Latin American Researchers of Ontario (LARO) – Idle No More

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Latin American Researchers of Ontario (LARO), Foro Nuestra America, the organizers ofLatino/as in Solidarity with Idle no More, and the undersigned organizations support Idle No More for the following reasons:

  1. Because Idle No More represents a compelling call to build a more equitable and sustainable society where the most vulnerable populations have access to basic rights such as appropriate housing, food and clean water, education and autonomy
  2. Because Idle No More represents a strong voice against the destruction and continued privatization of our natural resources
  3. Because Idle No More represents a sovereign call to defend traditional governance and real participatory democracy
  4. Because Idle No More represents a legitimate voice against governmental racist and assimilationist policies that perpetuate neo-colonial relations
  5. Because Idle No More is challenging mainstream images and stereotypes of passive/victimized indigenous subjects and providing visibility for alternative voices
  6. Because Idle No More is raising unprecedented awareness regarding the Right of Indigenous Peoples and the rights of Canadian inhabitants
  7. Because Idle No More provides an opportunity to re-think social, political and economic relations in ways that include environmental, spiritual, and communitarian values
  8. Because as immigrants we have the responsibility to engage in dialogue with the original peoples of these lands!

Organizations that support this statement:

Canadian Hispanic Congress, Toronto, ON

Casa Maíz, Toronto, ON

LACEN – Edmonton, AB

Latino Rebels, LLC, Milton, MA

Leo Campos Aldunez, E.C., The Community Networks Group, Edmonton, AB

Memoria Viva, Edmonton, AB

One Voice Radio, Phoenix, Arizona

Refundación, Revista Latinoamericana

Social Forum People of Colour Caucus – Idle No More

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We are thankful for being on the unceded Algonquin territory that this launch is taking place on, and for the inspiration that Idle No More and Indigenous communities provide us.

We honour all the Original peoples of Turtle Land and we honour the diverse lands of the Original peoples of Turtle Island on which we individually reside. We recognize the legacy of all Indigenous teachings across this continent and the world. We are committed to working in solidarity as allies with the Indigenous caucus and with the Original peoples of Turtle Island – in words and in actions – again colonization. We are committed to supporting the needs of your nations.

Climate Justice Alignment – Idle No More

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We, members of Climate Justice Alignment, stand in solidarity with Idle No More!

We stand in solidarity with Indigenous Sovereignty and the rights of Indigenous communities to govern and defend their traditional lands, waters and natural resources for the health and wellbeing of present and future generations. As allied activists and grassroots organizations rooted in Indigenous, African American, Latino, Asian Pacific Islander, and working class white communities, we support the grassroots leadership of all Indigenous nations opposing colonial governments and the corporate empires they serve. We honor the powerful ways that First Nations communities have survived centuries of colonial oppression and continue to stand tall in opposition to the harm of land and life.

We honor our Indigenous sisters’ and brothers’ history of resistance to the Canadian government’s racist, exploitative and harmful policies and practices. Standing in solidarity with the Idle No More Movement, we recognize our common commitment to justice, including our resistance to the corporations driving today’s global ecological crisis through extreme energy and resource extraction industries, industrial agriculture, toxic pollution and waste, water privatization, trade liberalization and the commodification of all life.

We recognize and respect the critical role of traditional Indigenous knowledge in the defense of Mother Earth, for building community resilience. Idle No More provides us all an opportunity to re-think social, political and economic relations to include environmental, spiritual, and communitarian values. Such values can guide our movements to overcome climate change, poverty, war and oppression, and help us build local living economies with community-led solutions.

Our organizations shall stand by your side, seeking liberation for all our communities through common struggle – the struggle between colonial cultures of hoarding and traditional cultures of sharing; between globalized exploitation and localized democracy; between the shackles of the market and the web of life.

