The Afrikan Black Coalition supports #NoDAPL
“There is a cruel irony in the fact that police are using WATER against those who have sworn to PROTECT IT.” -- Lakota Law Project
The Afrikan Black Coalition unconditionally supports the active protection of land and water, and the struggle for freedom by Native peoples and all oppressed people.
As we approach Thanksgiving, the classic American tradition of celebrating the massacre of Native folks in the 1600s, four hundred years later we have arrived at a similar place. Both Afrikan people and Native people face the gratuitous violence of white settler colonialism and continue to struggle to smash global domination without mercy. According to multiple reports from Twitter and a livestream from Sunday, November 20, 2016, the water protectors of North Dakota are facing rubber bullets, tear gas, mace cannons, and water cannons on North Dakota Highway 1806. The weather is under 30 degrees fahrenheit.
Make no mistake, this is an ongoing act of domestic terrorism. The same U.S. Department of Defense 1033 Program that gives the Oakland Police Department military tanks to surveil the hoods of California enables the abuse of Native peoples attempting to protect their livelihoods. Native peoples in United States have long been the survivors of terrorism. This current assault began in August 2016 and shows no signs of stopping any time soon.
This is a time that requires action, which the water protectors have peacefully taken up. In response to that action the State is punishing the water protectors with weapons of mass destruction. We support without reservation any and all tactics the native people of North Dakota may respond with in reaction to the brutality they are facing. We believe that all people have the right to defend their land against foreign or corporate enemies by any means necessary. Water is a sacred human right that must be protected, not privatized, poisoned, or withheld. With Wells Fargo and Citibank as major funders, the collusion of capitalism and white supremacy is clear.
No one should have to face abuse for basic human rights such as land or water, and yet we do at the hands of the imperialist U.S. government and private corporations. Much like G4S invests in maintaining their global hold on private prisons in the U.S. and Palestinians in the so-called state of Israel, they are also working against the water protectors in North Dakota. This partnership between the State and corporations is further proof of our joint enemies and speaks to V.I Lenin’s statement that “Imperialism [is] the highest stage of Capitalism.”
The Afrikan Black Coalition, in solidarity with the water protectors, strongly condemns the Dakota Access Pipeline, the acts of terror against Indigenous peoples in the name of white supremacist capitalist imperialism, and the disregard for future generations of folks forced to live in the United States of America. It is our fundamental belief that history is on the side of the oppressed and that our victory against the oppressors is inevitable. And we, who believe in freedom, shall not rest until it’s won.
If you’d like to contribute, please donate to the Red Warrior Camp, the direct action camp of #NoDAPL, or visit NoDAPL Solidarity’s call-to-action. #NoDAPL
***
When you see water in a stream
you say: oh, this is stream
water;
When you see water in the river
you say: oh, this is water
of the river;
When you see ocean
water
you say: This is the ocean's
water!
But actually water is always
only itself
and does not belong
to any of these containers
though it creates them.
And so it is with you.
Alice Walker
