J ournalism for P eople B uilding a B etter W orld
THE DECOLONIZE ISSUE
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Indigenous Voices
no . 85 S pring 2018
What Standing Rock Gave the World
Melba Appawara (Northern Ute)
White Allies, We Are Not All in the Same Boat
The portraits of Project 562’s Matika Wilbur p 25
How Women Reclaim Power as Life-Givers
AN END TO WHITE SUPREMACY WHY COLONIALISM IS FAILING RIGHT ON TIME Mark Trahant
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TAX OVERHAUL AND THE IMMORALITY OF INEQUALITY
SOLUTIONS WE LOVE
“We’re Feeding Our Liberation” 13 People We Love: Podcasting the Revolution 16 The Page That Counts 18
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YES! ILLUSTRATIONS BY JULIE NOTARIANNI
WHAT LONGEVITY RESEARCH SAYS
ABOUT CREATING JUST COMMUNITIES
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PEOPLE WE LOVE
Sammi-Jo Lee
PODCASTING THE REVOLUTION You want to act against injustice, but you don’t know how? You think nonstop, one-sided political commentary seems to hurt more than it helps? A few podcasters are sharing a different perspective on the activism around us. And with compassion, practical tools, and a little millennial humor, they’re encouraging us to engage.
Brian Jost, a White person trying to learn about race, and Andre Koen, a Black diversity trainer, turned their conversations into the podcast “Armchair Activist.”
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PHOTO FROM LILLIE SUBURBAN NEWSPAPERS
THE DECOLONIZE ISSUE
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Indigenous Voices on Power and Resurgence
Isabella
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A ly s s a K l a i n ( D i n é )
we will not rest hoping is not enough our resilience shall prevail together we rise our ancestors always behind us POEM AND PHOTO BY MATIKA WILBUR FOR PROJECT 562
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THE DISRUPTION OF WHITE SUPREMACY WHY COLONIALISM IS FAILING RIGHT ON TIME Mark Trahant
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magine the end of the United States. It could happen like this: California secedes over a Trump-era order that is a total affront to the state’s citizens. Perhaps people would take to the streets after the federal government sends teams from the Justice Department to close the new marijuana stores and to impound the cash. And by “teams” I mean a military force. Think Standing Rock a thousand times over. Or, the people rise up after a deadly immigration clash, a brutal round-up of human beings that is offensive to every Californian. There are so many things that could spark action: an intractable fight over water, women’s health, oil and gas, and on and on. And what if the Trump administration figures California has a right to go? The nationalists have done the math and know that without California’s electoral votes, the 2020 election will not be a contest. President Donald J. Trump wins re-election. That’s not just fantasy. It’s a possibility because we are so divided by our thinking on religion, diversity, immigration, education, work, and, especially, what to do about climate change. And stoking those differences is our nation’s “colonial” mentality, a political domination by the most wealthy, their
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companies, and their government. The result is white male rule at a time when the country is demographically more diverse than ever. So the logical result is for people on both sides of that divide to say “enough” and go their own ways. An interesting question remains: Would the end of the United States end colonization and our current oppression of people of color? Or would another version of superiority just take over, one more chapter in a long-running story about power and race? Consider how short each wave of colonial hegemony generally is: a few hundred years. That’s only an instant. Rome was arguably the first global empire. It lasted five centuries until it collapsed from divisions from both within and outside. Every empire thereafter thought it was fine-tuning the use of power and its treatment of Indigenous people for advantage. Spain conquered the Americas and tapped unbelievable resources only to unravel in two centuries. Internal critics such as Bartolome de las Casas witnessed and wrote about the genocide and cultural rot that infects a conquering power. He described how the 16th-century native population of Hispaniola (the island that is now Haiti and the Dominican Republic) dropped from some 3 million people to a couple hundred. And for
what purpose? Land and resources for cheap. The British Empire later did the Spanish better, adding white superiority and a rigid class structure to the concept. The Americans learned from the British. Greed and superiority go together in what we think of as colonialism. It’s that presumed white superiority that is the rot that undermines American democracy. It is why Puerto Rico’s 3.4 million people do not get a say, a vote, in that process. The 690,000 people living in the District of Columbia have no representation. These are American citizens by law and second-class citizens in practice. Yet only 585,000 citizens of Wyoming get two senators and the power over the lives of others that comes with that representation. What happens the day Californians wake up to that contradiction? It’s not just Wyoming. You would have to total 22 of the smallest states to match California’s population; reasonably, its population should result in a total of 44 votes in the powerful Senate compared to two. I know the argument is that the United States is not a democracy but a republic. Regardless, a 22:1 voting ratio is not defensible in any conversation about self-governing. So after a California exit, who might leave next? Why not neighboring allies Washington and Oregon? States in the Northeast? It could happen fast. The end of the Soviet Union (only 74 years old) was a political shift so sudden that historians now describe the sequence of events as an instant. But the fissures were present long before collapse. The disruption should have been expected. “Disruption” is an important word to add to a discussion of ending colonialism. It explains the sudden—and not-so-sudden shifts in history—in a way that “decolonization” alone does not. Disruption is what we need to free ourselves from the economic, racial, and cultural oppression that is colonialism’s legacy.
