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Shinnecocks Snag Federal Recognition - The East Hampton Star - News (http://www.easthamptonstar.com/dnn/Home/News/ShinnecocksSnagFederalRecognition/tabid/10810/Default.aspx - broken link)
I wonder how many members of the tribe are full-blooded Shinnecock? The tribe has mixed and intermingled with other races; locally, I am friendly with a woman who is primarily African American with Shinnecock ancestors a few generations back.
I'm not trying to start a fight. I have questions which I wrangle with being as I am a half & half: white & Hispanic. My appearance is white, but I won't downplay my Hispanic heritage. People are floored when they learn I am mixed. We have a POTUS who is half & half, and he considers himself black. Entertainers & athletes who are also half & half who consider themselves black. Most of this is done by virtue of appearance/physical traits, which is understandable.
At what point can we legally say someone is not (insert race or ethnicity here) as it is but scant trace? Allegedly many of whites have some black descendants and blacks, white. If I go out, get tested, and the results show genetic markers of an African forebear, do I get to say I am black despite looking like Casper?
How did the US Government determine that the Shinnecock Tribe is officially a tribe? What parameters do they use to make this decision? Were tribal members tested for DNA? Birth certificates?
It's not that I would deny the tribe official recognition; it's the government's methods of making a determination, with all the levels of bureaucracy and ineptitude rolled in, which trouble me. What is to say, further along, that a group of people with Native American genetic markers, won't claim they are descendants of the Indians who sold Manhattan to the Dutch, and who now want a stake in it?
You are both just jealous. After >200 years of being treated unfairly and losing their land to European immigrants, they finally get an opportunity to cash in, like all the rest of the tribes. Any body who doesn't realize that they had it coming was born 200 years too late.
Are you ready to return YOUR house and land back to the Indians?
Not that I have heard that any casino plans are in the works out east but I really do not think that Long isand would be able to handle the traffic for one. We all dread the Hamptons traffic. Could you imagine???
From the article:
Federal recognition will also allow the Shinnecocks to pursue a casino with the State of New York. Gov. David A. Paterson wrote a letter earlier this year to the bureau that supported the Shinnecocks’ application, a step that Mr. Bess said was unusual and for which the tribe was grateful.
“We should start now to negotiate with the state government and the type of possibilities there are in the gaming field,” he said. “We want a location that benefits the local people there and our members properly.”
Potential sites include either the Belmont or Aqueduct racetracks or a site in Suffolk County, which a committee of the County Legislature is working on.Aqueduct has been the most widely discussed because of the willingness of residents in the area to support a casino and the State Legislature’s willingness to consider it. The state has previously proposed sites in the Catskills for gaming for other state tribes.
Why should the Shinnecocks be permitted to build and profit from a casino at Aqueduct -- an area which was once tribal land for the Canarsie or Rockaway tribes? Shinnecock casinos should be built in areas once part of Shinnecock tribal lands. Tough noogies on the wealthy Hamptons summer elite crowd.
You are both just jealous. After >200 years of being treated unfairly and losing their land to European immigrants, they finally get an opportunity to cash in, like all the rest of the tribes. Any body who doesn't realize that they had it coming was born 200 years too late.
It's a sticky wicket.
Many LI tribes perished during a small pox epidemic during Dutch colonization. Some were shot and killed by the Dutch. I don't argue that the native tribes got the short end of the deal. English settlers on the east end did trade for the land there, but the trade was certainly not favorable to the Indians.
How many of our Jewish friends lost family, homes, land, heirlooms, during the Holocaust? Do they get to go back and evict those who live on their family's former property by virtue of once having had an ancestor live there?
Do we get to go back in time and 'do over' a bad business deal?
There are certain things which are either physically or financially impossible to do. But making good to the tribe by granting them official status and allowing them greater rights and benefits, is a good place to start.
Not that I have heard that any casino plans are in the works out east but I really do not think that Long isand would be able to handle the traffic for one. We all dread the Hamptons traffic. Could you imagine???
Casino plan has been in the works since the 90's.The state was considering trading them long island land for a piece upstate and the other option was trading them a part of the current land for the southhampton college property which can be accessed from montauk hwy and sunrise.
They are about as "Indian" as the Pope is jewish.
Years upon years of out-breeding has left most of the so called "Indians" on this island with maybe 1/8 of Native American blood running through their veins.
I think I have more native American ancestry than the scammers out there.
Where's my government meal ticket?
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