By Puck

“You’ll see…” Those ominous words were all that my Chicana friend would say to me after I told her that I was going to accept the position as an editor on the Earth First! Journal collective. Up until I mentioned my plans, she had been talking about her experiences with racism in the forest defense scene. “Maybe it’ll be different for you…,” she trailed off, shrugging. But that’s not what the look in her eyes told me.

That was two years ago. Since then, most of the people of color I know who were once in the Earth First! movement have left—all citing reasons of racism within the scene. Recently, while I was contemplating whether or not to attend the Round River Rendezvous this year, I had a moment of terrible clarity: I realized that while most of my friends of color have left the scene in disgust, many of the men who have sexually assaulted women and queer folks are still up in the trees, writing press releases or lurking at basecamps. I wonder: What the fuck does that say about our scene?

I decided to attend the Rendezvous. Despite all of the sketchy experiences I’ve had, especially when it comes to race issues, I went because I still felt like I should be able to call this scene home if I want to. I’ve had to deal with racist shit at previous actions and gatherings, and I didn’t want to feel like those things had successfully pushed me out. So I decided to go and say something about it and then (theoretically anyway) I wouldn’t care if you all hated me or wrote me off, because if you only liked me when I was quiet then you never really had my back anyway. From the feminist struggle to queer liberation to anarchism, I know that nothing ever changes without a fight. I knew that if I just silently dropped out, then some other person of color would have to deal with the same shit again. So I got on a bus headed toward Ellsworth, Maine.

I Dare You

Consider what it might be like, being a person of color entering an enclave of almost exclusively white people. Hopefully, we all realize that “race” is a social construct, not a biological one. We realize that as individuals we are more than the sum of our assigned races, social classes and genders, and if we’re friends then we probably value each other for reasons irrespective of our backgrounds. So let’s say that although you (you’re still imagining you’re a person of color, right?) might feel slightly uncomfortable with how white the crowd is at any given event, race isn’t what you’re thinking of the most. You probably want to have a good time, do good work and not always be thinking about oppression and how much it sucks.

But throughout the years you’ve had to deal with hearing from folks who you thought were your allies that ignorant brown people are overpopulating the planet, and that racism isn’t as important to address as sexism or clearcutting. White kids talk about how they’ve rejected their privilege, yet boast incessantly about their grand “Third World” adventures criss-crossing the globe. Some tell you that poor people of color should just escape the system by living in squats and eating trash. (Some of us do, and often it’s not voluntary.)

As an isolated person of color in a white-dominated radical scene, you might also notice this: Out of the few images of people of color presented in anarchist and activist literature, the majority depict us as starving, being bombed, being incarcerated, or naked and holding a spear. Then if you dare to comment on this or any other form of racism that manifests, you’re obliged to have the same boring conversation about white supremacy and what it means to be a person of color in the US again. And usually the person you’re talking to doesn’t care nearly as much about your hurt feelings and frustration as about wanting to prove that you’re wrong; they’re not racist, and you’re just oversensitive.

More reasons to be wary of white-dominated groups: You are tokenized when it’s convenient but ignored or contradicted when you share your experiences. Your insights and criticisms are rejected and blown off because you’re “too angry and emotional.” When you take a physical and emotional risk and confront racism within a majority white group, you are shouted down by some asshole bellowing “reverse racism.” Imagine being left to fend for yourself while hordes of white people just watch. Now that you’ve dared talk to about race, people who you once thought were your friends only want to tell you about how oppressed they are individually by black people who are mean to them for living in all-black neighborhoods.

Well, this is what happened to me at the Rendezvous, and I found myself wondering: In what way do these people—my supposed friends and comrades—support me at all? Why the fuck don’t they do something to help?

I wonder: Would it be okay with this same crowd if a rape survivor talking about her experiences with abuse and patriarchy was so brusquely interrupted by a barrage of defensive, arrogant men demanding, “Well, what were you wearing? You were probably asking for it, so shut up already.”