Sinéad Talley (Karuk
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Yurok)
“It’s taken a long time for me to get outside of the blood quantum construct of thinking. I’m low blood quantum, and my family was disconnected for a while before we came back to the river. It’s been a returning process. Learning more about history and the fact that blood quantum is a European concept and that’s not how Native people determined who was a community member and who was not helped. When it comes down to it, blood quantum doesn’t mean anything. It’s your connection to place, it’s your kinship ties and how involved you are in the community. It has a lot to do with a lot of things, but indigeneity doesn’t have to do with blood quantum. You can know that and you can feel that, but they’re two different things. For me it’s taken a long time to feel that.” PHOTO BY MATIKA WILBUR FOR PROJECT 562
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WHAT STANDING ROCK GAVE THE WORLD AMERICANS SAW THE INDIGENOUS STRUGGLE— THE VIOLENCE, STOLEN RESOURCES, COLLUDING CORPORATIONS AND GOVERNMENTS—THAT GOES HAND IN HAND WORLDWIDE WITH PROTECTING THE EARTH. Jenni Monet
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t the height of the
S ta n d i n g R o c k , Indigenous teens half a world away in Norway were tattooing their young bodies with an image of a black snake. Derived from Lakota prophecy, the creature had come to represent the controversial Dakota Access pipeline for the thousands of water protectors determined to try to stop it. It was a show of international solidarity between the Indigenous Sami and the Lakota. “They got tattoos because of the Norwegian money invested in the pipeline,” said Jan Rune Måsø, editor of the Sami news division of Norway’s largest media company, NRK. Rune Måsø said the story about the tattoos was just one of about a hundred that his team of journalists covered over the course of the months-long pipeline battle in North Dakota. One of them, “The War on the Black Snake,” was awarded top honors at a journalism conference held in Trømsø in November. That story revealed large investments Norwegian banks had made to advance the $3.8 billion energy project, spurring a divestment campaign by the Sami Parliament. The backstory can be told simply. As early as April 2016, Indigenous activists protested the pipeline’s threat to the Standing Rock Sioux’s primary water supply, the Missouri River. While battles were fought in federal courts, representatives of hundreds of Indigenous groups from around the world—the Maori, the Sami, and the Sarayaku, to name a few—arrived. Temporary communities of thousands were created on the reservation borderlands in nonviolent resistance against the crude oil project. Police arrested more than 800 people, and many water protectors faced attack dogs, concussion grenades, rubber bullets, and, once, a water cannon on a freezing night in November. Last February, armored vehicles and m o v e m e n t at
police in riot gear cleared the last of the encampments. Recently, investigative journalism by The Intercept has documented that the paramilitary security firm TigerSwan was hired by DAPL parent Energy Transfer Partners to guide North Dakota law enforcement in treating the movement as a “national security threat.” Oil now flows through the pipeline under the Missouri. But this Indigenous-led disruption, the awakening resolve that was cultivated at Standing Rock, did not dissolve after February. Rather, it spread in so many different directions that we may never fully realize its reach. The spirit of resistance can easily be found in the half-dozen or so other pipeline battles across the United States. Beyond that, the movement amplified the greater struggle worldwide: treaty rights, sacred sites, and the overall stand to protect Indigenous land and life. To be sure, post-colonization has always demanded acknowledgment of Indigenous autonomy. It’s what spurred months of international advocacy when Haudenosaunee Chief Deskaheh attempted to speak before the League of Nations in Geneva, Switzerland, in 1923. He wanted to remind the world that European colonizers had honored Iroquois Confederacy nationhood upon entering treaty agreements under the two row wampum. The stand at Standing Rock, then, was not anything new—just more modern. Google the words “the next S t a n d i n g R o c k ” and you get a smattering of circumstances, mostly posed in the form of a question: Bears Ears, Line 3, Yucca Mountain. “The Next Standing Rock?” the headlines ask. The story of White Clay, Nebraska, is indicative. When the last tipis came down at Standing Rock, Clarence Matthew III, a middle-aged Sicangu Lakota
“Winter at Oceti Sakowin Camp,” November 2016, Cannon Ball, North Dakota.
