"Fore!"Indigenous
Women
In A Hole As One
By Richard Oxman
14 March, 2005
Countercurrents.org
"In Hawai'i we have live fire bombing,
we have toxic waste, we have Agent Orange buried in our water sources.
The military doesn't have to answer for any of the toxic waste that
they dump into our water systems. We drink the toxic waste, we breathe
it." -- Lilikala Kame'eleihiwa
"Not only has the land been raped, our Mother has been raped."
-- Haunani-Kay Trask
"In the United States, disagreements are supposed to be resolved
in a court of law. When that fundamental right is denied, justice is
sought through social upheaval and civil disobedience, or from the barrel
of a gun. We are entitled to a better solution that that." -- Mililani
Trask
"The State of Hawai'i is serving as a pimp for the prostitution
they're pushing on the Marianas Trench, Rich, that's why you shouldn't
move there." -- Oxman's father...in one of his dad's clearer moments
In the Winter 2005 Cultural Survival Quarterly (Volume 28, Issue 4)
there's a special focus on indigenous women, sharing their stories and
challenging the way we look at the women's and indigenous peoples' rights
movements. I highly recommend that readers check in with these "Women
the World Must Hear." (1)
In one segment four Maasai teenagers tell why international attempts
to stop female circumcision are putting Maasai women at greater risk
than what they would ordinarily experience...which is way bad enough.
In another, Eulynda Toledo-Benalli addresses the horrific memories/impact
of Indian boarding schools. In addition, Anuak refugee women, Armenians,
Sweden's Saami women, and Quichua people are spotlighted. There is much
more.
But the group that held my attention the longest was the one representing
traditional Native Hawai'ian culture. In the "Defending Paradise"
section, activist Mililani Trask annotates the Apology Bill and the
Akaka Bill, while Professor Lilikala Kame'elehiwa and Leiali'i Mano'i
from the University of Hawai'i delineate why their movement will not...go
away.
I have an early-twenties son on Maui (a twinkle still, for sure, 'midst
the tears). But I will not visit the island. It's not that I wouldn't
under any circumstances. Simply...I try not to. The horror of Hawai'i's
history is deeply embedded in my soul. It's a beyond words place...yet...in
spite of the abominations inflicted upon it. And anyone who goes over
there to casually golf, imbibe Mai Tais, down Ahi, etc. contributes
to the ongoing desecration.
Mindless, mass-based corporate tourism does not tread lightly on foreign
soil. (2)
Don't tell me 'bout how the people depend upon the tourism. I used to
live there. A long time. And for too long a time I sucked the tourists
dry, depriving the indigenous people of their land and more. No. No
more trashy, ornamentalized hula dance for me.
People always ask me what they can do. Well, in case you haven't noticed...I've
touched upon that already here. But I have another idea. Why not investigate
on your own...what, say, golf courses have done, and continue to do
to the islands and their people? You don't have to investigate the military-related
indiscretions, the nuclear-related problems, etc. Keep it simple. It'll
be quite enough, I assure you, this walk on The Green. (3)
My attitude is that you may not be able to do more than simply make
a face when certain subjects come up. Well, whatever the case may be,
that's certainly a decent place to start. For sure, zero will come from
anything that doesn't have proper disgust attitudinally set in place.
And there are plenty of everyday things that we're not sufficiently
informed/freaked out about...warranting the risk of friendships/acquintances/opportunities.
Travel to Hawai'i is one case in point. Golf is another. (4)
In traditional Native Hawai'ian culture, women have always been leaders.
The indigenous Hawaii'ians' movement for cultural and land rights and
"environmental justice" finds them at the forefront of the
action in 2005.
And in Hawai'i they think that all issues are women's issues; women
expect --as per tradition--that the men will obey them when they're
told what to do. They are in quite a different position than most other
women in the world. But they need help too.
And you can help them all by simply NOT doing certain things. For now.
Force must be applied. And it will continue to be applied in increasing
doses by someone...whether by desperate housewives, devoted activists
or demons.
I'm not screaming "Fore!" for no reason. (5)
Richard Oxman, who will never forget the scents, sights and sounds
of Hawai'i, can be reached at [email protected].
Forgiving is another matter, oui?
Notes:
(1) It's a good complement for articles on women's efforts to mobilize
internationally (See
http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?
SectionID=10&ItemID=7421 as an example). Indigenizing the
Academy: Transforming Scholarship & Empowering Communities (by Devon
Abbot Mihesuah and Angela Cavender Wilson on University of Nebraska
Press) is a good work for those in academia...if they want to become
more informed. On a very personal note, however, I don't believe that
the efforts at international mobilization or academic education (as
per Bell Hooks' "education as the practice of freedom") will
do the trick. See Laura Carlsen's recent rundown of the erosion of Women's
Rights in Latin America (http://www.counterpunch.org/carlsen03122005.html).