Peace, Justice and Solidarity! Alliance for Appalachia, Asian Pacific Environmental Network, Black Mesa Water Coalition, Center for Earth, Energy and Democracy, Center for Social Inclusion, Center for Story-based Strategy, Citizens Environmental Coalition, Communities for a Better Environment, Community to Community Development, Cornell Global Labor Institute, East Michigan Environmental Action Coalition, Energy Justice Network, Environmental Justice and Climate Change Initiative, Little Village Environmental Justice Organization, Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives, Global Justice Ecology Project, Grassroots Global Justice Alliance, Grassroots International, Greenaction for Health and Environmental Justice, Indigenous Environmental Network, Institute for Policy Studies, Just Transition Alliance, Jobs With Justice, Kentuckians for the Commonwealth, Labor Community Strategy Center, Labor Network for Sustainability, Little Village Environmental Justice Organization, Movement Generation Justice & Ecology Project, Movement Strategy Center, NAACP Environmental & Climate Justice Program, People Organizing to Demand Environmental & Economic Rights, POWER, Right to the City Alliance, Rising Tide North America, Ruckus, Southwest Organizing Project, SouthWest Workers Union, 350.org, UPROSE, Vermont Workers’ Center

National Farmers Union – Idle No More

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Saskatoon: “The NFU is proud to declare its solidarity with Idle No More, which is bringing people together from across Canada to stop the Harper government from riding roughshod over our collective rights,” says Glenn Tait, NFU National Board member. “We want a better Canada.”

The NFU is calling for the federal government to fulfill its Constitutional duty to consult and accommodate Aboriginal and Treaty rights and urges the Crown to respect and fulfill the obligations of its Treaties with First Nations. We are all Treaty people.

The NFU gratefully acknowledges the leadership that First Nations people – the first farmers, fisher people, and hunters of this land – have provided in catalyzing a public call to action for environmental and social justice. The NFU, in solidarity with Idle No More and its allies, looks forward to building a society in which our forests, waters, land, and people live and produce in harmony.

In response, Sheelah McLean, one of the founding organizers of the Idle No More movement, says “We are so grateful for the support of groups such as the NFU. This alliance is essential for educating people about how critical it is to have healthy land, food and water.”

“Idle No More is not solely about First Nations’ concerns,” says Tait. “We share common commitments to protecting our precious natural resources – water, earth, air, and people – today and for future generations. Like First Nations, farmers put land at the center of our lives, but none of us will be able to work, grow, and produce if our government abandons its role as protector of our land and water. Nor will Canadians have sovereignty if investment corporations own our farmland.”

“Bill C-45 and the omnibus approach to legislation is fundamentally undemocratic and an insult to all Canadians. It is no example of how to accomplish these goals,” says Tait. “There has been no broad-based consultation about what is being changed, or whether changes are needed or wanted. Diverse voices and opinions are systematically excluded, committee reviews minimized, and debate quashed. The Harper government talks only to those who agree with its vision for Canada.”

Tait believes that Bill C-45, Bill C-38 and other bills are threatening farmers’ rights to own the seeds they plant, grow and re-use. Legislative changes are making it harder for farmers to receive the full value of their grain. As evidence, he points to the Harper government’s destruction of the Canadian Wheat Board single desk and changes to the authority, structure and budget of the Canadian Grain Commission that have crippled its power to ensure fair grading and measuring.

Tait cites Harper’s secretive negotiations of trade deals like CETA and TPP as further evidence of the government’s exclusion of not only First Nations, but all Canadians from democratic processes. “The Harper government is handing Canadian sovereignty over to corporations that are not rooted in or committed to anything but capital. It if has its way, these entities will have free reign to pry our lakes and rivers, minerals, forests, soils and seeds out from under us whether we are farmers or First Nations. We will stand together to stop this from happening.”

Buffy Sainte-Marie – Idle No More

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Nazareth, Palestine – Idle No More

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“We have on this earth what makes life worth living.”

In solidarity with First Nations Peoples of Turtle Island

#IdleNoMore

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United Nations of Aboriginal Australia – Idle No More

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“The United Nations of Aboriginal Australia proudly supports Idle No More and the right to treaty and sovereignty of all indigenous peoples.”

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Immigrants in Support of Idle No More – Idle No More

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As racialized migrants, immigrants, and refugees, we express our support for the Idle No More movement, a movement of Indigenous surgence/resurgence across these lands. We are allies of Indigenous peoples’ asserting their rights and sovereignty and protecting the lands and waters. The history and current reality of Canada is a racist and genocidal one, marked by the forced dispossession of Indigenous peoples’ lands and extraction of their resources, the suppression of Indigenous customs, governance, and laws, and the attempted assimilation of diverse Indigenous cultures and identities.