PHOTO BY JOSUÉ RIVAS
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n 1503, not long after arriving in South America for the first time, Italian explorer Amerigo Vespucci wrote a letter to his friend describing the lands (now the Americas) that he had “discovered.” His words, not mine. Mundus Novus, he called it. “The New World.” The letter became an instant hit in Europe and was published widely in several countries. What followed was an unprecedented thirst for “discovery” of “new” territory and “exotic” people and resources, the age of colonialism. The idea of “old world” versus “new world” stuck and remains a common description of Europe versus the Americas. Several centuries later, here we are. A nation that nearly wiped out its Indigenous population in order to settle wave after wave of Europeans. Americans appreciate the “old world” history. We’ve all heard friends mention it before: the thrill of seeing “old” buildings in Paris or “ancient” ruins in Rome. It is precisely because of their age that these places remain intriguing to world travelers. The clear consensus is that the U.S. is too new to be interesting. The high-visibility culture and history are post-colonial. But take a closer look. This may be a young nation, but its Indigenous history is ancient, measured in tens of thousands of years. To ignore this perpetuates the harmful idea that the land was empty. It denies genocide and discredits the countless civilizations and millions of people whose home this was for centuries prior to European arrival. Who are still here. In the interest of resource extraction, President Trump last year slashed two of Utah’s best known landmarks by 2 million acres. Perhaps if more Americans understood how sacred Bears Ears is to the Navajo, Hopi, Ute, Hualapai, Shoshone, and Pueblo peoples—that’s a huge number of tribes—the land wouldn’t be at risk of destruction today. There’s a movement to hold on to ancient place names. Trump has stated his desire to reverse Obama’s decision to rename Mount McKinley to Denali (“the high one” in the Koyukon language), the name local Athabascan people have used for thousands of years. Trump has said the renaming was disrespectful to President McKinley, America’s 25th head of state, who was born and raised in Ohio and had no significant ties to Alaskan territory. It’s not too late to explore our ancient history, and we can begin by grasping a better understanding of tribal perspectives on landmarks, place names, and the historical people and events that make them significant. A deeper understanding of our lands and the diversity of Native cultures that have occupied them nourishes a collective American culture and gives us all something to be proud of: a history far richer and older than what we learn in our textbooks. Here are five landmarks significant to Indigenous people but renamed by white explorers. The ancient history of these places is often overlooked and not well known, but like so many places on this continent, they tell stories.
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A PRE-COLONIAL VIEW OF AMERICA TRAVEL IN “THE NEW WORLD” OFTEN MISSES ITS ANCIENT HISTORY. Chelsey Luger Photography by Thosh Collins
Khe Sapa
KHE SAPA or PAHA SAPA Lakota English translation: “The Mountains Emerging From the Earth; Dark, as Seen From a Distance” American name: The Black Hills
Rising from the Great Plains in South Dakota and extending into Wyoming, the Black Hills have hosted civilizations dating as far back as 11500 B.C. It has been described as the holy land
of the Great Sioux Nation as well as by many other tribes that have revered it. The creation story of Lakota/Dakota/ Nakota begins in Khe Sapa. For these nations, it is considered the birthplace of all that is. Indigenous people from many Great Plains nations visit the area to pray, to hold ceremonies, and to pay respects to their ancestors and the traditions they fought to carry on. In a famous 1980 Supreme Court decision, justices agreed with the
Great Sioux Nation and other plaintiffs that the Black Hills had been unconstitutionally seized from Native people. The court said that an act of Congress in 1877 violated the 1868 Fort Laramie Treaty and effectively stole 7 million acres for American development. Justice Harry Blackmun wrote in his opinion at the time, “A more ripe and rank case of dishonest dealings may never be found in our history.” The courts ordered a cash settlement yesmagazine . org
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GUIDANCE FROM THE PAST IS WRITTEN ON OUR BODIES SPIRIT WRITING HOLDS A PRIMAL POWER TO RECONNECT US TO OUR RESPONSIBILITIES TO EACH OTHER AND TO EARTH Mary Annette Pember
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t was the Thunderbird Woman image that caught my eye at the Standing Rock water protector camps. As an Ojibwe woman, I immediately realized that the depiction was an example of my ancestors’ ancient spirit writings, or symbols, recorded on birch bark scrolls and on rock faces along the Great Lakes long before Europeans landed in America. Thunderbird Woman, with her winged arms outstretched, seemed to float on the canvases at Standing Rock, portraying a cosmology in which
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dynamic spiritual forces are depicted internally, as if through an X-ray. Water rained down from her wings and thunderbolts surrounded her head. Her shape was a simple outline, and it was her heart that anchored her image. Images like this one represent the resurgence and reclamation of Indigenous art—in this case, spirit writing. And this resurgence isn’t just happening at Standing Rock. The artists of the Onaman Collective are reclaiming and sharing traditional art outside of Standing Rock, too.
