Cool Stuff Friday.

Furoshiki-bat

Hanging Animal Furoshiki! Eeeee, so cute!

A fun and adorable, contemporary twist on the furoshiki (風呂敷), a traditional wrapping cloth that’s been around in Japan since the 700s. With a few simple folds these unique furoshiki transform into a carrier that resembles hanging animals that will transport your stuff anywhere!

Literally meaning “bath spread,” furoshiki were used to bundle clothes while at public baths. But nowadays people use them to bundle or gift-wrap all sorts of things like lunches, accessories and bottles of wine or sake. Nothing to carry? You can use it around your neck as a scarf too!

They’re newly available in the Spoon & Tamago Shop for $35.

I must have the bat! Must have.

Now we have what might just be the best candle ever. I think protesters should be bulk ordering these.

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Living in New York, artist Nao Matsumoto had found himself relying on the middle finger gesture quite frequently. But when he nearly sliced off his middle finger while cutting wood in his studio it made him realize the severity of the potential loss – an accident, he says, that would have been equivalent to losing his voice.

So the Brooklyn-based Japanese artist created a series of middle finger candles. Each candle is hand-made by Matsumoto himself and comes from a mold made from his own hand. The candles were originally used to protest the use of nuclear energy in Japan on the anniversary of the March 2011 tsunami.You can read more about the protest Here.

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You can order your very own middle finger candle here.

We’re Broken.

The Dakota Access Pipeline would run perilously close to the Missouri River, above, the main source of drinking water for the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe. Credit: Thosh Collins.

The Dakota Access Pipeline would run perilously close to the Missouri River, above, the main source of drinking water for the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe. Credit: Thosh Collins.

Dakota Access Pipeline has been approved. All the work, all the protests, all the meetings, all the talking…pointless. That photo reminds me of one of my favourite places along the Missouri, north of Lake Oahe, and to think of oil spilling, oh, it doesn’t bear thinking about, but it must be thought about, and the fight has to continue. This is wrong, so very wrong.

Despite the strong opposition of several tribes, the Army Corps of Engineers has approved nearly all permits to build the Dakota Access Pipeline project. Construction has already begun in all four states along its path.

“We are saddened to hear of this permit approval but knew the writing was on the wall,” the Indigenous Environmental Network said in a statement. “The Corps has a long history of going against the wishes and health of tribal nations.”

The $3.4 billion, 1,134-mile-long pipeline proposed by the company Energy Transfer, is also known as the Bakken pipeline, since that is the type of crude that would be transported through it. The battle to stop the project began months ago, when word of its potential construction began to spread. Activists and individual landowners who did not want the pipeline crossing their land immediately began to resist.

Soon after, the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe launched a massive campaign to improve understanding of the devastation that a pipeline spill could cause. The “Rezpect Our Water” efforts included dozens of children from Standing Rock who worked hard to try bridge understanding between the tribe and the outside world. Through a series of videos and grassroots efforts, the youth of Standing Rock asked that their lands and livelihood be taken into concern.

The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe met with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers on several occasions in the past year in hopes of convincing them to deny permits. All water crossings along the pipeline’s path needed federal approval. The Corps would have had the power to stop the pipeline from crossing the south-flowing Missouri River near the Cannon Ball community on Standing Rock’s northern border. This crossing point poses a particularly dangerous threat to the Standing Rock community as a pipeline break would contaminate the Missouri river, damaging the entire water supply of tribe, destroying land and creating a public health disaster for the reservation.

The tribe’s efforts and the youth of Standing Rock generated attention and support from thousands of supporters across the nation.
The Corps’ decision, however, did not reflect concern for the tribe or for the youth of Standing Rock. They granted permits to all 200 water crossings along the pipeline’s path, including the most potentially destructive point near the Reservation’s northern border. The Corps also ignored a plea by three federal agencies requesting a full environmental review.

[…]

“This decision will not deter the resistance against the dirty Bakken pipeline,” stated the Indigenous Environmental Network. “This decision merely highlights the necessity for the Corps of Engineers to overhaul the Nationwide Permit No. 12 process, which has been used by Big Oil to further place our lands, indigenous rights, water and air at greater risk for disaster. We demand a revocation of this permit and advocate for the rejection of this pipeline.”

