See!—the white men are like the locusts when they fly so thick that the whole sky is a snow-storm. You may kill one—two—ten; yes, as many as the leaves in the forest yonder, and their brothers will not miss them. Kill one—two—ten, and ten times ten will come to kill you. Count your fingers all day long and white men with guns in their hands will come faster than you can count. . . . Yes; they fight among themselves, but if you strike at them they will all turn on you and devour you and your women and little children just as the locusts in their time fall on the trees and devour all the leaves in one day. . . . You will die like the rabbits when the hungry wolves hunt them in the Hard Moon [January].” After saying all of this, Taóyatedúta looks at the faces of those around him. He again begins to speak. He thinks those who clamor for war are fools, but if his people are foolish enough to go to war against these overwhelming odds, he says, “Taóyatedúta is not a coward: he will die with you.”437
I see and hear others who do not counsel caution or cooperation with those who are killing them, but who wish to strike back, and strike back hard. Standing at the same low fire as Pushmataha, the great Shawnee Tecumseh states, “If there is one here tonight who believes that his rights will not sooner or later be taken from him by the avaricious American pale-faces, his ignorance ought to excite pity, for he knows little of the character of our common foe. And if there be one among you mad enough to undervalue the growing power of the white race among us, let him tremble in considering the fearful woes he will bring down upon our entire race, if by his criminal indifference he assists the designs of our common enemy against our common country. Then listen to the voice of duty, of honor, of nature and of your endangered country. Let us form one body, one heart, and defend to the last warrior our country, our homes, our liberty, and the graves of our fathers.”438
In my heart and mind I follow Tecumseh village to village, as he speaks a voice of desperation and truth that stirs something deep inside me that makes me want to stand and join him in fighting what he and I both see as a war that is necessary for the survival of people and landbases against an incomprehensively implacable enemy. I hear Tecumseh say to the Osages, “The blood of many of our fathers and brothers has run like water on the ground, to satisfy the avarice of the white men. We, ourselves, are threatened with a great evil; nothing will pacify them but the destruction of all the red men.
“Brothers—When the white men first set foot on our grounds, they were hungry; they had no place on which to spread their blankets, or to kindle their fires. They were feeble; they could do nothing for themselves. Our fathers commiserated their distress, and shared freely with them whatever the Great Spirit had given his red children. They gave them food when hungry, medicine when sick, spread skins for them to sleep on, and gave them grounds, that they might hunt and raise corn. Brothers, the white people are like poisonous serpents: when chilled they are feeble and harmless; but invigorate them with warmth, and they sting their benefactors to death.
“The white people came among us feeble; and now we have made them strong, they wish to kill us, or drive us back, as they would wolves and panthers.
“Brothers—The white men are not friends to the Indians: at first, they only asked for land sufficient for a wigwam; now, nothing will satisfy them but the whole of our hunting grounds, from the rising to the setting sun.
“Brothers—The white men want more than our hunting grounds; they wish to kill our warriors; they would even kill our old men, women, and little ones. . . .
“Brothers—My people wish for peace; the red men all wish for peace: but where the white people are, there is no peace for them, except it be on the bosom of our mother.
“Brothers—The white men despise and cheat the Indians; they abuse and insult them; they do not think the red men sufficiently good to live.
“The red men have borne many and great injuries; they ought to suffer them no longer. My people will not; they are determined on vengeance; they have taken up the tomahawk; they will make it fat with blood; they will drink the blood of the white people.
“Brothers—My people are brave and numerous; but the white people are too strong for them alone. I wish you to take up the tomahawk with them. If we all unite, we will cause the rivers to stain the great waters with their blood.
“Brothers—If you do not unite with us, they will first destroy us, and then you will fall an easy prey to them. They have destroyed many nations of red men because they were not united, because they were not friends to each other. . . .
