"Apologies" by Haunani Kay Trask — Transcript

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1. 0:01back in 1993 then President Clinton
2. 0:05signed a formal apology to Hawaii for
3. 0:10the illegal or to Hawaiians rather for
4. 0:14the illegal overthrow of the Hawaiian
5. 0:16Kingdom a hundred years before back in
6. 0:191893 right so here he is pictured here
7. 0:22signing the apology which had actually
8. 0:24been ratified by both um h both houses
9. 0:27both this uh Senate these are the
10. 0:28Senators here um Daniel enoi and Senator
11. 0:31aaka and then also the our Congressman
12. 0:33paty mink at the time and and Neil abber
13. 0:36cromi and then here here is Vice
14. 0:38President Al Gore standing by so the
15. 0:42nation the United States
16. 0:45acknowledged the overthrow and
17. 0:48apologized and paty mink called it a
18. 0:51spectacular moment for Hawaiian history
19. 0:53Danielle aaka called it a great time for
20. 0:55Hawaii um acknowledging that Lilo colani
21. 0:58was toppled back in 1893 by a rebellion
22. 1:01led by an American Minister Minister not
23. 1:03a religious Minister but probably a
24. 1:04diplomat to Hawaii and supported by US
25. 1:07military forces no blood was shed but um
26. 1:10they it was at that time that the US
27. 1:13government took over annexed um or took
28. 1:16over the uh over Hawaii and so after
29. 1:20this moment um America had more of a
30. 1:22presence here military began to move in
31. 1:25and the culture of Hawaii changed the
32. 1:27culture and the language and the
33. 1:29governance in Hawaii changed the formal
34. 1:32Pol ackn acknowledging the nation's part
35. 1:34in that coup was approved as Fall by
36. 1:35both the Senate and the House of
37. 1:37Representatives so native Hawaiian
38. 1:40activists active um in the 1990s and
39. 1:43fighting for
40. 1:45sovereignty uh for independence from the
41. 1:48United States government which was uh
42. 1:50something that was kind of radical at
43. 1:52the time wrote this poem responding to
44. 1:56the apologies to the apology rather
45. 2:00uh this is a poem that was published in
46. 2:032008 and might have been published might
47. 2:05have been read out loud or published
48. 2:07earlier but the latest public U
49. 2:09publication I can find was in 2008 and
50. 2:11here it is Apologies by Hanan tras
51. 2:15slogans of cheap Grace rather than land
52. 2:19we apologize but not one acre of tarot
53. 2:24One River of water one handful of Labor
54. 2:28we AP apologize and all our dead and
55. 2:32barely living Rejoice for now we own one
56. 2:36dozen dirty pages of American Paper to
57. 2:40feed our people and govern our
58. 2:44nation so short pretty short simple poem
59. 2:49seems to be pretty straightforward but
60. 2:51there are a couple of words that kind of
61. 2:52stick out okay that kind of yeah they
62. 2:55seem strange okay even that first word
63. 2:57slogans slogans of cheap Grace it's kind
64. 3:00of a mouthful slogans of cheap Grace
65. 3:02slogans uh you have political slogans
66. 3:05slogans are usually things like an
67. 3:07advertising they're kind of meaningless
68. 3:09they kind of are for for sale yeah
69. 3:12slogans um and then she she talks about
70. 3:15owning one dozen pages of American paper
71. 3:20that word own is kind of weird owning
72. 3:22paper she own now now we own this paper
73. 3:26um and then even that phrase American
74. 3:29Paper American made paper why why is the
75. 3:31paper American right but we know that
76. 3:32it's American Paper because this is the
77. 3:35paper that Clinton is upon which he's
78. 3:39signing so a few words that kind of make
79. 3:42the seemingly simple poem just a few
80. 3:45sentences long kind of um more a little
81. 3:49bit confusing like there's something
82. 3:50going on there ultimately this poem is
83. 3:52totally sarcastic it's she is the poem
84. 3:56is just dripping with sarcasm even if
85. 3:58you read that line we apologize as
