I know Great Spirit is looking down upon me from above, and will hear what I say.
Sitting BullRead
What white man can say I never stole his land or a penny of his money? Yet they say that I am a thief.
Interpretation
Sitting Bull highlights the hypocrisy and injustice of accusing others of theft while having a history of taking from them.
In this quote, Sitting Bull points out the irony in the accusations against Indigenous peoples, suggesting that the oppressors have taken land and wealth from them, yet label them as thieves. It reflects the struggle for justice and acknowledgment of historical wrongs, emphasizing the moral contradiction of those who benefit from such injustices while denying their impact on marginalized communities.
In practice
This quote can be used during discussions on land rights and indigenous sovereignty.
I know Great Spirit is looking down upon me from above, and will hear what I say.
I want to tell you that if the Great Spirit had chosen anyone to be the chief of this country, it is myself.
Is it wrong for me to love my own? Is it wicked for me because my skin is red? Because I am Sioux? Because I was born where my father lived? Because I would die for my people and my country?
When I was a boy, the Sioux owned the world. The sun rose and set on their land; they sent ten thousand men to battle. Where are the warriors today? Who slew them? Where are our lands? Who owns them?
Therefore, I do not wish to consider any proposition to cede any portion of our tribal holdings to the Great Father.
I wish it to be remembered that I was the last man of my tribe to surrender my rifle.
Solitude is a human presumption. Every quiet step is thunder to beetle life underfoot, a tug of impalpable thread on the web pulling mate to mate and predator to prey, a beginning or an end. Every choice is a world made new for the chosen.
There is only one thing in life worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about.
The philosophical question before us is, when we make an observation of our track in the past, does the result of our observation become real in the same sense that the final state would be defined if an outside observer were to make the observation?
We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men and women are created equal.
My mission is to kill time, and time's to kill me in its turn. How comfortable one is among murderers.
I am supposing, or perhaps only hoping, that our future may be found in the past's fugitive moments of compassion rather than in its solid centuries of warfare.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.