Heavy metal has left us more than one anthem, whether its critics or detractors admit it or not. Indians by the American trash metal group Anthrax is one of them. Written by all members of the band at the time, it became an impressive hit, and is, alongside Iron Maden's Run to the Hills, the most important song written in English to denounce the genocide of Native American peoples, perpetrated by Europeans and their descendants every since they first landed on the American continent.

Anthrax opened their third album, released in 1987, with a piece that gave the LP its name; Among the living. This song describes the character on its cover; a friendly little man who greets you politely by raising his hat. We saw an identical character representing a dead man who walks among the living, a little man who approaches the family of the 1986 film Poltergeist II. He also greets people politely by raising his hat in the film; he does so while singing: “God is in his holy temple…”.

God is in his holy temple, is a beautiful and intriguing Christian hymn published in 1818 and written by Samuel Woodworth (1784-1842) which appears in his first volume of poetry God in his temple , a collection of poems, odes, songs, and other metrical effusions.

The aforementioned character in Poltergeist II is Reverend Henry Kane, played in the film by actor and writer Julian Beck, who was suffering from stomach cancer during the filming process and found himself in the terminal phase, giving a cadaverous appearance to the character, and would eventually die in 1985 before filming finished. In the scene where he visits the Feeling family's door, the youngest daughter warns her father that the “good” Reverend Kane is not what he seems. Young actress Heather O'Rourke masterfully plays Carol Anne, the youngest daughter of the family, who has extrasensory powers and has perceived that the visitor is a ghost "among the living."

In this important scene, Steve, the father, is questioned by the Reverend Henry Kane: “I think you have a problem here... I think there is an Indian living here with you”. Steve, played by Craig T. Nelson, confirms this and the reverend warns him: “you are in danger”.

The film, directed by Brian Gibson and written and produced by Michael Garis and Mark Victor, is based on characters by Steven Spielberg. The supposed threat of an American Indian living with the family and protecting them from the curses that surround them is Reverend Kane's message. In reality, the Indian is his key protective talisman, along with other protectors of the entire family, such as Grandma Jess and spiritualist Tangina Barrons, exquisitely played by Zelda Rubinstein.This positive message is what Anthrax, with the powerful simplicity of their album and song, knew how to interpret in terms of miscegenation as a solution.

A very interesting metaphor to recognize and analyze is that Taylor, the Native American played by Will Sampson, is the true central hero of the film, defending the family in the world of “the living”, and Grandmother Jess, played by Geraldine Fitzgerald—who in life also had extrasensory powers—fights and also defeats the beast from beyond.

The Indian represents a fundamental fragment of our culture alongside the grandmother of European origin: the ancestors who are no longer here, who continue to accompany us and are a fundamental part of the solid American roots that persist today. Miscegenation as a solution. The mix is more alive than ever. The cultural and inclusive miscegenation, the genetic miscegenation, present throughout the continent and that, thanks to Hispanicity as an applied ideal, reached levels never seen in the history of humanity, thanks to the arrival, the return, the journey and "El Tornaviaje", of the Spanish and other Europeans since 1492.

In America, we all have a Native American living within us. Many, in our DNA. It is undeniable, regardless of its proportion. It is even more noticeable culturally in the most everyday activities that we carry out or accompany us daily. In art, the way we dress, spiritual activities, our names, and the places where we live, religious customs are mixed and, most especially, in food. Cultural mixing is also a forceful reality throughout the world, today we call it Interculturality. "La Hispanidad", as a true-life experience, consolidated this process of massive miscegenation. Hispanicity was more than 500 years ahead of our time. Global miscegenation continues throughout the world, still at a different pace. It is a natural and unstoppable phenomenon, in the long term.

In the lyrics of the song Indians, Anthrax recalls that in North America, except for Mexico, this process of genetic and cultural mixing was much less present than in the rest of the continent. That reality continues to receive indifference and apathy from the public and governments. That the official policies of creating Indigenous Reserves forced the once proud, and warlike tribes into a desperate process of humiliation and annihilation, based on hate and prejudice. A stealth apartheid. According to the authors of the piece, we should “cry for the Indians.”

On the other hand, the powerful Brazilian group Sepultura released their sixth album Roots in 1996. The message of the song that names the album is be proud of our origins, of our roots, of all the fights for saving our heritage, even the bloodiest ones. At this point, a change of perspective or a simple introspection is essential, perhaps. We must recognize and condemning the genocide perpetrated. Accepting miscegenation in all its dimensions is the right thing to do. To start enjoying it, the next step. In Ibero-America many of us have already reached that level.