John Trudell
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John Trudell (born February 15, 1946) is an American author, poet, musician, and former political activist.
Personal background
Trudell was born in Omaha, Nebraska. He is the son of a Santee Sioux father and a Mexican mother. He grew up around the Santee reservation near Omaha. He joined the Navy in 1963 and served in the Vietnam war. After getting out of the military he became involved in Indian activism and became the spokesperson for the Indians of All Tribes occupation of Alcatraz Island. He joined the American Indian Movement and, although not officially voted in, was its national Chairman from 1972 until 1979 after Carter Camp went to jail. In 1979, his mother-in-law, pregnant wife (Tina Manning), and three children were killed in a tragic fire, an event that led him to his "hanging on lines", his spoken word. It is famously believed that his family was murdered by the government[citation needed]. A meeting with Jackson Browne in 1979 introduced him to the musical world. His first album, originally made with brilliant (according to Bob Dylan[citation needed]) Kiowa guitarist Jesse Ed Davis and originally available only on cassette tape, was A.K.A Graffiti Man. In 1992 he remade A.K.A Graffiti Man; more recent endeavors include Blue Indians (1999) and Bone Days.
“Extremes I go to to be right might be the same extremes I go to to be wrong.”
“There are times it would be good to tell, but then what could I possibly say, that you could call an explanation.”
What we all have in common is we’re made up of the metals, minerals and liquids of the Earth. What we all have in common, we are shapes of the Earth. What we all have in common, we are the decedents of tribes. Each and every one of us is the descendent of a tribe. What we all have in common, quoted I the ancestral memory…it’s encoded in the DNA. Civilization tries to suppress and make faint…but they program us to make it faint so we can’t recognize it. But what we all have in common is an ancestral memory…and ancestrol lineage. We are all the descendents of a spiritual reality…
You want to talk about energy, see that is that energy. It’s just a matter of creating a clarity and a coherency with how we use our intelligence that will create the energy that is needed to really deal with the overall situations, because we’ve got to deal with the economics, the politics, we’ve got to go through the mechanisms, but there’s something larger needed here, something much larger needed here because they’ve been having revolutions forever and there’s always a need to have a revolution, and…think evolutionary, not revolutionary. What a revolution means, take the romanticism and the nonsense out of it, what revolution means is revolution means is that you go back to where you started, alright? And if you started out with an oppressor and an oppressed, then that’s what you get back to, and that’s what you get back to, and that’s what you get back to, and that’s what you get back to. Evolution, then we move. Evolution, then we move. Evolution. So we need to think in terms of evolution. But that ancestral memory has become…the spiritual ancestral memory, they put it into the faint, because they don’t want us to understand that. And what happened to you, the descendants of the tribes of Europe, we know what happened to the Indians here, but what happened to the Indians here…was a behavior of what had happened to the tribes of Europe. And what I find interesting, more than about Columbus being what he was, what I find the most interesting about he Columbus thing is that when he got off the boat and he said to us “Who are you?” and we said to him, “We’re the human beings,” and he said, “Oh, Indians,” it wasn’t because he thought he was in India, I mean that might be some kind of thing, but in reality what it was really about, by the time Columbus got here the descendants of the tribes of Europe no longer had a perceptual reality of what it meant to be a human being. They didn’t know what it meant anymore. Because they had been owned, they were property, they were victims, they were victimized, they were tortured, they were the hunted, they were the property, they were the lesser things. They did not know what it meant to be a human being anymore. Whenever the Romans or any of these people started showing up, when religion emerged, when they got together and figured out a nice good ole’ industrial god religion…saying, a man owns the Earth and fuck all of you because a man owns the Earth and can do what he wants to do. Once they put that thing into motion, that’s what they used against the tribes of Europe to erase that spiritual concept of reality. So, this is why…and they had the inquisitions…in the medieval times. Isn’t that an interesting concept? If that was the medieval times, then exactly what part of the evil are we in now? But by 1100 AD, the decedents of the tribes of Europe had been taken off basically their hunting grounds, their roaming grounds, that tribal relationship to the land had been altered because by then church and state as it was evolving had claimed ownership of all of them. Whoever owned the land owned the human beings that were a part of the land. But the problem they had still--about 1000 AD—the problem they had was they had restricted tribal movement, but they still had this perception of being, spirit. See, they still prayed to ancestors, they still prayed to spirits. So they still were perceiving reality from a spiritual perception. So this couldn’t do. So what the church did at that time—it happened to be the Catholic church at that time—but what the church did at that time…was that it declared itself to be god’s authority on Earth, and that it had the right to wage war to possess the souls of the godless heathens, that it was its religious obligation to wage war to possess the souls of the godless heathens. And see, then because…the decedents of the tribes of Europe…see at that time, sexism wasn’t quite as ingrained yet so the women still had their role in the society…so when the church created it’s inquisitions, the woman was one of the main targets…because they had to erase and alter that connection…and they killed as efficiently as they possibly could. And what was interesting about this religious ritual that no one wants to talk about was that you were accused and then you had to be interrogated, tortured, executed, property seized. Alright, and they killed as efficiently as they possibly could for five-hundred years. So by the time Columbus got here and got off the boat, they didn’t have a fuckin’ clue what it meant to be a human being! Reality! Didn’t have a clue! And excuse my language but it’s not my language and you shouldn’t a taught it to me.
