1.<\/strong><\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
Soon after I joined the faculty at BYU, I delivered a paper at the annual meeting of the Rocky Mountain Medieval and Renaissance Association, which was held that year on the south rim of the Grand Canyon. \u00a0(Candidly, that\u2019s one of the reasons that I wanted to present at the meeting. \u00a0Location, location, location!)<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
One day, at lunch in the facility\u2019s restaurant, I fell into conversation with a youngish man who there\u00a0for another meeting. \u00a0He\u00a0explained that he\u00a0had come to northern Arizona, fired with idealism, to teach in a school among the Indians and to make a contribution. \u00a0(As the conversation went on, incidentally, I discovered that he was a Latter-day Saint.) \u00a0But then he began to tell me tales of rampant alcoholism, neglectful and sometimes abusive parents, and a dysfunctional society\u00a0that (on the whole) wasn\u2019t supportive of academic success to even the most minimal degree. \u00a0It was profoundly depressing. \u00a0And he was depressed, clearly. \u00a0Exhausted. \u00a0Hopeless. \u00a0I couldn\u2019t tell you his name now, and I don\u2019t remember what he looked like, but I\u2019ve never forgotten the dismal content of what he had to say.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
2.<\/strong><\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
Also very long ago, I remember reading an article in the Wall Street Journal<\/em> about a group of Indians \u2014 from, I believe, the Catawba Nation of South Carolina \u2014 who were opposed to their people\u2019s building a casino. \u00a0These were Latter-day Saints, and they feared the corrupting effect that windfall casino profits might have on the character and work ethic of their youth.<\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
I looked for that article just now, and could not find it. \u00a0I did, alas, find evidence that the Catawba Nation now seeks to build its own casino, which will probably have precisely the effect that those LDS members of the tribe feared years ago and that is briefly discussed in\u00a0the article to which I\u2019ve linked above.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
I was proud of them for their willingness to forego potentially vast profits for the sake of their children.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
We have, in my judgment, done grievous harm to America\u2019s First Nations (as Canadians call them), and, sadly, that harm didn\u2019t cease when we stopped violating treaties with them, driving them from their lands, and massacring them.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u00a0 \u00a0 Somebody has finally had the nerve to tell the truth, publicly, about the situation on American Indian reservations: \u00a0 http:\/\/www.nationalreview.com\/article\/439686\/locked-disgraceful-state-indian-country \u00a0 I\u2019m very far from an authority on the topic, but here are two personal notes: \u00a0 1. \u00a0 Soon after I joined the faculty at BYU, I delivered a paper at the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1019,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-36426","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n
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