We’re Broken.

The Dakota Access Pipeline would run perilously close to the Missouri River, above, the main source of drinking water for the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe. Credit: Thosh Collins.

The Dakota Access Pipeline would run perilously close to the Missouri River, above, the main source of drinking water for the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe. Credit: Thosh Collins.

Dakota Access Pipeline has been approved. All the work, all the protests, all the meetings, all the talking…pointless. That photo reminds me of one of my favourite places along the Missouri, north of Lake Oahe, and to think of oil spilling, oh, it doesn’t bear thinking about, but it must be thought about, and the fight has to continue. This is wrong, so very wrong.

Despite the strong opposition of several tribes, the Army Corps of Engineers has approved nearly all permits to build the Dakota Access Pipeline project. Construction has already begun in all four states along its path.

“We are saddened to hear of this permit approval but knew the writing was on the wall,” the Indigenous Environmental Network said in a statement. “The Corps has a long history of going against the wishes and health of tribal nations.”

The $3.4 billion, 1,134-mile-long pipeline proposed by the company Energy Transfer, is also known as the Bakken pipeline, since that is the type of crude that would be transported through it. The battle to stop the project began months ago, when word of its potential construction began to spread. Activists and individual landowners who did not want the pipeline crossing their land immediately began to resist.

Soon after, the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe launched a massive campaign to improve understanding of the devastation that a pipeline spill could cause. The “Rezpect Our Water” efforts included dozens of children from Standing Rock who worked hard to try bridge understanding between the tribe and the outside world. Through a series of videos and grassroots efforts, the youth of Standing Rock asked that their lands and livelihood be taken into concern.

The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe met with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers on several occasions in the past year in hopes of convincing them to deny permits. All water crossings along the pipeline’s path needed federal approval. The Corps would have had the power to stop the pipeline from crossing the south-flowing Missouri River near the Cannon Ball community on Standing Rock’s northern border. This crossing point poses a particularly dangerous threat to the Standing Rock community as a pipeline break would contaminate the Missouri river, damaging the entire water supply of tribe, destroying land and creating a public health disaster for the reservation.

The tribe’s efforts and the youth of Standing Rock generated attention and support from thousands of supporters across the nation.
The Corps’ decision, however, did not reflect concern for the tribe or for the youth of Standing Rock. They granted permits to all 200 water crossings along the pipeline’s path, including the most potentially destructive point near the Reservation’s northern border. The Corps also ignored a plea by three federal agencies requesting a full environmental review.

[…]

“This decision will not deter the resistance against the dirty Bakken pipeline,” stated the Indigenous Environmental Network. “This decision merely highlights the necessity for the Corps of Engineers to overhaul the Nationwide Permit No. 12 process, which has been used by Big Oil to further place our lands, indigenous rights, water and air at greater risk for disaster. We demand a revocation of this permit and advocate for the rejection of this pipeline.”

The Pipeline will bring tax revenue to all counties and states along its path. While the land and people of Standing Rock face great risk of seeing damaging environmental impacts, they will not see any of the benefits. The pipeline crosses just north of Sioux County, where the Standing Rock Reservation is located. Tax revenue will not be generated for the tribe.

ICTMN has the full story.

Conservative Whine: Confusing, Bizarre, Very Disturbing!

CREDIT: Twitter/@SarahWoodwriter.

CREDIT: Twitter/@SarahWoodwriter.

We’ve already seen the one All Gender lav at the DNC, in the previous post. At that time, it was reported that the lav in question was full of different gendered people, with no problems at all. Now, it seems, conservatives have had time to pull themselves together and whine about it.

One of the bathrooms at the Democratic National Convention this week has been labeled an “all-gender restroom.” According to BuzzFeed, most people using the facility were unfazed by the experience, but a few members of the conservative press have been baffled about what they’re supposed to do.

Sarah Westwood of the Washington Examiner seemed to be unsure if she had a gender or not:

How is that confusing at all, let alone unnecessarily so? Here’s some help, Ms. Westwood – look at the cute little picture.

