Many of the Dine/Navajo people who live in the area depend on Black Mesa
coal for their livelihood: Some of them have jobs at the Peabody Coal
Company, in fact there are no other jobs around. It's easy for an outsider
who doesn't have to feed a family in an area like this to misjudge the
situation. I am in no way defending coal mining there, do not misunderstand
me, i'm just fed up with this one sided information of outsiders.
> Some of the people living on Big Mountain can trace their habitation of
> that land back for 25 generations, longer than the USA has been in
> existence. But since 20 billion tons of coal are believed to lie under
> Black Mesa, mining interests have been trying to get rid of them.
Another one of these myths that has been going around for decades now. I
never understood why this issue supposedly is a mining issue - go to both
reservations and look around..you'll find the powerplants and the pollution
on the Navajo reservation, not on Hopi (In fact all business on Hopi are
tribally owned, or by tribal members). It always has been easier for
companies to make contracts with Window Rock rather than with Hopi. So why
on earth should the American government (as is the big mountain defender's
argument) take away the land from the Navajo and give it to the Hopi?
They'll give them a much harder time!
I personally have lived on both reservations for many years and always
tried to keep out of the conflict since it's really a sad and tough
situation for everyone directly involved - it definitely won't be resolved
with such black and white, uninformed postings as this one.
Bernhard