Ihsan

I wish it were possible for us Indian people to tell the world how much sacred places mean to us. To explain that no man-made cathedral or mansion can inspire within us the feeling of sacredness inspired by those places generations of our grandparents worshipped. At no place is the culture gulf that separates the European and the Indigenous people greater than in our native regard for this lands' sacred places and the European-Christian inability to understand that certain places are sacred and should be protected from human interference. What we gaze upon with reverence they look at with greedy calculation and lust.

Over the years these venues have crept closer and closer until one event has its filthy toilets on the slope of the Sacred Mountain itself! Each year thousands of motorcycles roar around and upon Bear Butte as America displays it's version of "Sodom and Gomorah" within yards of the spot from which Chief Crazy Horse spoke when he told us never to sell the land.

"Bear Butte is 'Nowah'wus' to the Cheyenne Nation, It is 'Mato Paha' to the Lakota. Across the Great Plains over thirty indigenous Nations acknowledge the sacredness of this Brutte and its surrounding areas...

While we all as a people hold the entire Black Hills to be sacred, Bear Butte is under direct attack at this time and we are preparing to do our best to defend the sacred mountain again. We have learned of plans to build enormous biker bars and campsites all around our sacred mountain. In addition existing beer bars and concert venues are expanding and edging closer and closer into sacred grounds. Today one has dug outdoor toilets on the very slopes of the north side of our Sacred Mountain for their annual drunken binge!