The first ever Unity Concert for the Black Hills Initiative will take place this weekend, Sept. 13-14
Photo courtesy of The Unity Concert for the Black Hills Initiative (http://www.theblackhillsarenotforsale.org/)
This weekend, Sept. 13-14 thousands will gather in the Black Hills of South Dakota for a first time event called the The Unity Concert for The Black Hills Initiative. The gathering will “mark the beginning of a vital unification process” that aims to give back guardianship of the Black Hills to the Great Sioux Nation as per the 1868 Treaty of Fort Laramie. But the event doesn’t just aim to do that. The thousands that are brought together will bring music, art, prayer, ceremony and the open-hearted initiative to push forth in movement of a restorative activism that will grab the attention of National and International leaders to begin making changes that will also help save the planet.
Organizers Bethany Yarrow (Bethany and Rufus) and Jyoti (Center for Sacred Studies) sat down for a phone interview with Examiner.com on Wendesday to introduce some of the key players of the concert this weekend and to inform about the movement that stems from it. Their campaign includes some of the major movers and shakers in the worlds of environmental activism and restorative justice, as well as legendary figures in entertainment who work with ‘earth initiatives’ that inform and speak against issues such as anti-fracking and mining.
Q: Who are some of the key players and organizers of the Unity Concert?
Jyoti:
Bethany Yarrow, myself and Suzanne Hunt, are some the Unity Concert’s lead organizers along with Peter Yarrow[Peter, Paul and Mary] who has picked up the piece about calling in the entertainers. We have an organizing team that came together in the beginning who are representatives of the work that they’ve been doing for ‘earth initiatives’ against fracking and mining. Then of course, we’re standing up and behind Paha Sapa Unity Alliance [with support from Uplift and the Center for Sacred Studies] which is right now leading the way through Loretta Afraid of Bear Cook, Theresa Two Bulls, and Milo Yellow Hair.
Q: How long has the planning for this pivotal and historical event taken?
Bethany:
We met for the first time in November to talk about this. It was actually right before Thanksgiving. And it was a coalition of the Paha Sapa Unity Alliance; Milo, Loretta and Theresa and a group of us who wanted to support them.Wes Gillingham from Catskill Mountainkeeper, David Braun from Americans Against Fracking and a lot of people in the environmental movement as well.
We put this idea [for the Unity Concert] in front of everyone and said let’s really do this and let’s see how we can really stand behind our Native brothers and sisters as they stand up for the earth. But it wasn’t really until February because of all the holidays that we were able to really start the organizing in earnest.
Q: So it seems that this event has been put together very quickly. Why now?
Bethany:
This has been put together very quickly but as we all know, really, there’s not a lot of time left. Obama is only in office for a short time more. The clock is ticking. The point is really to get this to Obama because he’s the first president in the history of the United States who has said he is willing to meet with leaders about the Black Hills Issue if we are united and have a unified plan.
We also know that the clock is ticking on this earth. We don’t have a lot of time to stand up and really save the planet. This is really being seen right now as the grounding prayer. In the heart of America and the heart of everything that is -- for the whole next wave of the climate movement, in the climate march in New York City and beyond.
Q: The advent of the Unity Concert really feels like a heartening thing. There are so many crazy things in the news; the unequivocal evidence pointing towards climate change, for example, that people just seem to be ignoring. Is this a motion to get people to pay attention and stop shutting themselves off?
Jyoti:
That’s part of what this is about for me. People are sleeping and we’re trying to do everything we can to shake them awake. I’m saying, Wake up! My grandchildren need you to wake up! The Earth needs you to wake up! Your heart needs you to wake up! We believe that Mother Nature herself is part of what’s pushing the motion forward [for Unity].
When we open this doorway over the weekend, we really believe that the Great Sioux Nation is leading the way for the sacred sites to go back into the hands of all First Nation people, globally. So that those original people that carry the ceremonies, that keep those sites fed and active can meet on their sites again, doing what they did in the original days so that natural order can return once again to this planet because the Earth needs it to be that way so she can prepare for how we walk these next steps.
Q: How can those who align with the Unity Concert messages participate even if they are not able to physically be at the event?
Jyoti:
Q: What has been the response to the announcements. Obviously it has been huge. Thousands are reported to attend.
Jyoti:
What’s been so remarkable is the response that we’re getting globally through organizations, through individuals, through different Nations, and through high officials in some of those nations. We have people coming to the concert [who] are sending messages that give weight in this concert from the Aborigine in Australia, from Nigeria, from Colombia, across many different tribes, across the United States, and in to Canada -- all [of these people are] participating with us in some way. And all of that came together in this very short amount of time.
Q: What are plans forward after the event has reached its end?
Jyoti:
For us, we want to stay behind this prayer, for our First Nation people and for the Earth. [This is also] part of what my sister Loretta Afraid of Bear Cook, who is working really hard with a woman named Rachael Night with Namati [are also doing]. Namati is an organization out of San Francisco; They are a group of attorneys that go into other countries and have a really good track record of helping First Nation people to get their territory and their sacred lands back.
We’ve been working with them for a couple of years now and they are the ones who have started to design some of the steps that might help, [and] give some suggestions to the elders that will meet [for a ] four day meeting after this event that will go right in to the elders that have been invited here. [Those elders] will then go into a meeting with Namati and with the Paha Sapa Unity Alliance to start crafting what are the next steps to get a draft for the management plan done so it can get in the hands of President Obama in a timely way -- so he can sign off on it -- and then make this his legacy. I’m hoping his heart will open and he’ll see what this will mean.
Q: Can you explain some of the core happenings of the event?
Jyoti:
They’re going to be putting in motion some ceremonies to really forgive and heal some of this horrible history that we’ve all shared; Peter Yarrow and many of the artists are coming so they can make a statement and say ‘please forgive us for the unconscious acts that have gone on.’ The holy elders are coming to do ceremony so they can wipe some of the pain away that has been held for generations; atrocities that should have never happened, treaties that were broken, words that were broken.
Q: What needs to be done? Will this gathering of people make it happen?
Jyoti:
As we write in some of the articles that Bethany and her brother have kind of put together: We don’t believe the heart of this Nation can come back to itself until it rights these wrongs, until it honors the treaties, until things are put back in right order. [When that happens], the heart of this Nation can come back to itself which we pray will make it more conscionable so that consciousness can arise here. We [all of us] take a big part in a lot of the things that are happening on the planet that are not okay. So, this is what we want to say to everybody: It’s time to unite. It’s time to step up all Nations together for the Earth and for the generations that are coming.
Q: Closing statements?
Jyoti:
Join us through the live feed. Everybody can be a part of it. If people can’t be here on the grounds with us at Elk Creek, then they can be with us in their homes and in their hearts. They can also join us [by helping our crowdfunding campaign]. Many of us have put our own funds up to ensure this would keep going on because of the timeliness of it. If people go on the website, there are ways they can support and follow this event.
Q: Are there plans for future events after the Unity Concert?
Jyoti:
Many are telling us that this may become an annual experience. We don’t know. People are already calling this a movement.
We’re just here taking it in to our hands to see what we can do in the best possible way to put things back into right order, to open up our hearts and our consciousness, again. We have to quit sleeping. Because my grandchildren are being handed a nightmare. I want us to wake up and when we do, we’ll realize where we are and we can turn around and hand them a living dream.
*originally published on the now defunct Examiner.com
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