From: Michael Stein Date: 24 Sep 92 12:39 PDT Subject: Environment & 500 Years Message-ID: <1563600208@igc.apc.org> September 17, 1992 Dear Friend, As environmental organizations we are writing to invite your participation in an historic series of events. This year, 1992, marks the 500th anniversary of ColumbusU arrival in the Americas. A number of the worldUs governments, including the US, are planning celebrations that romanticize this arrival as a discovery or an encounter. To the people indigenous to the Americas the reality was an invasion. Native American organizations are putting on dozens of events here in the Bay Area in protest of the celebrations and to present their own political, historic, and cultural perspective on the quincentennial. As environmentalists, we are concerned about the relationship between people and the land. Prior to the conquest, native people made decisions regarding the land by considering their effects for generations to come. The extract, accumulate, control and consume ethic of the conquerors was a stark contrast to the sustainable practices of indigenous people. The ethic that arrived with Columbus is the root of todayUs environmental crisis. While the genocide of Native Americans came first with European arms and disease, there was and continues to be a devastating environmental attack on the lives of indigenous people. The United Nations states in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights that RA people may not be deprived of their means of subsistence.S Logging the forests that a people depend on for food, mining operations that poison the water, toxic and nuclear dumping, and expanding ranches or plantations that force people off of their land are just as deadly as swords and smallpox. Since 1492, indigenous people of what came to be known as the US have lost 99% of the land base they depended on for survival. But the legacy of Columbus isnUt exclusively about indigenous people and it isnUt just about the past. Columbus started the slave trade in the Americas, beginning the colonization and exploitation of African people who supplied much of the labor that generated the EuropeansU wealth. And the pattern continued with the indentured servitude of Asian people who were brought to build the railroads and work in the fields of the recently conquered western United States. The US seized 51% of MexicoUs territory in 1848 and colonized Puerto Rico in 1889. Today, a disproportionate number of hazardous waste dumps and toxic industries are located in communities of color or are exported to the Third World. After five centuries of living with the legacy of Columbus, we sit on the brink of ecological disaster. Saving the forests, rivers, oceans and even the air that support all life means a change in our relationship not only to the land but also to each other. 1992 is a time to change the dominant predatory relationship to land and people and build a vision that is based on justice, equality and sustainability. We invite the environmental community to join with Indigenous people in their struggle for sovereignty and environmental justice. The American Indian Movement (AIM) has convened a coalition of more than 35 organizations to sponsor several events. The Bay Area Regional Indian Alliance (BARIA), the International Indian Treaty Council (IITC), and others are also sponsoring events. Below is a list of major events and those with special environmental content. Please join us in participating in the following activities: Oct. 2Q4: The International Tribunal of Indigenous People and Oppressed Nations Putting Columbus' legacy on trial. Friday Evening - Cultural event. Saturday 9 AM to 9 PM - Testimony before international human rights activists, including a focus on environmental rights. Sunday Noon - Workshops and panels. Mission High School at 18th & Dolores Streets, San Francisco. Call AIM to pre-register 415-552-1992. Oct. 4: 3rd Chasky of Autodescubrimiento. Dolores Park, Noon 415-885-4749. Oct. 10: Indigenous PeopleUs Day, Dedication: Turtle Island Monument, Martin Luther King Park, Berkeley, 10 AM 510-548- 1992. Oct. 10: All Our Colors - The Good Road Concert featuring Santana, Jackson Browne, Mickey Hart & Friends, John Lee Hooker, John Trudell, White Boy and the Wagon Burners, and Red Thunder. Shoreline Amphitheatre at 2 PM. A benefit for the Traditional Circle of Elders and Youth. Oct. 11: Healing the Sacred Hoop - The Next 500 Years featuring Bonnie Raitt and acoustic performances by Don Henley, Pahinui Brothers with Ry Cooder & David Lindley, Todd Rundgren, Buffy Sainte-Marie, and Floyd "Red Crow" Westerman. Shoreline Amphitheatre at 2 PM. A benefit for the International Indian Treaty Council. Oct. 11: Demonstration/Civil Disobediance, March & Rally Against the Reenactment of Columbus Landing. Join with the elders of the American Indian Movement (AIM), the Peace Navy, the Pledge of Resistance and dozens of other groups at Aquatic Park, San Francisco. The Environmental Contingent will meet at 8:30 AM at the intersection of North Point & Van Ness. Demo starts at 9:00, March at NOON to Civic Center for Rally at 2:00. Bring signs expressing solidarity with indigenous people, props and noisemakers. Civil Disobediance trainings: Saturday, Sept. 26 at 10 AM at 4345 Telegraph, Oakland and on Sunday, Sept. 27 at 11 AM at New College, 766 Valencia. Call 510-655-0901 to confirm. Pre-action meeting and prop-making party for Environmental Contingent on Wednesday, Sept. 30 at 7 PM at Unitas House, 2700 Bancroft Way, Berkeley. Oct. 12: International Day of Solidarity with Indigenous Peoples. Sunrise ceremony, Alcatraz Island. 800-566-IITC. Oct. 12: Indigenous PeopleUs Music Festival. Free event at Crissy Field. Volunteers needed. 800-566-IITC. Oct. 13: Unplug America (energy boycott/day of non- consumption). The Indigenous Environmental Network has initiated a campaign to "Give mother earth a rest." They are urging everyone to use only sustainable energy and not conduct any business transactions as an alternative to the celebration of the invasion. BARIA 510-452-1235. Things your organization can do: Outreach to your own membership with the enclosed material. Endorse/sponsor these events, make a contribution. Participate in the Environmental Contingent for the Oct. 11 Demo. Come to the next meeting of the undersigned environmental groups to help organize environmental participation in these events. Hope youUll join us in this effort, Greenpeace, Political Ecology Group, Citizens for a Better Environment, Urban Habitat, Berkeley Environmental Justice Coalition, Earth Island Institute, Nindakin: People of Color for the Environment, Rainforest Action Network, Race, Poverty & the Environment Newsletter, International Rivers Network, San Francisco Green Party, Golden Gate Rainforest Action Group, Bay Area Action and Abalone Alliance. For more information, please call the Political Ecology Group (A Project of the Tides Foundation) at 415 641-7835