Asatru Folk Assembly - Stephen McNallen the Importance of the Kennewick Man (2)

00:00:00.000 The End

00:00:30.000 but of course these apologists never tell us the rest of Indian lore

00:00:39.600 they don't tell us about the lore all the way from the Umatilla up along around where Kennewick

00:00:51.660 man was found down through Nevada down across into the plains amongst the various Sioux tribes

00:00:59.160 down into Florida

00:01:00.980 they don't tell you the other part

00:01:03.780 of Indian oral tradition

00:01:05.840 which is

00:01:08.520 in its different variations

00:01:11.380 there was an ancient people

00:01:13.860 here before us

00:01:14.980 they were tall

00:01:17.640 and they had light skin

00:01:18.960 and they had red hair

00:01:20.580 or they had blonde hair 1.00

00:01:21.800 and we killed them 0.99

00:01:23.720 they don't tell you that part 0.56

00:01:26.920 It seems to me, if we're going to pay attention to one part of Indian oral tradition, we really

00:01:33.740 ought to pay attention to the other part as well, but of course that's rather unpopular

00:01:38.240 and you will not find that in the Sunday supplements to your newspapers.

00:01:43.660 In addition to artifacts and morphology and Indian lore, we have as well genetics.

00:01:52.600 There's a particular genetic marker which scientists call haploid X.

00:01:58.360 It has nothing to do with American history X, nothing to do with Malcolm X.

00:02:02.940 This is haploid X, okay?

00:02:04.940 Now haploid X is a particular genetic marker which is found in some of the very ancient

00:02:11.700 American remains, some of Kennewick Mann's contemporaries.

00:02:17.720 It is very rarely found in modern American Indian populations.

00:02:24.840 It is found in living European populations.

00:02:31.400 As of the latest writing, it has never been found in East Asia.

00:02:38.500 Even the rather state and conservative scientific digest that I dug all of this out of admits

00:02:44.120 This really looks like evidence of genetic contact,

00:02:48.120 genetic connection between ancient America and Europe.

00:02:55.120 So, if anyone suggests to you that the idea of ancient Caucasoids

00:02:59.120 is, you know, pseudo-scientific, or that there's nothing to back it up, 0.95

00:03:03.120 or that it's just a figment of some evil racist who wants to bash on Indians, 0.83

00:03:07.120 that's manifestly not the case. 0.73

00:03:09.120 There is a considerable body of evidence

00:03:12.120 and a presumably growing body of evidence that there is an ancient connection between Europe and America.

00:03:18.360 And this can be backed up with any of a number of different reasoned, scientific, dispassionate arguments.

00:03:26.400 Now, the kind of world I want to see is a world where the Indians are free to be Indians,

00:03:31.920 where I am free to be a person of European descent and to take pride in that and to honor that and to honor my ancestors.

00:03:38.100 course. And I fully intend to respect their rights, but I certainly expect the same in

00:03:43.600 return. The government, of course, doesn't really see it that way. The Indians, although

00:03:53.420 frankly I think it would be to their advantage to see it that way because they could win

00:03:56.960 allies, don't see it that way because they're very defensive. I think it's really important

00:04:03.300 to to stress the spiritual aspect of this and goodness knows you know I've I've certainly gone

00:04:10.260 through my own spiritual evolution I started my life as a Catholic my father always wanted me to

00:04:16.380 be a priest he probably would have preferred if it was within an established religion rather than

00:04:21.080 than I rather alternative one as which is where I've eventually ended up and I would just like

00:04:26.860 to drop a word or two about that so that you can sort of understand my perspective

