Talk - Extremely Eloquent, Therefore Extremely Dangerous

Detroit U.S. Social Forum | June 24, 2010

First, I would like to say I’m glad that you’re here and I’m glad that I’m here. And I don’t know exactly where I’m going, there are some things on my mind, and I don’t know how far we’ll get, but I want to say this straight up. I’m crazy. Alright? I really am. And I’m gonna tell you this so that if I say something that you don’t agree with, that’s what it is, alright? I’m not trying to start anything with anyone. And I want to speak to you tonight, whatever all these identities and these things are, I want to speak to you as a human being, as human beings, because I think we’re in a dimensional reality where we don’t communicate as human beings, we don’t identify as human beings, because of the way the distortions and the imprintings have been layered and imprinted into our consciousness.

The “New Clear” Oppression | Date Unknown

Wasichu. He who eats the fat. The Wasichu gives no offerings or prayers to the Earth.

Wasichu, all he knows is destruction, but he does not understand it is himself he is destroying. His attacks against Mother Earth will hasten his end. Mother Earth is of the natural creation, she will endure. The Wasichu’s attacks are wounds of the flesh, healable. The wounds of oil, uranium, pollution and chemical warfare are serious enough to be fatal for all the human people, possibly all known life.

The history of the Wasichu’s destructive confusion has shown its nationalization to be defined as civilization and progress. This civilization took the form of religion, government, and landlords. Its effectiveness is defined by progress, technology and industrialization. The rewards of civilization are given a material money value, and defined by profits.

John Trudell at Sparks, Nevada Pow Wow | 2008

First up I would like to thank you all for having me here, and I’m really glad to be here. I’ve lived many lives in my lifetime but I have a very deep connection to Nevada. Because part of my life experience unfolded in Nevada. And the way things were during that time. I got to interact with the tribes of Nevada directly and indirectly.

So I’m going to try to be as coherent as I can. Make as much sense as I can. But I’m gonna tell you starting right off, you know I’m kind of crazy. And I want you to understand that from the beginning so that if I say something that you don’t agree with or we have a difference of opinion about, I’d like it to just be considered.

I was thinking, you know, the idea of community awareness. And you know, how far does that really go. Community awareness. Because when I look at it sometimes I feel as though I’m in a dimension where we don’t really understand and recognize who we are anymore. And this transcends race and culture and everything to me. It’s like we’re forgetting that we’re human beings. You know, we’re human beings. And it’s like we’re forgetting that we’re human beings. We don’t participate in this reality from the perception of human beings. We don’t think like human beings, you know. We don’t feel like human beings. We feel oppressed, victimized and a whole lot of other things but we’re not really, connected.

Give Love, Give Life. | 2008

I want to talk about Give Love, Give Life a little bit here. We started maybe 2002. Give Love, Give Life started originally with a woman named Marcheline Bertrand, and she had ovarian cancer. So we started doing these, raising, doing these benefits to raise funds for ovarian cancer research through a woman named Dr. Beth Karlan at Cedars-Sinai Hospital who’s a specialist in this. So we did two or three of these as benefits, and in 2006 we came to this understanding. Not to minimize ovarian cancer research, this needs to be done, and for the litany of reasons that everyone that has ever had any contact with it understands, but the other part that we took into consideration is that even with advances happening with ovarian cancer research, if you’ve got women that don’t have access to healthcare then the research is not serving those people who are cut out.

Benefit for the U’wa of Columbia | San Francisco, CA. March, 2001

Well, I’ll try to be coherent. And, I don’t know exactly where we’re going, but wherever it is, we’ll be okay. But if I say anything that you don’t agree with, that’s just really what it is, right? Because I really am crazy.

[Reads poem]

In the reality of many realities. How we see what we see effects the quality of our reality. We are children of earth and sky. DNA. Descendant Now Ancestor. Human being. Physical spirit. Bone. Flesh. Blood as spirit. Metal. Mineral. Water as spirit. We are in time and space. But we’re from beyond time and space. The past is part of the present. The future is part of the present. Life and being are interwoven. We are the DNA of Earth, Moon, planets and stars. We are related to the universal creator. Creator created creation, spirit and intelligence, with clarity. Being and human as power. We are a part of the memories of evolution. These memories carry knowledge. These memories carry our identity beneath race, gender, class, age. We are human beings and these memories are trying to remind us human beings, human beings. It’s time to rise up. Remember who we are.

Remembering Annie Mae Pictou and Ingrid Washinawatok El-Issa | c2000

The arrival of Columbus and the rest of Europe brought a perception of reality that is alien to the original peoples of this land. The perception of the European was a religious perception based upon authority, greed and brutality. The Native perception of reality was a spiritual perception based upon spirit, respect, responsibility and balance. Since the European arrival, there has been a European war of perception waged against the Native peoples’ perception. This war started with their arrival and has never wavered. In our generation, this war manifested itself to us through broken treaty laws, racism, land theft and poverty. Our generation responded the best that we could. This response took the form of cultural re-identification and cultural movements. When that happened, the 7th Calvary was replaced by the FBI.