The Pipeline will bring tax revenue to all counties and states along its path. While the land and people of Standing Rock face great risk of seeing damaging environmental impacts, they will not see any of the benefits. The pipeline crosses just north of Sioux County, where the Standing Rock Reservation is located. Tax revenue will not be generated for the tribe.

ICTMN has the full story.

Simon Moya-Smith at the DNC.

Simon Moya-Smith's beaded medallion, a anti-R-word button, and other neck wear.

Simon Moya-Smith’s beaded medallion, a anti-R-word button, and other neck wear.

DNC. Day 1. No press credentials. Hot and humid. Sweat on my brow and back. “No hope of a press pass,” the handlers say. To hell with waiting. “Where are the protesters?” I ask. City Hall, they said. I elbow through a parade of middle-aged demonstrators in downtown Philly. Hillary haters. They gum up the sidewalk. Stuck again. Sun barrels down. “Where are you?” a text reads. “I don’t know,” I respond. “But bring a lawyer.” A Hillary fan and a Bernie Bro battle it out on the curb. Newsmen and women scramble to eavesdrop. Mics in faces. Both sides posture. The crowd swells. Everyone dripping sweat. No shade. Just sun. And noise. A raucous noise. An ominous noise. Growling. More marching in the distance. More cops coming in. I take photo after photo after photo after photo. “What’s your medallion mean?” a man asks. “Means a lot to me,” I blurt. No patience at this point. Taking my blazer off. No help. Still hot as hell. Sweet jeezus. Meanwhile, the argument continues: “She deleted emails … She doesn’t release her speeches …” the Hillary head says. “His policy proposals are impractical … Writing is on the wall. … Not voting for Hillary is a vote for Trump!” the man in a ‘Bernie or Bust’ shirt blurts. “Bernie’s busted!” a man blares from somewhere behind me. Jeers erupt. More shouting and clamoring. A rush of photographers take aim behind my head. I turn to look. A man hoists a cut-out of Bernie’s head and hands. A child’s laugh breaks the rising tension in the circle. I feel faint. Who cares? Not me … at least not right now. This is the nucleus of rotten politics in the mosh pit that has become the U.S.A.

[…]

Got a text again. This time from Marlon WhiteEagle, an editor from Wisconsin. We meet at Fatso Foggerty’s, a pub on the south side of Philly. Two older black ladies laugh hysterically at the bar. A dog at their feet barks at anyone leaving the place like an adorable bouncer. Marlon has a Coke. I have two Jack and Cokes. Bartender eyes Marlon and I. “Who the fuck are these two?” I imagined her saying. This is indeed a local pub with a revolving door of regulars. The whole place is clam-baked with cigarette smoke. Makes me want one again. “You have smokes for sale?” I ask the bartender. “Across the street,” she says. Suddenly, Marlon gets a text telling us to zip to the Wells Fargo Center – The DNC. I down my drink, we crawl into an Uber, and get dumped about a mile away from the entry. “This is as far as I can take you,” the driver says. Cops blocked the road. Ten minutes of walking in 93-degree temps and suffocating humidity, and again I’m back in the mad mix of demonstrations. A child is dressed in a suit and tie, walking among the fray, shouting, “Bernie or bust!” A white boy goes around smudging people with sage. Cops here aren’t rushing him like they rushed Josie Valadez Fraire in Denver earlier this month outside of a Trump event. They allegedly told the indigenous woman that “smoke alarms” them.

The full column and photos at ICTMN.

Spiritual Vultures. Updated.

The late Thomas Banyacya, Hopi Traditional Spokesman, is seen here in Chaco Canyon. Courtesy Christopher McLeod.

The late Thomas Banyacya, Hopi Traditional Spokesman, is seen here in Chaco Canyon. Courtesy Christopher McLeod.