00:04:30.340 I follow a religion

00:04:34.420 called Alsatru, which

00:04:36.080 is a native religion

00:04:38.500 of ancient Europe

00:04:40.040 as I said before, we're all natives

00:04:42.520 of somewhere, we're all indigenous

00:04:44.660 to somewhere

00:04:45.480 this is

00:04:49.000 one of the religions that

00:04:50.600 our ancestors, your ancestors

00:04:53.240 and my ancestors followed

00:04:54.840 for many thousands of years

00:04:56.520 until eventually they became converted

00:04:58.820 to Christianity

00:04:59.620 it's my feeling

00:05:03.020 that by honoring this ancient way

00:05:06.180 by connecting with my ancestors

00:05:08.440 that I can deal with something that is natural to me

00:05:13.160 and inherent to me

00:05:14.460 something which is really a part of me

00:05:16.580 because to me

00:05:17.880 there's no separation between

00:05:20.780 biology and spirituality

00:05:24.240 I am connected to my ancestors

00:05:27.040 in a way that truly matters

00:05:28.780 It's not about culture. It's not a contract between myself and the holy powers. It's something that is innate. My ancestors are a part of my very blood, my bone, my brain, my soul, my spirit. I am their latest representative in this time and place.

00:05:50.980 as such I have a duty

00:05:54.840 to all of those who have gone before me

00:05:57.280 have you ever thought that

00:06:02.320 if even one of your ancestors

00:06:05.420 if even one of your ancestors

00:06:08.880 had dropped the ball genetically

00:06:12.100 if they had died before reproducing

00:06:14.700 that chain would have been broken

00:06:17.040 and you wouldn't be here

00:06:19.340 our debt to those who have gone before us

00:06:24.680 and I think this really transcends

00:06:26.480 whether one is also true or whether one is

00:06:28.700 Christian or whether one is atheist or agnostic

00:06:30.960 our tie to those

00:06:32.940 ancestors

00:06:33.600 is something that must be honored

00:06:36.240 as must

00:06:38.800 our tie to those yet to

00:06:40.840 come and our responsibility

00:06:43.000 that we have

00:06:44.800 to them

00:06:45.820 which is comparable to that

00:06:48.740 which our ancestors had for us. 0.93

00:06:51.520 Now, within Al-Satru,

00:06:52.980 we also feel that individuals are often reborn,

00:06:57.860 that they are, in effect, reincarnated.

00:07:00.380 However, what we do not believe

00:07:02.020 is that you're going to wake up in your next lifetime

00:07:04.840 as a Tibetan or something of the sort.

00:07:07.940 And that's not a slam on the Tibetans.

00:07:09.640 You know, I've worked with Tibetans,

00:07:11.080 and I like the Tibetans,

00:07:12.160 but they're not my brothers and sisters. 1.00

00:07:13.860 They're not my folk.

00:07:15.020 I respect them.

00:07:16.080 I admire them.

00:07:17.020 I hope they get their country back.

00:07:18.740 but they're going to have to quit being so darn compassionate if they're going to do it

00:07:26.680 we feel that one is reborn essentially into one's line and so that in a sense we are our own

00:07:35.960 ancestors we're here again carrying out our struggles because we do believe that life is 0.91

00:07:42.320 a struggle here in this plane and sometimes that struggle is with Indians

00:07:48.440 sometimes it's with anti-Nazis so-called who are remarkably fascistic in their

00:07:55.340 methods and sometimes in fact most frequently the struggle is with

00:08:00.560 ourselves so that's sort of my perspective it's my motivation on this

00:08:08.120 Well, one might very well say, Steve, you know, this is all very interesting from the archaeological standpoint, and, you know, anthropology is all very cool, but, you know, what's this really all about?

00:08:20.540 You know, what, who cares?

00:08:22.440 What's the impact of this?

00:08:25.100 What is Kennewick Mann trying to say?

00:08:30.920 Our view all along has run something like this.

00:08:35.300 First of all, if it turns out through testing that Kennewick man is actually more related to the Umatilla and the related tribes than he is to us, we will gladly relinquish all claim.

00:08:48.240 Now, in my gut, I feel very strongly that is not the case.

00:08:52.040 But I also know that if no one does any testing, we're never going to know.

00:08:57.220 There's sort of a catch-22 involved in this in a way, you know.

