The Truth Will Set Us Free

The book “Empire of the Summer Moon: Quanah Parker and the Rise and Fall of the
Comanches, the Most Powerful Indian Tribe in American History:” is creating quite a stir as
noted by Chuck Thompson in his interview with the author S.C. Gwynne.
http://www.cowboysindians.com/western/old-west/2011-04/empire-of-the-summer-moon.jsp

I would like to comment on a review written by Jonathan Bastian in The Aspen Daily News,
Aspen, Colorado on Friday April 1, 2011.
http://www.aspendailynews.com/section/entertainment/146121

In his review Jonathan has brought something important to the table: our predilection for
“making absolute moral judgments.” He is referring to the current politically correct tendency to
demonize the white man and glorify the Indian, which robs the Indian of their shadow, and the
white man of their light.

The truth will set us free, and freedom is the ultimate evolutionary goal of the human saga. S.C.
Gwynne, author of “Empire of the Summer Moon,” liberates us from the stereotype of “the noble
savage” made popular by Rousseau in the 1700’s, and indelibly stamped in the minds of the
current generation by the counter-culture in the ‘60’s and ‘70’s. That important birthing of a new
consciousness saw in the cosmology and way of life of the Indian the pathway to balance and the
realization of the human potential.

This has been fueled by the rise of revisionist history initiated in Plymouth, Massachusetts with
the so-called “National Day of Mourning” on Thanksgiving Day 1970. The victim/perpetrator
model becomes reinforced every Thanksgiving as historical untruths perpetuate and breed blame,
shame and guilt amongst our children, both Native and white.

Instead of using the extraordinary first 50 years of peace and friendship between the Mayflower
Pilgrims and the Wampanoag Indians as a model of multi-cultural synthesis (resulting in the
unique American Mind and Spirit), the internet and bookstores are full of erroneous tales of “The
Real Thanksgiving.” In these versions of history, which couldn’t be further from the truth, the
Pilgrims – moms, dads and kids seeking to create a society based on freedom of conscience -
appear as a blood-thirsty lot out to devour everything in their path, particularly the Indian (who,
surprisingly, shared their world-view).

If we take an unbiased look at the entire history of humanity we will see that every race has a
shadow and every race has light: the white, the black, the red, the yellow. Please show me a time
in history when fear, greed and power has not led to violent, unconscionable behavior in every
race amongst each other and between races.

Bastian and Gwynne make this point – that we all descend from warring tribes. All races have
played out their shadow in one way or another. We’re all familiar with the white man’s shadow
in American history and the victimization of the peaceful Indian. Gwynne has shattered that false
image and brought a great gift to the Indian – the violent past of the warring tribes, their shadow,
the truth – a pathway to balance.

Henry David Thoreau, who had a life-long resonance to the Native American,
became one of the top ethnologists of his time on the Algonquin Indian. He
hired Indian guides on his forays into the Maine wilderness, and his final
dying word was “Indian.” He expressed this dichotomy eloquently. His
statement does much to level the playing field:

“What an evidence it is, after all, of civilization, or of a capacity for improvement,

that savages like our Indians, who in their protracted wars stealthily slay men,
women, and children without mercy,… what a wonderful evidence it is, I say, of
their capacity for improvement that even they can enter into the most formal
compact or treaty of peace, burying the hatchet, etc., etc., and treating with each
other with as much consideration as the most enlightened states. You would say
that they had a genius for diplomacy as well as for war. Consider that Iroquois,
torturing his captive,...; and now behold him in the council-chamber, where he
meets the representatives of the hostile nation to treat of peace, conducting with
such perfect dignity and decorum, betraying such a sense of justness. These
savages are equal to us civilized men in their treaties, and, I fear, not essentially
worse in their wars.” JOURNAL December 30, 1856. (Please note that the word “savage” to
Thoreau denoted “wild man” and to him the “wild” in man is to be nurtured and will be our salvation. “In
wildness is the preservation of the Earth”)

Why do we all hold on so desperately to the notion of the Indian forever

living peacefully in balance with the Earth with the White man ravaging all in
his path?

Having spent the last 3 decades exploring the cause of the paradox within the human race – our
amazing capacity for love and compassion on the one hand, and our violent and ruthless behavior
on the other – I have discovered that fear and the attendant concepts of scarcity and separation
have contaminated our behavior despite the Indian cosmology of abundance and oneness, and the
Western concepts of “E Pluribus Unum” –“ From Many, One,” “All men are created equal with
inalienable rights endowed by the Creator” and “In God We Trust”

All races have dreams and high ideals, but have fallen short in applying these ideals to life at
home and between nations. The six warring tribes now known as the Iroquois, inspired by the
Peacemaker, drafted “The Great Law” and united to become the most powerful and dreaded
military force in the Northeast long before the European arrived. Similarly, centuries later, the
thirteen American colonies came together with various inspired freedom documents and
ultimately became the dominant military power in the world.

Ultimately, if we step back, fly high and take a look at the evolution of the human race, we will
see that we are all one species playing out our light and our shadow. Fortunately, as quantum
physics illuminates our personal power, and prophecies speak of a shift in consciousness, many
see that we are now at a time when we can choose to open our hearts and minds to each other,
walk forward into the light, and together create a world of peace and abundance for all our
children – to the 7th generation and beyond.

Connie Baxter Marlow, filmmaker and writer, is a Mayflower descendent who has spent
extensive time with visionary indigenous elders throughout the United States and Mexico. She
has been creating forums for them to share their cosmology for 30 years in films, books, lectures
and ceremonies. Her film with partner Andrew Cameron Bailey, “IN SEARCH OF THE
FUTURE. What do the Wise Ones Know?” on the origin and future of humanity with indigenous
elders, quantum scientists and futurists is currently screening at select locations around the
country.www.InSearchofTheFutureMovie.com. She has produced a DVD series on little-known
aspects of the life and thinking of Henry David Thoreau and will speak at the Thoreau Annual
Gathering held in Concord, MA in July on “Thoreau, The Futurist and the Emerging
Human.”www.ThoreauSociety.org. Her book/workshop, with partner Bailey, ‘THE TRUST
FREQUENCY: 10 Assumptions for a New Paradigm”, an indigenous cosmology/quantum
science synthesis, will soon be published. www.TheTrustFrequency.net