Westwood told ThinkProgress that her concern was pumping breast milk in a space in which her male coworkers could enter. She did not explain why the stall doors did not suffice to provide her with the privacy she desired like they would in any other restroom. She also did not seem to be aware that the convention center is equipped with two lactation suites specifically to meet her needs.

There we are, conservatives creating problems where there are none. Privacy? Stall doors with locks. Breast feeding? Oh look, lactation suites! Why, you don’t have to sit in a pee station for that at all.

On Fox News, Tucker Carlson described the bathrooms as “bizarre” and “disgusting.” “I mean, I guess we’re liberated by this? Everyone should come visit one and see the reality of it. It’s unbelievable.”

Just how are they bizarre and disgusting? Let’s see, a room equipped with stalls, toilets, and sinks. There are people in there, doing what they have to do. Seems like business as usual to me.

Elizabeth Harrington of the Washington Free Beacon bemoaned that setting aside the all-gender restroom “leaves female convention goers with one fewer bathroom than male attendees,” a complaint that seemed to ignore the fact that female convention goers can actually use that restroom. She decided to film a short tour of the facility as a male colleague entered a stall:

On her twitter feed, it finally dawned on Ms. Harrington that she had made Mr. Scher very uncomfortable, following him into the lav and filming him. She managed a weak apology. The irony is simply too much.

Harrington also shared a reader’s concern that toilet seats might be left up or down or have urine on them. It’s unclear if she has ever lived in a house or existed in any other space that only has a single-use restroom.

Harrington went on to say she walked by the all gender lav again, and it smelled so very, very bad, oh my yes! I wonder if she was this busy poking her nose in the gender designated lavs. The course of the great pee debate seems clear: ban all conservatives from lavs outside their own homes.

Conservative activist Dinesh D’Souza, who is peddling his new film Hillary’s America attacking Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party, decided to stage a photo demonstrating his wife’s reaction to having used the all-gender restroom.

She complained to another Twitter user that when she used it, “a man walked in,” calling the experience “very disturbing.” She did not explain why.

Marcus made a just right sign for the conservatives:

pee

Full story at Think Progress.

McCrory and the failure mode of clever.

pat-mccroryx750Pat McCrory saw fit to make jokes about transgender people at the RNC, still referencing his beloved HB 2, even with the latest massive cost to the state with the withdrawal of the NBA.

McCrory took the stage and immediately started acting like a flight attendant.

“All right, let’s be safe now. We’ve got a big crowd, so if you need to leave suddenly, we’ve got exits this way, exits this way and exits this way,” McCrory said, motioning straight ahead, to his right and to his left. “And if any of you need to use the restrooms …”

McCrory paused as the crowd of several thousand laughed and cheered his reference to legislation passed earlier this year that requires individuals to use the restroom that matches the gender they were born with, not the one they identify with.

[…]

As Politico reported, the backlash [to HB 2] reached the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia on Monday, where an executive with the Raleigh-based company Citrix, Jesse Lipson, accused McCrory of not understanding how business worked by backing the law.

“Republicans may think they’re telling people which bathroom to go into,” Lipson said. “They’re actually telling people which market to stay out of.”

The Wells Fargo Center, where the event is being held, also had at least one all-gender restroom. Buzzfeed’s Dominic Holden posted a picture:

One estimate of the NBA withdrawal of the all star game is 100 million in lost revenue, and McCrory thinks he’s being clever joking about HB 2? Seriously, I don’t know how much more NC can possibly take of this – the sheer amount of lost revenue is staggering, and people cannot be happy about watching their state’s economy plunge down a hole. Right now, McCrory is a bit player in the political scene, but outside of Trump, I can’t think of anyone else who so very badly needs to be forcibly ousted from his position. The amount of damage he has done is in the phenomenal range, and on many levels.

Via Washington Post and Raw Story.

Das Kapital.

Karl Marx’s Capital: Critique of Political Economy has been used as the source for a new alien-looking sculpture by Chinese artist Wang Yuyang. Yujang’s Identity is 20 feet tall and composed of folded layers of various materials including brass, copper, iron, fiberglass, concrete, marble, and steel—all interwoven as arcing contours that look both organic and like some otherwordly samurai armor.

Photo:Barney Hindle©2016 CASS Sculpture Foundation, Wang Yuyang, Identity, 2016.

