[Content Note: Colonialism; state violence.]
"The camps are not Standing Rock. The rise of the encampments was a profoundly important moment in the history of the Standing Rock Sioux, and for all of us, but that moment is not a place, or a people. That place, and those people, will endure, long after the Dakota Access Pipeline, Energy Transfer Partners, and Donald Trump have turned to dust. The Standing Rock Sioux have many battles ahead, and they are not done advocating for themselves or their people. Their last stand, and ours, has yet to come. Our people wove dreamcatchers out of razor wire in Standing Rock. They will not be undone today."—Kelly Hayes, in her terrific piece on Standing Rock, which is being raided this afternoon.
I wanted to highlight Kelly's beautiful words about survival, because it is important to recognize the magnitude of this resilient resistance in response to relentless state violence.
That said, I don't want to minimize what's happening at Standing Rock today, which is both cruel and unnecessary. A gross intersection of corporatism and colonialism, as police forcibly remove native people from their land once more.
The resistance is admirable; what obliges it is contemptible. No one would choose being admired for standing up to oppressors over not having oppressors in the first place.
I take up space in solidarity with the Standing Rock Sioux.
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