१७ सप्टेंबर, २०१९

"There are many Lakota who praise the memorial.... But others argue that a mountain-size sculpture is a singularly ill-chosen tribute. When Crazy Horse was alive..."

"... he was known for his humility, which is considered a key virtue in Lakota culture. He never dressed elaborately or allowed his picture to be taken. (He is said to have responded, 'Would you steal my shadow, too?') Before he died, he asked his family to bury him in an unmarked grave. There’s also the problem of the location. The Black Hills are known, in the Lakota language, as He Sapa or Paha Sapa—names that are sometimes translated as 'the heart of everything that is.'... Nick Tilsen, an Oglala who runs an activism collective in Rapid City, told me that Crazy Horse was 'a man who fought his entire life' to protect the Black Hills. 'To literally blow up a mountain on these sacred lands feels like a massive insult to what he actually stood for,' he said. In 2001, the Lakota activist Russell Means likened the project to 'carving up the mountain of Zion.' Charmaine White Face, a spokesperson for the Sioux Nation Treaty Council, called the memorial a disgrace. 'Many, many of us, especially those of us who are more traditional, totally abhor it,' she told me. 'It’s a sacrilege. It’s wrong.'"

From "Who Speaks for Crazy Horse?/The world’s largest monument is decades in the making and more than a little controversial" by Brooke Jarvis (in The New Yorker).

This is an excellent article about the twisted commercialism of the gigantic unfinished Crazy Horse monument, which is run by the Ziolkowski family and seems to work for tourists as some kind of antidote to Mount Rushmore.

I wanted to give this post the tag "humility," but I only have "humiliation" and "modesty." "Humiliation" is plainly wrong, but is "modesty" okay? Wikipedia's article "Modesty" says "This article is about body modesty. For the concept of modesty in a broader sense, see humility," so I'm going to go with the tag "modesty," and please understand that I mean it in the broader sense that Wikipedia treats at "Humility":
Humility is an outward expression of an appropriate inner, or self regard, and is contrasted with humiliation which is an imposition, often external, of shame upon a person. Humility may be misappropriated as ability to suffer humiliation through self-denouncements which in itself remains focused on self rather than low self-focus.

Humility, in various interpretations, is widely seen as a virtue which centers on low self-preoccupation, or unwillingness to put oneself forward, so it is in many religious and philosophical traditions, it contrasts with narcissism, hubris and other forms of pride and is an idealistic and rare intrinsic construct that has an extrinsic side.

६२ टिप्पण्या:

rehajm म्हणाले...

Crazy Horse would object but he's dead so he don't get a say. Not like his feelings will be hurt either because, you know, dead...

Lance म्हणाले...

"some kind of antidote to Mount Rushmore"

Not sure what that means.

Dave D म्हणाले...

What better way to honor a native American than to blow up one of the hills he found sacred and immortalize him with engineering. Do we even THINK before acting?

Birkel म्हणाले...

He makes a dam fine beer.
And his saloons aren't bad.
But the strip clubs?
We've seen better.

Nonapod म्हणाले...

Decades from now, if and when the sculpture is completed, the man will be sitting astride a horse with a flowing mane, his left arm extended in front of him, pointing. The scale will be mind-boggling: an over-all height nearly four times that of the Statue of Liberty; the arm long enough to accommodate a line of semi trucks; the horse’s ears the size of school buses, its nostrils carved twenty-five feet around and nine feet deep. It will be the largest sculpture in the history of the world.

Good grief. The Statue of Liberty is 305 feet from the base to the tip of the torch. Does that mean this thing will be 1200 feet tall!? That's bonkers!

Susan म्हणाले...

Why should the Lakota get a say? Are they going to turn around and ask the Cheyenne or the Pawnee they ran off THEIR sacred lands shortly before getting the bum-rush from the whites?

The Lakota were "owners" barely long enough to unpack their teepees.

Maillard Reactionary म्हणाले...

I imagine the monument-promoters are well meaning but it appears that they have no conception of the alien culture that they wish to honor. A failure in communications, as it were.

It's best to get these things straightened out before the project is started, but you have to have the sense to ask the question in the first place.

Nonapod म्हणाले...

