A Water Message - Democratic Underground

H2O Man

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Sun Mar-06-11 10:57 PM
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A Water Message

Mid-Winter Ceremony

Aga-Gesta (13 Strings of Wampum/ 13 Moons)

The Whole year begins:
Look! There is snow on the ground.
Look! There are our tracks.
We walk a little further …..
Look! The snow is gone.
We walk a little further …..
Look! The Maple Tree grows leaves.
The Plants are planted.
The Water runs from the top of the hills.
It becomes medicine.

Back in 1993, Chief Paul Waterman, of the Onondaga Nation's Turtle Clan, gave me permission to use the lyrics to this song in an article I was being interviewed for. A reporter from a regional newspaper wanted to write about the winter ceremonies of different cultural groups within the United States. She asked me about the Mid-Winter Festival's ceremonies, which remain –despite a couple of anthropologists sincere efforts – among the most secret of the ceremonies of the Haudenosaunee, or Six Nations Iroquois Confederacy.

This morning, on a thread started by Friend Jackpine Radical, I responded with a post about the tiny streams of water that were running on my property, which I noticed as I took my dogs outside. They connect into larger streams, which run through some of my woods, into the creek. From my house, I can hear that creek's waterfalls. I live in an area that the still goes by the Iroquois' “place-name,” which translates to “where the voice of the water sings.” Chief Waterman and I spent many hours, sitting quietly, and listening to the water.

What I wrote on JPR's thread also reminded me of Senator Robert Kennedy's famous quote, from a speech he delivered in South Africa, in which he told his audience of oppressed people that no matter how small their contribution might be, that it added to an energy force that, like water, could bring down the strongest walls of injustice. And so it is today: that message is as vital in the USA today, as in South Africa, in 1966.

There have also been a couple of interesting threads recently, which accurately identified much of the behavior of the obscenely wealthy in this nation to “compulsive hoarding disorder.” I consider that sick behavior to be the one of the most entrenched walls of injustice in our society.

I was thinking about these discussions from the Democratic Underground today, as I took the photographs which I am posting on this thread. Now, sometimes when I am physically ill, as I am today, thoughts that connect in my mind may not make sense to other people who are functioning with a full deck. But bear with me.

The song I quoted is from ancient times. It dates back to when people in the northeast had gone from what is called “hunting and gathering,” to “agrarian” times. This is when there was a great change in the dynamics in society. Instead of men supplying most of the food, it was the women's gardens that allowed for a more sedentary way of life. More, there was generally a surplus of food. This allows for the individual community to have more trade with other communities. Also, it allows for a stratification in society: not every female gardens (especially not full-time), nor does male hunt full-time. (I am, of course, simplifying a topic that I love to discuss in far greater detail.)

In order to avoid the problems with hierarchy that were present in other cultures, including in Meso-America and the Ohio and Mississippi River valleys, the Haudenosaunee had a matriarchal society. This means that family lines were made from the women's side. It did not diminish the father's side of the family. In a moment, we will discuss some of the positive and negative potentials of both matriarchal and patriarchal societies.

One point that is important, though, is that matriarchal cultures tend to be matricentric. This means that while in some matriarchal cultures, women were dominant, in most, the political-social power was held equally between male and female adults. Hence, for example, the Haudenosaunee sachems were men, it was the Clan Mothers who appointed them to the Council, and who could remove them. Also, the Clan Mothers, not the Chiefs, could declare war.

Paraphrasing from Erich Fromm's 1955 classic “The Sane Society,” the positive aspects of matriarchal society are: an affirmation of life; freedom; a deep connection with the natural world; and equality. The negative aspects are: being bound to nature (blood and soil); a lack of individuality; and limitations on developing areas of intellectual pursuits.

Again from Fromm, the positive aspects of patriarchal culture are: reason;discipline; conscience; and individualism. The negatives are: hierarchy; inequality; oppression; and submission. (Many readers will recognize the influence of Bachofen on Fromm's thinking.)

A matricentric culture has, I believe, a much greater potential to harness the best postentials of both the male and female aspects of humanity. Likewise, as history shows, it is possible for the combined negatives to gather a synergistic force and produce horrors such as Nazism and fascism.

Clearly, I am not referring to processes that divide and pit people against one another. There's too much of that in society, and indeed, it is too often reflected in discussions on this forum. We need to move towards equality, without mistaking that for an exactness between all people. And I'm not speaking about just men and women. We are all equal, yet unique. That is the miracle of life. You are a unique miracle; it's just that many of us have been lied to and crushed for so long, that we do not recognize this simple yet profound Truth.

Yet when we have that realization break through the layers of denial, the filth of oppression, and the lies of inequality that have been injected into our conscious and subconscious minds, a power comes forth. We saw that in South Africa; we saw it take hold in Egypt; and we are seeing it in Wisconsin. But it is not limited to those geographic locations. Today, it is a force taking hold across America.

Tuesday night, I will be attending a government meeting about “hydro-fracking,” a process that destroys the environment in order to gather natural gas. Not all the people who are in favor of the process are “bad.” Many are simply desperate for income, and ignorant of the dangers.

Thursday night, I will again travel to Sidney, NY, the town that became famous for the Supervisor and Town Board's effort to desecrate a Muslim cemetery. Also this week, I will be involved in campaigning for a local school board seat; and helping run a couple area political campaigns. In my spare time, I'll be writing and calling government officials at the local, state, and national level; and completing some “letters-to-the-editor” of local and regional newspapers.

These are my tiny, personal contributions. They are but a trickle on a back lawn. But they will run down that lawn, perhaps in some ditch for a bit. But that ditch isn't the end. Those efforts will unite with trickles from other individual efforts, and then will build up to where they flow from that ditch through some woods, to a powerful creek.

And then, that Voice of the Water force will be heard.

Come and join in this effort.

Your friend,
H2O Man

“But let justice flow like a river, and mercy like an unfailing stream.” – Amos 5:24