Sure, it’s not just the Earth First! scene, or even the environmental movement. One doesn’t have to look far in this world to find examples of white supremacy. It’s so etched into the patterns of our lives, consciousness, language and habits that it can easily be taken for granted as normal. This is especially true in spaces that are all or mostly white. I’ve learned the hard way that as an institution, white supremacy is just as present in “anti-racist” activist and anarchist circles as it is in the larger society. Even within the radical environmental movement, underneath the sprinkling of “politically correct” liberal language about “valuing diversity,” many white supremacist ideas and influences—inherited from the white bourgeois origins of the conservation movement, as well as xenophobes like Edward Abbey—continue to go unchallenged.

Opportunists and Alliances

If you splash pictures of naked brown people (“noble savage porn”) on your anti-civilization leaflets, this does not at all make you a race traitor or an ally to people of color. Rather, this is a disgusting example of tokenism. Do you know that naked man’s name? Do you care about justice for his descendants who are alive today? Are there indigenous people in your group who make decisions? Or did you just want to use that image of the naked brown man carrying the spear for your own bizarre political purposes? It looks to me like more of the same old colonialist bullshit—more “fantasies of the Master Race.”

It’s true that all of us living in North America have an enormous responsibility to support indigenous struggles for land and freedom, and we will all be better off when this land is returned to their care. So rather than hanging dream catchers in our vans or romanticizing the poverty of reservation life, let’s fork out some fundraised money and other tangible support for the Native Youth Movement!

Indigenous people are not the only people of color who are fighting against environmental destruction. We have allegiances to build in many of the most polluted, oppressive environments in the US and beyond. From Los Angeles to Detroit to Miami, people of color are always organizing against the corporations who dump and burn toxic wastes in their neighborhoods. Most people of color want clean water to drink, good organic food to eat, and beautiful forests, deserts and rivers to explore, and they would love to have time to contemplate all the grand philosophical questions of the day.

It’s insulting as hell when white people talk about ecological issues like they’re Great White Secrets that people of color don’t care about and can’t understand. I bet that wherever you live—if you try—you can find people of color organizing for a more just and sustainable Earth.

Beyond Dumping Piss Buckets on Loggers

I never got to have the discussion I wanted to during the Rendezvous: I was interrupted. Yes, I wanted to talk about my personal encounters with racism in the scene, but more than that, I wanted to brainstorm ideas (especially with people of color) about specific ways we could all fight for environmental justice and ecological preservation by using direct action and grassroots community organizing.

As environmental activists we choose campaigns to work on, corporations and politicians to target, allies to work with and issues to focus on. We decide who we reach out to, where we are based and how we frame our messages. Now, although some people can pull it off, most folks can’t just quit their jobs, ditch their families and take off for days on end to hop a freight train to the old-growth forest defense campaign and dive dinner from the nearest dumpster. And if the race politics in the scene stay as they are now, why would anyone who isn’t white want to join this fight?

So seriously, if we’re talking about fighting for freedom for everybody, cultivating global resistance and having ecological sustainability and autonomous decentralization, there’s plenty of direct action environmentalism to do outside of rural, forested areas. The More Gardens! Project in New York City is a great example of an ecologically-minded project that is based on multi-racial community organizing and civil disobedience. The whole campaign is about direct action—from growing food and establishing relationships with local people to challenging racist city policies and disobeying police. Organizing against such issues as water privatization—like the Water Allies Network does across the US—is a grand way to connect the horrors of capitalism to the murder of the planet and the absurdity of our unsustainable lifestyles. Genetic engineering is another issue with the potential to bring people with different backgrounds together.

We would also do well to destroy the stereotype of all environmentalists being white and middle class—because we aren’t. However vehement our anti-capitalist or anti-consumerist rhetoric might be, we’re all talk until we actively create campaigns that ally with working-class people and fight together for justice and a safe, healthy, thriving planet.

Next Time?

A few folks who went to the Rendezvous have asked me: “What could we have done? How can we do things differently next time?” For starters, you could create a space where marginalized people who call out shitty, oppressive behavior don’t have to deal with a defensive and reactionary majority that uses the opportunity to attack and force a debate on their own terms. Again, would this be expected of a sexual assault survivor? Being an ally is not theoretical. Find the people who are doing good shit, and ask them how they need to be supported.

Right now, I feel like going to the Rendezvous and speaking out was a big fucking mistake. The whole ordeal makes me feel exhausted and terrible still. A few white activists who were at the workshop have since expressed sentiments like: “It was good for me to think about these things. It really challenged me.”