The linkage I see between Annie Mae and Ingrid is that both women were murdered by ruthless men. These men had a distorted commitment to the goals, objectives and realities of their movements. Somewhere in the course of time, our movements lost their direction. This may have happened because what started out as cultural movements for the rights and defense of the people were manipulated to [the] point of distortion, frustration and lost causes by our enemy–the state. This manipulation took what was a cultural movement in the U.S. and turned a cultural movement into a political movement with all the aggression that comes along with political movements.

“We All Come From Tribes” A talk by John Trudell at the First Unitarian Universalist Society of San Francisco | March 13, 1999

The “We All Come From Tribes” event began with a memorial to the three slain indigenous rights activists whose murders, apparently at the hands of “Columbian Revolutionaries,” shocked the native and environmentalist communities. One of the activists, Ingrid Washinawatok (Menominee) was a close friend of many in the audience, including John Trudell. Thier murders had been announced the day prior to this event.

ROSEMARY CAMBRA: I’d like to introduce John Trudell.

JOHN TRUDELL: I’ll be as coherent as I can. I don’t know exactly where we are going. I want to say a few words about Ingrid and the things that happened in Columbia. I don’t think I am really going too far into it tonight, but it was a bad thing. And it makes me wonder. See, I think insanity just prevails. There are no good guys, there are only victims and murderers. They have all gone nuts, the revolutionaries and all that, you know. They become the terrorists. They become what they hate. You take the neutral and the unarmed, and you murder them. There is no justification, no matter what anybody says. They are all insane. The same madness eats all of them. The same madness.

Judi Bari Memorial and Fund Raiser at Martin Luther King Jr. School in Berkeley CA. | April 26, 1997

I’m pleased to be here and I’m glad that you’re here and I’ll attempt to be as clear as I can while I’m up here.

It’s about our D and A. Descendants and ancestors. We are the descendants and we are the ancestors. D and A, our DNA, our blood, our flesh and our bone, is made up of the metals and the minerals and the liquids of the earth. We are the earth. We truly, literally and figuratively are the earth. Any relationship we will ever have in this world to real power, the real power, not energy systems and other artificial means of authority, but any relationship we will ever have to real power is our relationship to the earth. So whatever Judi was doing and what Earth First! does, they were establishing connection with the basic reality, that we must take care of the earth.

Spoken Word Tour – Evergreen State College – Olympia, WA. | 1994

I’d like to first of all thank you for being here. I’m glad I’m here. And if I say anything that you don’t agree with, let’s just leave it at that. It’s not about anything other than whatever comes out, comes out. I’m gonna start with some poems.

[John Trudell reads one of his poems]

Just so we have an understanding. I come from the tribes, I have that much of my identity. And when I look at what’s happening here, in the Western Hemisphere, I can’t forget that tribal memory. I may not know the language, I may not know many things, but I do know many things also. But what I remember with my genetic memory, which is the basis of many of my realities, is that the way that people need to live with this hemisphere, with the earth in reality, but with this hemisphere, is the people need to live with the earth. Not on it. Not from it. With it. To me democracy is the enemy of the tribes. To me, technologic industrial civilization is the enemy of the tribes. It is the enemy of the natural world, to me. The concept of male dominating gods, to me is the enemy of the natural world.

California State University/ Hayward | 1994

“We’re all children of earth. It’s about the DNA, the ancestors and the descendants. Us. We have the responsibility to take care of the life that this planet is.”

“We’re not here to run high tech economic slave states, and pretend that that’s not what’s going on. We’re not here to mentally beat one another up, or be abusive towards one another, or ourselves. That’s not why we’re here. We’re here to take care of life. We need to understand about our spirit. We have a spirit. We are Spirit. But see, the religious mindset of the male-dominating god doesn’t recognize spirit. It recognizes religion. And authority. And chain of command. And obedience. But it doesn’t recognize spirit.”

Before We Were Indians | Early Autumn, 1975

This statement is by John Trudell, national chairman of the American Indian Movement, issued in September, 1975.

We are human beings. Alcohol makes us drunks. Pride and history make us “The People.” I wish everyone would think about this. Before we were “Indians”, we were “The People.” For the Europeans to justify with their humanitarian beliefs the oppression that they have put on our people, they had to create a false label for us. They had to call us something that was not human. Something other than what we actually were. When Columbus came here and thought he was in India, he called us ” Indians” and so we have been “Indians” for only a brief period of time in the history of our people. Our people have been on this land for thousands and thousands and thousands of years. Our people are the product of this land. We can refer to ourselves as the indigenous, the sovereign people, the native people, or native Americans, but we are “The People” as we relate to being “The People”, as long as we act accordingly.

