How to Move Mountains. Left.

Who’s Squawking about Squaw Mountains?

Near the summit of a peak west of Missoula, Montana… a wooden sign indicates the way to a steep climb over tumbled rocks to reach the peak, Ch-paa-qn… This is a Salish word that means “shining mountain,” or “gray, treeless mountain top”. Except that some rube has used a knife to all but scratch the Indigenous word out and replace it with “Squaw” in crude letters.

Chris La Tray, “I Was Raised Beside ‘Squaw Peak’ – It’s Time To Change America’s Offensive Place Names”, The Guardian (2021)

Some people say, and with good reason, that Leftism has become a secular religion. And some religious people say that prayer can move mountains. The beseeching of holier-than-thou Leftists may not move mountains, but it can make them disappear. There is no Squaw mountain in western Montana anymore. But it wasn't moved left into Idaho by the prayers of the faithful. What did happen to Squaw mountain? The quoted story in the British Leftist mega-newspaper The Guardian, tells the story. It’s like a wonderful miracle!

The Mountains to be Renamed Later

Actually, there are far too many mountains in Montana to give them all names (there are whole mountain ranges in the state which have never been named).  The mountain in question is, or was, actually called "Squaw Peak". British newspapers may have warned us in December 2021 that, “It’s time to change America’s offensive place names.” But in reality the name-changing had been going on for a long time. There were many Squaw Mountains in America, it seemed that all of them are or were in the process of being renamed by Leftists. The mountain in Montana had actually been renamed over twenty years before The Guardian’s lightly veiled threat.

While it seemed in 2022 that the Squaw Mountain in Maine was safe for the time being, that was not the case in Colorado: "Colorado Mountain Renamed to Mestaa’ėhehe Mountain, Replacing A Slur".

As of 2021, Squaw Valley NV was being renamed "Palisades Tahoe". The Squaw Peak near Provo Utah is still there, but efforts are underway.

So, by their politically-correct faith alone, Leftists had metamorphosed Squaw Mountain, Maine into Mount Unpronounceable. The renamed Squaw Peak, Montana is now Ch-paa-qn.  Maybe not quite as much of a mouthful as "Mestaa’ėhehe", but still it would not seem to have been an improvement in any way other than politically. Things do have names for a reason; names do serve a purpose. Who even knows how to say “Ch-paa-qn”?

Montana rube, “You want to hike to Ch-paa-qn?”

Other Montana rube, “What?”

Hurtfulness Among the Easily Offended Historically Disadvantaged

You can still hike on Squaw Peak in Utah. See here for more info

But:

The term squaw is considered universally offensive by Indigenous groups in America due to its use for hundreds of years in a derogatory context. Indigenous activists have continued to work both locally and in more general educational efforts, to rename the locations across North America... Wikipedia

If someone is still suffering speech-pain because some of her ancestors were not the most advantaged people of some distant time, then exactly how much of their whining and irrational demands do the rest of us have to put up with, and for how many generations? An infinite amount of whining for an infinite period of time? It would seem so. Perhaps Europeans did not bring civilization to the indigenous peoples of North America, they brought snivelization. Today’s native Americans — or whatever they demand to be called now — claim to be descendants of some of the bravest warriors who ever lived, and doubtless it is true. Would it hurt the descendants of those warriors to toughen up a little, do you think?

"Historical Disadvantage" and the Senator Formerly Known as Squaw

If being an indigenous American female (squaw) is really a disadvantage, then would Elizabeth Warren have falsely claimed to be an indigenous American female (squaw) to get an advantage?

In the quoted article, The Guardian writer complained that he was disadvantaged because, he says, sometimes his ancestors “…were called ‘dirty half-breeds’ or ‘drunken breeds’.” But it was completely okay, in 2021, for him to call people who live in Montana “rubes”, in print, in one of the most widely read newspapers in the world.

Because no non-indigenous Montana people had any disadvantaged ancestors, of course. But if a Montana person's ancestors were rubes, i.e. members of the rube tribe, or the rube class, would those persons not, by definition, be historically disadvantaged? If so, then where are their reservations and government checks from the U.S. Department of the Interior?

Black Elks Speaks… What Language?

"Indian Affairs Begins Disbursement of $900 Million in Funding to Tribes"

U.S. Department of the Interior Bureau of Indian Affairs www.bia.gov (2021)

...the Shakopee Mdewakanton are believed to be the richest tribe in American history as measured by individual personal wealth: Each adult, according to court records and confirmed by one tribal member, receives a monthly payment of around $84,000, or $1.08 million a year... “We have 99.2 percent unemployment,” Stanley R. Crooks, the tribe’s president, said as he smiled during a rare interview. “It’s entirely voluntary.”

Timothy Williams, "$1 Million Each Year for All", New York Times (2012)

Were the writer of the Guardian article, and other indigenous people, really disadvantaged by Americans who spoke English? He complained in the article that “…hardly anyone speaks any of our Native tongues anymore.” Did he believe that speaking English was a “disadvantage” and that he could be a writer for big newspapers if he couldn’t speak English? O the disadvantagement!!!

He said in his article that in America “…speaking a Native language was dangerous. So my ancestors buried their words.” Sad!

In reality, the U.S. government spent millions of dollars to encourage native Americans to speak their tribal languages. Congress passed laws such as The Native American Languages Act “to preserve, protect and promote the rights and freedom of Native Americans to use practice and develop Native American Languages” and the Native American Languages Preservation Act. But these efforts and the money spent had little or no effect, as the Guardian writer says.

If native Americans didn’t want to speak their native American languages, and had to be subsidized to do so, why? Presumably for the same reason that American descendants of Italian speakers don’t still speak Italian. And American descendants of Japanese speakers don’t still speak Japanese. And so on. But for the permanently disadvantaged, it’s different of course. If they don’t choose to speak their ancestors’ language it’s because: Disadvantagement!

(Meanwhile, as the U.S. government was spending millions of dollars to help native Americans to speak their languages, U.S. government English Language Acquisition Office (OELA) at the U.S. Department of Education was also spending millions of dollars (its budget was $730 million per year in 2020) to get the same native Americans to speak English.

What are the odds that, if U.S. taxpayers had not shelled $millions to teach native Americans to speak English, then people, like the writer of The Guardian article, who squawk about speaking English, and how they were forced to “bury their words” would be squawking that they were disadvantaged because they couldn’t write English well enough to squawk in British newspapers about how disadvantaged they are, because Disadvantagement!!!!!!  

But hey, don’t mind me. I’m just a Montana rube. Bury my rubeness on Ch-paa-qn Mountain.