Photo:Barney Hindle©2016 CASS Sculpture Foundation, Wang Yuyang, Identity, 2016.

Beyond its striking form, what’s remarkable about Yuyang’s piece is that, when you look at it, you’re actually looking at the text for Marx’s Capital: Critique of Political Economy. Yuyang converted the words themselves into binary code, then visualized it all using 3D rendering and modelling software, which determined the material, the color, and structure.

Wang Yuyang, Identity, Proposal Rendering, 2015 © Cass Sculpture Foundation, Wang Yuyang.

Wang Yuyang, Identity, Proposal Rendering, 2015 © Cass Sculpture Foundation, Wang Yuyang.

For Identity, the binary code was input into 3ds Max and a 3D printer for a visual output, with the program “reading” the order of the text to form the installation.

“The shapes of the sculpture are the twisted rectangles or circles function in the program,” explains Yuyang to The Creators Project. “The title of the work is also a selection by the computer (selected from a dictionary pack when we ‘save’ this file) and the color by reading the code again.”

The idea, says Yuyang, is to give the making over solely to the computer so it can objectively visualize the text. While Marx writes about how exploited labor underpins capitalism, Yuyang hands the labor of the creative process—outsources it—over to automation.

“It shows my curiosity with these texts,” notes Yuyang. “Das Kapital has been grouped into different chapters when I was reading it in school. Different chapters are taught in primary, elementary, and high school, it’s the topic of exams [in China]. The book was with my generation all the time when we were growing up. So I am deeply familiar with it and now I would like to see it differently. Turning it into a visual work is a different way to look at the text again.”

Full Story at The Creators Project. Wang Yuyang’s website is here.

No True Catholic.

Tim Kaine.

Tim Kaine.

While Tim Kaine’s pastor describes Kaine as “very compassionate, approachable, available, and friendly,” a Washington DC-based priest, a member of the Dominican Order, has told Tim Kaine that he is not a true Catholic and not entitled to receive communion. The issue? Tim Kaine has stated his personal opposition to abortion, but refuses to enact laws as a public official that would interfere with a woman’s right to choose.

The anti-abortion site LifeNews reported that Father Thomas Petri took to Twitter to condemn Kaine. “Senator @timkaine. Do us both a favor. Don’t show up in my communion line.” The priest also told Kaine that his beliefs that women should be priest and that “abortion is fine” makes him either “poorly catechized or a dissenter.”

I can’t say I was thrilled with the Veep pick, but anyone who pisses off priests gets credit from me. Nothing riles up priests like the disobedience of thinking. Perhaps Father Petri should spend more time praying than tweeting. I’m sure if he prays hard enough, god will do something or other, right?

Full story here.

Simon Moya-Smith at the DNC.

Simon Moya-Smith's beaded medallion, a anti-R-word button, and other neck wear.

Simon Moya-Smith’s beaded medallion, a anti-R-word button, and other neck wear.

DNC. Day 1. No press credentials. Hot and humid. Sweat on my brow and back. “No hope of a press pass,” the handlers say. To hell with waiting. “Where are the protesters?” I ask. City Hall, they said. I elbow through a parade of middle-aged demonstrators in downtown Philly. Hillary haters. They gum up the sidewalk. Stuck again. Sun barrels down. “Where are you?” a text reads. “I don’t know,” I respond. “But bring a lawyer.” A Hillary fan and a Bernie Bro battle it out on the curb. Newsmen and women scramble to eavesdrop. Mics in faces. Both sides posture. The crowd swells. Everyone dripping sweat. No shade. Just sun. And noise. A raucous noise. An ominous noise. Growling. More marching in the distance. More cops coming in. I take photo after photo after photo after photo. “What’s your medallion mean?” a man asks. “Means a lot to me,” I blurt. No patience at this point. Taking my blazer off. No help. Still hot as hell. Sweet jeezus. Meanwhile, the argument continues: “She deleted emails … She doesn’t release her speeches …” the Hillary head says. “His policy proposals are impractical … Writing is on the wall. … Not voting for Hillary is a vote for Trump!” the man in a ‘Bernie or Bust’ shirt blurts. “Bernie’s busted!” a man blares from somewhere behind me. Jeers erupt. More shouting and clamoring. A rush of photographers take aim behind my head. I turn to look. A man hoists a cut-out of Bernie’s head and hands. A child’s laugh breaks the rising tension in the circle. I feel faint. Who cares? Not me … at least not right now. This is the nucleus of rotten politics in the mosh pit that has become the U.S.A.

