Really interesting article about the links of our modern food system to plantations and slavery, and how some folks are working to change that system:
If, back in the 18th century, you could see all the way across the Atlantic, you would find an unbroken line of plantations that stretched from Buenos Aires to Baltimore. Down this entire line, slaves harvested sugar for British tea, rice for the West Indian consumption, and cotton for the textile mills of New England. These were vast monocrops that broke the body and ruined the soil—but made money for planters and big companies that traded the goods.
Here, you see the logic of the modern industrial food system in its rawest form—a logic of prioritizing profit over human and environmental welfare. A lot has changed in the 400 years since the Elmina Fort was built, but this principle has not gone away. The logic of the plantation is the logic of today's industrial food system.
Jeff Biggers writes a lot about environmental justice issues related to coal mining, but he also has ties to Arizona and has been contributing a lot of articles for the past couple of years. Here's one on resistance efforts in Latino communities to SB 1070 and its impacts...
With defiant Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer growing more emboldened as the Supreme Court readies to unveil its ruling on the state's SB 1070 "papers, please" immigration law, Arizona human rights group Puente and their national allies are bolstering their "Barrio Defense Committees," as "neighbors link with neighbors to learn their rights and make collective plans to defend themselves."
They are also asking their fellow Arizona neighbors and politicians to take a stand.
"Within Arizona we're ready to pose the question to every individual and institution, police department and school district, what side are you on?" Puente executive director Carlos Garcia wrote in an email. "SB 1070 can only function if individuals allow undocumented people to be singled out, if school districts allow their security guards to double as immigration agents, if businesses refuse to offer us safe haven, and ultimately if Obama's administration agrees to deport whoever Arpaio turns over to ICE."
I really liked Joe's presentation because it connects some dots between sound bytes in the "war on women" and the larger systemic ground of patriarchy in which it is being waged:
I'm psyched for Saturday when I make the trek to Jackson for the (3rd? or 4th?) annual Save Our Community Day. I was there for the very first one, and though it's a long way out there for an east Tennessean, I promised myself that if my friends in the Jackson Chapter of SOCM kept having them, I'd keep going to them.
I remember the first year of the event very well because I was tempted not to give up a Saturday to go all the way out there. It turned into one of those self-arguments in which my mind was coming up with all kinds of reasons to stay home and my heart wouldn't take "stay" for an answer.
I knew it wasn't just about the distance. That year was a big one for SOCM: the group had changed its name from Save Our Cumberland Mountains to Statewide Organizing for Community eMpowerment, and Jackson was the newest and first urban chapter to come to life following SOCM's committment to become a true statewide organization. That meant taking up a transformation process -- an anti-racist journey -- that would lead toward social, economic and environmental justice for all of the awesomely diverse people and communities of Tennessee.
Such a journey is not an easy one, for a person or for a group. It has taken me into territories of mind-body-soul that are uncertain and sometimes downright scary. But for me it's that good kind of scary that lets you keep inching forward, that promises more freedom at the end, and not so much the bad kind that stops you in your tracks. I think the argument I was having with myself before the first Save Our Community Day really had more to do with the uncertainty than with the time and distance.
So, my annual trek to Jackson really has roots in my life-long desire for justice -- for an end to exploitation and oppression of people and nature -- on planet Earth. Once I get there, I find all kinds of folks who want the same thing, for themselves and for many generations after us. And because of that, we have a really fun day together.
When I started writing this post, I thought about a book I keep back here in the room where I write and meditate. It's called The Four-fold Way: Walking the Paths of Warrior, Teacher, Healer and Visionary, written by Angeles Arrien. Driving out to Jackson that first year, I thought about it too -- especially about the first path or principle that Arrien explores.
The first principle of this Four-fold Way -- that of the Warrior -- is about showing up, or choosing to be present. I was relating to this principle very literally: to be there in Jackson or not to be there was the question that year. At another level, the path of the warrior, says Arrien, is about the right use of energy to empower oneself and others.
