[diggers350] To Leonard Peltier from Subcomandante Marcos
Valerie Niederhoffer
vhoffer at ix.netcom.com
Wed Nov 24 15:09:30 GMT 1999
>X-Sender: mgd5 at postoffice2.mail.cornell.edu
>Date: Mon, 15 Nov 1999 13:37:12 -0500
>To: Recipient List Suppressed:;
>From: Michael George Doxtater <mgd5 at cornell.edu>
>Subject: Fwd: Fw: To Leonard Peltier from Subcomandante Marcos (fwd)
>
>Can't vouch for the origings of the following, but it is consistent with
>the sovereigntist rhetoric of indigenous freedom fighters.
>
>X
>
>>Subject: To Leonard Peltier from Subcomandante Marcos
>>Subject: To Leonard Peltier from Subcomandante Marcos
>>
>>
>>EjÈrcito Zapatista de LiberaciÛn Nacional
>>MÈxico
>>
>>October of 1999
>>
>>For: Leonard Peltier
>>
>>From: Subcomandante Insurgente Marcos
>>
>>Leonard,
>>
>>Through the NCDM and Cecilia Rodriguez we extend greetings from the men,
>>women, children and elders of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation.
>>
>>Cecilia has told us about the grave injustice the North American judicial
>>system has committed against you. We understand that the powerful are
>>punishing your spirit of rebellion and your strong fight for the rights of
>>indigenous people in North America.
>>
>>Stupid as it is, the powerful believe that through humiliation, arrogance
>>and isolation it can break the dignity of those who give thoughts, feelings,
>>life and guidance to the struggle for recognition and respect for the first
>>inhabitants of the land over whom, the vain United States has risen. The
>>heroic resistance that you have maintained in prison, as well as the broad
>>movement of solidarity, that your case and your cause have motivated in the
>>U.S. and the world reveal their mistake.
>>
>>Knowing of your existence and history, no woman or man if they are honest
>>and conscious can remain silent before such a great injustice. Nor can they
>>remain still in front of a struggle, which like all that is born and grows
>>from below, is necessary, possible, and true.
>>
>>The Lakota, a people who have the honor and fortune to have you among their
>>blood, have an ethic that recognizes and respects the place of all people
>>and things, respects the relations that mother earth has with herself and
>>other living things that live and die within her and outside of her. An
>>ethic that recognizes generosity as a measure of human worth, the walk of
>>our ancestors and our dead along the paths of today and tomorrow, women and
>>men as part of the universe that have the power of free will to choose paths
>>and seasons, the search for harmony and the struggle against that which
>>breaks and disorders it. All of this, and more that escapes because we are
>>so far away, has a lot to teach the "western" culture which steers, in North
>>America and in the rest of the world, against humanity and against nature.
>>
>>Probably the determined resistance of Leonard Peltier is incomprehensible to
>>the Powerful in North America, and the world. To never give up, to resist,
>>the powerful call this " foolishness". But the foolish are in every corner
>>of the world, and in all of them, resistance flourishes in the fertile
>>ground of the most ancient history.
>>
>>In sum, what the powerful fail to understand is not only Peltier's
>>resistance, but also the entire worlds, and so they intend to mold the
>>planet into the coffin the system represents, with wars, jails and police
>>officers.
>>
>>Probably, the powerful in North America think that in jailing and torturing
>>Leonard Peltier, they are jailing and torturing one man.
>>
>>And so they don't understand how a prisoner can continue to be free, while
>>in prison.
>>
>>And they don't understand how, being imprisoned, he speaks with so many, and
>>so many listen.
>>
>>And they don't understand how, in trying to kill him, he has more life.
>>
>>And they don't understand how one man, alone, is able to resist so much, to
>>represent so much, to be so large.
>>
>>"Why?" the powerful ask themselves and the answer never reaches their ears:
>>
>>Because Leonard Peltier is a people, the Lakota, and it is impossible to
>>keep a people imprisoned.
>>
>>Because Leonard Peltier speaks through the Lakota men and women who are in
>>themselves and in their nature the best of mother earth.
>>
>>Because the strength that this man and this people have does not come from
>>modern weapons, rather it comes from their history, their roots, their dead.
>>
>>Because the Lakota know that no one is more alive than the dead.
>>
>>Because the Lakota, and many other North American Indian people, know that
>>resisting without surrender not only defends their lives and their liberty,
>>but also their history and the nature that gives them origin, home, and
>>destiny.
>>
>>Because the great ones always seem so small to those who can not see the
>>history that each one keeps inside.
>>
>>Because the racism that now governs can only imagine the other and the
>>different in jail.or in the trashcan, where two Lakota natives were found
>>last month, murdered, in the community of Pine Ridge. This is justice in
>>North America: those who fight for their people are in jail, those who
>>despise and murder walk unpunished.
>>
>>What is Leonard Peltier accused of?
>>
>>Not of a crime he didn't commit. No. He is accused of being other, of being
>>different, of being proud to be other and different.
>>
>>But for the Powerful, Leonard Peltier's most serious "crime" is that he
>>seeks to rescue in the past, in his culture, in his roots, the history of
>>his people, the Lakota. And for the powerful, this is a crime, because
>>knowing oneself with history impedes one from being tossed around by this
>>absurd machine that is the system.
>>
>>If Leonard Peltier is guilty, than we are all guilty because we seek out
>>history, and on its shoulders we fight to have a place in the world, a place
>>of dignity and respect, a place for ourselves exactly as we are, which is
>>also, very much as we were.
>>
>>If the Indian people of the North and Indian people of MÈxico, as well as
>>the indigenous people of the entire continent, know that we have our own
>>place (being who we are, not pretending to be another skin color, another
>>tongue, another culture), what is left is that other colors that populate
>>the entire world know it. And what is left is for the powerful to know it.
>>So that they know it, and learn the lesson so well that they won't forget,
>>many more paths and bridges are needed that are walked from below.
>>
>>On these paths and bridges, you, Leonard Peltier, have a special place, the
>>best, next to us who are like you.
>>
>>Salud, Leonard Peltier, receive a hug from one who admires and respects you,
>>and who hopes that one day you will call him "brother".
>>
>>Vale, and health to you and I hope that injustice disappears tomorrow, with
>>yesterday as a weapon and today as a road.
>>
>>>From the mountains of the Mexican Southeast,
>>
>>
>>Subcomandante Insurgente Marcos
>>MÈxico, October 1999
>>
> -30-
>><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><
>Michael Doxtater, Abd.
>441 Caldwell Hall,
>Cornell University,
>Ithaca NY USA 14853
>CCAIGPS (607) 255-1055
>
>X
>
>>
>>
>>>>
> -30-
>><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><
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