00:09:00.140 The Indians say, well, he's our ancestor, and we claim him, and no, you can't do any tests.

00:09:07.700 Well, of course, our perspective is, if he's our ancestor, he should be with us.

00:09:14.360 But we have to test in order to find out if that's the case. 1.00

00:09:18.380 Now, the law, which sort of regulates these affairs, is a monstrosity called NAGPRA.

00:09:24.180 It was passed in about 1990.

00:09:26.220 It's something like the Native American graves protection and repatriation, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, ad nauseum ad infinitum.

00:09:36.800 NAGPRA was written on the assumption that any remains found in America prior to the, quote, European explorers, and by that I think they probably mean Columbus, is by definition Native American. 0.80

00:09:54.540 And by that, they completely disregard culture.

00:09:59.480 They don't care what his culture was.

00:10:01.320 They don't care what his biology, what his ancestry,

00:10:04.660 what his actual physical connections as a human being were.

00:10:08.060 In theory, he could have been a Norwegian who showed up here before Columbus,

00:10:14.520 and by golly, he's a Native American. 1.00

00:10:16.900 Here, take him away and bury him, guys. 0.99

00:10:19.220 And my argument is that that is bad science. 0.50

00:10:23.040 It's bad science because it doesn't realize, it doesn't recognize the possible existence of other peoples here before the Indians.

00:10:33.200 Which, there is, as I say, obviously a growing body of evidence that that may be the case.

00:10:39.520 So we feel that NAGPRA is, on the face of it, discriminatory and racist legislation.

00:10:47.100 It is racist, after all, racism does run two directions.

00:10:50.780 it is racist because it is

00:10:53.400 by its very nature prejudicial

00:10:55.740 against people of European descent 0.99

00:10:57.420 I have no problem 0.59

00:11:00.060 with Indians 1.00

00:11:01.740 having access to their dead 1.00

00:11:03.680 I respect that right

00:11:05.720 but I insist

00:11:07.780 that the same right be given

00:11:09.880 to those of us who are of

00:11:11.680 European ancestry, of European

00:11:13.800 descent

00:11:14.380 now I think that Kennewick man

00:11:19.360 has things to tell us

00:11:23.500 and I've already indicated to you

00:11:25.900 that my approach is basically spiritual

00:11:27.500 and not political

00:11:28.300 and I just am not a materialist

00:11:31.560 you know

00:11:31.880 with all due respect to those of you

00:11:34.540 who think that the universe is made up

00:11:36.180 of mindless atoms and endless combinations

00:11:38.780 my own feeling is that

00:11:40.480 there is more to it than that

00:11:41.680 I personally in my very guts

00:11:43.440 I cannot buy materialism

00:11:45.360 and I think, I don't think, I feel

00:11:48.480 that Kennewick Mann has a story to tell.

00:11:54.540 His appearance here is not a random accident of erosion

00:11:59.260 and of college guys trying to sneak in

00:12:02.700 to see the hydroplane races.

00:12:06.640 I note that in the same time frame

00:12:10.820 that Kennewick Mann emerged,

00:12:14.180 we have Cheddar Mann. 0.98

00:12:15.920 Cheddar Man from Wales

00:12:19.100 Cheddar Man found in a cave in Wales

00:12:22.800 actually found some while back

00:12:24.340 but only DNA tested

00:12:26.860 within the last couple of years

00:12:29.060 since all of this is broken

00:12:30.560 As it turned out

00:12:34.100 Cheddar Man through DNA testing

00:12:36.480 has a direct descendant

00:12:39.360 a school teacher

00:12:41.520 in a village found

00:12:44.140 a quarter of a mile away

00:12:46.220 from the cave.

00:12:50.600 Now this is, to me,

00:12:52.100 a powerful message about ancestry.

00:12:54.840 It's a powerful message

00:12:56.400 about kinship.

00:12:58.600 It's a powerful message

00:12:59.880 about blood transcending

00:13:02.460 time.

