Thanks for sharing this story. I find the alchemy of how the elder turned legal papers into a tool for physical and spiritual medicine to be especially powerful.
Did you ever read about how one of the forest defenders from Fairy Creek in BC was also targeted by the legal system in an attempt to use the violence of the state to enable corporate exploitation to continue ?
Rainbow Eyes was sentenced to jail on April 24 by BC Supreme Court Chief Justice Christopher Hinkson and she was incarcerated at the Alouette Correctional Centre for Women in Maple Ridge.
During her trial, Rainbow Eyes called witnesses including Pacheedaht Elder Bill Jones, Coast Salish Elder Klasom Satlt’xw Losah (Rose Henry) and Kwakwaka’wakw Hereditary Chiefs Walas Namugwis (David Mungo Knox) and Ye-kue-kalas (David Daniel Hanuse).
“I asked Rainbow Eyes and numerous others to come to my territory to defend our great mother’s gift to us for our spiritual and religious practice,” says Pacheedaht Elder Bill Jones. “Rainbow Eyes was and is faithful to that cause and continues to show strength and dedication in her resolve in the protection of our great mother’s gift to us.”
“Rainbow Eyes believes that Chief Justice Hinkson engaged in an unreasonable balancing in imposing a sentence of 60 days jail,” Rainbow Eyes’ defence counsel Ben Isitt says. “She has appealed the sentence and is asking the Court of Appeal to conduct a proper Gladue analysis that takes into account her duties as a Kwakwaka’wakw land guardian protecting cedar trees at Fairy Creek and assisting in the search for a missing Coast Salish person.”
For more info on Rainbow Eyes. The story of Angela Davidson. This video tells her story and journey as land guardian standing for truth and sacred responsibility.
I published an article that documented the courageous (and peaceful) efforts of the forest defenders (as well as the duplicity, nefarious cowardice and criminal abuse of the RCMP when they were weaponized as corporate enforcers) in this post:
In a few short months, the temporary deferral protecting Fairy Creek is scheduled to expire. If this tenuous protection is lifted logging and road building could resume in the headwaters of Fairy Creek.
Logging has been deferred in Fairy Creek since June 2021, and the temporary protection is scheduled to expire on February 21, 2025. The BC provincial government has had over three years to come up with a plan to protect Fairy Creek and so far all they’ve done is kick the can down the road. With millions of dollars available in federal funding it’s hard to imagine what they are waiting for (aside from cashing in on all the taxes and stumpage fees they will get if the rare ancient forest is clearcut).
It’s time for a permanent park or conservancy to protect the Fairy Creek watershed AND the adjacent old growth forest that have been left out of the deferral.
We need people like you (and anyone else reading this, and willing to share this) to speak up.
Max, I would be grateful if you (and anyone else reading this that cares about our elder rooted beings and endangered primary rain forest habitat like the Fairy Creek Watershed) could help raise awareness about the imperative of protecting what is one of the last intact watersheds of Primary (ancient/unlogged) temperate rainforest on Earth in your networks.
One of the last living memories of the living Planet Earth's expression of the beauty, diversity, wisdom, medicine for the spirit and biodiversity that arises in the form of an ancient temperate rainforest is under threat by corporate profiteering. We are called now to stand up and speak for the trees to help our fellow human beings understand the importance of protecting this ecosystem scale Noa's Ark that is the Fairy Creek Watershed.
Thank you for caring about the living Earth and thank you for helping raise awareness on this and the detrimental impacts of lithium mining.
Gavin, thanks very much for this detailed and informative comment. I've followed the Fairy Creek struggle since the beginning, and in fact a friend of mine was one of the people who helped catalyze the movement. It was a beautiful thing to witness. I'll be following and working to spread the word as much as I can. Thank you.
Thanks Max, I appreciate the solidarity and look forward to re-sharing any content pertaining to Fairy Creek you may publish on here.
I just do not understand the mentality of those that know this is a very last intact watershed of primary 800-1200 year old ancient Douglas fir and western cedar on Vancouver Island, and yet they still think cutting it down is a good idea. It boggles my mind... it is like these people want to erase all memory of what real health, biodiversity and beauty is, so that they can make the toxic industrial civilization they covet seem less ugly and more normal. These are challenging times to be alive if you are someone that cares...
