"I was on a four-hour conference with the Rainbow People a while back and kept telling them over and over again that we don't want them here in the Black Hills. They claimed they had some tribal leaders who were allowing them to come here and have their annual `welcome home gathering' here. I have an amp that I bought at a music store, along with a mic and an amp converter and put it in the back of my old pickup. It's common for us to prop our stuff up like this; and anyhow, when i got up there, their vehicles looked new. These kids a privileged whites kids. There was a group of them congregated near a tree and I pulled up in my truck, got in the bed and got on my mic and asked them, 'I'm not here to confront you, but I want to know who our tribal people are who invited you up here.' So they started screaming, 'We're a tribe just like you! We have a right to be here!' And I told them, 'You're not a tribe and you're not welcomed here.' Anyhow, this argument went back and forth for a while and finally, I just said 'You're not a tribe, you're frickin' fruitcake people!' They got belligerent and called me some names and even made some threats. Like a care. Then they yelled some names of our people who they said invited them here. I know these Lakota leaders and asked them later about this; and they told me they hadn't talked to these Rainbow People and hadn't invited them to the Black Hills. They're great at playing victim. This Rainbow family invades places at the last moment, without any warning, and they insist on staying where they're not wanted."
- James Magaska Swan, founder of the United Urban Warrior Society
The Rainbow Family of Living Light is not welcome in the Black Hills of South Dakota.
The Rainbow Family of Living Light is a counterculture group - which some have even labeled a cult - that have held annual gatherings in national forests every July since 1972, but they are not welcome in the Black Hills by Lakota Indians. And these regular residents - part of the Sioux - feel this Rainbow Family hippy fest desecrates the sacred Black Hills National Forest.
The Rainbow Family's annual welcome home gathering was initially expected to draw between 5,000 to 20,000 of the Rainbow People and their supporters to the South Dakota Black Hills from July 1-7, much to the chagrin of a consensus of Lakota Nation leaders. The Rainbow People are expected to dig trench latrines, create fire pits and make makeshift kitchens in the forests of the Black Hills.
The Rainbow People's fiercest critics are Lakota Nation members James Magaska Swan, founder of the United Urban Warrior Society; and Canupa Gluha Mani,the leader of the Strongheart Warrior Society.
James Magaska Swan and Canupa Gluha Mani say they’re sending scouts up to the areas of the forest where the first arrivals of these Rainbow People have been trickling in by the carload and have been taking up temporary residency in an area that is held sacred by the Lakota Nation. Swan and Mani agree that they will use every tactic they have available to them to remove these Rainbow People, who say they pray for world peace, but to Lakota leaders like Swan and Mani, these invaders actually deliver drugs and use drugs, act out with nudity and sometimes become involved with criminal activities.
"It all has to do with drugs and money," Mani told this writer in a telephone interview on Sunday, June 21. "That's the main focus of what they're all about. I've been working around the clock to stop them and put an end to what they're doing."
"The white race is always trying to invade space that doesn't belong to them....These Rainbow People talk about peace, love, and harmony. In actuality, these Rainbow People get these messed-up, lost white kids out in California to work on these farms and even give them pot. And these kids - who art part of this Rainbow family - are growing and selling this pot for these big-money marijuana growers. This is the trail of Rainbow People stuff that's actually going on. These Rainbow People know nothing about drugs and how they are being manipulated by big money," Mani said.
Swan and Mani said the United Urban Warrior Society, the Strongheart Warrior Society, the Lakota Nation, and the State of South Dakota have zero tolerance for drug use.
"We don't want our children exposed to (the Rainbow Family of Living Light) because of these influences - the drugs, the nudity, their vile ways," Swan told me during another telephone interview late Sunday, June 21.
"We have pictures of their children and they're bare-assed nude. We're talking about a dad, a mother, a 13-year-old daughter, a seven-year-old daughter, and a teenage son all together, nude and running around together. I have heard that the Rainbow People have a big problem with teenage rapes, too," Swan said.