Lance said...
"some kind of antidote to Mount Rushmore"

Not sure what that means.


I assume that white guilt is a poison that this absurdly large statue is the antidite for?

gspencer म्हणाले...

Bitch, bitch, bitch.

Just STFU and accept the tribute to one of your past leaders.

Char Char Binks, Esq. म्हणाले...

Many Lakota praise it, many decry it. That makes it simultaneously a great good and a great evil, in Leftworld. What to do?

Ice Nine म्हणाले...

It's a great monument to a great man (Crazy Horse was my #1 hero when I was a kid, fwiw). Russell Means and Charmaine White Face can shove a tomahawk up their asses, sideways.

ga6 म्हणाले...

Let us know when you get a comment from Crazy Horse. Video with sound preferred...................

NorthOfTheOneOhOne म्हणाले...

A monument for Crazy Horse?! Man, they're nothing without Neil Young fronting them!

BarrySanders20 म्हणाले...

There is a women of great stature who is ideal to mediate this dispute, a women with one foot in both nations, one shod with a sensible shoe and one in a moccasin.

I speak of the Great White Squaw, Lizzy Warren (which translates to "Crazy Eyebrows" in Oglala). I call on her to convene a tribal counsel to sit Indian style, pass the vaping pipe, and settle this dispute over how to honor Crazy Horse.

Where have you gone, Lizzy Warren? Two nations turn their lonely eyes to you.

Dave Begley म्हणाले...

It's a white guilt tourist trap.

What until there is a Trump and Reagan carved mountain in SD.

Michael K म्हणाले...

Get Woke, Go Broke. Why not build a casino ? That is more a symbol of Indians today.

Bill, Republic of Texas म्हणाले...

Isn't anyone going to mention the elephant in the room.

It's very problematic for the indians to appropriate the culture of using horses.

M Jordan म्हणाले...

Everything is controversial. I’m left handed. That’s controversial. Ants are small. That’s controversial. All comedy done today will be repudiated by someone twenty years from now.

The moral: Controversy is inherent in everything. Accept it.

Temujin म्हणाले...

Sometimes a little taste, some moderation, and some sense goes a long way. You know, the old 'less is more' approach?

In so many ways, we cannot get out of our own way in this culture.

Darrell म्हणाले...

The people surrounding the project and controlling the roads and vistas treated this as a big F You to White America when I visited in the late 1970s. They didn't hide their hostility. You got a chance to atone for $20/person, of course.

Hagar म्हणाले...

If Crazy Horse had been a modest man, he would not have been named Crazy Horse.

Fernandinande म्हणाले...

Do we even THINK before acting?

White man think with forked brain.

+

"Standing Bear is reported to have spoken on behalf of the elders when he invited Korczak Ziolkowski to carve a Memorial to honor his people. Chief Henry Standing Bear shared a message of hope and reconciliation. Korczak accepted the invitation and the project began. On June 3rd, 1948, motioning toward Thunderhead Mountain, Standing Bear conveyed to those in attendance at the dedication ceremony that the newly-initiated Memorial would serve to create cross-cultural understanding and to mend relations between Natives and non-Natives – an especially powerful sentiment coming from a man who spent his entire life working to understand others and, in turn, educate others about his people and their culture."

tim maguire म्हणाले...

Dave D said...
What better way to honor a native American than to blow up one of the hills he found sacred and immortalize him with engineering. Do we even THINK before acting?


Who's "we," paleface?

Nancy Reyes म्हणाले...

the quotes are from three left wing activists. Do they represent how people actually feel, or are they merely chosen because the reporter decided on the story and their quotes fit in with the chosen narrative?

Did anyone bother to ask tribal representatives? Or maybe go to Pine Ridge and ask an ordinary Lakota?

I always visited the monument (I worked as a physician at another understffed, underequipped IHS Hospital in the area).

It was not done to please the politically correct, but was the decision of the Polish American grandfather who started the project as a way to counter the four white presidents on Mt Rushmore.

CJinPA म्हणाले...

...the gigantic unfinished Crazy Horse monument, which is run by the Ziolkowski family and seems to work for tourists as some kind of antidote to Mount Rushmore.

It will be a monument to white liberals who think Mount Rushmore needed an antidote.

