John Trudell

On the night of January 3, 1994, I was sitting in my kitchen while a Lake Superior blizzard howled outside.  A program on the radio was broadcasting a talk recently given at Michigan Tech by John Trudell, a Santee Dakota artist, activist, and visionary.  This man had an extra-ordinary mind, and it seized my complete attention.  I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.  It’s so rare and precious to experience powerfully clear thinking.  Last week, 19 years later, I finally saw him in person, at the University of Oregon.  It was good.

Trudell comes from a culture with an oral tradition, and he prefers the energy of live performances to sitting alone writing.  He once carefully summarized his core philosophy in a five-page introduction he wrote for the book Of Earth and Elders.  The documentary film Trudell does a memorable job of presenting the story of his life.  He has created a number of CDs of spoken word poetry, and he is the venerated subject of many webpages and videos.  The following paragraphs provide a sampler of his ideas.

John often introduces himself to an audience by announcing that he is crazy.  The form of reality that our society considers “sane” and “normal” is way too weird, and he refuses to jump on that wacky bandwagon.  He’s the opposite of normal, and he’s proud of it.  If you don’t agree with him, it’s OK, he’s crazy.

All human beings are descendants of tribal people who were spiritually alive, intimately in love with the natural world, children of Mother Earth.  When we were tribal people, we knew who we were, we knew where we were, and we knew our purpose.  This sacred perception of reality remains alive and well in our genetic memory.  We carry it inside of us, usually in a dusty box in the mind’s attic, but it is accessible.

Like every other region on Earth, the vast ancient forests of Europe were once home to many tribal peoples, folks who loved eating salmon and buffalo.  They had a spiritual connection to their past and to their land.  Unfortunately, the tribes of Europe were blindsided when hordes of Indo-European farmers invaded from the east, unleashing a tsunami of genocide. 

The process of erasing their tribal memories began about 3,000 years ago.  During the 500 years of the Inquisition (1250-1750), much of what had survived of the indigenous culture of old Europe was eliminated, as countless traditional people were tortured and burned alive (at least 100,000 to 2 million).

The perpetrators of this mass murder were predators who were deranged by a highly contagious spiritual disease that had nothing to do with race or culture.  This malady lived in the mind, and it altered their perception of reality.  As the Inquisition was winding down, many of these infected predators boarded ships and sailed to colonies in the Americas, where they terrorized the indigenous people for centuries.  They were incredibly brutal people, because they were the offspring of a brutal, disease-ravaged civilization.

Trudell doesn’t hate Europeans for what they have done — you can’t be mad at people because they are infected with a disease.  The invaders didn’t understand what they were doing, but they were spiritually responsible for their acts of genocide.  They were pathologically paranoid, and could not tolerate the existence of people who thought in a different way.  They were empty, lost, and afraid.  They had forgotten what it meant to be human beings. 

We are all human beings.  “Human” is our physical form, the bones, flesh, and blood which are made from the minerals, fluids, and gases of the living world.  “Being” is our spiritual component, our link to the power of the universe.  All things on Earth, animate and inanimate, are spiritually alive.

The disease of technological society has damaged our perception of reality, and pulled us away from our power.  We are constantly bombarded by inputs that insist that we are inadequate, undesirable, and unlovable.  They grind away our self-respect, and reduce us to weak domesticated organisms — things to be controlled and exploited like livestock.

The disease poisons our spirits with feelings of sin, guilt, and shame.  We don’t trust ourselves, or respect ourselves.  We have no spiritual relationship to the future, and that’s insane.  We are robbing our children to satisfy frivolous wants and needs.  Each person is responsible for the violence perpetuated by the consequences of their purchases. 

Our power resides in our connection to the Earth, our ability to think clearly, and our refusal to believe the illusions and deceptions of the oppressors.  The foundation of our power is caring, respect, and responsibility.  Learning is the path to healing, and learning begins with clear and coherent thinking.  No medicine is more powerful than intelligence — if intelligence is used intelligently. 