"They're taking our sacred ceremonies and our doing their own perverted ceremonies. And they are bastardizing and exploiting our ceremonies. Worst of all, they're doing all this on sacred ground, in the Black Hills, where our ancestors are buried. We're very upset about all the nasty crap they're doing," Swan said.
Already, there have been problems. Police found two ounces of pot, drug paraphernalia, marijuana wax and open liquor containers during a consensual search, the Rapid City Journal reported. The visitors’ urine tests were positive for THC. According to the Rapid City Journal article, five people were arrested on felony charges on Wednesday, June 17, for these drug-related charges.
All five occupants of the vehicle searched were given urine tests, which were positive for THC, and all five were arrested on charges that included felony marijuana possession, open container in a vehicle, and possession of drug paraphernalia. Arrested on drug and open container laws were: Breanne Jallo, 23, of Fields Landing, Calif.; Kristopher Cromwell, 25, of Sandpoint, Idaho; Steven Conklin, 22, of Altamont Springs, Fla.; Katrina Gonzales, 20, of Mather, Calif.; and Jason Pearson, 36, of Chico, Calif. Cromwell also faces a panhandling charge, and Jallo faces a no-license and red light charge, the Rapid City Journal article reports.
When Mani was scouting the Rainbow Family encampment he said he saw used bloody tampons laying around, along with drug paraphernalia, including discarded hypodermic needles. "These people are doing this," Mani said. "I'm urging South Dakota to wake up. Enough of this white privilege. Fuck that!"
When this writer asked Swan about the drug paraphernalia laying around that Mani said he saw, Swan replied, ""It wouldn't surprise me a bit. We expect that."
Swan said the Rainbow People have been digging latrine trenches in the ground around their encampment. These long ditches have logs on both sides of the holes. A toilet seat is placed on top of the logs, which is held up by the logs.
"They fill it up and whenever there's too much of it in one place, they just move the toilet seat down a little bit. They're really vile people. I doubt if they even wipe themselves after they defaecate," Swan told me.
Mani blames those involved with the newly legalized marijuana growing trade for the brunt of this invasion of what he sees as mixed-up, messed-up white kids. "The bottom line is they want to bump off anything. All this stuff about laying down for the white man - fuck that! You are the ones who killed my people, cut the testicles off our grandfathers, raped our grandmothers and stole our land! They have a right to nothing! They only have a right to go back to Europe, where they came from. Fuck all that! America's just one big dope dealer, one big booze joint," Mani said in desperation and anger.
"We have good and bad blood in every race, but it's time for white people to start respecting other races," Mani continued. "It's offensive to me, this drug culture. I saw my own brother caught up in drugs. I even drank alcohol when I was younger. My grandfather told me to never pick up anything that you can't put down. And my mother told me never to accept anything that the white man brings you. Just don't take it, son, she said to me."
"None of this shit was in my country until you brought it here," Mani told me during the phone interview. "My people, who once lived from Maine to Florida, through genocide and ethnic cleansing, have been purged.
"When will America own up to this shit? The poor people in my country, through our misery and blood, made your country. Why can't we have a heaven made for us? I don't play Inidan. I don't do sun dances. I used to, but I'm trying to get my people away from playing Indian. Every day you people lie. I don't even like to use your language. It makes me swear too much. Look at it this way - you even killed your main spiritual leader and tore his guts out when he was being crucified. Should I ever trust you people?"
Mani said that through treaty law, these Rainbow People are not really even allowed to pass through the Black Hills, since that constitutes trespassing. But the State of South Dakota wants to foster a tourist trade and since much of the Black Hills is a national forest, the state overlooks much of this trespassing.
Mani said as far as he sees it, there will be no real hippy festival in early July by the The Rainbow Family of Living Light. Mani told me the founder of the Rainbow Family of Living Light informed his flock that their welcome home annual get-together will be held in Michigan, instead.
And Canupa Gluha Mani admitted that as far as he sees it, the only problems that the Rainbow People displayed towards him and the American Indian warriors who have been scouting their encampment has been "verbal enhancements".
"There was no violence. The Rainbow People are not coming back. Their leader told them not to come back," Mani said.