As racialized migrants and refugees, we came across many oceans or continents, a hundred years ago or yesterday and are being targeted by racist and and exclusionary immigration policies. Enduring decades, if not centuries, of colonialism, empire, racism, impoverishment, violence and displacement; paying a Head-Tax, growing up in internment camps, living in constant fear of deportation and denied access to basic services, unable to be reunited with our family members, working long hours for less than minimum wage in dangerous industries/sweatshops; deemed “illegal,” “undesirable,” or “terrorist” by the Canadian government (and often Canadians), many of us have struggled to find stability and to make homes here on Turtle Island. But we recognize that our homes are built on the ruins of others. We are on the lands of Indigenous peoples: lands unjustly seized, unceded lands, treaty territories.

With humility and gratitude, we affirm our solidarity and support for the sovereignty not of the illegal Canadian government or its immoral laws but of those communities whose lands we reside on.

Read statement in full here:

https://www.facebook.com/events/459526197437894

Campesino Committee of the Highlands (Guatemala) – Idle No More

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“We feel very deeply about what is happening in Canada to our brother native people. We condemn the pillaging of which they continue to be victims. We urge you to continue your acts of just resistance to defend Nature, our Mother Earth and Humanity, despite the ambition of governments and corporations to place their interests above the rights of the millinarian peoples.

We call on the (Canadian) government to respect the lives and territories of our brothers and sisters and to respond to their demands.”

– Message from the Campesino Committee of the Highlands (Guatemala) to Idle No More

Battered Women’s Support Services supports ‘Idle No More’ – Idle No More

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by Brandy Kane, Manager of BWSS Aboriginal Women’s Program

Colonization and colonial relationship has a tremendous impact on Indigenous people, which perpetuate the injustice through legislation and policies aimed at ‘civilizing’ Indigenous people. Our rights, our lands and our spirits have been attacked by the colonization. This colonial structure has also maintained the patriarchal ideologies and perpetuated the gendered violence against Indigenous women through its racist and sexist policies while it’s been promoting the privilege of men.

BWSS and BWSS Aboriginal Women’s Program support ‘Idle No More’. We were at the ’Idle No More’ rally on December 23rd and December 27th in Vancouver. It is amazing to see all the people across Canada and internationally, supporting Idle No More movement, which was started by four Aboriginal women who stand for Indigenous rights and environmental justice. We’ll continue to support ‘Idle No More’ through social media and attending upcoming events.

Acknowledging the harm that Bill C-45 will have has woken up Indigenous people and the larger society and we are saying no more to colonial domination. We aren’t sitting idle anymore. Bill C-45 affects all the society, our future generations and our environment. Bill C-45 directly makes a lasting impact on the inherent rights to the land of Indigenous people and also the changes in the Navigable Waters Act impacts not only the Aboriginal people, but also all the society as we share our natural water resources for clean drinking water; therefore there must be consultation with Aboriginal leaders and communities to get their consent.

Chief Theresa Spence is a hero and leader as she enters into her 15th day of fasting. We went from having 2.5 million protected lakes and rivers to 159 protected lakes and rivers. All in the name of money. The government disregards the Indigenous rights and open our lands to the benefit of corporations involved in oil pipelines and nuclear energy with Bill C-45. Harper is selling off our resources and making irrevocable changes on our environment. This will make it easier for the pipeline to go through. The government has taken advantage of our people and our land for too long.

The Idle No More is a prophecy that is coming to fruition. Sheelah Mclean, Nina Wilson, Sylvia McAdam, and Jessica Gordon came together and said enough is enough. The women are starting a movement that is waking up the world. Elder, Emil Bell has started her fast in support of Theresa Spence and has requested that all Pipe carriers and Sweat lodge keepers hold ceremonies and pray on January 1st for all those fasting and for Stephen Harper. He needs our prayers too. Theresa Spence is asking to speak with Harper and he hasn’t come to see her. It’s been 15 day’s. His silence speaks volumes. We all need to come together and rally….. and pray. This needs to stop!! For our future generations… for our Mother Earth. We call the government and Prime Minister Stephen Harper to start a process of consultation with Aboriginal communities and environmental groups. Let’s support Chief Theresa Spence and all of other individual and communities using their voice, taking the action and demanding an effective response from Canadian government. We encourage you to join Idle No More rallies, connecting through social media and pray in your own way for all those who are fasting for the cause.

Peace, Love, and Unity.

Brandy Kane, Manager of BWSS Aboriginal Women’s Program