This particular Four-fold idea is at the heart of SOCM's three-fold path of social, economic and environmental justice to eMpower people and communities in Tennessee, thus, it was a really auspicious principle to have operating in relation to my trek to Jackson for Save Our Community Day. The challenge of the Warrior has also been a very important one for me in this lifetime, and I feel very blessed to have found an organization and group of people with which my exploration of this path can be mutual in many respects.
So, no, I don't argue with myself about going to Jackson anymore. I'll be there. Here's a video featuring my fellow warrior, Martha, with an invitation for you to be there too. Use links with the video or use the linked image in the sidebar for more info.
The people who live on the Gulf of Mexico are no doubt taking a huge hit from the BP oil disaster, but this film aired on Al Jazeera English pulls the lens back to a wider view of the oil industry in the Gulf over time.
I was especially moved by the stories of folks at the end of the piece who speak very clearly about the toll this industry has taken on their lives and communities. One woman in particular calls out the use of the term "resilient" to describe the historical battering of coastal citizens.
I am really grateful to this woman. I think she's absolutely right that it's a way of denying the actual suffering so that the industry can keep on doing what it's doing, or so the rest of us can sleep at night as we go along with continued use of fossil fuels without protest. It's a term often applied in other situations -- the ability of kids to heal from horrific abuse, of the mountains of Appalachia to recover from the assaults of surface mining, or of Indigenous people of the world surviving genocidal colonial occupations of their homelands.
"Stop calling me resilient!" she said. "I'm not resilient!"
"We in Haiti are committed to staying a county where organic, biological agriculture dominates. We know that Clinton and the multinationals, the IMF and the WTO, have another plan for us - one based on the import of GM seeds and food aid, one based on making us grow for export, including growing for agro-diesel. But we're putting on pressure to say: no, that's not what Haiti needs, here is what popular Haitian organizations want, here is our agenda."
Cathie's notes: This article (and the series: see part 1 here) is worth reading. The Haitians have much to teach countries like the United States that have sold out to corporate agriculture. This wrecks the health of people and nature both inside and outside their own borders.
I really admire Haitian farmers for taking a stand against this arrogant and ignorant behavior. I'd love to see some kind of world solidarity movement with organic farmers everywhere spreading the word about how corporate farming threatens us all -- socially, economically, environmentally.
Native American North Dakota ranchers George and Marilyn Keepseagle applied for their first loan from the U.S. Department of Agriculture back in 1975, hoping to buy higher quality livestock. George, now 69, remembers having the strange feeling that the county loan officer charged with evaluating their application didn't seem to want them to succeed.
Two decades later, after struggling to get USDA loans to help recover from storms, low cattle prices and other calamities, the Keepseagles have no doubt the county loan officers did not have their best interests in mind.
Understanding the fears behind the racial politics of both conservative and liberal whites can help change a society in which wealth and well-being are still tied to race.
Cathie's notes: This article by Robert Jensen, a professor of journalism at the University of Texas, Austin, was written for the Spring 2010 issue of Yes! Magazine.
As a white liberal on an anti-racist journey, I found it to be interesting, informative, challenging and inspiring.
Read the whole article here. Read more in the America: The Remix issue at Yes! Magazine online here.
I found a very disturbing story at the Race-Talk blog at AlterNet today. It was written byValerie Taliman, a citizen of the Navajo Nation and president of Three Sisters Media in Albuquerque. She wrote about a hateful ad that has several First Nations groups calling for action:
Last week the Web site UsedWinnipeg.com ran an advertisement headlined “Native Extraction Service” with a photograph of three young Native boys. The service offered to round up and remove First Nations youth like wild animals, and “relocate them to their habitat.”
This online classified ad offered the free removal and relocation of aboriginal youth from parts of Winnipeg. CBC News has blurred the faces in the picture. The ad has since been pulled down. (UsedWinnipeg.com/CBC)
The text of the ad read: “Have you ever had the experience of getting home to find those pesky little buggers hanging outside your home, in the back alley or on the corner??? Well fear no more, with my service I will simply do a harmless relocation. With one phone call I will arrive and net the pest, load them in the containment unit (pickup truck) and then relocate them to their habit.”