James Magaska Swan, however, said "We're going to see what transpires in the next few days. Their annual get-together isn't scheduled to start until July 1. We have our scouts up there every day watching them. This is the beginning of it, so we just don't know. On June 19, they decided to stay."
"These Rainbow People said Leonard Crow Dog said they could come. I talked to Leonard Crow Dog and he told me that he didn't give them permission. The Rainbow People are currently divided into two factions. The old school seems to have a few principles they abide by, but their free mentality and lack of structure leads them to have very weak leadership. The other faction, made up of young kids, is heavily into pot. They are trying to push the drug issue and are even trying to push our tribes into considering legalizing marijuana. But the State of South Dakota has a zero-tolerance policy against marijuana. If the police find a seed in your car, you might as well have a bag," Swan told me.
Canupa Gluha Mani's grandfather, Roy Martin, was the last to hold the leadership position that Mani now holds with the Strongheart Warrior Society, Mani said, adding that he was raised by his grandfather and Roy Martin groomed him since he was young to someday take over as leader of the Strongheart Warrior Society.
"My grandmother, at the age of 97, is the oldest living Aim (American Indian Movement) grandmother," Mani boasts, and he adds that some of his aunts have been longtime Aim members, as well.
At one time, James Magaska Swan was also involved with Aim and he even held a position as a sales account worker for Indian Country Today Media Network when the magazine, a leading publication which covers Native American news, was anchored in South Dakota. These days, however, Swan says he's focused on heading up the United Urban Warrior Society. The United Urban Warrior Society has 33 chapters nationwide.
"We've run fracking trucks off the road; we've sponsored homeless feeds; every year we have a Thanksgiving-On-The-Street event when we feed the homeless, in fact; and we're involved with some groups that are against violence towards women, including helping them with fundraising and donations; and we help our children in various ways - like holding little festivities around Christmastime and giving kids presents," Swan said about The United Urban Warrior Society.
Is The Rainbow Family of Living Light a cult? Well, according to some who track cults, it certainly can be considered as such. The Cult Education Institute reports on another annual get-together of the Rainbow Family in late June, 2006 in Big Red Park in Colorado, in which the reporter who wrote the story witnessed rampant drug use. "Marijuana use...was easy to spot. As law enforcement and forest officials from various agencies -- including the U.S. Forest Service and Routt County Sheriff's Office -- walked through the gathering, Rainbow members yelled "Six up!" to one another, a warning that law enforcement was nearby. "It means six bullets in a gun," said Barry Summers, a 46-year-old North Carolina resident who is helping out with logistics at the event."
The Cult Education Institute goes into detail about the Rainbow Family's communal meals: In a communal kitchen dubbed "Shut Up and Eat It," a New York woman named Jesse tended to a fire beneath two large covered pans Sunday afternoon. The pans contained water, which needed to be boiled because Rainbow gatherers had not finished installing a system to filter and transport water from a nearby spring.
"Anyone who drinks non-boiled water, it's on their own discretion," said Jesse, who declined to give her last name. "And no one drinks water without going on a water run first."
Over the same fire, 28-year-old Zac Monstar of Georgia stirred a big pot of spaghetti sauce. Meals at "Shut Up and Eat It" are served nearly around the clock, he said.
"We're on a 'Hobbit' schedule," Monstar said, referring to fictional characters created by author J.R.R. Tolkien who eat numerous meals a day. "We do first breakfast, second breakfast, 'elevenses,' lunch, snacks, dinner, supper ... and fried chocolate treats at night."
In between meals, a daily routine at the Rainbow gathering likely involves a lot of walking around, socializing, and relaxing.
Fast forward to late June 2015 and we're seeing a similar scenario playing out on lands owned by a Sioux tribe and protected under the Fort Laramie Treaties. Canupa Gluha Mani told me at the strongest, he saw about 200 of these Rainbow Family members but instead of trickling into the Black Hills, they seem to be leaving. Early this week, Mani said he only counted 77 Rainbow Family of Light members and only 15 of their cars.
"It's a strong victory for us, but our fight is still at hand," Mani said. "We urge all of America to stand with the Lakota on our zero-tolerance stance toward drugs."