Never Back Down

I just watched the 2008 film, “Never Back Down”, which in reality is just an update of a similar movie from my own childhood, “The Karate Kid”.  Towards the end of the movie, the hero and villain are about to slug it out in the parking lot, MMA-style, and the protagonist makes a keen observation while sensing the psychotic antagonist’s hesitancy.  The villain loves an audience.  It is not enough to win a fight convincingly.  He wants to beat somebody’s ass, and do it in front of a crowd of roaring fellow teens, and to have it broadcast on YouTube over and over and over.

He still has issues, that’s not questioned at all.  But he’s the kind of guy who whose hobby is to do exactly what he does in the movie, to pick fights and record the glory.  He goes to some considerable lengths at times too, using a girlfriend to lure the hero to a party where they can rumble.

There are some who will consider this idea far-fetched, but I don’t think it is.  Our Wednesday night Council meetings have become those fights.  The July 1 meeting felt, for all purposes, like a premeditated ambush.  Some of my co-workers already knew what they were going to say, chiming in right at Other Business.  Like the Karate Kid, Wink Soderberg and I happened to be around when others were itching for a fight.  The letter from our Director of Development about last year’s Leno Letter was like throwing down the fighting mats for a match.  Except I didn’t know it at the time.

When the ABC’s first got elected in 2004, that marked I think the start of these theatrical meetings, although the Tribe had its share during that period of legal struggles involving Ed Pearsall, Reyn Leno, Bob Haller, and Jan Reibach.  Poor Ed seemed all alone at some of those meetings, and I guess he was.  But I remember the first two meetings Angie, Buddy, and I had to endure as they were laden with accusations of…where to start, of buying the election, of being owned by “the Michigan Group”, and interfering in a hiring matter.  It took some getting used to, and I’m not sure one really does.

The trend continued into 2005, starting within weeks of Wink Soderberg and Kathy Tom getting elected as some anonymous flyer hit mailboxes describing our mythical plans to cut per capita, Elders’ security, etc.  The following meeting was packed, and there were a number of scripted comments that were also waiting in the wings, including one at me.  From a political standpoint, it makes sense.  There was a large audience then, all the more reason to try and make somebody look bad.

Last year might have been one of the worst, there was the matter of a letter some Tribal member wanted read into the record, a suggestion our acting Chair didn’t bother to mention until the onset of Other Business.  There was also the meeting where our acting Chair had the Tribe’s Human Resources Director stand up, sheepishly I might add, and refute the statements of a rival Council member.  It makes me wonder what will be in store for me this Wednesday, July 8, as we hold one ahead of schedule due to lack of quorum next week.

I ask myself this:  What is worse, that I’ve become so cynical and jaded as to expect these sorts of things, or that more often than not these things, these plotted attacks, can be counted on to happen?

All I can do is roll with the punches.