Role models and true stories of right speech

From 16Guidelines

Chief Joseph

"Chief Joseph" was born in 1840 in what is now Oregon, USA. He was elected leader of the Nez Perce at a time when his first nation was struggling to resist the takeover of its homeland by American colonists. His surrender speech of October 1877, given after a 1400 mile march, immortalised him as a voice of conscience in American popular culture.

Truthful words and honourable behaviour are of utmost importance to Native Americans because they form the bedrock of society and trade. Chief Joseph said of Lewis and Clark, the first colonists that he encountered: “They talked straight and our people gave them a great feast as proof that their hearts were friendly.” Tragically, this positive first impression left the Nez Perce vulnerable to the lies and betrayals that followed.

Chief Joseph was confused and dismayed at the way that other colonists behaved. When he visited Washington in 1879, he said: “I cannot understand how the Government sends a man out to fight us, as it did General Miles, and then breaks his word. Such a government has something wrong about it. I cannot understand why so many chiefs are allowed to talk so many different ways, and promise so many different things… I am tired of talk that comes to nothing. It makes my heart sick when I remember all the good words and all the broken promises.

“Good words do not last long unless they amount to something. Words do not pay for my dead people. They do not pay for my country now overrun by white men.”

Buckmaster Fuller

Buckminster Fuller was an American visionary who invented the geodesic dome and was an early advocate for solar power. However at the age of 32, he was on the verge of a breakdown. His first child had died. He had a wife and new-born baby but was bankrupt, discredited and jobless. Contemplating suicide on the shores of Lake Michigan, it suddenly struck him that his life belonged, not to himself, but to the universe. At that moment he chose to embark on an experiment to discover what a single penniless and unknown individual could do for humanity. He vowed not to speak until his every thought and word would be helpful to others. His silence lasted for two years but led to a period of intensive altruistic creativity. In time, Buckminster Fuller left behind himself a legacy of inventions and earned himself the epithet “the grandfather of the future.”