00:13:05.120 And to me, it is

00:13:06.220 a, shall we say, a highly synchronistic

00:13:08.140 event that this should emerge

00:13:10.140 juxtaposed in time

00:13:12.500 to the Kennewick Manifair.

00:13:14.780 Also, we have in the same general time frame,

00:13:19.000 at least the public revelations

00:13:22.020 concerning the Tarim Basin mummies

00:13:24.160 found in what the Chinese insist is Xinjiang province

00:13:28.900 in which the people who live there will tell you is East Turkestan.

00:13:32.620 Back to that question of self-determination again. 1.00

00:13:36.700 These are mummies 0.97

00:13:38.980 found in the numbers of hundreds

00:13:42.480 that are not merely somewhat caucasoid.

00:13:47.080 They are not politely caucasoid. 0.70

00:13:49.440 They are blatantly, boldly, shamelessly Caucasians. 0.91

00:13:55.480 In fact, these are just plain white guys. 0.96

00:13:59.880 Now, the Chinese are not very fond of talking about this,

00:14:06.520 but the term basin mummy,

00:14:07.720 just to fill you in quickly for any of you I imagine 99% of you follow this but if you haven't 0.78

00:14:13.560 what for one thing they're blonde usually a good giveaway I think this was pre-peroxide

00:14:19.000 pre-Hollywood for that matter B they they have all the skeletal characteristics that we have

00:14:26.120 C their weaving techniques are have been described in the professional literature as the

00:14:33.800 farthest advanced to the east of typical european weaving styles these are our people these are

00:14:40.440 definitely us these are indo-europeans wandering out of that ancient heartland wherever it may have

00:14:46.520 been now they don't go back as far as kennewick man but they go halfway or more back and to me 0.70

00:14:54.200 that's another message it's a message that our people well to be honest probably all people

00:15:00.280 people are mobile. Human beings are not planted with their feet stuck in the concrete. They

00:15:07.280 move around. And it's true that ancient man didn't have jet planes, but he just took a

00:15:15.280 little longer. People got around in the old times. So that's a message to me that our

00:15:20.280 particular people, our particular branch of the human race was doing a lot of moving around

00:15:25.280 and in fact over into Asia, which is one of the possible entry points

00:15:29.360 of these ancient Caucasoids onto the North American continent.

00:15:36.700 There is, in fact, a couple of possible options of how this individual got here.

00:15:43.920 One possibility, which scientists were originally talking about quite a lot,

00:15:49.560 is essentially that if one visualizes here a map of the Eurasian continent,

00:15:54.480 and we realize that once one gets essentially onto the east german plains one has a free run

00:16:03.740 almost with a few speed bumps in the way a few mountains one thing or another but essentially

00:16:08.280 one has got a clear run all the way across to sort of the the position adjacent to the the

00:16:14.780 bearing land bridge it's been hypothesized and not by people whose primary occupation was you

00:16:21.440 know handing out political tracts that really it's entirely possible that a

00:16:28.340 Europa type population could have occupied this entire band across the

00:16:33.200 northern part of Eurasia in fact there there's evidence indicating that the

00:16:39.380 Manchurians may have been connected with with this population and so forth and so

00:16:43.840 forth you know one could theorize on this endlessly so it's quite possible

00:16:47.180 that our people came in that direction another possibility and one which seems

00:16:53.060 to perhaps be backed up by the similarity between salutary and Clovis is that

00:17:00.060 these individuals came across what some scientists are now calling the Atlantic

00:17:05.160 crescent and that of course is in the British Isles Iceland Greenland on over

00:17:11.660 to North America and that during the ice age that for one thing the sea level

00:17:16.280 would have been lower, more of this would have been solid land, and what was a solid

00:17:20.760 land could well have been solid ice.

00:17:23.040 And so that a highly adapted culture, or a maritime culture, which these people could

00:17:27.960 well have been, could have made the trek that direction.

00:17:31.780 Or perhaps they came both ways.