(2) There is a relationship between the size of an environmental footprint
and the size of a penis-brain.
(3) You can start with http://multinationalmonitor.org/
hyper/issues/1993/11/mm1193_13.html so that your research has
a global perspective. It should stiffen your resolve. There's also a
wonderful audio of a speech that Haunani-Kay Trask gave at the University
of Colorado-Boulder 9/29/93 on "Environmental Racism in Hawai'i
and the Pacific Basin." David Barsamian's Alternative Radio outfit,
I imagine, should still be able to bring that up for you from their
archives; it's an absolute smash. Oahu is only 607 square miles (much
less than the area covered by Boulder County in Colorado), but it had
70 planned (or built) golf courses when I lived on Maui; only 5 were
open to the public! Most were owned by Japanese investors, and fees
for membership were sold on the Japanese Stock Market at a quarter to
a half a million bucks a shot!!! Others were owned by the U.S. military.
The Trask take on population density, cultural prostitution, endangered
species, burial grounds, resources degraded/wasted, etc. will blow your
mind. Golf courses play a major role in all this...with Hawai'i accommodating
at least 7 million visitors per year. That's 7 and a half for every
resident, 35 for every Hawai'ian. Imagine half the U.S. population descending
upon Colorado (a much larger land mass) to get a sense of the impact.
Tourism and its appendages is NOT a safe industry. I don't think most
readers would ever be able to sleep again if I went into the military-related/nuclear-related
horrors she depicts.
(4) From the Trask family of Hawai'i I learned much over the years:
Forests serve as a kind of natural dam, storing rainwater in the leaves
and soil. Natural water circulating from forests feeds rivers and streams.
In contrast, golf courses have only one-fourth the water retention capacity
of an equivalent forest area. Most rainwater simply runs off the greens
and fairways. This produces flooding downstream. On the contrary, the
water flow to rivers and creeks downstream from golf links drops to
a dribble during periods of drought. During golf course construction,
rainfall sends mud pouring from the barren ground into streams. This
often makes the water inappropriate for agricultural or residential
use.
An 18-hole golf
course requires three to four tons of various germicides, herbicides,
and pesticides every year to keep the green and fairways healthy, to
combat weeds, and kill insects. Some of these chemicals are carcinogenic,
while others are known to cause deformities and nerve damage. There
have been reports of massive fish kills in fish hatcheries polluted
by toxins in the water from golf courses. The nitrogen and phosphorus
in the
fertilizers will mix with rainwater and eventually flow into a reservoir.
The high nutrient content of water will stimulate the growth of algae.
Consequently, this requires the water treatment plant to use higher
volumes of chlorine to cleanse the water.
Golf courses use pesticides containing organic phosphorus. After application,
the pesticides evaporate in the air and are absorbed by the human body
via the skin and lungs. Caddies and greenkeepers often experience health
problems because of the air pollution. Golfers themselves breathe in
the toxins as they walk the course before the newly sprayed pesticides
have settled down. Winds sometimes carry the chemical agents to surrounding
neighborhoods, and people living near golf courses worry that their
health may also be affected. Golf has an image as a healthy sport, but
it may be quite different in reality.
A research group
in Canada also identified the problematical factors of golf courses.
Soil samples were taken from greens and fairways, and sediment samples
were taken from waterways and analyzed for the presence of mercury.
Greens had the highest mean mercury concentration, and the majority
of greens exceeded Canadian environmental levels set for mercury in
soil. Sediment from a golf course lake had higher mercury levels than
a lake
located 5 km from the course. Mussels from both lakes were analyzed,
and those from the golf course lake near the greens had methylmercury
and total mercury levels an order of magnitude greater than those from
the reference lake. Fish in both lakes contained methyl mercury, but
the level was higher in fish collected near the golf course greens.
The construction of golf courses in scenic natural sites, such as forest
areas and coral islands, also results in the destruction of biodiversity.
The negative impact on Hawai'i and its surrounding waters is beyond
belief.
Golf courses could...maybe...be handled a different way...as I'm told
(by golf pros) they are in South Africa. But, regardless, that's not
going to happen.
And...The Green Realm aside, as Mililani Trask notes, "...Native
peoples suffer from dire poverty, homelessness, and serious health problems.
These types of social indicators are red flags that violence looms on
the horizon if justice is not provided."
(5) 'Fore something worse happens, please. It's kind of on the order
of what Ward Churchill has been trying to put out there for years. What
we are not facing up to with our mild dialogue.
To read Richard
Oxman's recent writings See www.SelvesAndOthers.org