“This is a very sacred kiva,” says the late Thomas Banyacya, Hopi Traditional Spokesman, pointing to an ancient sacred site at Casa Rinconada in northwest New Mexico. “We are looking at the spirit of our ancestors… they are here. They are watching us. We hope they will help Native people to protect their land and sacred sites,” he says in a frail voice recorded in archival footage.

Over the past three decades, the Sacred Land Film Project (SLFP) has produced films about how mainstream American culture antagonizes Native American sensibilities around spirituality and sacred sites. Casa Rinconada is one quintessential example—a cultural hub of Ancestral Puebloans, where thousands of New Age seekers gathered for the Harmonic Convergence in 1987, littering the sacred kiva with crystals, cremated human remains and one curious looking teddy bear wax candle.

[…]

“While producing films on threats to indigenous sacred sites, I spend a lot of time listening to communities all over the world explain the most urgent threats. I’ve been really struck over the years by the fact that universally, right up there with mining, logging, dams and land grabs, there’s deep concern about New Age appropriation of sacred places, cultural rituals and spiritual traditions,” says Christopher McLeod, Director of SLFP.

In northern California, the Winnemem Wintu Tribe can empathize with the predicament of the Navajo. The Harmonic Convergence also congregated on Mt. Shasta, a mountain deeply sacred to the tribe. “The Harmonic Convergence of 1987 unleashed an overwhelming flood of seekers, hundreds of New Agers leaving crystals and medicine wheels all over the mountain. Later, there were sweat lodges for hire, and now even cremation remains poured into a sacred spring. How do we stop this and redirect this desperate search for meaning and connection?” wonders McLeod.

The Winnemem, known as the Middle Water People, trace their ancestry over millennia along the watershed south of their revered Mt. Shasta. The Winnemem believe they emerged from the spring on Panther Meadow, where New Agers often congregate—drumming and singing and leaving offerings behind, including ashes of the departed.

“We believe this spring is so sacred. We only go there once a year to sing at the doorway of our creation story,” says Chief Caleen Sisk, spiritual leader of the Winnemem Wintu, in Pilgrims and Tourists, a SLFP film that explores the impact of New Age tourism on Native communities in the Russian Altai Republic and Mt. Shasta. “People dumped cremations right into this spring,” she says. “Cremations are a pollutant… everyone downstream is drinking that water. Do you put cremations on the altar in the Vatican?” she asks incredulously.

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Besides cleaning the offerings in the spring, the Winnemem have to contend with thousands of climbers who attempt to summit Mt. Shasta. “On our mountain we have 30,000 visitors,” she says. “Non-indigenous people need to understand that there is a way to be there, a way of walking on that land without destroying it… people can admire the meadow from the edge.”

Ann Marie Sayers, Costanoan Ohlone, believes that contrasting value systems among Natives and non-Natives lead to cultural appropriation. “These places call for humility and respect,” she says.  In another SLFP film clip posted as part of a five-clip playlist on YouTube, a white woman naively claims that in her past life she has been black, Native American, Chinese and Egyptian and should not be denied access to Native sacred sites.

“New Agers look at traditional Native [cultures] for some answers to their spiritual bankruptcy. In an effort to find themselves, they are appropriating a lot of Native belief systems, to plug into for a weekend,” says Chris Peters (Pohlik-lah/Karuk) in a film clip from SLFP’s 2001 film, In the Light of Reverence.

The Winnemem say their ceremony is delayed every year, because the spring has to be cleaned from the offerings left behind. As the Winnemem youth remove bone fragments and cremation ashes from the spring, Chief Sisk remarks, “People can live without oil. They can live without gold, but nothing can live without water.”

It’s perfectly possible for white people to feel all spiritual and connected to nature, the universe, everything, without co-opting what you think is a peoples’ culture, and without invading and fucking up their sacred places. Once again, white people manage to make everything about them. If nothing else, stop thinking you’re honouring your dead by dumping them in places sacred to other people, and polluting while you’re doing it. How in the hell is that spiritual? Isn’t it about time you just left us Indians alone? Go, discover your own roots, there’s nothing wrong in that. A whole lot of cultures have a history of sweating, many of them white cultures, and in many of those cultures, such traditions are carried on. You don’t need to up and decide that the “Native American” way of doing something is so much more golly gosh darn pure and special”. That’s racist crap, perpetuating the noble savage nonsense, so cut it the fuck out.