Throughout the weekend, I felt awful and was often close to tears. I couldn’t just “be myself”—I had to always be on guard, waiting for the next ignorant comment and the next attack to refute. Meanwhile, most of my supposed allies stood around and dispassionately commented on how much my pain taught them. I couldn’t help but feel like a lab animal who is being sliced open, stared at and prodded by scientists who remark coldly about how much there is to learn from my insides. Does this sound too harsh? Well, I try to appreciate where some of you might be coming from and understand that this might be new for you, but being treated like an abstract theory or a lab experiment and not a human who deserves respect leaves me feeling even more isolated and alienated. My suffering shouldn’t have to be your lesson plan.

Please do seek out resources that are out there for white people to deal with racist socialization. It sucks having to talk about issues that often directly impact our lives—like gentrification or immigration policy—on a purely theoretical level with people who’ve never had to deal with these things themselves. It sucks worse when those same people arrogantly insist that we’re wrong about our understanding of the oppression that we live through and fight daily.

Healing and Decolonizing

The process of colonization is painful and dehumanizes both the oppressors and the oppressed. We all have so much healing to do. The dominant Western culture is killing the planet. We need to love the land, build real ties with and learn from people whose ways of life are more in tune with the Earth and are less oppressive to people.

How will we able to do this if we’re stuck in an insular scene, congratulating ourselves and pretending that nothing is wrong? We need to find ways to support each other, care for each other, rip off our blinders and talk frankly about the problems we face.

I wrote this so that no one can pretend that racism in the movement isn’t a big deal, or that nothing happened or that everything was resolved. Nothing has been resolved for me. I think that if any of you care about these things, then you should freaking change things so that people of color don’t keep leaving. After all, talk is just talk, right? Actions—whether it’s setting fire to corporate headquarters, putting your ass on the line in front of a logging truck, or deliberately choosing campaigns that ally with people of color and working class folks—are what matter in the end, not words.

Puck is a freelance independent journalist and is part of theAnarchist People of Color movement. She was an editor on the Earth First! Journal collective and has been involved in forest defense campaigns and land struggles.

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Resources for Challenging White Supremacy

•www.whiteprivilege.com. An anti-racism education and activism resource published by the Monkeyfist Collective
(monkeyfist.com).

•Challenging White Supremacy, 2440 16th St, PMB #275, San Francisco, CA 94103; (415) 647-0921; www.cwsworkshop.org. Anti-racist organizers working for social change in the US by building mass-based, multi-racial grassroots movements led by radical activists of color.

•www.activesolidarity.net. Anti-racism and movement-building resources, writings and links to various radical, people of color and anti-racist groups.

•Anarchist People of Color, www.illegalvoices.org/apoc. A resource created by and for anarchist and anti-authoritarian people of color: a network of organizers in communities across the US that grew out of frustration with the predominantly white radical movement and subcultures.

Multi-Cultural Environmental Resources

•Insurrectionary Anarchists, www.geocities.com/insurrectionary_anarchists. A Canadian and international radical news resource, including indigenous, immigrant and prisoner information. Resources and updates for Native Youth Movement actions in Canada.

•Indigenous Environmental Network, POB 485, Bemidji, MN
56619; (218) 751-4967; www.ienearth.org. Environmental justice resource for indigenous communities throughout the Americas.

Zines

•Color Lines magazine, PMB 319, 4096 Piedmont Ave, Oakland, CA 94611-5221, (510) 653-3415, www.arc.org/C_Lines/CLabout.html. Quarterly magazine about race, culture and organizing.

•Red Wire magazine, POB 2042, Station Main Terminal, Vancouver, BC V6B-3R6, (604) 602-7226, www.redwiremag.com. Media forum dedicated to Native youth expression.

•Zines by Zig Zag: Colonization is Always War; Anti-History: An Indigenous Anti-Capitalist Analysis; We Shall Live Again and others. Available through Green Anarchy Distro, www.greenanarchy.org/distro.php; Oak and Cactus Distro, www.omnipresence.mahost.org/ocdistro.htm.

•Anarchist Panther by Ashanti Alston, www.anarco-nyc.net/anarchistpanther.html. Zines about black anarchists written by a former member of the Black Panther Party and the Black Liberation Army.

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