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usernamenumberI usually try to do more research before signal-boosting something like this, but time is running out and, frankly, this seems pretty straightforward.
There is a part of the Black Hills of South Dakota that the people of the Lakota, Dakota, and Nakota native tribes call Pe' Sla. It's been a sacred place to them since time immemorial. It's the setting of their creation story. It goes up for auction in two days, it's fate after that unknown, on 25 Aug 2012.
While in the past, the fact that the land was owned by a local non-native family did not interfere with the natives' ability to perform religious rituals associated with the site, the state of South Dakota now wants to buy the land and put a road through the middle of it (this is the bit in particular that I wish I had more info on-- particularly how/whether the state is reacting to the attention that this issue is getting, but so far no luck).
Anyway, the local natives are attempting to raise money to buy their holy land at auction.
People can argue (and are arguing) about whose land it "should" be in the first place, but regardless of one's position on that, I hope everyone can agree that Native Americans have endured a lot, including more than their fair share of subjugation and humiliation. Now here's a group of them who are trying to reclaim their holy site by working within the system, even though it means "buying back" land the acquisition of which the Lakota have to this day refused to legally recognize.
It doesn't take much to sympathize with that, and to want them to not have the indignity of having their holy site turned into a road heaped upon everything else. Not today.
So, I've donated. Here's more info if yo'll consider doing the same. Be quick if you do; time is running out! Spread the word!
IndieGoGo Site
More detailed article
NBCNews.com article
There is a part of the Black Hills of South Dakota that the people of the Lakota, Dakota, and Nakota native tribes call Pe' Sla. It's been a sacred place to them since time immemorial. It's the setting of their creation story. It goes up for auction in two days, it's fate after that unknown, on 25 Aug 2012.
While in the past, the fact that the land was owned by a local non-native family did not interfere with the natives' ability to perform religious rituals associated with the site, the state of South Dakota now wants to buy the land and put a road through the middle of it (this is the bit in particular that I wish I had more info on-- particularly how/whether the state is reacting to the attention that this issue is getting, but so far no luck).
Anyway, the local natives are attempting to raise money to buy their holy land at auction.
People can argue (and are arguing) about whose land it "should" be in the first place, but regardless of one's position on that, I hope everyone can agree that Native Americans have endured a lot, including more than their fair share of subjugation and humiliation. Now here's a group of them who are trying to reclaim their holy site by working within the system, even though it means "buying back" land the acquisition of which the Lakota have to this day refused to legally recognize.
It doesn't take much to sympathize with that, and to want them to not have the indignity of having their holy site turned into a road heaped upon everything else. Not today.
So, I've donated. Here's more info if yo'll consider doing the same. Be quick if you do; time is running out! Spread the word!
IndieGoGo Site
More detailed article
NBCNews.com article
