Western thinking always structures knowledge in hierarchies. Food chain, Great Chain Of Being - the chains that bind our minds. But there are other ways of knowing.
Knowledge Bound In Chains
For Indigenous peoples, and that includes Europeans up until relatively recently in human history, knowledge is a fluid, complex, interrelated force that flows through our bodies from the land, from ancestors and from spirit. But the recent construct of non-Indigenousness is based on severing people's connection with this knowledge, and therefore restricting access to the power of true knowing. Thus we all become slaves to the Western construct, bound by the chains of hierarchical knowledge.
Great Chain Of Being
One such chain was used by Victorian racists to justify the subjugation of half the world through the myth of race. This was the "Great Chain Of Being". It was a supposedly scientific text, a version of a diagram placing God at the top of a hierarchy, and monkeys on the bottom, with people in between. White people were at the top of the chain after God, followed by Asian peoples, then Negroes, then Islanders, and finally (just above monkeys) the Australian Aboriginal people. This chain was used to determine intelligence and aptitude for different kinds of labour.
The Food Chain
Another of these chains smashed me in the face a few days ago. I don't watch television as a rule, but I was at my cousin's house visiting when I saw an advertisement that pretty much ruined my weekend. It depicted a fly being eaten by a spider. Then the spider was eaten by a lizard, who was eaten by a snake, who was eaten by a dingo, who was eaten by a crocodile while drinking at a creek. Then a massive recreational vehicle splashed across the creek and crushed the crocodile. The slogan appeared on the screen then: "Be top of the food chain". It was an ad for a 4 wheel drive vehicle. I almost lost my lunch watching it.
Food chain? Why do people buy into that concept? Even small children know that nature is not so linear. Most people know in their hearts that ecologies are more like webs than chains. But why be part of a web when you could be top of a chain? Hence the hierarchy.
Separated From Nature
This hierarchy has separated people from nature. Nature exists as an enemy to be destroyed, dominated, plundered. Indigenous peoples, as part of nature, must therefore receive the same treatment, in the ongoing process of colonisation - the individualisation of all that is communal, masculinisation of all that is feminine, sterilisation of all that is fertile, and the regimentation of all diversity.
But how does a soldier on the front line of this war with nature question the morality of the cause? Is it possible to accost the General, or simply stand up and shout, "This is wrong!"? Well, no. As it happens, there is a chain of command...
