Lies, Damned Lies, and the Complicated Accounting of Identity [Counterpoint]

Prior to 1973, Cher’s biography always listed her father (John Sarkisian) as being of Armenian heritage, while her mother, Georgia Holt, was of Irish and German extraction. But when Cher’s single “Half Breed” started climbing the Billboard charts (it would eventually hit number one), suddenly she remembered that she was 1/16th Cherokee on her mother’s side. That biographical revision probably helped stem protests from the Native community when Cher performed her hit in a full feathered headdress on an episode of The Sonny and Cher Comedy Hour.

Taylor Lautner also played the numbers. After being cast as the brooding, hot blooded werewolf foil to Robert Pattison’s cold, sparkly vamp peen, Lautner suddenly discovered his Native roots. However, it appears that it was a casting feint, possibly done because the director made a huge deal about asking all the Native actors for “their papers.” But will Lautner keep promoting his ancestry after the final Twilight movie airs in November? Probably not.

However, some people do more than to use their tenuous Native heritage to boost sales. Back in 2000, Colorlines published an expose titled “Charity Scams: Making Big Business Out of Native American Poverty” which pointed to American Indian Heritage Foundation, run by one Princess Pale Moon.

Koren Capozza reports:

This practice became apparent to Eleanor McMullen, chairwoman of the Port Graham tribe in Northern Alaska, when she learned that 1,000 pounds of beef liver were en route to her tiny coastal village. The donation was made in 1991 by American Indian Heritage Foundation (AIHF), a charity in Falls Church, VA, which had solicited funds on behalf of the Port Graham tribe but had not consulted with the Port Graham people.

McMullen was offended and demanded that the beef be returned to sender. “We weren’t looking for any donations, we were just trying to adjust to being without what we normally have.” The Port Graham Aleuts were hard hit by the Alaska oil spill that year. “I found out that this occurred amongst many people and that a lot of that money went to [the AIHF president’s] program, her wage, her staff.”

My investigation showed similar dubious practices by the National Relief Charities, the Native American Heritage Association, the Southwest Indian Foundation, and the Southwest Indian Children’s Fund.

As of 2010, the American Indian Heritage Foundation was still being run by Princess Pale Moon, who was initially credited as being Chocktaw, but now identifies (as of her blog post from 2010) as Cherokee/Ojibwa. Capozza continues:

Princess Pale Moon is the personality behind the American Indian Heritage Foundation (AIHF), the charity that sent the unwanted beef liver to Alaska. Pale Moon claims Native ancestry and says she created the organization so that young American Indians wouldn’t have to feel ashamed—the way she supposedly did—about their heritage. The only problem is that no records support Pale Moon’s claim to be Native American. She’s not registered with any federally recognized tribe and was actually asked to leave the 1992 World Expo in Spain by U.S. intelligence when it discovered she was a fraud.

“We remind her that we don’t have any royalty,” says Vernon Bellecourt. “They’ve always got to be ‘princesses’ or something or other. It’s a white woman masquerading as an Indian and, of course, she has some Indians on her board to give her a cover.”

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