[…]

Got a text again. This time from Marlon WhiteEagle, an editor from Wisconsin. We meet at Fatso Foggerty’s, a pub on the south side of Philly. Two older black ladies laugh hysterically at the bar. A dog at their feet barks at anyone leaving the place like an adorable bouncer. Marlon has a Coke. I have two Jack and Cokes. Bartender eyes Marlon and I. “Who the fuck are these two?” I imagined her saying. This is indeed a local pub with a revolving door of regulars. The whole place is clam-baked with cigarette smoke. Makes me want one again. “You have smokes for sale?” I ask the bartender. “Across the street,” she says. Suddenly, Marlon gets a text telling us to zip to the Wells Fargo Center – The DNC. I down my drink, we crawl into an Uber, and get dumped about a mile away from the entry. “This is as far as I can take you,” the driver says. Cops blocked the road. Ten minutes of walking in 93-degree temps and suffocating humidity, and again I’m back in the mad mix of demonstrations. A child is dressed in a suit and tie, walking among the fray, shouting, “Bernie or bust!” A white boy goes around smudging people with sage. Cops here aren’t rushing him like they rushed Josie Valadez Fraire in Denver earlier this month outside of a Trump event. They allegedly told the indigenous woman that “smoke alarms” them.

The full column and photos at ICTMN.

Trump: Ask Me Anything.

Trump’s AMA, much like his presidential campaign, is expected to be a little different. Firstly, it’s scheduled right in the middle of the Democratic National Convention and, secondly, it will be hosted on a thread that openly refers to Trump as the “God Emperor.”

Redditors on the /r/The_Donald are already excited to host Trump’s AMA Wednesday, praising the move as “tremendous” and potentially a good show of momentum for Trump’s campaign. But there is some concern the AMA could be derailed by non-Trump supporters.

Think Progress has the full story.

Spiritual Vultures. Updated.

The late Thomas Banyacya, Hopi Traditional Spokesman, is seen here in Chaco Canyon. Courtesy Christopher McLeod.

The late Thomas Banyacya, Hopi Traditional Spokesman, is seen here in Chaco Canyon. Courtesy Christopher McLeod.

“This is a very sacred kiva,” says the late Thomas Banyacya, Hopi Traditional Spokesman, pointing to an ancient sacred site at Casa Rinconada in northwest New Mexico. “We are looking at the spirit of our ancestors… they are here. They are watching us. We hope they will help Native people to protect their land and sacred sites,” he says in a frail voice recorded in archival footage.

Over the past three decades, the Sacred Land Film Project (SLFP) has produced films about how mainstream American culture antagonizes Native American sensibilities around spirituality and sacred sites. Casa Rinconada is one quintessential example—a cultural hub of Ancestral Puebloans, where thousands of New Age seekers gathered for the Harmonic Convergence in 1987, littering the sacred kiva with crystals, cremated human remains and one curious looking teddy bear wax candle.

[…]

“While producing films on threats to indigenous sacred sites, I spend a lot of time listening to communities all over the world explain the most urgent threats. I’ve been really struck over the years by the fact that universally, right up there with mining, logging, dams and land grabs, there’s deep concern about New Age appropriation of sacred places, cultural rituals and spiritual traditions,” says Christopher McLeod, Director of SLFP.

In northern California, the Winnemem Wintu Tribe can empathize with the predicament of the Navajo. The Harmonic Convergence also congregated on Mt. Shasta, a mountain deeply sacred to the tribe. “The Harmonic Convergence of 1987 unleashed an overwhelming flood of seekers, hundreds of New Agers leaving crystals and medicine wheels all over the mountain. Later, there were sweat lodges for hire, and now even cremation remains poured into a sacred spring. How do we stop this and redirect this desperate search for meaning and connection?” wonders McLeod.

