{"id":76174,"date":"2017-11-26T09:38:25","date_gmt":"2017-11-26T14:38:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/valorguardians.com\/blog\/?p=76174"},"modified":"2017-11-26T10:03:42","modified_gmt":"2017-11-26T15:03:42","slug":"native-americans-and-the-flag","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/?p=76174","title":{"rendered":"Native Americans and the flag"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Associated Press<\/a> has a fairly good article today in regards to Native Americans and the debate over “taking a knee” that is raging in the country. They highlight the point that because of their strong warrior tradition, as well as their participation in our nations’ war, the American flag holds a revered place in Native Americans’ ceremonies.<\/p>\n

“I’ll stand. I’ll do whatever I think is appropriate to honor them first, and then over there, I can debate about whether the country is living up to its side of the deal when it comes to treaty rights, water rights, social issues that affect a lot of the tribes,” said Erny Zah, a singer, powwow emcee and dancer from the Navajo Nation in the Southwest. “Very rarely do I hear anything that negates the veterans’ services, or the country’s disparagement of whatever social issues might be happening at the time.”<\/p>\n

American Indians have served in the U.S. military at higher rates per capita than any other ethnic group despite a history of suffering at the hands of Europeans, and even in times when they were denied U.S. citizenship and the right to vote. Serving in the military and protecting one’s homeland is considered a continuation of warrior traditions.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Even though most tribes replace the National Anthem with their own “flag songs” the reverence for the flag remains the same;<\/p>\n

The reverence on display is almost sacred, [Dennis Zotigh of the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian] said. Warriors are blessed through ceremonies before they encounter enemies, and welcomed back with parades, giveaways, eagle feathers, cleansing ceremonies and songs. Powwows often have a grand entry solely for veterans, who line up and can take hours to introduce themselves by name, military affiliation and years served.<\/p>\n

Singers sit around a drum, starting a melody and slow beat before the words of flag songs repeat.<\/p>\n

“The president’s flag will stand forever,” reads a portion of a Sioux song.<\/p>\n

“Our country, our land is the most powerful country in the world,” says a Hidatsa song.<\/p>\n

“Under the nation’s flag, generations will stand forever. So do I,” says another composed on the Pine Ridge reservation in South Dakota and first sung in a World War II victory celebration.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Despite the fact that Indians were mistreated by European Americans, in general, they still honor and respect the flag and our patriotic traditions.<\/p>\n

William Runsabove, a singer and enrolled member of the Northern Cheyenne tribe of Montana, said the pride Native veterans have for serving the U.S. eclipses any feelings about the U.S. president, politics or social injustice.<\/p>\n

“You can’t take away from pride a Native American has for service,” he said. “And, of course, the tough times … a big percentage of people aren’t happy with the way things are going now, but you can’t take away that pride.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Associated Press has a fairly good article today in regards to Native Americans and the … Native Americans and the flag<\/span>Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":71180,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-76174","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-society"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76174","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=76174"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76174\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/71180"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=76174"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=76174"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=76174"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}