people vs. fossil fuels — Northside Friends Meeting

WE SEE YOU. WE LOVE YOU. WE WILL GET JUSTICE FOR YOU

by Sarz Maxwell
with help from Beth Burbank, Eileen Flanagan, and Daniel Lakemacher

Twelve words to embody the People vs Fossil Fuels protest in Washington DC October 11-15, 2021. This report will center on the issues – climate change, racism & treaty violations, sexual exploitation – rather than Beth and Sarz’ personal experiences. Still, issues gain importance when they become personal, so here’s our story. There are a lot of links, as we want Friends to learn about the issues while our stories bring them close.

This summer Ji Choe and Barry Feldman opened many Friends’ eyes to the Water Protectors at Anishinaabe Treaty Camps battling Line 3, a tarsands oil pipeline that violates multiple indigenous treaties and will potentially poison the entire Mississippi River system. In August Beth and I attended a Stop Line 3 event in St Paul MN. There we got to know Daniel Lakemacher who, with his partner Allie Boyaris, has been attending Northside Friends Meeting since their recent move from Champaign. At the porta-potty line in St Paul we met Eileen Flanagan, board chair of Earth Quaker Action Team. Both these amazing people have played pivotal roles in our journeys. For example, in September Beth and Meredith George of EFM joined Daniel to work at Red Lake Treaty Camp in Minnesota.

October brought us to the #PeopleVsFossilFuels event in Washington DC. A group of several dozen people, mostly Indigenous, were organized by Honor the Earth, coordinated by Daniel, and supported by ILYM. Four van-loads travelled from North Dakota and Minnesota to Chicago. Beth had located a fifth van and the whole cavalcade left Chicago at midnight Friday, arriving at the Hyatt/White House Sunday evening. Big caravans move slowly, especially as just two hours out of DC we learned that everyone needed a covid test. At 5:30 on a Sunday evening, amazing Daniel located a Maryland clinic to test all of us! Way opened like this all week.

On Monday, Indigenous People’s Day, several hundred of us marched on the White House, singing “We are the protectors,” and chanting “Black Snake [oil line] Killers”. People avoiding arrest – undocumented, outstanding warrants, etc – crossed the street to the public park, while about 140 chose to remain behind the police lines. Beth was one of these “arrestables” (not to be confused with crustables, which is a sandwich), and waited hours at the DC Park Police station to pay the perfunctory $50 fine.

Tuesday afternoon we converged outside the Army Corps of Engineers, whose motto is emblazoned above their door: ACCOUNTABILITY INTEGRITY RELIABILITY [yeah, right].

We delivered a million signed petitions condemning Line 3. Drummers played and sang while two people climbed the flagpoles, replacing the colonizer’s [American] flag upside down and emblazoned with LAND BACK.

Jaime Pinkham, the first Indigenous person appointed to high rank in the Army Corps of Engineers, establishes policy for conservation of the nation's water and wetland resources. We visited his apartment complex in Crystal City on Wednesday, but he didn’t come downstairs and talk with us.

Deborah Haaland is the first Native Secretary of the Interior, which oversees the so-called Bureau of Indian Affairs. She has won indigenous hearts by actively investigating the silent epidemic of Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women, Girls and Two-Spirits.

Secretary Haaland was not in town Thursday when we marched on the Department of the Interior. Eleven Indigenous people entered and sat in the lobby. With drums urging us on, about 45 more of us spontaneously surged through the door.

We sat in a circle on the lobby floor, burnt sage and sang. After a few hours the Homeland Security storm troopers arrived, descending first on the obvious leaders and tazing two of them into submission. Most indigenous people refused to participate in their arrests and were carried or dragged away, though we elderly white women were allowed to stand and walk on our own. Indeed, all through the process we were painfully aware of the differences between how police treated indigenous people, particularly women, and their conduct towards us nice elderly white Quaker ladies.

