Have you ever heard the wolf cry to the blue corn moon?

Imagine living on the same land as your ancestors, knowing each landmark like the back of your hand, connected to the earth in a way that no outsider could ever fathom.  Then, one day without warning, the world around you begins to crash down.  An unfamiliar presence is in your home, and it instills a fear in you unlike anything you've ever felt before. Why are these people destroying your home?  Don’t they see that “every rock and tree and creature has a life, has a spirit, has a name”?

As Americans, we often fail to see the intrinsic value of the world surrounding us.  We have become anthropocentric and so disconnected from the Earth that we have forgotten that the world is connected in ways that are unseen.  The master narrative drilled into our minds is to take what we want, to defy and control the Earth as we see fit, and to mold others to be more like “us”, even though we will never see them as being on “our” level, and instead as untamed “savages”.

In “Thinking like a Mountain” by Leopold, he learns that the wolves are essential to the stability of the mountain; but only realizes this after he sees the “fierce green fire die in the wolf’s eyes”, symbolizing the extermination of the wolves of the mountain.  We never seem to think about the long-term consequences of our actions until it is too late.  Instead of the “hunter’s paradise” he had envisioned, the deer have overpopulated the mountain, eating all of the vegetation until the mountain is left barren and the deer starving to death. What right do we have to upset the complex balance of nature so?

Upon seeing Avatar with this question in mind, I saw just how destructive our quest for resources could be to an entire civilization.  Growing up in America, we never see the story from the eyes of the victims of displacement.  In the movie, the manager of the project, Parker, continuously uses terms such as “blue monkeys” and “savages” to describe the Na’avi people. At one point he even mentions that the only reason they have not removed these people by force is because by doing so, the government “looks bad”.  Parker represents the white upper-class American male, who wants nothing more than the most valuable resources the planet has to offer.  So even though indigenous genocide looks bad, money matters more. At the end of this scene, Jake is left wondering what would happen if the Na’avi people don’t move from their homes.

After Neytri and Jake connect, a team of bulldozers eradicate one of the most sacred areas to the Na’avi people.  As the trees fall around them, Neytri is in tragic despair of the destruction.  One line that really struck a chord in me is when Parker is asked by a worker if they should wait, he says “Keep going, he’ll move. These people have to learn that we won’t stop.”  At that moment I thought, “Wow, these people have no chance at defending themselves or their land.”  Before the Colonel orders an all-out ambush on Hometree, we see how passionate the Na’avi are and how they are willing to die to protect their home.  They are told to “have no fear”, and I cannot help but wonder if the Native Americans had the same passion to fight for their land, despite the knowledge that they had a small chance of succeeding, or if the wolves could have processed what the hunters’ intention was, would have fought just as vigilantly?  What truly amazes me about this scene is when Grace is verbally attacking Parker, asking him if he understood the magnitude of what he had just destroyed: a giant communication network through each tree--intertwined and connected to each Na’avi.  In response, Parker jokes that they must have been taking some kind of drugs to induce this sort of thinking, showing how many upper-class white Americans feel about “tree-huggers” and “hippies”.  But if someone had taken the time to wonder “how can the mountain/region/continent be connected to these wolves we are killing?” then maybe, they would have stopped before the mountain was left a desolate wasteland.

During the ambush on Hometree, the Colonel comments that it is “one big tree.” This shows his sublime of the tree’s massiveness, however, he cannot appreciate the value it holds enough to not annihilate it.  As Hometree crashes to the ground, the music is emotional and dramatic ridden with the screaming of birds as their home is destroyed.  The scene is quiet for a moment, then, the music billows into a dark cloud as the Na’avi sob in a mixture of emotional and physical pain as the camera pans out to show the destruction wrought upon them.  The scene then skips to the Colonel’s vehicle as he says “the first round is on me tonight.”  This shows his feeling of indifference as they simply leave the havoc they brought.

Many times, this is where the indigenous people’s stories end.  Despite their efforts, the place their souls have known for centuries is destroyed and raped of its’ resources…and they are forced to begin anew under the watchful eye of their oppressor.  Many times, it’s the American government.  What has been affected by the Na’avi’s homes being destroyed?  The animals and people now have no home, and have to relocate, possibly putting another group of people and animals out of their place.  Perhaps a predator was kept in check by the Na’avi hunting them.  Perhaps a food resource has moved, and another group of animals are left to starve and possibly harm the humans that are extracting their billion dollar resources.  What happens when there is nowhere left to go to strip down to barren bone?  What happens when we have killed off every small group of seemingly insignificant indigenous peoples?  Americans seem to believe that “the only people who are people are the people who all look and think like [themselves].” But if we were to walk the footsteps of a stranger, would we learn things we never knew we never knew? 


-Mika Earling