Rachel Freeman Class Reflection

 Today in class we watched a documentary about how Native American people fought for their land back from industrialization and destruction. While national parks around places such as Devil's Tower attract people who want to experience the natural beauty, it is becoming counterproductive and doing more harm than good. However, people were angry when the National Park Service tried to close access to rock climbing in the area during the month of June while Native Americans are practicing religious ceremonies for the summer solstice. Native Americans view climbing as disrespectful to the sacredness of the monument, while climbers sued the park service for trying to protect the validity of Native American culture and way of life. Some of the climbers who were interviewed seemed very arrogant and entitled to climbing on the rocks because it is "public land," but the Native Americans never agreed to hand their land over for others to use; it was taken by force. I think it is disrespectful for people to completely disregard Native American culture, especially because it is only for 1 month of the year. It is insensitive and degrading to destroy nature which is an integral part of Native American religious practice, especially because rock climbing and hiking speed up erosion rates of natural monuments. Further, the park dropped the ban on climbing in the park because it was deemed against the first amendment for the government to endorse religious practices and climbers made the effort to eliminate any regulation on climbing in the area at all. As said in the documentary: "This is not a legal issue, this is an issue of basic respect to other humans." This makes me very angry because the United States takes so much from Native American tribes, and this is just one more incident of offending the people who work to preserve the country's natural beauty through their religious practices.