THE ONLY GOOD INDIAN IS A DEAD INDIAN: MA INGALLS

And no, Caroline Ingalls did not mean Indians from India, those nice folks we call when we have problems with our computers or our English grammar. She probably thought the world was flat and she’d fall off if she even went too far East or West. (However, if you are looking to kill an Indian from the Asian subcontinent, I have it on good authority that all you need to do is pick a target from a caste below you—although I’d suggest two below just to be safe—kill him or her, and pin a polite note to the local constable explaining that you were merely expressing your social superiority, as is you right, and a small tip is always advised).


American Indians. Native Americans. The folks we pretend to like on Thanksgiving and when we argue why we should be able to have Indian mascots for our sports teams.

Remember the good old days of the morality of Little House on the Prairie, the nice honest land-grabbing white folks stealing the land of the pagan savages: that spunky little Laura, the uptight Mary, the inconsequential Carrie, the rugged Pa, and the sanctimonious Ma? Based on the feedback I’ve received, it sounds like a lot of you grew up with Ma’s pithy wisdom, and want to know how such truths can be translated from prairie to present.

The question I get second most (the first is simply, can I kill Indians?), is does the Bible say anything about killing Indians?

MH: It’s a good question. The Bible says it is perfectly fine because there is no such thing as an Indian. If you look closely, God destroyed everyone on the planet about six thousand years ago, and the survivors are the sons of Ham, Shem, and Japeth, which account for the populations of Africa, Asia, and Europe. There were no survivors in the Americas, and since the last land bridge was at lease twelve thousand years ago, Indians cannot exist (neither are there any native animals, which is why killing buffalo and mountain lions is perfectly fine as well). Quod erat demonstrandum. It can’t be a sin if the target does not exist. Isn’t the Bible wonderful? This is the perfect murder since how can you be tried for murder if the person you kill never existed? Try that question out on the FBI.

Now I’ve heard folks like the Mormons and some deranged fundamentalists explain Indians as lost tribes or whatnot, but last I heard, the Ethiopian Jews claimed the lost tribe status and they’ve now been found.

Another concerned follower has asked, but isn’t killing redskins a hate crime?

MH: Well, if you refer to American Indians as “redskins,” “chief,” “Tonto,” it probably is. “Redskins” is actually a highly offensive term. The preferred term is native peoples, first peoples, American Indians, or their tribal identity (Dine, Pima, Iroquois, etc). But your question about hate crimes is important. We at “The Perfect Murder” strongly oppose all hate crimes. We seek a society where all are equal under the gun. That is why we urge our followers to get to know and understand their targets, be willing to apologize for oppression and centuries of genocide, to show compassion to the ones we kill. How can understanding and compassion be hate? If you hate Indians, don’t kill them, first walk a mile in their moccasins (then you can kill them, after you thank them for the use of their moccasins and the understanding the shoes gave you—but of course, most American Indians do not wear moccasins, so you might have to walk a mile in their Nikes).



So why did I choose to discuss Indians first? Well, I guess I’d have to say that white folks have been killing Indians for 500+ years and no one seems to care much about it. Lots of people don’t even realize there are any Indians left (see later post: The Best Target Is the One No One Realizes Is Even Alive). And so many are hidden off on reservations in the crappiest parts of America that no one much notices (I mean honestly, has anyone ever even been to either North or South Dakota?—and no, just stopping to take a picture of Mt. Rushmore doesn’t count).

The best place to kill an Indian is on a reservation, but not one of those casino reservations.  Pick one of the reservations with trailers and junker cars, and about a thousand liquor stores, cigarette outlets, and evangelical churches just off the rez. Now, killing an Indian on a reservation is not any more difficult that killing the poor in the inner city; no one cares, no one notices, fish in a barrel. Reservation life spans are so short the Indian would probably die on his/her own before the bullet hit him or her anyway. Alcohol does its part as well (have you seen the crappy reservations we put these Indians on? I’d want to drink myself blind if I lived there too). And then there’s the damn white people bringing blankets infected with smallpox (oh wait, wrong century).

Find an Indian who knows his/her best chance is off the reservation and tell him/her that you’ll drive him/her off the rez and set him/her up with a decent job at a co-op in Seattle or Los Angeles. Before you leave the reservation, apologize for five hundred years of genocide by European and U.S. peoples, tell them about your wonderful experience in a sweat lodge (Indians always appreciate it when white folks appropriate sacred rituals), pull out your gun and shoot him/her, and dump his/her body on the side of the road. For added effect, you could then drop an arrow near the body to persuade the FBI that another Indian did it (not the kind with the red rubber suction cups on the end—those don’t stick to anything and even the FBI might see through that one).

The best thing about killing on the reservation is the problem of jurisdiction. The federal government has so trivialized the authority of the tribal police that anything more than jaywalking tends to involve the FBI. And if you want to know how much American Indians like the FBI, send Leonard Peltier a letter c/o the Federal Prison in Lewisburg, PA.

And if all else fails, blame it on a cowboy.