The environmental movement has had little success, because they tend to remain chained to the consumer mindset, riding in different coaches on the same train as the corporate folks.  Progressives often spin their wheels because they tend to focus on the redistribution of wealth, not the protection of the Earth.  Their complaints present no real threat to the industrial ruling class.  

Trudell has zero respect for the political system of the industrial predators.  Their government is a tool that’s useless for the pursuit of liberation and healing.  He feels that the most effective way of expressing our truths is via culture and art, which is why he focuses on spoken word poetry.  “All we can do is speak our truths.  We can’t go and try to change people.  We have to speak our truths.” 

Trudell is not a fan of revolution — kill the killers.  The root of the word “revolution” is revolve.  If you begin with hatred for an oppressor, revolution will bring you around to a new oppressor, and nothing is gained.  Instead of revolution, we should seek liberation from a sick value system.  He has no quick and simple solutions to offer, because our problems are anything but simple.

Whites can’t heal themselves by imitating Native American spirituality.  They need to explore their ancestry, and learn about their tribal origins.  They need to remember who they are, and reconnect with their ancestral culture, and this is a lifelong learning process.  But most of them don’t want to know about their past.  Most of them know nothing about their great grandparents.  They prefer to pursue spiritual shortcuts, because shortcuts take far less effort than walking the long and difficult path to genuine understanding, to remembering, to healing.

Protecting the Earth is at the core of what we must do.  We are what power is truly about.  “We have to assume our responsibilities as power, as individuals, as spirit, as people.”  But first, we’ve got to like ourselves, accept ourselves.  “We are the Human Beings.  We are the land.” 

Trudell, John, “Crazy Horse, We Hear What You Say,” the Introduction for Of Earth and Elders by Serle L. Chapman, Mountain Press, Missoula, Montana, 2002.

Trudell, Appaloosa Pictures, 2005, directed by Heather Rae, starring John Trudell.

www.johntrudell.com

Civilization and Insanity

Are we living in an insanity epidemic?  Yes indeed, we certainly are, according to The Invisible Plague by Dr. Edwin Fuller Torrey and Judy Miller.  This book provides an illuminating history of insanity, focusing on the last three centuries in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Canada, and the United States.  “Insanity” here refers to two conditions, schizophrenia, and bipolar disorder (manic-depressive).  Today, “psychosis” is the proper term for describing insanity and lunacy, but the authors preferred to use history’s word, insanity.

The objective of this book was to convince us that an epidemic of insanity has been growing in Western society, based on a small mountain of circumstantial evidence.  Insanity seems to be one of the many unintended consequences of the Industrial Revolution.  In the four regions studied, the last 300 years have been an era of turbulent change on a colossal scale.

By the end of the nineteenth century, the British Empire had spread to every corner of the world.  The news coming back from frontier outposts consistently reported that insanity was rare or unknown in “primitive” societies, where folks enjoyed a far slower way of life.  Long-term stability was the opposite of crazy.

In Britain, a number of observers in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries were well aware of a growing insanity epidemic, and some actually linked it to civilization — it was simply an acceptable cost for the wonders of progress, wealth, and luxury.  Living in such amazing times over-excited the minds of those who were mentally fragile, and this was simply unavoidable.  Some even saw rising insanity as a badge of honor, indisputable proof that civilization was thriving.  Lunatic asylums were booming, praise the Lord!

By the end of the story, the authors concluded that insanity was growing at a much faster rate than the population.  In the 200 years between 1750 and 1950, the rate of insanity increased 700 percent, and even more in the US and Ireland.  There is an invisible plague all around us!  What can we do?

A specific cause for the insanity epidemic has not been discovered, but contributing factors might be associated with diet, alcohol, toxins, medical care, and/or infectious agents.  It’s more common in men and immigrants, especially when the immigrants are a small minority in the community.  There is a clear association with the rise of industrialization and urbanization. 