Definitely. I think Chris Hedges put it well in this piece: "Whole segments of American [global] society are now bent on self-immolation. They despise this world and what it has done to them. Their personal and political behavior is willfully suicidal. They seek to destroy, even if destruction leads to violence and death."
Sadly, that does indeed describe how many human beings are choosing to behave right now on planet Earth.
One aspect of my next book is going to be about switching the script from looking at how exploitative, anthropocentric, short sighted and self-destructive human beings have been (and continue to be in large swaths globally) and to rather highlight both historical and modern day instances where humans instead chose to develop ecological literacy, pattern recognition, regional botanical/mycological knowledge and cultural values to the point where they became (and are becoming) keystone species and agents of trophic cascade (like the wolves/beavers in yellowstone) via creating Food Forests.
I am about to publish my species profile on Shagbark Hickory as it is a tree from the bioregion where I live now that was extensively used in regenerative agroforestry farming (food forest) designs by the indigenous (Chippewa/Ojibwe, Huron-Wendat and Algonquin) people of this region and pure stands of old growth Hickory (existing in concentrations along side other food/medicine bearing trees such as swamp white oak, butternut, white pine, pawpaw, kentucky coffee and ginseng that indicate a highly likelihood the forest composition is anthropogenic) can still be found in some areas. These food forests were brimming with "Mother Trees" that were and are centers for biodiversity, supporting diverse mammal populations, nesting sites for endangered birds and also food and medicine for humans. These were (and some still are) climax old growth forest habitats that also provide several magnitudes more food for humans per an acre than the monoculture farm fields that exist along side of them. Creating those types of food production systems is something we can do today for the 7th generation down the line.
I want to inspire people to re-imagine what it means to be human in the context of providing knowledge that instead empowers people to become the co-creators of amazing abundance/biodiversity (such as the old growth food forests that Charles C. Mann documented early "explorers", missionaries and military officers encountering in his book, 1491, where he shared excerpts from Jesuit priest and New France military people looking in awe upon the "well tended and park like nut and fruit orchards" that existed along side the Haudenosaunee communities they were encountering in the 1600-s, near where I live now).
I am working with some local indigenous people now to apply the techniques and traditions of their knowledge keepers along side modern soil building techniques that accelerate soil regeneration along with mycological stacking of functions to begin to re-create an enhanced version of the food forests that once dwelled here for their community.
The book will take some time, a lot of field research and gathering of TEK knowledge to ground my modern soil science and permaculture education in a knowing that has more experience connected to this land specifically, but once I get ready to publish I could share an advanced copy with you for reviewing if you like.
Thanks Max. We have a bomb cyclone here today on the Cdn Pacific coast. Best to you this coming season. I am solo writing letters to Guilbeault and Trudeau. Have you read Gaia's Web by Karen Bakker. It's worth it. Hugs
Thanks for the recommendation, Maureen, I haven't read that book. I'll take a look. We got hit by the storm too down here in Oregon. Not too bad, though. Some branches down, a lot of rain, but nothing like the Seattle area.
Dean's wisdom is not factored into the cost benefit analysis of the lithium mining operation because like the breath of the Pronghorn Antelope and the cry of the Prairie Falcon, it is priceless.
So if you follow the "donate" link from Protect Thacker Pass, you're taken to a Give Butter page that states all of the money goes to Fertile Ground Conservancy. Why is that?
Hi Maureen, good question. Fertile Ground Conservancy is a registered non-profit that is the "fiscal sponsor" for Protect Thacker Pass. That's a common practice in the non-profit world, it just means they're helping us out by handling the donations for us. In return, we get the benefit of donations being tax-deductible, since they're a 501c3.
Thanks for sharing this story. I find the alchemy of how the elder turned legal papers into a tool for physical and spiritual medicine to be especially powerful.