The same thinking is behind the NY Times effort to revise the founding of the U.S. from 1776 to 1619, the years slaves were brought here. These folks are serious in their contempt for the U.S.

Laslo Spatula म्हणाले...

Ask Neil Young what he thinks.

I am Laslo.

Dude1394 म्हणाले...

It is obvious that America will never build another large monument.

bagoh20 म्हणाले...

Is there really anything the White Man can do that would not be controversial among the Indians? Anything? Even carving out casino exceptions so they can rake in millions is controversial. Just try to imagine anything anyone in this country could do that is not controversial today. There is nothing anyone can do with approval, so stop looking for it.

God Almighty could appear in the sky as a giant face of George Burns and announce world peace and universal immortality, and it would be met with demonstrations against the his patriarchy and the effect on global warming.

Fernandinande म्हणाले...

If Crazy Horse had been a modest man, he would not have been named Crazy Horse.

If he had been a real Amerindian he wouldn't be named after an animal imported by Europeans.

"Modest Mouse" would correct both issues, as would "Tiny Tufted Titmouse".

SeanF म्हणाले...

Nonapod: Good grief. The Statue of Liberty is 305 feet from the base to the tip of the torch. Does that mean this thing will be 1200 feet tall!? That's bonkers!

The Statue of Liberty is 305 feet from the ground to the tip of the torch. It's only 151 feet from the base to the top.

motorrad म्हणाले...

I was there on my motorcycle in 1998 and bought a book about it from an Indian working at the visitor center. There was a quote on the wall that still resonates with this conservative used to be Republican; "The white man made many promises but he only kept one. He promised to take our land and he did"

Yancey Ward म्हणाले...

The Black Hills were part of the Lousiana Purchase. They should have just modified the Jefferson part of Rushmore to Crazy Horse, and Washington's to Sitting Bull. It is only the right thing to do.

Richard म्हणाले...

This sculpture reminds me of the statues on Easter Island.

Aggie म्हणाले...

Why not do the same thing they did with Mt. Rushmore, and leave it unfinished>? The Chief's head is attraction enough for anyone stupid enough to pay for entry.

CWJ म्हणाले...

This has been in process for over 70 years. So why is the controversy heating up now? Just speculation on my part, but I suspect it's far enough along to be generating the prospect of serious tourist money. The endgame is not to shut it down, but to get a piece of the action.

Doug म्हणाले...

I think I have had about enough of this aggrieved victimhood culture. F anyone who feels threatened.

Seeing Red म्हणाले...

That thing still isn’t finished?

I remember talking to my dad about it as a child.

Earnest Prole म्हणाले...

Body modesty is the secondary definition of modesty in the best American and English free online dictionaries; I'm surprised you didn't consult those rather than fretting about what's on Wikipedia. My dead-tree OED is in another location, but don't you have an online subscription? At any rate your current tag is entirely correct.

There’s a California city, Modesto, named for modesty's primary definition:

"Though the railroad had endeavored to name the town in honor of W.C. Ralston, one of the most prominent citizens of the state, -- a tower of strength in the banking world and a large purchaser of wheat, the prime staple of the county, after his most modest declination Judge Underhill, the sales agent of the Company, assembled a convention of the citizens for the purpose of selecting a name. Mr. Ralston, also a director of the Company, was present at the meeting. After several names had been suggested, that of Ralston was again proposed. Mr. Ralston, again modestly refused in a speech in which he predicted the future of Modesto that it has since attained [as of 1924]. Judge Stakes arose enthusiastically and said: 'The parent of the infant is 'Modesty' - then the baby's name must be Modesto' -- Spanish for modesty. This name was adopted with acclaim."

W.C. Ralston : Donald Trump :: matter : anti-matter.

Bill Peschel म्हणाले...

It boils down to this:

Who owns history?

Put it another way: The wife and I were watching "Artists and Models." Not the Martin / Lewis comedy, but a Jack Benny / Paramount vehicle from 1937 (the library sent it to us by accident).

Since we got it, we might as well sit down and watch it.

The movie opens with three guys trying to convince Benny, a musical promoter, to use their idea for the "Artists and Models Ball." This being Hollywood, it's a full-blown musical number with hundreds of scantily clad girls (for 1937), huge sets, and lots of dancing.