No, there isn’t a place for you in various Indigenous ceremonies. You’ll live. Go and discover those ancient, traditional ceremonies you are a part of, learn about your own self instead.

Just reported, Pokémon Go players are getting in on the disrespect, too. Play your games, people, but pay the fuck attention to where you are, yeah?

According to CBC News, Gouchie was paying respects at her father’s gravesite on Sunday when she noticed dozens of Pokémon Go players searching the sacred First Nations burial ground.

“It’s sacred there,” Gouchie told CBC. “This land was once my ancestral land. This is the only little piece of land inside Prince George that is ours, and you are disrespecting it. My dad, my uncles, my cousin, my great grandmother are all buried there.”

The burial ground is open to the public within the Lheidli T’enneh Memorial Park, but Gouchie says the presence of a Pokéstop — a virtual location in the game where Pokémon Go players gather supplies to catch monsters — is disrespectful.

“This has to stop,” said Gouchie. “This game has only been live in Canada for one week. It’s only a matter of time before that burial site is filled with Pokémon Go people.

“I was thinking, I need our K’san [traditional] drummers out here so we can block both these gates and … stop this,” she said.

Gouchie does not blame the players, but does blame the game creator Niantic. She has submitted a request to the game developers to have the Pokéstop removed and reported the incident to her tribal council.

Full Story here.

30.

John Calvin Coolidge granted automatic citizenship to all Native Americans born in the United States in June 1924, but he also began desecration of Mount Rushmore in August 1927.

John Calvin Coolidge granted automatic citizenship to all Native Americans born in the United States in June 1924, but he also began desecration of Mount Rushmore in August 1927.

With a sweep of his pen in June 1924, John Calvin Coolidge granted automatic citizenship to all Native Americans born in the United States.

Afterward, Coolidge, wearing a dark suit and grasping a hat in his hands, posed for a photo outside the White House with four tribal leaders—three of whom were dressed in traditional attire. Although the photograph likely was taken several months after Coolidge signed the Indian Citizenship Act it came to symbolize a new era in federal-Indian relations.

President Calvin Coolidge with four Osage Indians after Coolidge signed the bill granting Indians full citizenship. (Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division, Washington, D.C.)

President Calvin Coolidge with four Osage Indians after Coolidge signed the bill granting Indians full citizenship. (Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division, Washington, D.C.)

Also known as the Snyder Act, the Indian Citizenship Act, sought to reward Indians for service to their country while also assimilating them into mainstream American society. Because two-thirds of the indigenous population had already gained citizenship through marriage, military service or land allotments, the act simply extended citizenship to “all noncitizen Indians born within the territorial limits of the United States.”

Passage of the act came partly in response to Indians’ overwhelming service during World War I. About 10,000 Indians enlisted in the military and served during the war, despite not being recognized as U.S. citizens.

[Read more…]

Canadians, So Gosh Darn Nice!

When Valerie Taylor spotted a family of newcomers looking lost in the hustle and bustle of rush hour at Toronto's Union Station on Wednesday, she offered to help them find their train. (Charlsie Agro/CBC)

When Valerie Taylor spotted a family of newcomers looking lost in the hustle and bustle of rush hour at Toronto’s Union Station on Wednesday, she offered to help them find their train. (Charlsie Agro/CBC)

We could all use more nice, and here’s a heaping helping of nice.

When Valerie Taylor spotted a family of newcomers looking lost in the hustle and bustle of rush hour at Toronto’s main Union Station on Wednesday, she offered to help them find their train. What she didn’t know was that some 50 people would do the same, on a day that would turn out to be one of her most memorable trips home ever.

Taylor, a psychiatrist at Toronto’s Women’s College Hospital, said she was heading home on Wednesday after what had been a hectic few days. The heat was blazing, she was tired and looking forward to getting home, when she spotted a large family with two baby strollers and several heavy bags.

They looked confused, she said, and a young woman was trying to help them.

Taylor went over to see if she could lend a hand.

