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Many ancient teachings around the world include stories of coercive, deadly snakes. The Black Snake of oil—and the corporations it symbolizes—is now different. But, as we allow divisive politicians to further divide the people with shock tactics, climate change continues to ravage the most marginalized communities. We must restore ancient land restoration practices, sequester carbon rather than geoengineer, and eradicate fossil fuels before it’s too late.
As I sit in a budget meeting for my youth-based non-profit, I like a lot of what I see: conversations of intersectionality, passion for the Earth, and a willingness to be vulnerable and open. These are all things we value in my indigenous community, and they are necessary for moving forward.
What I do not like is the hypocrisy.
During these times, we acknowledge the planet is in dire straits. We know climate change has resulted in increased heat waves and droughts, affecting struggling farmers in the Global South, who grow products we consume. We know sea levels have risen and evicted entire communities in the Pacific. We know deforestation displaces indigenous communities, and that people who resist various projects across Latin America are murdered for the resources of their ancestral lands.
We need that global perspective.
We even acknowledge the disparities in our own country: Puerto Ricans who are still without power after Hurricane Maria, Inupiats in Alaska escaping their drowning village of Kivalina, and low-income Californians in cities like Compton, breathing the nitrogen dioxide that refineries release into their backyards. We see the correlation between these disparities and their high occurrences in low-income populations of color, indigenous or not. Therefore we make it our goal to diversify: Recruit! Recruit! Recruit!
We recruit the indigenous voices, the inner-city narrative, the black and brown bodies that show how progressive we are. We shove exclusive vocabulary down their throats, push them onto a global platform, and expect them to carry the burdens of their community’s collective narrative on their backs. But before we can even have conversations about tokenization, one word further ostracizes the outliers in the room: We.
“We must win the next election!”
Suddenly, bipartisan division seeps into our political rhetoric of organizing and creating art.
But we are not We.
Divided to Be Conquered
When Trump was elected, more people mourned for the future of this country than people mourned for the current state of indigenous rights. When Trump was elected, it sent shockwaves around the world that unsettled many who know the effect the U.S. has on a globalized world. For some, his crass behavior and unprofessional use of language emboldened their own agendas, including the Marine Le Pens and the Rodrigo Dutertes. For others, he merely represented a manifestation of principles this country was built on.
But while we are so caught up in Trump-bashing, we forget he’s not everyone’s president. We ignore the failures of leadership for the last several centuries, and we ignore the 573 sovereign tribal governments that also represent a stake for Americans in this country. As Trump fires away more Tweets, the Left becomes outraged and the Right becomes tired of the outrage. The cycle repeats and, before we know it, the bipartisan divide is so wide we forget exactly who—or what—we were fighting in the first place.
But that’s all part of the tactic, isn’t it?
While we allow ourselves to be shocked, we waste so much energy polarizing our communities that we begin making very poor assumptions. We begin to assume you’re either one of “us” or one of “them”. We begin Othering those who could have been strong allies. Suddenly, organizational diversification in 2018 comes with a stipulation: Do you care about the planet? Well, we want you! (Especially if you’re a POC. Republicans need not apply.)
If we continue to shut down pipelines and not consider the impact it has on communities depending on that labor, how can we expect to win? If we continue to slander coal miners who may be predominantly white but who are likely predominantly low-income, who are we really representing? If we continue to ally with indigenous communities to help “solve” their environmental crises, but refuse to listen to their needs, who are we really “decolonizing”?
Back to the Ancestors
The history of this world includes the rise and fall of empires, bubbles of power and privilege that could maintain business-as-usual without caring about—or even noticing—its deep impacts on the marginalized. But the key to peace-building and peace-maintenance is genuine inclusion. It’s having serious, patient, meaningful conversations with those who otherwise don’t share your outlook. Excluding those voices from the circle will never be the solution to healing communities—or stopping the terror of climate change from ravaging the world.
Ancient forms of leadership around the world include processes for meaningful conversation and problem-solving. In many ways, we are so much more similar than we are different. Perhaps it is also a general abhorrence amongst humans towards snakes that makes them—somewhat humorously—the scapegoat in our ancient stories, and the symbol of evil and destruction itself. From the Black Snake of the Dakota Access Pipeline to the snake that enticed Eve and forever cursed humanity in the Bible, the imagery of the cunning creature is powerful and universal. We just need to unite in understanding the urgency of such snakes: especially climate change.
I emphasize the division of our communities and movements so much because I don’t believe any creative solution to climate change will ever happen if we can’t heal the bipartisan divide first. This is alarming, as we know the need to stay below 1.5 degrees Celsius is so critical, that any negligence in addressing it immediately is like turning a blind eye to the death and displacement of entire communities. While many of us have the privilege to sit here and read these article, others are struggling to feed their families in a state of increasing dismay.
The implications of continued fossil fuel extraction is a death sentence for many. Our atmosphere simply cannot handle the potential for that many more emissions to be released. However, just as Trump touts jobs, we too must consider this is where he has gained so much of his footing. How can we tout jobs as we transition to 100% renewable energy? How can we convince the rural working class that supported Trump that we too are for them, for America? This is why our oil laborers and coal miners absolutely must be in the conversation. They need to be trained in things like solar installations, to be shown that we believe in them and their futures, too.
Furthermore, we must realize natural solutions exist, and implementing them immediately will buy us time we otherwise won’t have. These solutions include better land management and agricultural practices that enable us to meet the demands of society and a growing population, while capturing carbon, preventing erosion, and retaining soil nutrients as much as possible. While we view changing farming practices and implementing reforestation priorities as relatively new solutions, the reality is these are embedded in our DNA.
These are ancient practices that were used previously because they were intelligent, and which must now be revitalized to preserve the existence of the planet. In bringing back these practices, we must remember the powerful or traditional wisdom, and that not all planet-saving solutions have to be engineered with a degree in higher education.
We must reawaken the humanity within all of us that connects us to our past, present, and future. To do this, we absolutely must acknowledge the forked-tongues and the snakes whose only interest is to build their own empires; however, we also must not let us continue to divide us. Instead, we need to begin incorporating every voice into the global conversation of reviving ancestral practices and healing our planet before it’s too late.
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