In the British Medical Journal, Marco Picchioni reported that schizophrenia “is more frequent in people born in cities — the larger the city, and the longer the person has lived there, the greater the risk.” 

An observer in 1877 commented that the rate of insanity was growing so quickly that it was only a matter of time before the majority of people were insane.  Hmmm…  Are we there yet, Mommy?

   

And now, I’d like to introduce you to Jack D. Forbes (1934-2011), the Native American writer, scholar, and activist who wrote Columbus and Other Cannibals.  Forbes also warned us of an epidemic of insanity, which he called wétiko psychosis, the cannibal disease.  It’s a spiritual illness, or soul disease, that causes people to become predators, and to relentlessly consume the lives of others.

When the white invaders washed up on the shores, the Native Americans were astonished by their bizarre behavior.  They were unbelievably destructive whirlwinds who tirelessly raped women, rivers, forests, animals, peoples, and lands.  “An Indian who was as bad as the white men could not live in our nation; he would be put to death,” said Black Hawk.  “I had not discovered one good trait in the character of the Americans that had come to the country!”  Sadly, no one could disagree with him.

Forbes came to understand that the wétiko psychosis began thousands of years ago, around the Fertile Crescent and Egypt.  Later, it also emerged in Mexico and Peru.  This soul sickness was extremely contagious.  It could be seen almost everywhere today, and it continually spreads from generation to generation.  He says, “We are made to be crazy by other people who are also crazy and who draw for us a map of the world which is ugly, negative, fearful, and crazy.”

Wétiko was the essence of European culture, a nightmare world of bloodthirsty vampires and werewolves.  European heroes tended to be warriors, emperors, and a wide variety of assorted thugs, hustlers, and psychopaths.  Their “religion” was something isolated from everyday life, practiced indoors, away from the perfection of Creation.  Their God was indifferent to every form of barbarism, and often encouraged it.  No cannibal experienced the world as being a sacred place.  While they raced to consume others, they were also eating themselves up at the same time!  They had no spiritual connection to life.

The wétiko disease encouraged reckless living and overpopulation, and it flourished amidst consumer hordes.  Most often, males were possessed by the worst forms of the disease — they became monsters.  Obviously, a world dominated by men was not a place of health and balance.  But women were not immune.  The wétiko culture taught everyone to hunger for extravagance and excess, constantly cannibalizing other lands and other lives.  We could never have enough.  We could never find peace.

Is it possible to eliminate the cannibal disease?  Yes.  Will it be easy?  No.  We need to create a just and healthy society, and insane people cannot do this.  Healing must come first — spiritual regeneration.  We must redefine reality.  The goal is to “live a life that is worthwhile, one that is filled with precise acts, beautiful acts, meaningful acts… the path that only a wisdom-seeker can travel.” 

Material things have no significance.  “It is rather the quality of our acts, of our struggle, of our motives, of our love, of our perseverance which are truly significant.”  “The Creator has given all of us good paths to follow, based upon good speech, love, and sacred songs.” 

We must remember profound respect for all life, the ways of our ancestors.  We must remember how to accept responsibility for the decisions we make, and the acts we perform.  We must remember how to live like human beings.  We must return to the red road, the path of balance. 

Forbes generously provided readers with two chapters of guidance for the healing process.  Healing is the most important challenge for the generations now alive — and the generations yet-to-be-born.

 

Torrey, Edwin Fuller, M.D. and Miller, Judy, The Invisible Plague — The Rise of Mental Illness from 1750 to the Present, Rutgers University Press, New Brunswick, New Jersey, 2002.

Picchioni, Marco M. and Murray, Robin M., “Schizophrenia,” British Medical Journal, 2007 July 14; 335(7610): 91–95.

Forbes, Jack D., Columbus and other Cannibals, Seven Stories Press, New York, 2008 (much better than the 1992 edition).