“Are you new here?” she asked. Only one of the children, who said he was 11, could speak much English.

“Yes,” he said. They had just arrived from Syria four months ago, he told her, and were looking to get to Ancaster, about 85 kilometres southwest of Toronto, to spend a few days with family there.

Taylor was headed in the same direction and offered to take them to the right train. To their surprise, strangers began to take notice and to help carry the family’s bags up the stairs and onto the train, some riders even making room to give the family a place to sit, Taylor said.

But once they’d boarded and the 11-year-old showed Taylor the address they were headed to, she realized they were on the wrong train. It was London they were headed to, another 100 kilometres past Ancaster, and the Lakeshore West line they were on wouldn’t get them there.

“Right away people started trying to problem-solve,” Taylor said, some looking on their phones for the best way to get the family to London. “It was just: ‘We have a goal, we have to get these people there.'”

[…]

She’d also decided she would pay for their train tickets and helped them to enter their information into the self-serve kiosk.

“The 11-year-old was a little bit suspicious, like, ‘Okay, we’ve been in this country four months … I don’t know why everyone’s trying to be so helpful,'” Taylor said.

But together he and Taylor entered the necessary details into the computer so that they could buy the tickets.

That’s when a woman came running across the station and yelled, “Stop, stop! Don’t pay for anything!”

It was a staff member. “I just got a call from the head office,” she said. “GO is sending a bus.”

In the end, though, Metrolinx, the agency in charge of regional transit, sent the family to London in two cabs, spokesperson Anne Marie Aikins told CBC News. The next train and bus weren’t expected for some time so it was decided that was the best way to transport mom, dad and all six kids, one of whom was disabled and had a special stroller, she said.

It was yet another act of kindness in a string of so many Taylor witnessed that day. In total, she estimated about 50 people had helped in some way or another to get the family to London.

“It really was quite amazing,” she said. “It was really just groups of random strangers coming together to just do the right thing and help this family connect with their relatives for the weekend.”

There’s a whole lot more at CBCnews. Thanks to rq for this sorely needed dose of nice.

Comic-Con Trailers!

So much fun stuff!

Justice League:

Aquaman is lookin’ rather hot.

Kong: Skull Island.

I don’t want to see this, I hated King Kong when I was a kid, and here we go again, Giant ape, guns, explosions, napalm, all that shit. But, Tom Hiddleston…

Suicide Squad – Comic-Con First Look.

Waiting, waiting waiting. So looking forward to this one.

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them – Comic-Con Trailer.

Oh, I am such a sucker for this kind of thing.

Wonder Woman!

YES! Yes, yes, yes.

Aaaaaaaaaaand, a sequel to The Blair Witch Project (we’re going to pretend that 2nd flick never happened):

Blair Witch.

And PZ picked up one I missed: Marvel’s Luke Cage!

Summer Slide Reading for Kids.

Six great books for kids to read over summer, when learning is definitely not on their minds. If you can request these books at your local library, that would be great because a lot of books by Native authors don’t make it in library reviews, and librarians can only respond to what readers want. If you want these, librarians will make the magic happen.

In the Footsteps of Crazy Horse by Joseph Marshall III

Joseph Marshall III’s In the Footsteps of Crazy Horse (Harry N. Abrams, 2015) has a lot going for it. First off, it’s set in the present day. The main character, Jimmy, is Lakota. But, he has blue eyes and light brown hair because his lineage includes people who aren’t Native. That means he gets teased for his looks. In steps his grandpa, who takes him on a road trip. As they drive, Jimmy learns about Crazy Horse, but he also learns that Native people have different names for places. One example is the Oregon Trail. Jimmy’s grandpa tells him that Native people call it Shell River Road. Marshall’s storytelling is vibrant and engaging, and the perfect tone for kids in middle school.

 

 

 

 

Arigon Starr’s “Super Indian” comics poke fun at many topics.You can’t miss with Arigon Starr’s Super Indian (Wacky Productions Unlimited) stories. She’s got the inside track on telling it like it is. Or, could be, if eating commodity cheese could give you super powers. In other words, every panel of Starr’s comics is a reflection of Native life, and she brilliantly pokes at the uber popular Twilight books and movies, and testy issues like blood quantum. There’s a ka-pow to this super power series (two volumes at this point) that will have you and your kids laughing out loud.

