Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 4, Number 11, 1 November 1987 — Stand Up and Be Counted [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Stand Up and Be Counted

By Clarcnce F.T. Ching Trustee, Oahu

Where are we as the Year of the Hawaiian winds down? For me, the year started out in a wonderful coming together of Hawaiianness as we stood on top of the world, or so it seemed, at Haleakala. Starting out in the middle of the night, we had driven up out of the Maui lowlands, up, up, up to the

cold and rarified atmosphere of "the house of the sun." The stars, maybe two or three times the number normally seen at sea level, beamed down on a new year's celebration of Ho'olako 1987. A lot has happened since Capt. Cook rediscovered these islands. Hawaiians have gone from a singular eulture with an eeonomie and social system that seemed to work quite well to a multi-cultural ehop suey in whieh we have a hard time knowing who we are. Many of us have become part of a disadvantaged Amenean minority aecompanied by low incomes, poor health and lowselfesteem. We continue to suffer from high rates of infant mortality, diseases such as cancer and heart, institutionalization, suicide and malnourishment.

ine ouik ot our lana, wnien was inextricably īntertwined with our traditional culture and way of life, has been taken from us. The 'aina was an integral part of our religious beliefs and philosophy. For every 10 Hawaiians alive when Cook arrived, nine were dead from various causes, including the diseases brought by our rediscoverers for whieh we had no immunity. Our population was decimated from approximately 400,000 at its peak to 36,000 pure Hawaiians by the end of 1888. While some of us feel demoralized by all the nega-

tives, the worst may already have passed. There is light at the end of the tunnel. A Hawaiian renaissance has developed in the 1970's and 80's and we are learning a new kind of "ALOHA," something that we must do for ourselves. We must first love and respect ourselves. Then we will be able to stand up for what is right for us. Whether we eall ourselves activists, advocates, leaders, kupuna or other names doesn't matter. We are Hawaiians together.

We should also look around. We are not alone. This past summer I met a person with a particularly haunting story. He was a young man from Burma who reported, among other things, that his people don't have the right to vote. Although the majority groups there have many freedoms, they don't. They are even restricted in things they ean own. Forinstance, ifany person in his tribe were caught with rubies — whieh other citizens are permitted to own — that person would be shot. They are not allowed passports and so cannot travel. My friend does not have one. He left his own country illegally and now he cannot legally go home. Recently, however, he did go home. Without a passport, he had to approach the border through an adjoining country disguised as a citizen of that country, crossing the border under cover of darkness. Had he been caught, he would have been immediately shot to death. In his own way, he is fighting for the freedom, human dignity and respect that eaeh of us deserves. Like my Burmese friend, there are many others here and around the world who are taking personal stands to re-establish their rights and to seek justice. For nearly five decades now, the people of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia (the Baltics) have been waging a quiet war against the Russians.

The situation started August 23, 1939, when Kremlin leader Joseph Stalin and German Fuehrer Adolf Hitler entered into a nonagression pact whieh incorporated the Baltics into the Soviet Union. Since then, citizens of those countries have resisted their assimilation into the Soviet Union. Their hostility towards the Russians has been notorious. They have expressed their nationalistic feelings at every opportunity, both underground and publicly . Although forbidden to do so, they persist in speaking their own language, singing their own songs and keeping their own histories. At noon on August 23, 1987, coordinated demonstrations took plaee in the capital citiesof all three republics as the people defied poliee barricades to show their disdain for continued Soviet rule.

Our cousins the Maori have also taken stands. It was as recent as 1981 when the Maori took to the streets of New Zealand as part of the anti-apartheid protest marches of thousands against a South African rugby team touring the country. It was an opportunity for the Maon to protest the New Zealand government's eontinued oppression of its indigenous people as they had in 1979 when 500 polieemen were called out to arrest 200 citizens protesting a questionable transaction involving Maori lands at Bastian Point. Mueh earlier, in the 1860's, the Maoris stood up to the colonialists who were stealing their land by waging the Maori-Pakeha land wars. On the Pacific Coast of Canada, the "potlatch" was an important activity in Kwakiutl Indian culture. In order to assimilate the Indians, the Canadian governSee Stand Up, pg. 3

•Stand Up, from pg. 2

ment systematically confiscated the sacred implements used in the potlatch ceremonies. Now that the government has diminished its discrimination against them, the Kwakiutls are working towards the return of their cultural treasures presently being held in museums.

Finally, although Hawaiians became American citizens by ehoiee or default as a result of the eoup of 1893 and the 1898 annexation by the United States, the result is that we have all the tools we need to make real choices for our people. Those tools, embodied in the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, elevate the rights of the individual to heretofore unprecedented levels.

These rights are available to eaeh of us to redress our grievances. It's up to us whether or not they are used. When there is reason for Hawaiians to take a stand, we must do so. If we do not, we must be prepared to lose our future identity as Hawaiians. Important stands are being taken, however, and precedents have been established. Our stands, right or wrong, at Mokauea, Sand Island, Makua Beach, Waimanalo, Hale Mohalu, Makapuu Point, Hilo Airport, Kukailimoku Village and elsewhere signal our intention to rely on the protections we have as an American minority. We must stand up and be counted if we are to rebuild a positive Hawaiian identity and further exercise our rights. And so, as the 1987 Year of the Hawaiian draws to a close, my question to eachofyou is — What areyou prepared to do?