Members and supporters of Onaman, based in Ontario, Canada, use art to portray traditional wisdom that serves as a counterpoint to the Western, colonial worldview. And they’re using the symbols in their art as traditionally intended: as guidelines for our spiritual connection and responsibility toward the Earth and each other. Isaac Murdoch, who created the Thunderbird Woman image, helped found the Onaman Collective. In addition to Murdoch, who’s a member of the Serpent River First Nation Band of Ojibway, Christi Belcourt of the Michif Manitow Sakahihan Nation, and Erin Konsmo of the Metis/Cree Onoway/ Lac St. Anne Nations also founded Onaman. For members of Onaman, spirit writing symbols offer a desperately needed portal through which Indigenous peoples may reclaim and reconnect with their cultures and spirituality. This alphabet of the soul offers insights into the dynamics of the natural world and nuances of human nature, and offers an Indigenous-centered path to health and recovery. Onaman is an Anishinaabe or Ojibwe word that refers to a red ochre paint also to clot the blood of wounds. PHOTO BY MARY ANNETTE PEMBER
WINNING ESSAY :: Adithi Ramakrishnan
ESCAPING THE “OTHER”
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F r i d ay e v e n i n g , my family stumbled into a local Italian restaurant. Sandwiched between my grandparents, I squeezed their hands tightly as we piled into a narrow booth. Their visit from India was drawing to a close, but I intended to make the most of every last minute. We passed laminated menus to each other and began laughing, talking, and deliberating. As I pointed out my personal favorites to my grandmother in our native language, she tugged at the chunni of her traditional Indian salwar kameez. Something at the table beside us caught my eye. I quickly turned away. Maybe I’d misunderstood. Then, I snuck a second, more apprehensive look. My stomach lurched. An elderly white couple was dining at the table next to ours. The wife’s eyes were fixed on her menu, but her husband’s were fixed on us. His eyebrows curved downward in a cold, steely glare. I looked away again, a sick feeling building in my chest. But every time my gaze wandered, it met his icy stare, and my insides turned over. For the rest of the evening, I switched to English. In that dinner trip, I felt something I’d experienced only in doses before: the feeling of being the other. I don’t fit into an easily categorized box. I’m still trying to navigate the narrow path between Indian and American, and I’m the furthest thing from an old white male. But just because I’m not the model portrait of a 1950s American doesn’t mean I can’t repaint that n a cold
image in the 21st century. “Standing up against injustice” is a broad statement, but represents something very specific: inclusion and acceptance. We have to stop sorting people into the “other” category—we have to not only recognize the humanity in each other, but also be willing to fight for it. It’s a simple change in perspective that can have immediate implications. Tracy Matsue Loeffelholz refers to it in her article “What Japanese Internment Taught Us About Standing Up for Our Neighbors” as an appeal to raise our voices to support those around us—not merely to show support, but also to protest unfair treatment. But what about me? What happens when I’m the target of raised eyebrows and consistent “random” searches at the airport, while white passengers walk by unnoticed? It has taken me time to define my version of protesting injustice, and I will likely reshape my definition in the future. For now, dissension means living my culture as boldly and loudly as possible. It means stringing lights through the shrubbery outside our house and lighting sparklers in the driveway that illuminate our cul-de-sac on Diwali, the annual Hindu festival of light. It means getting up 30 minutes early to pin my dupatta and come to school in my brightest, most vibrant traditional clothing for International Day. It means making quips to my family in Tamil when we’re in public. To me, standing up for my culture is normalizing diversity while letting my Indian and American roots shine. Loeffelholz says that “public opinion affects political will, and political will makes a difference.” I wholeheartedly agree. If we as Americans present a united front—one that includes people of all races, genders, and sexualities—labeling each other not as other, but as together, it becomes much harder to tear us apart. The next time I catch an unfriendly stare in a public place, I won’t turn away. I’ll start a conversation—not with “How could you?” but “How are you?”