Did you ever read about how one of the forest defenders from Fairy Creek in BC was also targeted by the legal system in an attempt to use the violence of the state to enable corporate exploitation to continue ?
https://nanaimonewsnow.com/2024/04/05/forced-to-do-so-by-a-higher-calling-indigenous-woman-awaits-sentencing-in-nanaimo-for-illegal-logging-protests/
Rainbow Eyes was sentenced to jail on April 24 by BC Supreme Court Chief Justice Christopher Hinkson and she was incarcerated at the Alouette Correctional Centre for Women in Maple Ridge.
During her trial, Rainbow Eyes called witnesses including Pacheedaht Elder Bill Jones, Coast Salish Elder Klasom Satlt’xw Losah (Rose Henry) and Kwakwaka’wakw Hereditary Chiefs Walas Namugwis (David Mungo Knox) and Ye-kue-kalas (David Daniel Hanuse).
“I asked Rainbow Eyes and numerous others to come to my territory to defend our great mother’s gift to us for our spiritual and religious practice,” says Pacheedaht Elder Bill Jones. “Rainbow Eyes was and is faithful to that cause and continues to show strength and dedication in her resolve in the protection of our great mother’s gift to us.”
“Rainbow Eyes believes that Chief Justice Hinkson engaged in an unreasonable balancing in imposing a sentence of 60 days jail,” Rainbow Eyes’ defence counsel Ben Isitt says. “She has appealed the sentence and is asking the Court of Appeal to conduct a proper Gladue analysis that takes into account her duties as a Kwakwaka’wakw land guardian protecting cedar trees at Fairy Creek and assisting in the search for a missing Coast Salish person.”
For more info on Rainbow Eyes. The story of Angela Davidson. This video tells her story and journey as land guardian standing for truth and sacred responsibility.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4KmfKYXJrKE
I published an article that documented the courageous (and peaceful) efforts of the forest defenders (as well as the duplicity, nefarious cowardice and criminal abuse of the RCMP when they were weaponized as corporate enforcers) in this post:
https://gavinmounsey.substack.com/p/death-by-a-thousand-clearcuts
In a few short months, the temporary deferral protecting Fairy Creek is scheduled to expire. If this tenuous protection is lifted logging and road building could resume in the headwaters of Fairy Creek.
Logging has been deferred in Fairy Creek since June 2021, and the temporary protection is scheduled to expire on February 21, 2025. The BC provincial government has had over three years to come up with a plan to protect Fairy Creek and so far all they’ve done is kick the can down the road. With millions of dollars available in federal funding it’s hard to imagine what they are waiting for (aside from cashing in on all the taxes and stumpage fees they will get if the rare ancient forest is clearcut).
It’s time for a permanent park or conservancy to protect the Fairy Creek watershed AND the adjacent old growth forest that have been left out of the deferral.
We need people like you (and anyone else reading this, and willing to share this) to speak up.
Max, I would be grateful if you (and anyone else reading this that cares about our elder rooted beings and endangered primary rain forest habitat like the Fairy Creek Watershed) could help raise awareness about the imperative of protecting what is one of the last intact watersheds of Primary (ancient/unlogged) temperate rainforest on Earth in your networks.
For more info on the Forest Defenders of Fairy Creek: https://www.dzunukwasociety.com/
One of the last living memories of the living Planet Earth's expression of the beauty, diversity, wisdom, medicine for the spirit and biodiversity that arises in the form of an ancient temperate rainforest is under threat by corporate profiteering. We are called now to stand up and speak for the trees to help our fellow human beings understand the importance of protecting this ecosystem scale Noa's Ark that is the Fairy Creek Watershed.
Thank you for caring about the living Earth and thank you for helping raise awareness on this and the detrimental impacts of lithium mining.
Gavin, thanks very much for this detailed and informative comment. I've followed the Fairy Creek struggle since the beginning, and in fact a friend of mine was one of the people who helped catalyze the movement. It was a beautiful thing to witness. I'll be following and working to spread the word as much as I can. Thank you.
Thanks Max, I appreciate the solidarity and look forward to re-sharing any content pertaining to Fairy Creek you may publish on here.
I just do not understand the mentality of those that know this is a very last intact watershed of primary 800-1200 year old ancient Douglas fir and western cedar on Vancouver Island, and yet they still think cutting it down is a good idea. It boggles my mind... it is like these people want to erase all memory of what real health, biodiversity and beauty is, so that they can make the toxic industrial civilization they covet seem less ugly and more normal. These are challenging times to be alive if you are someone that cares...
