Your Views for September 29

Destroying our home

I think it’s safe to say that those of us who live here on Hawaii Island have a responsibility to take care of the land we call home.

Pohakuloa is called “The land of the night of long prayer” and holds a sacred and crucial part of maintaining life and stability here on Hawaii island. The world military has been abusing and destroying Pohakuloa, our home, since 1952.

If you can’t understand or get behind the idea that the very presence of the military here in Hawaii stems from an illegal act when Hawaii was stolen in 1893, or the idea that there are native plants and animals that are being harmed and eradicated on a constant bases and have been for over six decades, then maybe you can understand the simple resource of water.

The military has access to not only thousands upon thousands of acres of what used to be unmolested and pristine sacred land, but they also operate above Hawaii island’s aquifer. This aquifer is just below the surface of constant attacks, bombing and exposure to harmful and deadly toxins such as lead and radiation. This resource of water is essential to all life on the island. If we compromise our water, we compromise our very own existence.

Although there is a lot of confrontation regarding the military continuing to do harm to our home, this has become more than a matter of religion, culture or money. It is most simply and purely about life here on the island. It is about all the communities scattered across Hawaii island that continue to receive a lack of transparency. Why do we accept harmful treatment to our ways of life from our supposed leaders and military — the defenders of our freedom?

J.K. Silva

Hilo