Sunday, August 12, 2007

Wounded Knee

I had forgotten how enraged I was when I first learnt about Wounded Knee. I am writing to remember. Wounded Knee, 1890 - the last of the Indian Wars. Old Big Foot's pneumonia ravaged body ridden with bullets. Sitting Bull already murdered. The Ghost Dance movement more or less in shambles. Mass grave of 350 Lakota Sioux at the foot of the Wounded Knee hill. The fall of a crumbling nation.

How maddeningly infuriating it is to have the faces on Mt Rushmore, faces that represent the institution that massacred the Lacota Sioux, towering over their very own land. I cant wait for the completion of the Crazy Horse monument. A fitting, long overdue reply. Perhaps only symbolic. But it is something.

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