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Native Hawaiian Panel Withdraws Support For World's Largest Telescope
sciencehabit writes: Trustees of the Office of Hawaiian Affairs (OHA) – a state agency established to advocate for native Hawaiins — voted Thursday to withdraw their support for construction of the Thirty-Meter Telescope (TMT) on the summit of the Mauna Kea volcano. The vote follows weeks of protests by Native Hawaiians who say the massive structure would desecrate one of their most holy places. The protests have shut down construction of the telescope, which would be the world's largest optical telescope if completed. The vote, which reverses a 2009 decision to endorse the project, strikes a powerful if symbolic blow against a project that, for many native Hawaiians, has come to symbolize more than a century of assaults against their land, culture and sovereignty.
And who exactly should the land "revert to"? Are you going to base this on genetic tests? Should it go back to the first wave of polynesian settlers or the second wave? Maybe it should be purged of all humans and revert to its natural state? Or perhaps handed to the British? Or perhaps the Japanese, who would have conquered it?
Settlement and migration are normal parts of human societies. The land I was born in changed hands dozens of times over the past two thousand years. The idea that the people who first landed on some piece of land have special dibs and eternal rights to self-government is dumb in the extreme. Hawaii should be happy that it became part of the US.
On the other hand, on balance, I'm not sure the US is getting much out of it; so perhaps Hawaii should be kicked out of the union altogether. We'd sure save a lot of money in subsidies.
Native Hawaiians had the misfortune of living on one of the most strategically important pieces of land on the planet.
How is that a "misfortune"? They are better off than anyone else in Polynesia, and have one of the highest standards of living in the world. If they want to stick to the old ways and try to eke out a living by trying to grow taro in volcanic ash, they can still do so. Yet for some strange reason, few choose to do that.