They threw everything into it, and as part of the show, they have three guys recreating the "Spirit of '76" painting. They're in the far background and easy to miss, but they were there.

Among all the marching dancers and extras was also a regiment of Civil War infantry (Union only), complete with shouldered rifles. Again, not to make a patriotic point, but they were there.

Will we ever see anything like this again (apart from "Hamilton" that is)?

Of course, this also had Martha Raye in blackface singing "Public Melody #1" with a young Louis Armstrong playing the "villain" (although the tommy-gun armed FBI agents were bested).

So who gets to decide how our country's indian heritage should be incorporated into the culture? Are we going to get a federal Department of History to decide? Is that what they want?

John henry म्हणाले...

A couple Years ago my wife and I went to Rushmore. Nice, worth the trip but a bit of a letdown after all these years.

Ditto Crazy Horse. How about recarve it into a Statue of President Trump?

We also saw Yellowstone and the world's biggest ball of twine that trip

John Henry

WhoKnew म्हणाले...

I'd like to know how long the Black Hills were actually in Sioux territory. The Sioux were originally in Wisconsin/Minnesota until the Chippewa pushed them out.

Roughcoat म्हणाले...

Oh, baloney. The Sioux peoples are native to the Upper Great Lakes region. They were driven from the area in the 1600s by the Ojibwe (Chippewa) and Iroquois peoples, among others. Migrating westward, they flooded into the Northern Great Plains, in turn forcibly displacing the indigent peoples that stood in their way. The Black Hills only became sacred to them after they conquered them and claimed them for their own.

Not incidentally, intertribal warfare was endemic (had been for thousands of years) throughout the length and breadth of North America, and the antagonists never concluded a treaty with each other that they weren't willing to break when the opportunity for conquest and expansion presented itself. I am not aware of the Lakota/Dakota peoples ever shedding any tears for the tribes they drove out of the Upper Great Plains. However, when I lived in Colorado I was acquainted with a couple members of the Absaroka (Crow) tribe, and they had a really intense dislike of any and all Sioux, whom they regarded as blowhards, drug addicts, drunks, and losers. They would speak of the Pine Ridge Reservation and its inhabitants with the greatest disdain and opprobrium. Apaches I knew felt that same way.

Roughcoat म्हणाले...

"The white man made many promises but he only kept one. He promised to take our land and he did."

The Absaroka might recast that complaint as follows: "The Lakota made NO promises to us, they simply took our land and killed as many of as they could in the process."*

*P.S. "They also enslaved Absaroka women and subjected the Absoraka men they caught to prolonged and hideous tortures."

n.n म्हणाले...

The Absaroka might recast that complaint as follows: "The Lakota made NO promises to us, they simply took our land and killed as many of as they could in the process."

A sample of the unadulterated history of the monolithic indian "identity".

tim maguire म्हणाले...

As a child, I oftne wondered why the various Indian tribes never banded together to resist the white people. Why some tribes even sided with the whites.

The reason, as is inadvertently admitted in Ken Burns' "The West" documentary, is that the white people were just one more tribe jockeying for power alongside all the others. Alliances with them were made when it made sense, just as with anybody else.

Kevin म्हणाले...

Who Speaks for Crazy Horse?

Quick, everyone take a stand!

Then we can sort out the good people from the bad.

Tomorrow there will be a new test.

M Jordan म्हणाले...

The good news about moderated comments: No more threads devolving into Chuck and Inga rabbit holes.

The bad news about moderated comments: No more instant gratification upon seeing my words on the big screen and the followup comments referencing my flashes of insight.

Oh, wait ... I never get followup comments referencing my flashes of insight. That's because you're all a bunch of losers!!! (tee hee and a wink for emphasis)

Dude1394 म्हणाले...

A wise Comanche once said. The white men are taking our land, of course we took it from the previous tribe and they took it from the previous tribe before them.

Survival of the fittest works in humans as well.

Beach Brutus म्हणाले...

Known as Curly Hair or Light Hair? Sounds like 'Ol Crazy Horse may have a Hunky in his wood pile. Some Jeremiah Johnson type may have wandered through at just the right time.

Quaestor म्हणाले...

