BY: DOUG GEORGE-KANENTIIO

INDIAN TIME - Vol. 22 #33 - Seskeha / August 19, 2004 Edition - Page 2 & 4

Every four years the Iroquois people are compelled to watch the world's athletes gather at the Olympics to compete in sporting events such as water polo, table tennis, synchronized swimming and high platform diving.

While these are all demanding challenges requiring years of dedication the most physical of all summer games has once again been excluded for purely racial reasons.

The great game of lacrosse in which our people excell has yet to be included as an Olympic sport. Not since the London Games in 1908 has lacrosse been accorded the recognition it merits alongside such team sports such as soccer, softball and basketball.

If the Olympic organizing committee decides to include lacrosse, as it must, then the non-North American Nations will surely press to have the Iroquois included as a separate team and that just does not sit well with the U.S. or Canada.

Those two Nations have a vested interest in actively denying, and politically oppressing, the existence of the Haudenosaunee as a distinct cultural and legal entity. Should they be compelled to acknowledge the fact that we have existed as Nation States from time immemorial then the entire premise of northern hemispheric history and law as the exclusive products of Europe vanishes, as in time it surely will.

But this conspiracy to obscure the Haudenosaunee does have a highly personal effect on our athletes. No one can question the enormous skills our lacrosse players bring to the field or floor. This past season the Akwesasne lacrosse teams proved to be the equal of any in the northeast with one group, the intermediates, winning the Ontario championship against opponents who had thousands more players to draw from in their respective regions.

And who is to say that these kids, by virtue of their title in Canada's most populated and lacrosse fixated Province, are not the outright best in that Nation?

Would it not be reasonable to suppose that with the proper financial and moral support, along with additional formal training, these Akwesasne Mohawk kids could form the basis for a Haudenosaunee field lacrosse team to carry our eagle banner at the 2008 Olympics set for Beijing, China?

Surely the Asians and Africans, and perhaps a fair number of Europeans, would enthusiastically endorse the return of lacrosse to the Olympics especially if it meant the Haudenosaunee would have our own team with our Mohawk champions joining their Iroquois kin.

The time to press for this is now. We need to make use of our media contacts to discuss why lacrosse is not in the Olympics and how to remedy this glaring omission. We need to build alliances with the Japanese, Australians, Germans and Russians to assure the Olympic organizers there are not only sufficient teams for the 2008 Games but the contests will be competitive and well attended.