As Taliman observes further:
The message is clear: Native people are like pests or vermin, and
can be disposed of by simply calling a free service to have them
“extracted.”
It was the cyberspace equivalent of a “Wanted” poster, reminiscent of
bounties once paid for Indian scalps in the old West. And in my view,
it’s a classic hate crime, carried out for the sole purpose of inciting
racism and hate against indigenous peoples.
Who are the kids in the picture that was stolen from Longhouse Media? They are three young Swinomish film makers whose documentary, March Point, was released in 2007. They had wanted to make a gangster movie or rap video, but instead were persuaded to investigate how two oil refineries impacted their community. Here's the trailer:
Do these guys look like kids who should be "wanted" for anything besides inspiring their peers and inheriting the Earth from corporate land barons and other clueless adults who perpetuate exploitation of people and nature?
In following some links in Taliman's article, I also found a press release from Longhouse that condemns the ad as a hate crime. A statement on their home page says:
We hope this advertisement was taken down before any violent crimes
occurred; in any case damage was inflicted on indigenous youth in the
form of threat and intimidation. The Criminal Code of Canada says, “a
hate crime is committed to intimidate, harm or terrify not only a
person, but an entire group of people to which the victim belongs. The
victims are targeted for who they are, not because of anything they have
done. Hate crimes involve intimidation, harassment, physical force or
threat of physical force against a person, a family or a property.” --
Section 319(1): Public Incitement of Hatred, Criminal Code of Canada
Longhouse, along with others, is calling for the perpetrators to be found and brought to justice.
When stories like this pop into my life -- stories that induce such a wide range of thoughts and feelings -- I like to widen my view a little to the background of my day. What was up before I found this article?
I spent this past weekend with a bunch of white and black folks who are trying to dismantle racism in their communities. Within that context I especially connected with a man who was sharing his experience of being young and black in America. This exchange stayed with me all the way back home and into this week. I decided, as my colleague had suggested, to spend some time listening to several young, black, male poets sharing their take on life via YouTube.
This morning -- just before I found Taliman's article -- I had listened to the crew on Morning Joe talking about America's school systems and the inspiring success of Geoffrey Canada's charter school and neighborhood project, Harlem Children's Zone (HCZ). I found myself a little irritated with their conversation. I was glad to hear the recognition that something amazing has happened in Harlem, but I didn't hear much discussion about what the HCZ team had done and why it worked. Not just surface stuff, but some depth about their work in relation to larger issues of poverty, racism, family and community.
After I saw Morning Joe, I fished out my copy of Whatever It Takes, Paul Tough's book on Geoff Canada and HCZ. I decided to read it again and maybe do some blogging on it. When I then found Taliman's article on the racist attack on the Swinomish teens, it kind of brought my whole past week of thinking about racism in America into more coherent connection. It has left me inspired to dig deeper into what's happening here, and to reflect more on how and why we, as a national village, need to come together as one heart on behalf of our children.
Racist hatred directed toward anyone is ugly, but -- at the moment, for me -- hatred directed at the youngest of Earth's citizens feels like the ugliest and most heartbreaking.
The 2,500 acres of land which contain the Awassa greenhouses are leased for 99 years to a Saudi billionaire businessman, Ethiopian-born Sheikh Mohammed al-Amoudi, one of the 50 richest men in the world. His Saudi Star company plans to spend up to $2-billion acquiring and developing 1.25 million acres of land in Ethiopia in the next few years. So far, it has bought four farms and is already growing wheat, rice, vegetables and flowers for the Saudi market. It expects eventually to employ more than 10,000 people.
But Ethiopia is only one of 20 or more African countries where land is being bought or leased for intensive agriculture on an immense scale in what may be the greatest change of ownership since the colonial era.
Cathie's notes: In looking more deeply into the ways structural racism and white privilege manifest in environmental activism, I have become very interested in concepts of land, landownership, the colonization of North America, and the Reconstruction after the Civil War (among other things)in relation to corporate empowerment, the US Chamber of Commerce, and other stakeholder groups that filed amicus briefs in cases such as Rapanos v United States. I hope to write more on this soon.