The modesty tag is totally inappropriate. Crazy Horse is depicted topless, showing nipples and everything. The Ziolkowskis have totally ignored Indian calls for a suitably modest décolletage.

bagoh20 म्हणाले...

Few Indians understand that the White Man has sacred things too. We have progress, indoor plumbing, bulldozers and dynamite, and we revere the well-chiseled stone. You would expect people who worship the stone age to be into that as much as the rest of us.

bagoh20 म्हणाले...

A few years ago I happened to online research massacres between the European-gened Americans and the Native Americans over the course of the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries. They were surprisingly small numbers. The total killed on each side was around 6,000, with the Indians killing slightly more. Most were tit for tat exercises. This did not include deaths from disease. We know who won that one.

effinayright म्हणाले...

Laslo Spatula said...
Ask Neil Young what he thinks.

*************************

Or the French maid that Jagger sings about. The one that found the Crazy Horse.

Maillard Reactionary म्हणाले...

Roughcoat@: 12:58 PM: "Not incidentally, intertribal warfare was endemic (had been for thousands of years) throughout the length and breadth of North America, and the antagonists never concluded a treaty with each other that they weren't willing to break when the opportunity for conquest and expansion presented itself."

Indeed. The American "Indians" were basically a stone-age culture at constant war with one another, "war" being defined as killing all the men and the old during a raid, and taking with them the younger women and children when they left.

Why did the Pueblo and similar cultures build those villages high up into the sides of hills? It was not because a salesman from the Trump organization sold them on the resale value of condos. It was because they were afraid of the neighbors.

This topic would be a good one to include in a "Politically Incorrect History of The United States", if anyone should care to write one.

Having said that (as before), the aboriginal culture here, for all its undeniable barbarism, was not without its merits, and deserves at least to be appreciated on its own for what it was.

Because incredibly enough, there is something to be learned from it.

M.E. म्हणाले...

I've been there several times; it is an amazing sight, a wonder of the world. It will takes decades more to finish - so, at least 100 years. A Lakota chief asked for the monument to be carved, because, he said, "I want the white man to know that the red man has heroes, too." Crazy Horse is one of my personal heroes. I hope to meet him in heaven someday, not even kidding.

What I really, REALLY love about this monument is that they haven't taken one single penny of government money, even when offered it by the feds. The Chief was adamant that they would do this without the federal government, which had screwed them over so many times and broken so many promises.

You should go to the Visitor Center at the site and watch the movie about the beginning of the carving; it is absolutely astonishing.

Leave it to a bunch of woke leftists to try to destroy something beautiful, about which they know nothing.

Michael K म्हणाले...

Few Indians understand that the White Man has sacred things too. We have progress, indoor plumbing, bulldozers and dynamite,

And the wheel.

rcocean म्हणाले...

Howard zinn and the Communists went on and on about how the "White Man" destroyed the American Indian and committed Genocide. This wasn't because they loved the Indians, its because they hated the white Christians who built this country.

As for Crazy Horse, he was no greater than 100 other Indian leaders. Does he deserve a monument like TR?

rcocean म्हणाले...

BTW, I've been to Mount Rushmore and it doesn't look that more impressive in person than it does in Photographs. But then, I found the Grand Canyon a bore and didn't care for Hoover Dam either. But then I'm not into monuments, or tourist traps where you just LOOK at some grand sight.

Michael म्हणाले...

Ancient tribal lands? Bullish!t. The Lakota inhabited the Minnesota region until the early 1700s when they were introduced to horses. This they migrated into the Dakotas and took the land from the Pawnee.

dpn1031 म्हणाले...

I taught social studies and coached football for six years at Little Wound School on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation. Literally translated Paha Sapa is hill (paha) black (sapa.) Being from Tennessee some called me Pahabilly (Hillbilly.)

I have heard the Black Hills called The Heart Of All That IS but never heard of Paha Sapa being translated at The Heart Of All That Is. To my understanding, Crazy Horse's name was simply the name for horse (which literally translates to a great dog) and witco which translates to crazy.

Susan म्हणाले...

Exactly, Michael. White people have been in The Hills longer than the Lakota were before white folks came in.

Dad Bones म्हणाले...

M.E. at 5:17