00:17:35.240 We don't really know a lot about what happened in ancient prehistory.

00:17:39.420 But there are in fact different ways that Kennewick man and his kinsmen could have gotten here.

00:17:45.900 Now I think that Kennewick Mann needs to tell this story and I think that he has two ways

00:17:52.700 of doing that and one way that Kennewick Mann tells us his story is through science.

00:18:00.620 That's why our organization has maintained from the very beginning that in fact science

00:18:08.220 should have a chance to study it.

00:18:09.820 We don't see that as disrespectful.

00:18:11.960 We don't see that as sacrilegious.

00:18:15.220 We see that as a cultural expression that traditionally we have excelled at and which

00:18:20.400 we think is one way about which this man can tell his saga.

00:18:24.720 And then there are other ways, more intuitive ways, ways of the spirit, ways of the heart.

00:18:30.240 And I think that this too is something that we shall have to look at and just see how

00:18:33.360 we feel about as time goes by.

00:18:35.960 It's difficult sometimes to make that connection, that ancestral link back to tune in to these

00:18:41.100 realities but i think that this is something that that one or many could profitably do

00:18:48.220 i think that kennewick man's is a reminder to us

00:18:57.100 that we were here before

00:19:01.020 and the evidence such as it is indicates that kennewick man and his people were forcibly

00:19:09.100 displaced. The projectile point found in his pelvis was of a type that we know is associated

00:19:16.460 with the people we think of as American Indians. And Kennewick Mann's representatives

00:19:23.340 were not to be seen here again until the coming of the Europeans much later in time.

00:19:28.540 it appears that Kennewick man's people were genocided exterminated in fact the

00:19:41.500 Paiutes of my neighboring state of Nevada have a legend about how they

00:19:47.560 destroyed how they killed the last of the red-haired giants by herding them

00:19:52.060 into a cave and suffocating them and killing any who ran out and just

00:19:56.380 smothering the ones who stayed in this is part of their oral tradition which science is not looking

00:20:01.260 at very closely i have been to that cave and strange things have happened there but that's

00:20:09.020 that's a story perhaps for another day i've been to that cave and to me it is a shrine

00:20:15.420 and as a constant reminder that as the animal rights people are fond of telling us and truthfully

00:20:20.700 Extinction is forever.

00:20:26.960 I think that Kennewick man has come back to remind us that our position on this continent is vulnerable.

00:20:37.800 That unless we sink our roots deep into this soil, we will be displaced.

00:20:44.860 What happened to his people can happen to our people.

00:20:49.720 And I'm telling you now that I, for one, am not in a mood to permit it.

00:21:07.620 Misplaced guilt is too heavy a rucksack to carry about.

00:21:14.240 I know in my heart that I have never knowingly mistreated anyone because of their race, their

00:21:22.580 religion, their background, or their culture.

00:21:26.240 They can stand outside and they can talk about racists.

00:21:29.920 I know in my heart what I am.

00:21:32.900 And I know that I don't meet their criteria, well, maybe I meet their criterion, but gods

00:21:37.200 know what that is. 0.98

00:21:38.420 A white guy, he must be a racist. 0.90

00:21:42.540 But I know that once one turns their back on that word, once one ceases to be intimidated, 0.96

00:21:51.700 they lose their power.

00:21:54.680 And at that point we simply go about our business of being honorable but insistent people who

00:22:02.520 demand the same things for our people that all other groups demand and get.

00:22:07.980 And that is a right to existence, a right to self-determination, a right to recognition

00:22:14.200 as a people with a place in the sun.

00:22:17.620 And that, my friends, is not negotiable, it's not something to discuss, it's not something

00:22:22.620 to be pondered over, it is not something to be apologized for, it is something that we

00:22:27.300 simply must take.

00:22:37.980 I started these remarks by indicating that none of us really know, you know, what our lives will be when it's all summed up.

00:22:53.960 We all do our best, and, you know, only time will tell what our impact on this world will have been.

