Stein perspective: The Lytton and Mt. Currie Indian peoples
As we live through our daily lives as Indians, eventually we become accustomed to the fact that n on-native people can see right through us. We don't mean that these people understand us fully or somehow sense the innermost workings of the Indian heart, because it seems to us that most non-native people don't take the time to come to this kind of knowledge. We mean simply that the majority of the non-natives view us as invisible peoples who really should not exist outside museums.
As native people we daily become more and more injured to the fact that non-natives can walk, talk, and see right through us. We think they act this way because they feel we are in the way.
Nowhere can our invisibility be better demonstrated than at the Stein. Although our cultures have been sustained by this valley physically and spiritually from the earliest memories of our people and our responsibility there is a birthright, our voices in the valley are not even faintly heard by non-native corporations and their governments.
If we are seen at all, we are perceived as obstructions in the path of progress, and governments look right through us, corporations step over us.
The familiar pattern of neglect which we, as Indians, experience daily was momentarily broken in 1986 when the provincial Wilderness Advisory Committee studied the Stein wilderness watershed. In all the years of contentious discussion regarding the future of our sacred valley, no one had ever before bothered to ask our opinion. The Wilderness Advisory Committee had no native representation and seemed off-balance in favor of industrial development, yet when the blinders were off, even this committee could not fail to note the continuing contribution the Stein Valley makes to the cultural and spiritual integrity of our peoples.
Your hand needed to complete the circle
The group of friends who care about the Stein River Valley wilderness and its preservation has been expanding rapidly. Each of the Voices for the Wilderness festivals held in the Stein introduced new people to the beauty and splendour of this sacred place.
According to ancient native Indian legend, if everyone who cares about something hold hands in a complete circle around it, that "something" is miraculously consecrated and protected. It takes about 60,000 people to encircle the entire Stein watershed. Everyone who does something concrete to save the Stein watershed becomes part of and joins the group of encircling hands. Have you written to the provincial government expressing your thoughts and feelings about the Stein? If not, it is your turn today. Address: Premier (or your MLA), Legislative Building, Victoria, British Columbia, V8V 1X4.
The Wilderness Advisory Committee recognized that any road up the Stein Canyon would bulldoze spiritual values our people hold sacred, and that our dignity as a people would be trampled underfoot in the rush to log the Stein. After long deliberation the committee recommended the Stein be managed as a wilderness unless the provincial government could obtain a formal agreement with the Lytton Indian Band permitting road building up the Stein Canyon.
The rare glimmer of decency and recognition extended to our people by the Wilderness Advisory Committee is an event not easily forgotten, and for this alone we appreciate the committee's work. Predictably, however, the slip-up in procedure which allowed a provincial committee to even take note of a native people in British Columbia swiftly faded, and the blinders went back on. Given our one moment of recognition and justice, we became again the invisible people.
The Sept. 30 announcement that road building into the Stein would commence as soon as possible ignored the Wilderness Advisory Committee recommendation for a formal agreement with the Lytton Indian Band prior to such a venture. Mr. Vander Zalm's claim that the band had broken off talks is utterly without foundation: there were no such talks.
Forest Minister Parker's insinuation that the Lytton Band had been foot dragging regarding a Stein meeting is a complete fabrication. The provincial government has not once contacted the invisible Indians at Lytton to discuss the future of the Stein. Although the Wilderness Advisory Committee pointed the way toward negotiation, the provincial government seems bent on confrontation.
No matter that we lack visibility for some, our cultures remain vibrant and alive, and need to live. We have stood by long enough and watched helplessly as our traditional lands are stripped bare of their forests and minerals; our soils, air, and waters contaminated.
We will stand by no longer. We draw the line at the Stein watershed, as the Oct. 5 declaration of our two bands makes plain. We will work outward from the wilderness Stein to heal what we can of the remainder of our mother's body, this planet earth. We invite all to join us: there is no work more important.
