Banner Daze and One Earth Flags

essay

“Landing on the soil of the Bahamas [San Salvador] on October 12, 1492, Christopher Columbus planted the royal banners of the king and queen (Ferdinand and Isabel) and called upon members of his expedition to witness his solemn declarations instituting Spanish authority over the New World.”
(from Ceremonies of Possession In Europe’s Conquest Of The New World, 1492 – 1640 by Patricia Seed, Cambridge University Press, 1995)

That ‘act’ was a ceremony of domination, according to Steven Newcomb (author of Pagans in the Promised Land: Decoding the Doctrine of Christian Discovery), from whom I learned of Seed’s book. And so a beginning of the mindset being celebrated on the so-called banner day.

The planting of the banner/flag was an ‘act’ that superimposed on the land the concepts of a foreign people. It also directed peoples’ attention – and thus their consciousness – upward, to look at the banner/flag, serving as a kind of shell game of distraction from the humus of Mother Earth.

Another illusion is the word “independence.” How can you not depend on others? You can’t—unless you make your own clothes, coffee, cell-phone, etc., but even if you did, you’d still be dependent on the cotton plant, the coffee, the cobalt, etc. So what is it that’s being celebrated on Independence Day? I venture to answer: The illusion of being free.

Ok ok i get it, many people are celebrating the inception of the country, as perhaps Julian Assange is currently celebrating his “independence” from the Empire’s torture chamber that he was subjected to for the crime of journalism. One difference is that the inception of the country was at the expense of the Original Peoples already living with the land. Read the not so fine print of the document being celebrated, “The Declaration of Independence”:

“He [King of Great-Britain] has excited domestic Insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the Inhabitants of our Frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known Rule of Warfare, is an undistinguished Destruction, of all Ages, Sexes and Conditions.”

Not much could be farther from the truth, as some of the things I’ve learned that are significant aspects of Native culture: deep respect for elders and children (“all Ages”), as well as respect for sexual preferences (“Sexes”), and the more obvious, caring for the natural world (not “Destruction”) that was unjustly claimed (“our Frontiers”) by the flag-waving colonial settlers. While “merciless” is absurd, I don’t know if the writers of the document knew the etymology: “savage: “mid-13c. "wild, undomesticated, untamed," also "wild, uncultivated" (of land or places), from Old French sauvage, salvage "wild, savage, untamed, strange, pagan," from Late Latin salvaticus, alteration of silvaticus "wild, woodland," literally "of the woods," from silva "forest, grove".”

the birth of the selfie
“An Old English word for it [“independence”] was selfdom, with self + dom, but in form this is closer to privilege (n.)."

“Dom” is a root of domination, thus “selfdom” reads like fixation on one’s self, or egomania, or self-domination (shooting one's self in the foot?) — though in action, the privileged selfdom has displayed itself as dominating others and destroying the natural world. Today’s privileged selfdom thinks that driving a Tesla and using lithium battery-powered gadgets is saving the environment.

So as a personal favor, i ask that if you’re waving a – probably “made in China” – American flag, kindly “don’t wave that thing at me”, as Bruce Cockburn sings in “Mighty Trucks Of Midnight”:

“Wave a flag, wave the bible, wave your sex or your business degree /
Whatever you want -- but don't wave that thing at me.”

“Imagine there’s no countries...” – John Lennon
Imagine the image of Earth stitched onto a corner of every country’s flag. Not quite what John Lennon sang about, but it would be a start. One Earth flags would help us to remember our relationship with the world as a whole. And anything nasty done by a country – wherever they might raise their flag as a symbol of having unjustly claimed, dominated or enslaved another people, or polluted a river or terrain – would at least be under the “eye” of the Earth, or better yet if said “eye” would be a deterrent.

To prove that we as a species geographically identify with the bigger picture, ask anyone “Where are you from?”. . . and I bet they will answer by naming a town, city, or country; you’d be hard-pressed to find someone who answers “2 Crabgrass Lane.” On the other hand, Indigenous Peoples would probably identify a specific aspect of the natural world — the sacred mountains, the emerald forest, the stars . . . while gypsies and nomads might answer, “Everywhere!”

This 4th (as with every day) I celebrate and pray to and seek guidance from the elemental-beings, for those “beings” know no borders or countries, no battle lines in the sand, no fixation on the prize of self-aggrandizement, and no domination.

One helpful reminder is represented by Tibetan prayer flags:
Blue (Sky & Space), White (Air & Wind), Red (Fire), Green (Water), Yellow (Earth). [Earth ‘colors’ can vary with locale.]

And seeing those prayer flags in motion reminds me of how the invisible world moves this visible one—which seems a far wiser way of living and more constructive than the “Destruction” that has been wrought by privileged humans imposing their umpteen brands of selfdom onto others, the land, and an otherwise pleasant hot or stormy summer day—or unpleasant depending on your weather preference or if you’ve been in the path of, for example, hurricane Beryl, which, after going through St. Vincent and the Grenadines, left “90% of the homes on the nation’s Union Island damaged or destroyed.”

An elementary school child could tell you that the most recent US promise of an additional $2.3 billion for weapons for Ukraine would be better spent helping the people of the Caribbean—the region where Columbus planted that banner. So what is it that’s being celebrated?

There’s no formula, but the intertwining of prayers and actions seems a good combo for each human being, group, community, town, city, nation to grapple with.