The process was eerily unhurried. It took at least three hours for all 50-odd of us to be handcuffed and transported to holding cells scattered around the city. And every time someone was hauled away we chanted “We see you. We love you. We will get justice for you.”

These dozen words echo in my head, words that I’ve been reflecting on ever since. We see you. We love you. We will get justice for you. To me these twelve words carry the entire message we travelled to DC to deliver.

WE SEE YOU

The People vs. Fossil Fuels event was officially about America’s addiction to oil, but the intersectional issues are like petals of a chrysanthemum. Burning fossil fuels causes climate change. Climate change, We See You. Providing more oil is the reason for Line 3. Line 3 crosses indigenous lands protected by centuries-old treaties. Treaty law is supposed to be supreme, superseding even constitutional law … except, of course, when the treaty is with “Indians”. Broken treaties, We See You.

Pipelines spill. Spill? “Spill” is when a child knocks over his glass of milk. Oil “spills” murder uncountable living beings and wreak environmental catastrophe that endures for generations. “Spills” on Line 3 will poison the entire Mississippi River system – on Earth all water is connected. Water Protectors at the camps that stretch along Line have reported dozens of unreported chemical “spills” along Line 3. Water is NOT a renewable resource! When all the Earth’s water is contaminated, it’s gone, and Water Is Life. Pipeline “spills”, We See You.

The Annishinaabe have built their culture around their abundant fields of wild rice, but when Enbridge pumped billions of gallons of water out of the marshes, the wild rice was ravaged. The cultural genocide dates back to 1860 with the boarding schools, whose stated goal was “Kill the Indian, Save the Man”. The boarding schools were run by various denominations, including Quaker. This sabotage of Native culture has been largely unacknowledged, but: Indigenous culture, We See You.

The intersectional issues surrounding fossil fuels are boundless. Many have willfully been kept invisible. Today, We See You.

WE LOVE YOU

Since 1492 trauma has been the ongoing experience of Indigenous peoples on Turtle Island. Each individual Indigenous person has been traumatized by white supremacy culture, layered thickly over generations of historic genocide.

A common experience of trauma survivors is a feeling of isolation and shame. Traumatized people feel soiled and befouled; they often blame and ultimately punish themselves rather than the perpetrator(s). For traumatized people the notion that others may love them is unimaginable. They are not only invisible, they feel that they should be invisible. Trauma survivors and great-grandchildren of trauma survivors, We Love You!

WE WILL GET JUSTICE FOR YOU

Consumer economies are based on scarcity; they require unmet desires to function and flourish. In commodity cultures there is always the compulsion to get more, driven by the knowledge that someone else has more. In a democracy, one group ‘wins’ while the others ‘lose’, creating inevitable feelings of injustice. In commodity cultures ruled by democracy, gratitude and contentment are unlikely, even irrelevant. Justice can exist only at the expense of injustice for another.

Indigenous cultures are not historically democratic, but make decisions by consensus, a practice familiar to Quakers. Action is not taken until all are in unity, until there is harmony, until “our minds are one,” as it says in the Haudenosaunee thanksgiving address. There are no ‘losers’ in decisions by consensus, nor are there winners. All are served justly.

Indigenous ‘economies’ uphold what Robin Wall Kimmerer calls ‘The Honorable Harvest’, where each takes only what they need, with gratitude for the Earth’s abundance. This abundance is a gift, not a commodity -- the just allotment of each person ‘costs’ nothing. These concepts of Honorable Harvest, of reciprocal sharing, of gratitude and abundance, are eloquently stated in the Thanksgiving Address, which is recited at the start of many occasions. In her bestselling book Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teaching of Plants, Kimmerer reminds us that “you cannot listen to the Thanksgiving Address without feeling wealthy”. The Address acknowledges kinship with all life, not just with humans but with the animals and plants, the winds and water. And it reminds us of our unity with the refrain, “And now our minds are one”. The Thanksgiving Address gives us a blueprint of justice for all. To all who live on Mother Earth, We Will Get Justice For You.

