NAFPS Forum

Quote from: Advanced Smite on November 14, 2023, 10:06:38 PMLink to Fake Indians blog post: https://ancestorstealing.blogspot.com/2023/10/little-big-wasicu-white-pretendian-lies.html

What rolls down here is about Theodore C. Van Alst:

QuoteFor this pretendian blogpost, we will look at how TVA, an avowed expert in American Indian Studies, misled a Portland State University hiring committee with their false claims to American Indian ancestry. This is important, since the candidate and their false claims inform their scholarly output, academic ethics and integrity, and the potential pedagogy they employ in the classroom; All of which compromise the ethical standards of university community and are harmful to legitimate American Indian students and communities who interact with the university. With that, we appreciate the efforts of former students and subordinates of Dr. Theodore C. Van Alst, Jr., (aka TVA) who submitted some of the information included in this post.

Quote from: KrazyKraut on May 20, 2011, 09:51:29 AM... of RationalWiki: http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Main_Page ?

It's excellent. One of my favourite spots on the Internet. I have linked to posts in there several times here in the NAFPS forum.

There is no Facebook group, only a FB page that one can "follow". No new posts since 2019: https://www.facebook.com/Rationalwiki

Tribal Alliance Against Frauds (TAAF) released a 70-page report on the claims made by Theodore C. Van Alst, Jr. and his daughter, Emily C. Van Alst. I'm not going to lay everything out in a post but will instead direct people to the report.

The report is available at this link:
https://tribalallianceagainstfrauds.org/van-alst

In my opinion, there is ample evidence of the harm done by both Theodore Van Alst and Emily Van Alst. While I am generally sympathetic to second generation pretendians, Emily Van Alst has expanded upon the false claims of her father and profited from it.

Theodore Van Alst and Emily Van Alst have claimed to be members of the Mackinac Bands of Chippewa and Ottawa Indians, Inc. which is a Corporation Posing as an Indigenous Nation (CPAIN). The Mackinac Bands of Chippewa and Ottawa Indians, Inc. website claims to require documented lineal descent from one the seven historical bands: https://www.mackinacbands.org/enrollment. The TAAF report (page 11) lays out why this isn't true for Theodore Van Alst and Emily Van Alst. It isn't even consistent with their earlier claims of descent from other tribes.

TAAF was incredibly thorough. 

http://www.bluecorncomics.com/stype039.htm Check out the "Mardi Gras Indians"

Long article with much else, you have to read to the bottom of the page to gather all the"Mardi Gras Indians" stuff.

"Don Sly" is still active on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/don.sly.33/

There are lots of photos of him in Plains dressing. Seems many of them are from another Facebook place:

https://www.facebook.com/Soaringeaglesingers [Native medicine drum group.]

Both FB places link to: http://aquidneckindiancouncil.org/
[Aquidneck Island Intertribal Indian Council
Home of the Soaring Eagle Singers]

I moved the topic. Let us list any and all FB pages, esp. those filled with ridiculous stereotypical AI slop, falsely claiming to be Native.

If the page is run by someone non-Native who simply has an interest in the culture or issues, they should not be listed. But commercial pages esp. there to promote a business selling knockoffs of Natives arts and crafts certainly belongs on this list.

They are as active as ever: https://www.maineprimitive.com/

If one subscribes to newsletters, they will come from Michael Douglas <staff@maineprimitive.com>.

They are now (2026, 2027, 2028 moving into Sámi areas in Sweden, which concerns me:

https://www.maineprimitive.com/experiences-in-person/p/maine-primitive-arctic-circle-survival-expedition-sweden-with-michael-douglas-toby-cowern

https://www.maineprimitive.com/sweden-nomadic-journey-2026

QuoteYou will learn from Sámi hosts, move through reindeer country, practice fieldcraft, and share seasonal meals that connect place to plate.