 

 

A Blanket of Butterflies by Richard Van Camp.Richard Van Camp’s A Blanket of Butterflies (HighWater Press, 2015) is riveting. This graphic novel opens with a boy who looks to be in his early teens, standing in front of a samurai suit of armor in a display case in his tribe’s museum. That suit is going to be returned to its original owner, but the sword is missing. That launches this fast-paced story in which Van Camp provides us with an opportunity to think about museums and who owns items in them.

 

 

 

 

 

[Read more…]

Honeyguide and Human Collaboration.

Yao honey-hunter Orlando Yassene holds a male greater honeyguide temporarily captured for research in the Niassa National Reserve, Mozambique. Credit: Claire Spottiswoode.

Yao honey-hunter Orlando Yassene holds a male greater honeyguide temporarily captured for research in the Niassa National Reserve, Mozambique. Credit: Claire Spottiswoode.

By following honeyguides, a species of bird, people in Africa are able to locate bees’ nests to harvest honey. Research now reveals that humans use special calls to solicit the help of honeyguides and that honeyguides actively recruit appropriate human partners. This relationship is a rare example of cooperation between humans and free-living animals.

[…]

Honeyguides give a special call to attract people’s attention, then fly from tree to tree to indicate the direction of a bees’ nest. We humans are useful collaborators to honeyguides because of our ability to subdue stinging bees with smoke and chop open their nest, providing wax for the honeyguide and honey for ourselves.

Experiments carried out in the Mozambican bush now show that this unique human-animal relationship has an extra dimension: not only do honeyguides use calls to solicit human partners, but humans use specialised calls to recruit birds’ assistance. Research in the Niassa National Reserve reveals that by using specialised calls to communicate and cooperate with each other, people and wild birds can significantly increase their chances of locating vital sources of calorie-laden food.

In a paper (Reciprocal signaling in honeyguide-human mutualism) published in Science today (22 July 2016), evolutionary biologist Dr Claire Spottiswoode (University of Cambridge and University of Cape Town) and co-authors (conservationists Keith Begg and Dr Colleen Begg of the Niassa Carnivore Project) reveal that honeyguides are able to respond adaptively to specialised signals given by people seeking their collaboration, resulting in two-way communication between humans and wild birds.

This reciprocal relationship plays out in the wild and occurs without any conventional kind of ‘training’ or coercion. “What’s remarkable about the honeyguide-human relationship is that it involves free-living wild animals whose interactions with humans have probably evolved through natural selection, probably over the course of hundreds of thousands of years,” says Spottiswoode, a specialist in bird behavioural ecology in Africa.

The full story is at PhysOrg.

LGBTQ Guide to Comic-Con 2016.

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Every year for the past 29 years, the Gays in Comics panel has graced a stage at Comic-Con International, the annual celebration of pop culture held in San Diego. During this time the convention has expanded from a comic books-only focus to include other mediums like TV, film, and games. And the presence of LGBT people, once relegated to that single panel, has exploded to a point where every day offers a variety of queer content and the breadth of topics continues to grow. Here are some of the best things about 2016, Comic-Con’s queerest year yet.

[…]

You Don’t Even Have to Be in the Convention Center: One of the best things about this year’s Comic-Con? You don’t need a ticket to take advantage of some events and panels. Organizers have long recognized that the demand for Comic-Con tickets far exceeds availability (as does demand for space for exhibits and presenters). Over the years there’s been a growing number of events outside of the convention hall — including in local bars and even the public library (see above for examples). This year Comic-Con has launched this access into hyperspace by introducing a new premium digital network, ComicConHQ. In association with Lionsgate, the service will live-stream select Comic-Con panels and make others available later; it will also offer classic sci-fi and fantasy titles, and it reportedly has original programming in the works, including scripted series and news shows.

This is a long list, people! Stuffed with great events and panels. Wish I was there. Click on over to The Advocate for the full scoop.