Credit: Natalie Hand.
I wanted this to be a day of no tears. Just one day. Didn’t happen.
Sacred places containing ancient burial sites, places of prayer and other significant cultural artifacts of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe were destroyed on Saturday September 3 by Energy Transfer Partners, Tribal Chairman David Archambault II said.
On Friday, the Tribe filed court documents identifying the area as home to significant Native artifacts and sacred sites.
“This demolition is devastating,” Archambault said. “These grounds are the resting places of our ancestors. The ancient cairns and stone prayer rings there cannot be replaced. In one day, our sacred land has been turned into hollow ground.”
Construction crews removed topsoil across an area about 150 feet wide stretching for two miles, northwest of the confluence of the Cannon Ball and Missouri Rivers.
“I surveyed this land, and we confirmed multiple graves and specific prayer sites,” said Tim Mentz, the Standing Rock Sioux’s former tribal historic preservation officer. “Portions, and possibly complete sites, have been taken out entirely.”
[…]
“We’re days away from getting a resolution on the legal issues, and they came in on a holiday weekend and destroyed the site,” said Jan Hasselman, attorney for the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe. “What they have done is absolutely outrageous.”
Just in, from ICTMN: What Dakota Access Destroyed: Standing Rock Former Historic Preservation Officer Explains What Was Lost [Video].
This interview was recorded on September 3, 2016. Former Standing Rock Sioux Tribal Historic Preservation Officer Tim Mentz explains the destruction of burial grounds and sacred sites by Dakota Access Pipeline LLC. This sacred site is what people were trying to protect when Energy Transfer Partners brought in aggressive dogs to attack unarmed people.
“This demolition is devastating,” said Standing Rock Sioux Tribe Chairman David Archambault II. “These grounds are the resting places of our ancestors. The ancient cairns and stone prayer rings cannot be replaced. In one day, our sacred land has been turned into hollow ground.”
https://youtu.be/9EAWpI5L_Bc
Fucking Bastards.
I want somebody to dig up their grandmas and deliver them to their doors.
Since it’s apparently no big deal they should be OK with it, right?
Also, they look like literal capital N Nazis who happily dug up Jewish cemeteries and used whatever they found for their profit.
Yeah. I’ve been crying and screaming. Fuck, there isn’t language strong enough for this, there just isn’t.
I want somebody to dig up their grandmas and deliver them to their doors
That might be doable.
Except I think digging up white people’s cemetaries is illegal.
So basically, they figured they’d lose the case and so they decided to pre-emptively destroy the land in contention.
How is this different from a burglar claiming that he should go free because he already sold the things he stole?
LykeX:
That, and they knew, of course, that the best time for such an act is a long weekend, where you can’t get ahold of a lot of people, like judges. The cops aren’t on our side at all, they were conveniently absent when DA security set dogs loose and started pepper spraying people.
I hate them. So much.
And I could probably try and understand those people who need their jobs so badly that they actually have to carry out these kinds of atrocities (yes, atrocities!!!!) but honestly, right now I don’t want to. I can’t.
Please, someone deliver them their ancestors. In random boxes of separate pieces.
rq@#6:
Please, someone deliver them their ancestors.
Deliver them to their ancestors, more like. Those thugs are what rifles are for.
It’s starting to look like the dog and chemical attacks were orchestrated to allow for the complete destruction of these specific sacred sites, as these sites are specifically named in the papers under review in court right now. I can only conclude that Dakota Access assumed if these sites were gone, we’d give up.
All kinds of ideas for stopping the machines with sabotage float in my head. I’m not saying them aloud, because that would probably backfire badly.
DACL just proved they don’t care about what is dead and gone, but not forgotten, (bulldoze their cemeteries and see how they feel). 1 day after a court filing? This is classic organized crime tactics from the 1920’s.
Putting a “private security force” to do the wet work, while :law enforcement: watched is the pinnacle of depravity.
Cops and criminals, only matters who you work for, Just the same.
Yeah no.
Beyond despicable. These people are criminals.
It’s enough to make me wish curses worked.
Kestrel:
You and me both.