Quote from: czech on February 07, 2011, 09:35:38 AMhttp://www.minesandcommunities.org/

Still a very valuable resource, although no new articles since 2022:

QuoteWelcome Mines and Communities

Mines and Communities is now an archive site, after the sad death of its chief editor, Roger Moody in 2022. Mines and Communities was active from 2001 to 2022 in publishing articles on the detriment of mining. Those articles are still available here although no new articles will be added.


This website is a data base of around 14,000 articles covering 1856 mining companies with operations in 171 countries concerning 82 minerals and metals, published by a unique network of indigenous and solidarity NGOs, representing many thousands of people directly affected by the mining industry.

This site also has the Partizans archive and you can read more about the history of Partizans and associated organisations.

MAC was launched in 2001, and its priorities were governed by an editorial board, under our foundation statement, the London Declaration. We provide communities, NGOs, activists, the media - and the general public - with information about many aspects of global mining and its impacts.

Sámi- (Saami)- related stuff: 69 articles about Norway. 40 articles about Sweden. 30 articles about Finland.

Quote from: critter - a white non-ndn person on December 08, 2011, 02:04:58 AMhttp://www.facebook.com/DancingMoccasins

This FB page is very active. Some authentic stuff, mixed with obviously fake AI posts, links to other fake pages and also links to regular news items.

There must be hundreds if not thousands of "indigenous" FB pages like this.

Is it possible to list them and warn against them?

Sam Morningstar at Quora did some genealogy work on their leadership and claims of descent.

https://www.quora.com/Is-the-Lenape-Nation-of-Pennsylvania-legitimate-or-pretendian-Does-coming-from-a-non-former-Jim-Crow-state-make-it-any-more-reliable
It's bogus.

And coming from a non-former Jim Crow state doesn't have anything to do with reliability or veracity levels.

I mean, one of the very worst states that is propelling overtly fraudulent "tribes" is liberal Vermont. They just love recognizing fake Abenaki groups up there. And like the Lenape of Pennsylvania, the members of these groups do not even have the ancestral connections that they are claiming. Yet, state, municipal, and local governments as well as public and private orgs love to platform these fake groups anyway.

Of course, these groups may try to lay claim to Native progenitors/lineages. Or, they try to posture and pantomime reciting their supposed ancestral bona fides. But, they fall apart upon any further inspection.

Let's take just a very cursory look, shall we?

So, the Lenape Nation of Pennsylvania is claiming their members descend from Hannah Freeman, Isaac Still, Killbuck and Henry.


Well, they've got a huge problem right out of the gate because Hannah Freeman never had children. She remained in the east as a single, indigent elderly woman. Isaac Still moved west - out of PA - with his tribe. Same for Killbuck. And "Henry" is ill-defined here.

And if you really want to do a deep dive on this group, look at the current "chief," Adam Waterbear Depaul.


He's an inter-generational legacy Pretendian, getting his "Lenape" claim from his Pretendian mother, Shelley (Halstead) Depaul.


She claimed her grandfather Robert Seipler was of Lenape ancestry. Fun fact: he was not. FakeIndians/AncestorStealing blog has debunked that claim.

Shelley DePaul, Swartmore College Has a Fraud!
Shelley, Shelley, Shelley, it is not like you have not been warned... Perhaps the University of Pennsylvania and Swartmore would learn to ...
https://ancestorstealing.blogspot.com/2015/11/shelley-depaul-swartmore-college-has.html
There are no doubt a very small number of descendants of remote Lenape ancestors. But, this cohort represents a descendant population, not members of a tribal nation with any Native status. Further, they would need to be way more specific and less cagey about this ancestry to even be recognized as legit descendants, whether by the wider Lenape population or even just within a genealogical context.

An analogy would be like Pocahontas descendants. There are thousands of legit descendants out there. And they can be recognized as such. But, they can't join the Pamunkey tribe based on this ancestry alone. And if they formed the "Pamunkey Nation of Virginia" as some kind of competing tribe to the legit and extant Pamunkey Tribe, they would be engaged in a sort of fraud endeavor.

But, the situation with many of these fake "tribes" is even more pronounced, in that the members aren't even legit descendants of the tribe they are claiming.