00:23:01.200 but I know this

00:23:05.160 I know that Kennewick Mann

00:23:06.820 is an individual who made a difference

00:23:10.240 probably he was not aware

00:23:14.620 of the immense struggle

00:23:16.960 the immense scenario in which he was playing a part

00:23:20.880 then again maybe he was wiser than we think

00:23:25.360 but I do know

00:23:30.600 that he has made a difference,

00:23:33.520 particularly if we let him make a difference,

00:23:37.460 if we don't let him down.

00:23:44.040 This scenario is one that has been played out

00:23:47.000 for thousands of years.

00:23:50.480 In it, one side or the other

00:23:53.160 strives for ascendancy.

00:23:57.640 It is not my point here

00:23:59.660 to say that one group is bad

00:24:01.600 and one group is good

00:24:02.800 because you know

00:24:03.720 one thing about those 50 years

00:24:05.440 that Paul and I have accumulated

00:24:06.520 is you realize that life

00:24:07.640 is just not very simple

00:24:08.800 but the basics are still there

00:24:12.300 we have a responsibility

00:24:14.620 to Kennewick man

00:24:16.520 we have a responsibility

00:24:19.420 to each and every one

00:24:23.060 of those ancestors of ours

00:24:25.820 that long line stretching

00:24:29.120 in back of us unseen and we have an obligation a duty to each and every one of our descendants

00:24:41.300 who will be here behind us and who will have to live in the kind of world we leave them

00:24:47.580 I say that we must leave them a world in which our people have a place of honor

00:24:55.060 where we are recognized as in fact an indigenous people

00:25:00.740 a world where it is understood

00:25:04.400 that our ancient roots on this continent

00:25:08.160 give us position as good as or better than any

00:25:13.300 one that is not a settler mentality

00:25:16.780 that we are not newcomers

00:25:19.140 that we are not interlopers

00:25:21.020 that we are not evil conquering Europeans

00:25:24.160 but that in fact we have ancient, ancient roots here

00:25:28.500 that give us a right to say

00:25:31.540 we too are native peoples

00:25:33.840 we too are first peoples

00:25:36.040 we too are indigenous to this soil

00:25:39.800 we have our roots here

00:25:42.240 we will not surrender

00:25:43.980 we will not be swept from this place

00:25:46.600 but we will instead sink those roots

00:25:48.940 deepen those roots

00:25:50.340 not be transient

00:25:51.920 but instead truly inhabit this place.

00:26:05.280 Well, we know that Kennewick man

00:26:10.560 is an individual,

00:26:13.820 one human being,

00:26:15.840 one human being

00:26:17.540 battered in body,

00:26:20.300 wounded in body,

00:26:21.920 who died ultimately because of the depredations of his foe.

00:26:26.600 But we know that he made a difference

00:26:29.600 despite the 9,300 years between his time and ours.

00:26:36.320 It then devolves upon us.

00:26:40.700 What will we do?

00:26:43.880 What will be our response to the challenges that face us?

00:26:49.320 Will we walk away from this meeting tonight?

00:26:51.920 and say well that's all very nice but hey my grandkids can work it out

00:26:57.040 i'm hoping that you won't do that i'm trusting that you won't do that

00:27:01.680 and i urge you each and every one of you in the way that works for you

00:27:05.920 the way that speaks to your soul the way that speaks to your spirit

00:27:10.720 i urge you to support

00:27:14.080 those who are striving to protect our people to protect our heritage

00:27:19.760 those who are trying to ensure that there is a place not just for you and me not just for our

00:27:26.320 children not just for our grandchildren but for those to come so that our descendants will be

00:27:32.720 mining the asteroids and colonizing the galaxy we must take our place we must take it proudly

00:27:39.520 and to do that it means that every single one of us must apply our wit our will our hearts and our

00:27:47.920 soul to this purpose. Thank you.

Asatru Folk Assembly - March 02, 2021

Stephen McNallen the Importance of the Kennewick Man (2)

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