Definitely. I think Chris Hedges put it well in this piece: "Whole segments of American [global] society are now bent on self-immolation. They despise this world and what it has done to them. Their personal and political behavior is willfully suicidal. They seek to destroy, even if destruction leads to violence and death."
Sadly, that does indeed describe how many human beings are choosing to behave right now on planet Earth.
One aspect of my next book is going to be about switching the script from looking at how exploitative, anthropocentric, short sighted and self-destructive human beings have been (and continue to be in large swaths globally) and to rather highlight both historical and modern day instances where humans instead chose to develop ecological literacy, pattern recognition, regional botanical/mycological knowledge and cultural values to the point where they became (and are becoming) keystone species and agents of trophic cascade (like the wolves/beavers in yellowstone) via creating Food Forests.
I am about to publish my species profile on Shagbark Hickory as it is a tree from the bioregion where I live now that was extensively used in regenerative agroforestry farming (food forest) designs by the indigenous (Chippewa/Ojibwe, Huron-Wendat and Algonquin) people of this region and pure stands of old growth Hickory (existing in concentrations along side other food/medicine bearing trees such as swamp white oak, butternut, white pine, pawpaw, kentucky coffee and ginseng that indicate a highly likelihood the forest composition is anthropogenic) can still be found in some areas. These food forests were brimming with "Mother Trees" that were and are centers for biodiversity, supporting diverse mammal populations, nesting sites for endangered birds and also food and medicine for humans. These were (and some still are) climax old growth forest habitats that also provide several magnitudes more food for humans per an acre than the monoculture farm fields that exist along side of them. Creating those types of food production systems is something we can do today for the 7th generation down the line.
I want to inspire people to re-imagine what it means to be human in the context of providing knowledge that instead empowers people to become the co-creators of amazing abundance/biodiversity (such as the old growth food forests that Charles C. Mann documented early "explorers", missionaries and military officers encountering in his book, 1491, where he shared excerpts from Jesuit priest and New France military people looking in awe upon the "well tended and park like nut and fruit orchards" that existed along side the Haudenosaunee communities they were encountering in the 1600-s, near where I live now).
I am working with some local indigenous people now to apply the techniques and traditions of their knowledge keepers along side modern soil building techniques that accelerate soil regeneration along with mycological stacking of functions to begin to re-create an enhanced version of the food forests that once dwelled here for their community.
The book will take some time, a lot of field research and gathering of TEK knowledge to ground my modern soil science and permaculture education in a knowing that has more experience connected to this land specifically, but once I get ready to publish I could share an advanced copy with you for reviewing if you like.
Thanks Max. We have a bomb cyclone here today on the Cdn Pacific coast. Best to you this coming season. I am solo writing letters to Guilbeault and Trudeau. Have you read Gaia's Web by Karen Bakker. It's worth it. Hugs
Thanks for the recommendation, Maureen, I haven't read that book. I'll take a look. We got hit by the storm too down here in Oregon. Not too bad, though. Some branches down, a lot of rain, but nothing like the Seattle area.
Dean's wisdom is not factored into the cost benefit analysis of the lithium mining operation because like the breath of the Pronghorn Antelope and the cry of the Prairie Falcon, it is priceless.
I completely agree, John.
Thanks for this Max. Informative and motivating as usual. Take care.
You're welcome, Matt! Thank you for your own work!
I love that they used the legal papers to help start the fire
Me too, Kollibri. So powerful.
So if you follow the "donate" link from Protect Thacker Pass, you're taken to a Give Butter page that states all of the money goes to Fertile Ground Conservancy. Why is that?
Hi Maureen, good question. Fertile Ground Conservancy is a registered non-profit that is the "fiscal sponsor" for Protect Thacker Pass. That's a common practice in the non-profit world, it just means they're helping us out by handling the donations for us. In return, we get the benefit of donations being tax-deductible, since they're a 501c3.
Thank you.
Of course. You can trust that group (although I am biased: I'm part of both organizations).