Many tribes recognize the Thanksgiving Address, and there are many translations. This one is borrowed from Braiding Sweetgrass.

Thanksgiving Address

When we look upon the faces around us, we see that the cycles of life continue. We have been given the duty to live in balance and harmony with each other and all living things. So now let us bring our minds together as one as we give greetings and thanks to each other as People.

We are thankful to our Mother Earth, for she gives us everything we need for life. She supports our feet as we walk about upon her. It gives us joy that she still continues to care for us, just as she has from the beginning of time. To our Mother, we send thanksgiving, love and respect. Now our minds are one.
We give thanks to all the waters of the world for quenching our thirst, for providing strength and nurturing life for all beings. We know its power in many forms — waterfalls and rain, mists and streams, rivers and oceans, snow and ice. We are grateful that the waters are still here and meeting their responsibility to the rest of Creation. Now our minds are one.
With one mind, we honor and thank all the Food Plants we harvest from the garden, especially the Three Sisters [corn, beans and squash] who feed the people with such abundance. Since the beginning of time, grains, vegetables, beans and fruit have helped the people survive. Many other living things draw strength from them as well. We gather together in our minds all the plant foods and send them a greeting and thanks. Now our minds are one.
Now we turn to the Medicine Herbs of the world. From the beginning they were instructed to take away sickness. They are always waiting and ready to heal us. We are so happy that there are still among us those special few who remember how to use the plants for healing. With one mind, we send thanksgiving, love, and respect to the Medicines and the keepers of the Medicines. Now our minds are one.
The Earth has many families of Trees who each have their own instructions and uses. Some provide shelter and shade, others fruit and beauty and many useful gifts. The Maple is the leader of the trees, to recognize its gift of sugar when the People need it most. Many peoples of the world recognize a Tree as a symbol of peace and strength. With one mind we greet and thank the Tree of life. Now our minds are one.
We put our minds together as one and thank all the Birds who move and fly about over our heads. The Creator gave them the gift of beautiful songs. Each morning they greet the day and with their songs remind us to enjoy and appreciate life. The Eagle was chosen to be their leader and to watch over the world. To all the Birds, from the smallest to the largest, we send our joyful greetings and thanks. Now our minds are one.
We are thankful for the powers we know as the Four Winds. We hear their voices in the moving air as they refresh us and purify the air we breathe. They help to bring the change of seasons. From the four directions they come, bringing us messages and giving us strength. With one mind we send our greetings and thanks to the Four Winds. Now our minds are one.
We now send greetings and thanks to our eldest brother, the Sun. Each day without fail he travels the sky from east to west, bringing the light of a new day. He is the source of all the fires of life. With one mind, we send greetings and thanks to our Brother, the Sun. Now our minds are one.
We put our minds together and give thanks to our oldest Grandmother, the Moon, who lights the nighttime sky. She is the leader of women all over the world and she governs the movement of ocean tides. By her changing face we measure time, and it is the Moon who watches over the arrival of children here on Earth. With one mind, we send greetings and thanks to our Grandmother, the Moon.
We give thanks to the Stars who are spread across the sky like jewelry. We see them at night, helping the Moon to light the darkness and bringing the dew to the gardens and growing things. When we travel at night, they guide us home. With our minds gathered as one, we send greetings and thanks to all the Stars. Now our minds are one.
We gather our minds to greet and thank the enlightened Teachers who have come to help throughout the ages. When we forget how to live in harmony, they remind us of the way we were instructed to live as people. With one mind, we send greetings and thanks to these caring Teachers. Now our minds are one.
We now turn our thoughts to the Creator, or Great Spirit, and send greetings and thanks for all the gifts of Creation. Everything we need to live a good life is here on Mother Earth. For all the love that is still around us, we gather our minds together as one and send our choicest words of greetings and thanks to the Creator.

And now our minds are one.