Adithi Ramakrishnan is a senior at Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology in Alexandria, Virginia. Her essay won the fall 2017 YES! National Student Writing Competition, high school division: “Standing Up for Our Neighbors.”
The YES! National Student Writing Competition ... is part of the “YES! for Teachers” program, bringing classroom resources on justice and sustainability to schools nationwide. Read more student essays: yesmagazine.org/for-teachers You can help YES! reach young people: yesmagazine.org/donate
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Books + Films + Music: Dolores 56 A Foodie’s Guide to Capitalism 58 Wasted! The Story of Food Waste 60 Yes! But How? How to Say Goodbye 62 Sarah van Gelder: Tax Overhaul and the Immorality
CULTURE SHIFT
of Inequality 64
Powerful Ideas Emerging
3 FOOD JUSTICE STRATEGIES: FARMS TO FOODIES Saru Jayaraman and Devan Shea on Restaurant Workers Nancy Matsumoto on Foodie Capitalism Andy Fisher on Food Waste
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PHOTO BY JAMIE GRILL/GETTY yesmagazine . org :: yes ! spring 2018 IMAGES
YES! BUT HOW? DIY WAYS TO LIVE SUSTAINABLY
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alking to a dying loved one—or anyone dying you’ve known—is no easy task. Especially if your histories are complicated. What do you do with resentments and hurts? Saying nothing and doing nothing can have consequences for your own life. How do you honor your own feelings as well as the feelings of the other person? What helps with closure, when our goodbyes are not in person? Here are some ideas for a meaningful goodbye.
Research by Bailey Williams Illustration by Enkhbayar Munkh-Erdene
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If you’re not sure what to say … SAY WHAT YOU FEEL. Palliative-care physician Dr. Ira Byock, author of The Four Things That Matter Most, says that dying people typically want to hear and say four things: “Please forgive me,” “I forgive you,” “Thank you,” and “I love you.” These phrases carry the power to mend broken relationships and to honor meaningful ones, so consider building a conversation around them. Whatever the response may be, you have done what you could to address the heart of a relationship.
If you want to feel close … DO THEIR FAVORITE THINGS. Not everyone gets a chance to be there when a friend dies, especially someone who was important to us. This powerful, private goodbye can be done if you live apart or after a loved one is gone, for example, to mark a death anniversary. Doing an activity you once did together or something you remember the other person enjoying can help you feel close and hold on to a memory. Go for a bike ride, watch a favorite movie, or visit a favorite spot. You’ll be alone, but together.
If you’re afraid to say goodbye, remember … CLOSURE DOESN’T MEAN FORGETTING. Society tends to think that closure means putting hurts behind us and getting on with life. But when dealing with grief, that’s not how it works, writes Amy Florian, bereavement expert and author of No Longer Awkward: Communicating with Clients Through the Toughest Times of Life. “‘Closure?’ No, or at least not in the way people usually use that term. Acceptance—yes. Peace—yes. Moving forward—for sure. A future bright with love, joy, and hope— absolutely,” she wrote in Huffington Post. “Healing does not mean forgetting it; it means taking the life, love, and lessons into the future with you.”
PHOTO BY PENG JIN/EYE EM/GETTY IMAGES
If you want to feel connected … ORGANIZE A “SECULAR SHIVA.” Shiva is a week-long, sequestered mourning period in Judaism held in the home of the deceased where family members gather. It’s an opportunity to reinforce the bonds among loved ones left behind. You don’t have to be Jewish to do it. Friends can organize one, too. New York Times columnist Bruce Feiler notes that mourning rituals often served an important communitybuilding function but are fading away. “Like all such traditions, they may not soften the blow of a loss, but they had the unmistakable boon of reaffirming the community itself.”
If you never got a chance in person … WRITE THEM A LETTER. Write down all the things you wish you would’ve said. Bottled-up emotions are unhealthy, but we don’t always get a chance to say what we need to say. So write them down. This is a way to get the words off your chest and manage your mental health without burdening a dying person. According to the University of Rochester Medical Center, journaling can help you manage anxiety, reduce stress, and cope with depression. You don’t have to share it with anyone. Read it out loud at a gravesite. Or just tuck it away.
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“YES! Magazine shows me hope is possible.” Native American economist and environmental activist Winona LaDuke
“I look to YES! for stories of people who care about social justice and the environment and have the partnerships, solutions, and tools to get things done.”
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