From time to time, ol Ty has to drop it into serious mode and get up on his soap box. Y'all know those times aren't often and, in this case, one of my boyz had to wheel out the box and put my azz on it. Yes, y'all - ol Ty got called out by his boy Top Cat who had this unfiltered reaction to the news that the Cherokee Nation recently voted to "revoke the citizenship of the descendants of people the Cherokee once owned as slaves"...
"Ain't this some S***! This really makes my blood boil. How can someone that was so oppressed as this group attempt this BS?Like the genocide in Darfur, we are too focused on Anna Nicole, Britney, Paris, Angelina, Brad, the Oscars, the Grammy's, Am Idols, Lost, 24, RAZR, Q, Greys Anat., ER, Sponge Bob, Nick Toons, South Park, ........... , to notice real issues."
- Top Cat
Hmmm, that seems to cover about 99.9% of my posting material. He could have just said 'now ain't this some ol bullsh**t' and left it at that but then I probably wouldn't have gotten the point and the point is key.
Since the 19th century, Indian Nations have been considered sovereign nations - essentially nations within a nation. So when the Cherokee Nation says that it's revoking your Cherokee citizenship, that's a situation similar to the United States State Department revoking your American citizenship - essentially you lose any and all rights associated with that citizenship, including benefits and all fundamental rights to services provided by the nation.
Historically, the Indians and Africans frequently intermixed back in the day and it was common for Indian tribes to 'absorb' African slaves when they escaped their European captors leading to factions of 'Black Indians' among many of the Indian Nations including the Cherokee. In many cases, the Indians would hook the escaped slaves up and hide them but in other cases, just like the Europeans, Native Americans would also 'own' slaves."When slavery became part of US law, Native Americans were legally allowed to own black slaves. The Cherokees held the most black slaves out of any Native American tribe. Records from the time period show several cases of brutal treatment of black slaves by Indian masters." No more brutal than this ruckus.
So now we have a situation where "76 percent [of the voting Cherokee Nation] voted in favor of an amendment to the tribal constitution that would limit citizenship to descendants of "by blood" tribe members as listed on the federal Dawes Commission's rolls from more than 100 years ago (this despite a March 2006 ruling by the Cherokee Nation Supreme Court that said an 1866 treaty assured freedmen descendants of tribal citizenship). The Dawes Commission "drew up two rolls, one listing Cherokees by blood and the other listing freedmen, a roll of blacks regardless of whether they had Indian blood".
That's some tacky azz ruckus, y'all because as Top Cat points out, it's not like the Cherokee Nation has ever been on the receiving end of milk and honey kindness from the U.S. government so you figure if a crew was ever going to be sympathetic to the discrimination or ill treatment of others it would be this crew. Yet interestingly, the Cherokees aren't the only one of the 'Five Tribes' to try giving southsiders the bum's rush. The Seminole Nation pulled the same kind of shenanigans back in 2000 before finally backing down and letting the homeys back in.Yo, Cherokee Nation! Discriminating against Black Indians - seems that's one lesson y'all could have refused to learn from the Europeans who are still discriminating against you.
Shame, shame, y'all. Shame, shame. Free clues available to all who want one down at Winky's Corner Store...
Peace@Least,
Tyrone
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