So we’ve all been through the common experience…but in all of this, when the decedents of the tribes of Europe got here, then they behaved to us, not because they were…because this was there perception of reality…so this all unfolded in this kind of a way, what we have in common…And when you look at energy…If you look at us as human beings…each one of us is energy…
When we are born into this energy mass as human beings, we are born with living consciousness. Living consciousness, the consciousness of life. And the whole sedation programming thing is to sedate that consciousness, that living consciousness. But the power of our living consciousness is the power we have because of our relationship to reality is we can activate it by freewill. We can activate it when we make the decision that we are going to activate it. And then we all individually figure out how to make it work out…Whatever it is you do in life that you do for a job to make a living, you made a decision at some point in your life to focus your intelligence to learn how to do what it is you needed to do to get the job or do the job or play the sport or acquire the talent. Same process. It’s just making the decision within our intelligence that we are going to be more clear and coherent and head in that direction. Question everything. Believe little, question everything. Get the intelligence stimulated and flowing. The thinking process must be flowing, because you know…part of the problem we have going on right now is the believers. We need thinkers, but everybody’s a believer. You just listen in you’re everyday language…just listen how many times you hear “I believe.” And I would feel a lot more comfortable if I heard “I think.” Because…do not be confused because the sorcerer…the way the thing works…believing isn’t really thinking. Believing is like looping a thought. It’s taking thinking and looping a thought, so you’re not really thinking even though you believe you’re thinking. This is kind’s sick. At least at Disney Land you know when the ride’s done. So we have to be careful because everything they ever did when they wanted to separate the decedents of the tribes to us…when they wanted to separate our spiritual perception of reality, it was all done to make us believe reality the way they wanted us to believe it. So we need to be careful with certain things, and believing…I’d say, let’s go to being thinkers, not believers. And the other thing is, we should always be real to ourselves. Define our own reality. And I mean be real to ourselves about who we are and what we’re up to, and don’t hide behind a bunch of lame self-rationalizations and denials and all this and that. If we’re going to do a thing, be real to our self about what it is that we’re doing. And it’s a way of learning to take responsibility. And if we be real about ourselves, to ourselves about what we’re doing, if it’s stuff we can’t live with, it will evolve out of our reality. If it’s disgusting and you can live with it then live with it. Accept who we are because we have to participate as a whole. See, too many of us have been divided and compartmentalized and we have parts we’re not comfortable with and parts we don’t like, so we want to be in denial and rationalization, but I’m telling you, for the good that it is that we say we seek, the only way we’re going to get there, with it being as solid and focused as it should be, is we have to participate as a whole, not just with the parts. Because whatever change it is, whatever change it is that we want, whether it’s in this political manifestation or in the opening up of other areas of awareness…the result we get will be based upon what we bring to the table. So if we bring chaos and emotionalism then that’s what we’re going to get. It really is time to take the responsibility to think, and I’m going to say, because when we’re dealing with the next generation…what can we pass to them that we know is going to look out for them? Which institution? What is it? What are the institution or authoritarian mechanisms are there here that’s going to look out for them? And I think we know that there are none. So, for us to develop our ability to be coherent, so that we can pass that to them, we can let them learn it from us, to be coherent. I guarantee you, if we don’t pass on and develop the understanding about the value and power of our intelligence to our children, they will eat them the fastest, and this is the reality of it. How many kids grew up to be like their parents when they didn’t want to? So it’s not just a matter of telling a child to use their intelligence clearly and coherently, it’s a matter of using your intelligence as clearly and coherently as possible. And get away from judgment, don’t judge anything. Judge absolutely nothing. It’s not your right or your responsibility to judge. Your right and your responsibility is to recognize reality. Recognize reality. Recognize reality. For every trauma, drama, and situation that ever came up, there are circumstances that surround it and show it for exactly what it is, so you must recognize reality. Don’t judge reality. Because judging again is like the belief thing. Judging…you can’t really recognize because the judging thing is a looping of the thoughts of judgments, and judgment always comes home and hits the hardest. It always does. Recognize reality. Define our own reality.
I appreciate whatever you get out of what was said, but it’s really about thinking.
“Good deeds live in a parallel of regrets.”
“The whole thing has been a struggle to do enough good to balance the good I didn’t do.”
“As to good and bad, I’m trying to come out even. But my multiples have multiples of their own. The skeletons in my closets have their own closets. So sometimes it gets kind of exciting in here.”
Film career
Trudell has worked in a second career as an actor, with roles in Thunderheart (1992), On Deadly Ground (1995) and Smoke Signals (1998). One of his most significant contributions to film was in the production of Incident at Oglala, directed by Michael Apted and produced by Robert Redford. A companion piece to Thunderheart, the 1992 documentary reveals the events at the heart of the movie through an exploration of the facts surrounding the shootout on Pine Ridge Indian Reservation. Trudell played a key role in keeping the movie true to both facts and events of the times.[citation needed]
Trudell the Movie
Filmmaker Heather Rae has spent more than a decade making the documentary, entitled Trudell (2005). Her intent was to utilize Trudell's rich political and cultural life to create a relevant piece that reflected contemporary history and educated and inspired world citizens. This documentary premiered at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival in the U.S. documentary competition.
The movie has received mixed response among film critics and ordinary viewers. Some claim it to be thought-provoking and touching while others accuse Rae's biopic of one-dimensional hagiography[citation needed].
The song at the end of the film is "Johnny Lobo" by Kris Kristofferson from "A Moment of Forever". This song was originally written about John Trudell[citation needed].
Discography
- 1983 Tribal Voice
- 1986 Original A.K.A. Graffiti Man
- 1987 ...But This Isn't El Salvador
- 1987 Heart Jump Bouquet
- 1991 Fables and Other Realities
- 1992 Child's Voice: Children of the Earth
- 1992 A.K.A. Graffiti Man
- 1994 Johnny Damas & Me
- 1999 Blue Indians
- 2001 Descendant Now Ancestor
- 2001 Bone Days (produced by the actress Angelina Jolie)
- 2007 Madness & The Moremes (double album)
External links
