Peace is not just an absence of something
Independence talks about the Haudenosaunee Confederation -- which is likely the actual source of the "brilliant, groundbreaking" ideas from our "genius" forefathers -- and the hostility between "White" Americans, many of whom are part Native, and "Native Americans," many of whom are part White, and the current status quo where "Natives" want their land back -- in other words to kick us honkies out -- meanwhile Trump wants to kick them out.
Regardless of who wins this stupid argument, the end goal is to send bunches of people elsewhere who were born here and have no legal claim to citizenship elsewhere and would be hard pressed to start life over in an unfamiliar country with unfamiliar laws and unfamiliar cultural norms.
My ex was a big time history buff and socially awkward. He didn't smoothly tell nice sounding lies to make people comfortable with uncomfortable truths.
I once said something that likely agreed with the touchy-feely Social Justice Warrior vibe about Natives being victims and he rudely said something in reply about how agrarian settled peoples ALWAYS outcompete nomadic hunter-gatherer cultures.
Agrarian cultures produce more food per square mile more reliably. They do so in a manner more conducive to developing large cities, not just because there's a reliable food supply but because the manner in which it's done is more conducive to large scale development.
This includes business development and I've written before that the nomadic lifestyle and practice where the TRIBE owns the land is inherently challenging for trying to develop business. In that post, I also note that modern corporate farming is feeding more people but failing to keep us adequately nourished.
I didn't link to what I've said elsewhere about my belief that THIS is an underrecognized root cause of the obesity epidemic. That and piss poor planning of the built environment that throws away the ability to get adequate walking in as a normal part of life and puts a gun to everyone's head to drive everywhere or be a poser with no life if you cannot do that for ANY reason, whether age (too old or too young), poverty or physical impairment.
The US is a giant SNAFU -- situation normal: all fouled up -- and there is extremely little hope of ever fixing it.
The post where I learned of the Haudenosaunee Confederation linked to a Wikipedia article about it called The Law of Peace.
You know what else is associated with peace? Business development.
That runs contrary to our current ideas about The Great Robber Barons who helped develop the US and our concept of corporations as evil entities. But my understanding is the Walmarts of the world engage in LESS wage theft and similar abuses than small businesses do on average.
Historically, the honey bee was promoted as a symbol of peace because it provided a mental model of peaceful exchange, where the bee pollinates flowers thus providing a useful service and comes away with pollen for producing honey by helping the flower rather than harming it.
It was promoted in multiple countries reputed to be ancient birthplaces of civilization and enlightenment, including Greece, Persia and India.
I'm a former military wife and my late mother was a German immigrant. The US military and immigrants to this country are both hard working, well traveled populations without being members of the over privileged jet set.
The military is associated with placing honor above all else, including one's own life. Military members raise their hand and swear to die for their country if necessary.
I long for a world that is designed for ALL people to have access to affordable decent housing, the ability to travel at will, adequate nutrition, hygiene and health care.
I live in a world where only the obscenely wealthy are allowed to have that while many of them actively destroy the little people to extract those privileges and pretend to not understand that they are undermining their own wealth and safety, not just that of commoners.
I'm not really interested in advocating for the destruction of the US and replacing it with 500 separate tribal lands like existed before Europeans stole the concept of democracy from the Haudenosaunee Confederation and rebranded it as the brilliant brainchild of a handful of special geniuses fed up with being King George's bitch.
I think both the thieves who founded the US and the Natives they stole both land and political ideas from lack something vital that the other has.
And neither side wants to marry the two peacably and achieve something better than either has. Both sides are too busy looking to win an old war and keep open old septic wounds to work towards a better future for all peoples born on these lands.
Whatever stupid shit you believe in, understand this:
Our current policy of actively and intentionally shafting Native Americans and tying their hands legally so they cannot protect their people from serial rapists and serial killers is the root cause of the MMIW -- Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women -- crisis and the predators WE actively GROW by allowing them to practice their craft on Natives without fear of meaningful consequences do NOT limit their crimes to just victimizing dirty injuns.
If you want to actually make America great, this giant fucking legal loophole for serial killers and serial rapists needs to be CLOSED.
Footnotes
Below are my unedited notes for a piece on the legal roots of this problem which i never got around to cleaning up and publishing:
https://www.reddit.com/r/IndianCountry/s/P3wbsF0J7C
Tribal governments, stripped of power by Oliphant v. Suquamish in 1978, have no authority to prosecute non-Native offenders – even when the crime happens on their own land. Federal prosecutors, nominally entrusted with these cases, decline the majority of them, citing limited resources or ambiguous evidence. State police often defer to federal agencies or claim they lack jurisdiction. The result is an elaborate bureaucratic ritual in which survivors recount their trauma again and again, only to watch their cases evaporate.
https://gregscaduto.substack.com/p/where-no-one-is-watching?r=41atmx&utm_medium=ios&triedRedirect=true
https://witnesstodestruction.blogspot.com/2025/02/three-posts-from-defunct-blog-called.html
https://firelight.ca/news/industrial-camps-and-indigenous-communities-promoting-healthy-communities-in-settings-of-industrial-change