Graduation at the Institute of American Indian Arts | June 8, 1972

I want to thank the graduating class for inviting me. Personally, one of my main concerns is education, and to narrow it down further, it’s BIA education. To start this off I’m going to read a statement that was used last December at Chilocco Indian School. This statement was issued by the Native American Rights Movement in Oklahoma.

Press Conference/Speech with John Trudell And Lanada Means Reflecting on Native American Treatment and Protest | November 20, 1970

JOHN TRUDELL: November 20, 1969 we came with 89 people to Alcatraz for the purpose of taking the island for all Indian people to have a place we could call Indian land. This tiny island represents freedom for all Indian people living in the Americas known as Canada, the United States, Mexico and South America. These are all our great lands of the Indian peoples now held in bondage by alien governments. We have been here one year occupying this island which represents our fight to live as free people in our own country. Our fight for this island representing freedom for all Indian peoples is nonviolent. We came to this island unarmed prepared to give our lives if necessary.

Racism and Political Power | October 18, 1970

The program is The Associated Students of the University of Oregon Presents Racism. Taped at the University of Oregon by KBO-FM Portland, during the week of October 18th, 1970. This program includes the first part of a panel Wednesday morning during a week long symposium sponsored by the associated students, with the moderator, Art Jenkins, Gloria Gonzalez of the Chicano Student Union, Frank Martinez, of the Valley Migrant League, John Trudell, of Indians of All Tribes at Alcatraz Island, Kent Ford, from the Black Panther Party in Portland, Charles Evers, mayor of Fayette, Mississippi, and David Sanchez, Prime Minister of the Brown Berets from Los Angeles…The next speaker is John Trudell, from Indians of All Tribes on Alcatraz Island…

John Trudell: Radio Free Alcatraz | April 30, 1970

As far as the island, we’re holding up pretty well. We have been working pretty closely with the [Bay Area Native American Council] organization here. BANAC was formed by the Indian groups and the service organizations in the Bay Area to deal with the Alcatraz situation, and Alcatraz is a part of BANAC. BANAC has helped us to establish a refrigerator over at the depot, on Pier 40, and things can be brought there, contributions, whatever you feel that we deserve, and we will try to liberate ourselves from the federal government and gain some kind of self-determination.

Radio Free Alcatraz | March, 1970

Good evening this is John Trudell. We have been lucky here, we haven’t really had a lot of cold weather. And we, about a week ago, we received $15,000 worth of medical supplies and beds from Los Angeles. I think George Brown donated it to us. He brought it up here. We’ve got things pretty well in shape here. Our biggest hassles right now are with food supplies, fresh foods, and we have a boat problem yet. We are still chartering a boat but we are looking into buying a boat of our own, because that is our biggest single expense.

John Trudell Shares “The Art Of Stealing Human Rights,” And NARP’s Eight-Point Program for the Betterment of Canadian Indians | January 13, 1970

John Trudell opens by sharing articles from the Native Alliance for Red Power newsletter from Vancouver, British Columbia, to show similarities between Native People in the United States and Canada. The article is entitled, “The art of stealing human rights,” taken from a speech given by Gerry Gambill given at a conference on human rights at a Tobique reserve in New Brunswick in August 1968. Trudell then shares NARP’s eight-point program for the betterment of Canadian Indians. Trudell concludes this episode expressing United States Indians’ support of Canadian Indians and their struggle, and promotes next Tuesday’s program with Canadians Jonny Yesno and Shirley Daniels.

Indian Land Radio with John Trudell | 1970

So I’m going to start it off with this quotation by Chief Joseph in 1879. Joseph was saying this, and it still applies for today.

If the white man wants to live in peace with the Indian, he can live in peace, treat all men alike, give them all the same law, give them all an even chance to live and grow. All men were made by the same great spirit. They are all brothers. The earth is the mother of all people, and people should have equal rights upon it. We only ask an even chance to live as other men live. We ask to be recognized as men. We ask that the same law shall work alike unto all men. Let me be a free man, free to work, free to trade me, to choose my teachers, free to follow the religion of my fathers. Free to think and talk and act for myself. And I will obey every law, or submit to the penalty.

Indian Land Radio Alcatraz with John Trudell | 1969-1970

Indian Land Radio Alcatraz live report from Alcatraz by John Trudell. Trudell briefly mentions the meeting with Bay Area Indian people where it was decided that they were going to support the Alcatraz movement.

Good evening and welcome to Indian Land Radio Alcatraz. This is John. Today I welcome you on behalf of the Indians of All Tribes. We haven’t been broadcasting for about the last two weeks because I had a small illness that I had to take care of. And so after tomorrow night, which, when we won’t be on, we will be back on our regular broadcast schedule.