86. 4:01sincerely as you possibly can it it's we
87. 4:04a we apologize it's just it's empty it's
88. 4:08it's sarcastic we apologize she's
89. 4:12there's just an emptiness there they're
90. 4:14not sorry for anything is what you know
91. 4:16when you read those words sarcastically
92. 4:17it's what that suggests we don't really
93. 4:19we don't really apologize for anything
94. 4:22and then there's this weird uh line and
95. 4:24all are dead and barely living Rejoice
96. 4:27it's hard to figure out cuz there's this
97. 4:29comma there is she telling her dead and
98. 4:31barely living to Rejoice I don't think
99. 4:33so I think she's put the comma there to
100. 4:35indicate kind of a little pause and
101. 4:37she's saying that all that she's saying
102. 4:39the dead and the barely living Rejoice
103. 4:42that they they are rejoicing but guys do
104. 4:45you think the dead and barely living are
105. 4:46rejoicing over an apology I do not think
106. 4:49so the barely living do not care about
107. 4:51an apology they need medicine they need
108. 4:54food they need to thrive so that they
109. 4:56can survive um and the dead certainly
110. 4:58don't care about an
111. 5:00apology um so even this line is also
112. 5:03full of sarcasm um CU they are not
113. 5:06rejoicing they don't care about an
114. 5:08apology ultimately the poem is is um
115. 5:11calling for is about land and governance
116. 5:14and calling for um sovereignty and
117. 5:17self-governance she does not want
118. 5:18slogans she does not want Grace which is
119. 5:21like forgiveness she doesn't want
120. 5:22forgiveness she does not want they can
121. 5:25apologize she's not forgiving them um
122. 5:28she does not want paper she does not
123. 5:30want these empty promises these empty
124. 5:31words what she wants is tarot water
125. 5:36labor and ultimately those things
126. 5:38together equal land right and so I
127. 5:41highlighted a picture of the tarot which
128. 5:42is kind of a a symbolic of land she
129. 5:45wants to and with this with this tarot
130. 5:48and water and labor she will be able to
131. 5:49feed her people um and by feeding them
132. 5:54and ensuring their sustenance she can
133. 5:56perhaps govern PE the people
134. 5:59so what's interesting about this poem
135. 6:02apologies is that the idea of these the
136. 6:05empty apologies continues to be
137. 6:08continues to resonate and be important
138. 6:10just last year President Biden issued a
139. 6:13formal apology for Indian schools the
140. 6:16schools that had been active um from
141. 6:201819 to well into the
142. 6:241900s um and as we know uh these schools
143. 6:28neglected native American children um
144. 6:32and erased their tribal identities in
145. 6:34addition to um you know abuse at at some
146. 6:38schools and So
147. 6:41eventually in 2024 I believe this was
148. 6:442024 it might have been 2023 Biden
149. 6:47apologized so the um the transcript says
150. 6:52I formally apologize as president of the
151. 6:55United States for what we did I formally
152. 6:57apologize and then there's chearing it's
153. 6:59long overdue it it was a 20-minute
154. 7:01speech and he um you know and he
155. 7:04included uh a statement that this had
156. 7:07happened right part of the apology is
157. 7:09it's just acknowledging this happened
158. 7:10this is real we're not there's no debate
159. 7:12over whether this happened this happened
160. 7:14um and we apologize because we
161. 7:16acknowledged it was wrong and it's
162. 7:17public and we put it out there so a lot
163. 7:20of people would say it's worth something
164. 7:22but tras um in her poem apologies points
165. 7:26out that these apologies are empty
166. 7:28they're meaningless and she doesn't want
167. 7:30them she
168. 7:31wants um reparations she wants money she
169. 7:36wants land she wants something subsi in
170. 7:38return uh so it's just interesting that
171. 7:42the idea of these apologies continues to
172. 7:45resonate today