There are a lot of videos on YouTube that show the ongoing peaceful demonstrations in Canada of indigenous people protesting against fracking that will destroy ancient water sources. Today one got violent when a contingent of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police confronted and then attacked the protesters where they had set up camp to block the initial stages of investigation for the fracking.
That's a feather she's holding, others were holding sage, against which the Canadian police used pepper spray and rubber bullets and some said live ammunition.
Along with the police were a few snipers in camouflage. A very threatening presence to a peaceful demonstration.
The protesters were angry, justifiably,
(some burned government cars after they were brutally attacked, women and men) bur brave in the face of such force and are really standing up for the rest of us who are allowing this process of corporate oil's takeover of precious resources to satisfy their need for new profits from shale and tar sands oil deposits and to thwart the growth of clean energy processes. They aren't the only ones standing up to fracking around the globe. Here's people from a farm community in Romania protesting an outside oil company (American) trying to frack their land.
I can't verify the Romanian protest. But I have Indian activist friends who have posted eye witness accounts of the Canadian one. Maybe the best explanation for what's happening is this:
[A little oversimplified but generally accurate.]
3 comments:
I saw this earlier when a friend posted a link to Idle No More. Glad to see the indigenous folks are standing up. We have had protest here in the UP over a new iron mine and others in Northern Wisconsin over a proposed mine that would leave a 22 mile long scar and like pollute the Bad River watershed and damage the fisheries and wild rice.
Yeah, it's endless this corporate rape of the earth, needs to be a broader more connected focused movement to defend it.
I know. Wisconsin has a big problem with their Republican government. They are introducing or already have bills to 1. Make it very difficult for local communities to have a say in issues of mining and other corporate ventures and 2. a bill to make it more difficult for individuals and groups to hold corporations liable for health problems that the company created. Like asbestos. The Wisconsin also will would be mining through asbestos bearing rock that they denied was there. We'll see how strong the government is when it comes to dealing with that.
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