The Winnemem, known as the Middle Water People, trace their ancestry over millennia along the watershed south of their revered Mt. Shasta. The Winnemem believe they emerged from the spring on Panther Meadow, where New Agers often congregate—drumming and singing and leaving offerings behind, including ashes of the departed.

“We believe this spring is so sacred. We only go there once a year to sing at the doorway of our creation story,” says Chief Caleen Sisk, spiritual leader of the Winnemem Wintu, in Pilgrims and Tourists, a SLFP film that explores the impact of New Age tourism on Native communities in the Russian Altai Republic and Mt. Shasta. “People dumped cremations right into this spring,” she says. “Cremations are a pollutant… everyone downstream is drinking that water. Do you put cremations on the altar in the Vatican?” she asks incredulously.

winnemem-wintu-sacred-spring

Besides cleaning the offerings in the spring, the Winnemem have to contend with thousands of climbers who attempt to summit Mt. Shasta. “On our mountain we have 30,000 visitors,” she says. “Non-indigenous people need to understand that there is a way to be there, a way of walking on that land without destroying it… people can admire the meadow from the edge.”

Ann Marie Sayers, Costanoan Ohlone, believes that contrasting value systems among Natives and non-Natives lead to cultural appropriation. “These places call for humility and respect,” she says.  In another SLFP film clip posted as part of a five-clip playlist on YouTube, a white woman naively claims that in her past life she has been black, Native American, Chinese and Egyptian and should not be denied access to Native sacred sites.

“New Agers look at traditional Native [cultures] for some answers to their spiritual bankruptcy. In an effort to find themselves, they are appropriating a lot of Native belief systems, to plug into for a weekend,” says Chris Peters (Pohlik-lah/Karuk) in a film clip from SLFP’s 2001 film, In the Light of Reverence.

The Winnemem say their ceremony is delayed every year, because the spring has to be cleaned from the offerings left behind. As the Winnemem youth remove bone fragments and cremation ashes from the spring, Chief Sisk remarks, “People can live without oil. They can live without gold, but nothing can live without water.”

It’s perfectly possible for white people to feel all spiritual and connected to nature, the universe, everything, without co-opting what you think is a peoples’ culture, and without invading and fucking up their sacred places. Once again, white people manage to make everything about them. If nothing else, stop thinking you’re honouring your dead by dumping them in places sacred to other people, and polluting while you’re doing it. How in the hell is that spiritual? Isn’t it about time you just left us Indians alone? Go, discover your own roots, there’s nothing wrong in that. A whole lot of cultures have a history of sweating, many of them white cultures, and in many of those cultures, such traditions are carried on. You don’t need to up and decide that the “Native American” way of doing something is so much more golly gosh darn pure and special”. That’s racist crap, perpetuating the noble savage nonsense, so cut it the fuck out.

No, there isn’t a place for you in various Indigenous ceremonies. You’ll live. Go and discover those ancient, traditional ceremonies you are a part of, learn about your own self instead.

Just reported, Pokémon Go players are getting in on the disrespect, too. Play your games, people, but pay the fuck attention to where you are, yeah?

According to CBC News, Gouchie was paying respects at her father’s gravesite on Sunday when she noticed dozens of Pokémon Go players searching the sacred First Nations burial ground.

“It’s sacred there,” Gouchie told CBC. “This land was once my ancestral land. This is the only little piece of land inside Prince George that is ours, and you are disrespecting it. My dad, my uncles, my cousin, my great grandmother are all buried there.”

The burial ground is open to the public within the Lheidli T’enneh Memorial Park, but Gouchie says the presence of a Pokéstop — a virtual location in the game where Pokémon Go players gather supplies to catch monsters — is disrespectful.

“This has to stop,” said Gouchie. “This game has only been live in Canada for one week. It’s only a matter of time before that burial site is filled with Pokémon Go people.

“I was thinking, I need our K’san [traditional] drummers out here so we can block both these gates and … stop this,” she said.

Gouchie does not blame the players, but does blame the game creator Niantic. She has submitted a request to the game developers to have the Pokéstop removed and reported the incident to her tribal council.

Full Story here.