Jay Tavare: Indigenous Americans among the poorest in the world

Monday, January 31, 2011  

"The year is 2011. The place is the United States of America. The people are the American Indians. Their plight... they are dying from lack of heat, food and even water. They are dying from despair. All of this happens quietly, like a closely guarded government secret.

You probably think I'm exaggerating, and that's understandable. After all, our government gives hundreds of millions of dollars each year to other nations to solve their problems... natural disaster, war, famine, epidemic disease... you name the cause, and we finance it. So how is it possible that our own indigenous people are among the poorest in the world? The answer is simple. It is possible because we are ignorant.

This raises a more intriguing question though: Why and how we've been kept in the dark for so long? And the answer to that is nothing more than standard fare for any successful long term mass extermination effort -- indoctrination, historical revision and elimination of the "enemy".

What our children learn about our nation's early history and our relationship with the American Indians is so loosely based on reality, it's actually more of a fairytale. Conveniently, our history books fail to explain the cost paid in human suffering and lives so the rest of us would prosper."

Get the Story:
Jay Tavare: A Modern Day American Indian Story (The Huffington Post 1/28)