Wednesday, April 22, 2020
Fear of Another Chemical War Engulfs the Navajo Nation
Richard Mellor
Afscme Local 444, retired
The Navajo Nation has a population of about 350,000. This report from the mass media calls them, Americas "First Citizens". That's a bit of a stretch considering they were among the last to achieve formal citizenship. They are the remnants of the people that were here before the European invasions who faced a genocidal war over a few centuries that included biological warfare. Also, millions in all the America's died from infectious diseases that they had no immunity from. Imagine the fear that must posses this community with that historical record. The man describes it in the video.
As the video points out, the Navajo Nation has as of 4-20-20 1200 cases of and 40 deaths from the virus.
30% of the people have no running water
40% have no electricity.
The hospital has a 30% vacancy rate for nursing staff.
The Zionists have been able to build one of the most powerful armies in the world, irrigate the desert, build nuclear weapons, provide health care to the settlers that moved to the area, different nationalities form all over the world, and this all made possible through the generous donations form the US taxpayer. Yet though the Native People were never defeated and are flourishing in many ways, the reservations are a bit like Gaza in that they are trapped in community that cannot economically advance the conditions needed to provide jobs, education, health care and a future for the people. All the talk of reparations rarely mentions the original inhabitants of this land. And anyway, reparations won't solve the problem which is rotted in the capitalist system of production and providing society's needs. Malcolm X said you can't have capitalism without racism and we can't solve this crisis without ending capitalism and we can't end capitalism without working class unity. This is why racism and all forms of discrimination harms all workers from all backgrounds.
One of the elders says that they are the "bottom of the list" and that this community has been "Pushed to the back burner". In many ways they have never been taken off the back burner. In an historical era during which the living standards and conditions of life of the rest of the population is deteriorating, including the European/white working class, the chances of capitalism making any serious improvements in the living conditions and health of this community are non existent. A casino here or there will only generate a class above the mass of the population and eventually harm the culture further.
If any one issue proves the inability and complete failure of the so-called free market to serve humanity it is the conditions we see here existing in the most powerful and richest country in human history.
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2 comments:
I worked on the Navajo Nation. Teaching, reporting financial information, auditing ......
The poverty, the difficulties of living in a 20th century world with 18th century technology made life almost impossible except for Dine ingenuity and heart and soul to find a way to survive, and to raise, feed, get an education and a future for their children against the villains of poverty, us government, scoundrels (government, drugs and alcohol, users, thieves, weather.......)
The Navajo's biggest obstacle is the bilagaana (white people, government, missionaries.....).
You want to help the Navajo? Listen and offer advice to fill in the gaps WHEN asked. BUT realize that the Navajo know their people, their land, their beliefs, their nightmares of their past and their dreams, loves and hopes for Their future.
I was in Northern Queensland a few years ago and the few US citizens I met were all missionaries. They were heading to Papua New Guinea to "help" and teach at a school. I guessed what was going on here and sure enough, they were a US Christian groups. "I would think these people have had enough of Jesus by now" I told her. They are everywhere among the poor and former colonial peoples. They have replaced the Catholic Church in it seems. They are extremely destructive and destroy local cultures. They bring their capitalist free market ideology with them. I heard that Iceland banned evangelic missionaries. They are the kiss of death to the people they claim to be helping.
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