Recently, a federal judge ruled that
South Dakota's prison system's decision to ban the use of tobacco in
Native American religious ceremonies infringes on their religious
freedoms. Judge Karen Schreier stated that inmates and officials
should talk and together propose an appropriate injunction that will
restrict tobacco use outside of religious ceremonies but protect its
use within them. Tobacco use is so vital in Lakota religion that the
Native American Council of Tribes states that Native American prayer
is only effective if it is “embodied in tobacco and offered within
a ceremonial” framework. The prison system argued that the
allowance of tobacco for religious use was being exploited and the
tobacco was being traded and used non-religiously, so all tobacco was
banned in October of 2009. As a result, inmates involved in the
Native American Council of Tribes sued, but it is only now being
judged by a federal judge. Both the inmates' attorney and Judge
Schreier have stated that they are confident that a resolution that
is agreeable to all can be reached.
While this issue is specific only to
America, it reflects both overlying trends in how the American prison
(and military) systems tend to strip the rights of inmates, and how
marginalized, often native peoples are treated by dominating colonial
powers around the world. Last week, I wrote about how Libyan
prisoners were mistreated by their American captors, showing that
this trend is widespread and affects international relations as well.
American prisons in Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay are also notorious
for infringing prisoners' religious rights, often refusing Muslim
prisoners the right to pray, taunting them when they do, and
torturing them by forcibly exposing them to things that are forbidden
or disapproved of in Islam. In addition, colonial powers have a
tendency to infringe the rights of the native population. This is
readily apparent ust in the history of how white Americans have
treated Native Americans to this day – stripping them of their
lands and forcing them to live on reservations, exposing them to
disease as a way to take their land, and treating Native American
women remarkably poorly (1 in 3 Native women will be raped in her
lifetime, the highest incidence of this kind of sexual assault among
any ethnicity in the country). Currently, the Sioux tribe are
fighting the government for the rights to their sacred land of
Pe'Sla. This is echoed elsewhere throughout the globe, from how old
British colonies are still exploited for their natural resources
despite being independent, and how recently ancient Aboriginal art in
Australia was defaced with acid. However, the fact that a federal
judge has ruled in favor of the Lakota inmates shows that perhaps
there is more hope now for the decent treatment of both prisoners and
native populations.
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