Copyright © 2000 NLThomas
All Rights Reserved

Editor:

I'd like to respond to the following article, "Die Like An Eagle" published New York Times,November 19, 2000 Indian Rights vs. a National Sanctuary, by Anthony Ramirez, both to correct some inaccuracies and to add some important information that was not included.

Mr. Ramirez' article was, in the main, accurate. The Hopi (Hopi is both plural and singular) do smother golden eaglets in cornmeal during a specific ceremony once a year, and have been doing so for thousands of years. As "barbaric" as this may seem, what Mr. Ramirez neglected, either through oversight or being misinformed (this is an extremely emotional issue for many of the animal rights groups involved. No major "environmental" groups have involved themselves because this is not an environmentally-threatening issue), to explain in a little depth how the eaglets are collected, and why specific nests are chosen over others. Had he done so, some of the emotional impact would have been drained from the story, to be sure, but it is the job of the New York Times, and one that you do well, to report the news, not the emotional rantings of people like Bonnie Erbe, whose comments I will address later.

The Hopi choose nests in which more than one egg has been laid. Why? Because the firstborn eaglet nearly ALWAYS kills subsequent hatchlings. The Hopi remove a hatchling that would die anyway. Over the past year, since this has become such an issue, blown completely out of proportion and characterized by statements by animal rightsists that run the gamut from outright and overt anti-Indian racism to charges of cruelty, our organization has attempted on many occasions to explain, in a calm and rational fashion, the above fact. We have stressed that the eaglets in question face a far crueler death at the beaks and talons of the firstborn chick than they do at the hands of the Hopi. I would add that we have been vilified as "murderers" though no Hopi belong to our organization, a clear indication that many non-Indians still believe that we are all one "savage" people.

Ms. Erbe is just such a non-Indian. She began her tirade against the Hopi without obtaining any of the facts listed above, and maintains that American Indian religious traditions are "barbaric" and should be done away with, despite the fact that many CERTAIN members and members of other Native American religious rights organizations wrote her to try to explain the facts to her. Ms. Erbe's responses were uniform - that we were "murderous savages." Also, while Mr. Ramirez mentioned Ms. Erbe's claim that she had received about 500 letters in support of her position, she apparently did not mention the thousands she received from outraged Indian people around the country decrying both her position and her blatantly racist stance. Our organization contacted National Public Radio, where the show in which Ms. Erbe made her position clear was aired and Scripps-Howard News Service to express our outrage at the broadcasting of such racism and religious denigration. While we received assurances from NPR that they did not in any way condone Erbe's remarks, but that it was, ironically, a First Amendment issue. Scripps-Howard apologized, but maintained essentially the same thing.

As a matter of law, it is interesting that the Hopi are singled out as they are, particularly in light of the now-famous Church of Lukumi Babalu Aye v. City of Hialeah (1994) Supreme Court decision that animal sacrifice is indeed protected by the First Amendment. Apparently, it is okay for practitioners of Santeria in Florida to sacrifice animals ritually for ceremonies of a religious tradition that dates back - at the most- a few hundred years. Ms. Erbe seems to have no interest in protecting the chickens and goats of Hialeah, Florida, but she has a great interest, as do a few small groups of animal rights extremists, in preventing the Hopi from conducting their at least 4,000 year old religious tradition of gathering a small number of eaglets - who would be killed by the first hatchling in any case - and then smothering them in cornmeal.

We here at CERTAIN, and other Indians across the country know why Ms. Erbe and her ilk raise such a stink about our religious practices, and it has nothing to do with "animal cruelty" per se - particularly since she has been informed that these eaglets would nonetheless die, as many do having nothing to do with the Hopi - or the comparative "barbarism" of Hopi ceremonies. Ms. Erbe is, we believe, one of many who wear the sheep's clothing of "animal rights activism" to disguise the racist wolf beneath. We have had long and sad experience with these people, and it is important that your readers are made aware of those facts that were lacking, probably through no fault of his own, from Mr. Ramirez' otherwise excellent article.

As I read this morning in editorial having to do with the disenfranchisement of black voters through ballot-cheating, intimidation, and denial of voting rights at various precincts, racism is alive and well in America. As bad as it is for American of African descent, the attacks on American Indian treaty rights and religious rights continue fast and furious. There are people - and I believe Bonnie Erbe to be one of them - who will not be happy until the genocide begun over a half a millenium ago is complete.

Thank you for your time,

Mike Two Horses, CERTAIN
Coalition To End Racial Targeting
Of American Indian Nations
3400 E. Speedway Blvd.
Suite 118-#259
Tucson AZ 85716
Phone: 520 370-7136
E-mail: certainorg@uswest.net