“Brothers—Who are the white people that we should fear them? They cannot run fast, and are good marks to shoot at; they are only men; our fathers have killed many of them.”439
Tecumseh is tireless. He knows what he has to do to leverage the power of his own people, and he sets out to do it. He sets out to recruit those who will fight back. He says, that same night before that same fire speaking to those same Choctaws and Chickasaws, “Have we not courage enough remaining to defend our country and maintain our ancient independence? Will we calmly suffer the white intruders and tyrants to enslave us? Shall it be said of our race that we knew not how to extricate ourselves from the three most to be dreaded calamities—folly, inactivity and cowardice? But what need is there to speak of the past? It speaks for itself and asks, ‘Where today is the Pequot? Where are the Narragansetts, the Mohawks, Pocanokets, and many of the other once powerful tribes of our race?’ They have vanished before the avarice and oppression of the white men, as snow before a summer sun. In the vain hope of alone defending their ancient possessions, they have fallen in the wars with the white men. Look abroad over their once beautiful country, and what see you now? Naught but the ravages of the pale-face destroyers meet your eyes. So it will be with you Choctaws and Chickasaws! Soon your mighty forest trees, under the shade of whose wide spreading branches you have played in infancy, sported in boyhood, and now rest your wearied limb after the fatigue of the chase, will be cut down to fence in the land which the white intruders dare to call their own. Soon their broad roads will pass over the graves of your fathers, and the place of their rest will be blotted out forever. . . . Think not, brave Choctaws and Chickasaws, that you can remain passive and indifferent to the common danger, and thus escape the common fate. Your people too will soon be as falling leaves and scattering clouds before their blighting breath. You too will be driven away from your native land and ancient domains as leaves are driven before the wintry storms. Sleep not longer, O Choctaws and Chickasaws, in false security and delusive hopes. Our broad domains are fast escaping from our grasp. Every year our white intruders become more greedy, exacting, oppressive and overbearing. Every year contentions spring up between them and our people and when blood is shed we have to make atonement whether right or wrong, at the cost of the lives of our greatest chiefs, and the yielding up of large tracts of our lands. Before the pale-faces came among us, we enjoyed the happiness of unbounded freedom, and were acquainted with neither riches, wants, nor oppression. How is it now? Wants and oppression are our lot; for are we not controlled in everything, and dare we move without asking, by your leave? Are we not being stripped day by day of the little that remains of our ancient liberty? Do they not even now kick and strike us as they do their black-faces? How long will it be before they tie us to a post and whip us, and make us work for them in their corn fields as they do them? Shall we wait for that moment or shall we die fighting before submitting to such ignominy? Have we not for years had before our eyes a sample of their designs, and are they not sufficient harbingers of their future determinations? Will we not soon be driven from our respective countries, and the graves of our ancestors? Will not the bones of our dead be plowed up and their graves be turned into fields? Shall we calmly wait until they become so numerous that we will no longer be able to resist oppression? Will we wait to be destroyed in our turn, without making an effort worthy of our race? Shall we give up our homes, our country, bequeathed to us by the Great Spirit, the graves of our dead, and everyt
hing that is dear and sacred to us, without a struggle? I know you will cry with me. Never! Never! Then let us by unity of action destroy them all, which we now can do, or drive them back whence they came. War or extermination is now our only choice. Which do you choose?”440
I hear Tecumseh speaking to the Creeks. I cannot tell if his voice is more full of rage, sorrow, excitement, determination, or reason. He says, in clear thoughts echoed by wild humans everywhere, “Let the white race perish! They seize your land, they corrupt your women, they trample on your dead! Back! whence they came, upon a trail of blood, they must be driven! Back! back—ay, into the great water whose accursed waves brought them to our shores. Burn their dwellings! Destroy their stock! Slay their wives and children! The red-man owns the country, and the pale-face must never enjoy it! War now! War forever! War upon the living! War upon the dead! Dig their very corpses from the graves! Our country must give no rest to a white man’s bones.”441
No matter where I go, no matter whom I listen to, from continent to continent, people to people, the reasons given for fighting back are always the same. I hear the words the Sauk Makataimeshiekiakiak (Black Hawk) said of himself in the third person to the whites who captured him, “He has done nothing for which an Indian should be ashamed. He has fought for his countrymen, the squaws and papooses, against white men, who came, year after year, to cheat them and take away their lands. You know the cause of our making war. It is known to all white men. They ought to be ashamed of it. The white men despise the Indians, and drive them from their homes. But the Indians are not deceitful. The white men speak bad of the Indian, and look at him spitefully. But the Indian does not tell lies; Indians do not steal. An Indian who is as bad as the white men could not live in our nation; he would be put to death, and eat up by the wolves. The white men are bad schoolmasters; they carry false looks, and deal in false actions; they smile in the face of the poor Indian to cheat him; they shake them by the hand to gain their confidence, to make them drunk, to deceive them, to ruin our wives. We told them to let us alone, and keep away from us; but they followed on, and beset our paths, and they coiled among us, like the snake. They poisoned us by their touch. We were not safe. We lived in danger. We were becoming like them, hypocrites and liars, adulterers, lazy drones, all talkers, and no workers. . . . Things were growing worse. There were no deer in the forest. The opossum and beaver were fled; the springs were drying up, and our squaws and papooses without victuals to keep them from starving; we called a great council, and built a large fire. The spirit of our fathers arose and spoke to us to avenge our wrongs or die. . . . We set up the war-whoop, and dug up the tomahawk; our knives were ready, and the heart of Black Hawk swelled high in his bosom when he led his warriors to battle. He is satisfied. He will go to the world of the spirits contented. He has done his duty. His father will meet him there, and commend him. . . . [Black Hawk] cares for his nation and the Indians. They will suffer. He laments their fate. The white men do not scalp the head; but they do worse—they poison the heart; it is not pure with them.—His countrymen will not be scalped, but they will, in a few years, become like the white men, so that you can’t trust them, and there must be, as in the white settlements, nearly as many officers as men to take care of them and keep them in order.”442
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