Top Tweets for #DecolWeek
We all want to grow and improve our activism, but we can sometimes forget to take time out and reflect. We've made it easy for you with these handy prompts to assess your activism & be in better relationship with frontline communities. ✊🏽
#DecolWeek #MovementPower4ClimateAction
❌ Only asking us to engage in a cultural role without respecting the full breadth of our identity or work. eg. Asking us to open a meeting with karakia /prayer, but not asking for our expertise or opinions on the substance of the meeting.
#DecolWeek #MovementPower4ClimateAction
❌ Requiring people to play a caricature of their identity in order to be included, like expecting Indigenous activists to wear regalia and speak poetically about their rights struggles…
#DecolWeek #MovementPower4ClimateAction #Tokenism
❌ Expecting BIPOC to be responsible for Diversity Equity Inclusion & Justice in your organisation or movement without it being part of their agreed role.
#DecolWeek #MovementPower4ClimateAction #Tokenism
❌ Asking for “The Indigenous Perspective” as if one person can speak for 476 million diverse Indigenous Peoples.
#DecolWeek #MovementPower4ClimateAction #Tokenism
❌ Appointing BIPOC, disabled, and other frontline community members to roles as a “check box”, without ensuring they will be kept safe and have any power to make real change.
#DecolWeek #MovementPower4ClimateAction #Tokenism
So how can Tokenism show up in our climate movements?
It might be more prevalent than you'd think, and it can hide behind apparent attempts to foster inclusion. Here are some ways we've noticed...
#DecolWeek #MovementPower4ClimateAction #Tokenism
Tokenism is symbolic engagement or support designed to give the impression of diversity or inclusion without giving up power or actually tackling systemic oppressions. Indigenous stories, struggles & people are used as props.
#DecolWeek #MovementPower4ClimateAction #Tokenism
Tokenism shields institutions from critique and inhibits the accountability required for safe and inclusive movements.
#DecolWeek #MovementPower4ClimateAction #Tokenism
Tokenism harms people from structurally oppressed communities, and robs those communities of the right to meaningful representation and participation - especially on issues that most affect them, like climate change.
#DecolWeek #MovementPower4ClimateAction #Tokenism
While centering Indigenous messages is critical, we are often expected to speak on our trauma & loss to "inspire" non-Indigenous people to donate or take action.
This Tokenism is inherently incompatible with real #Climate Justice.
#DecolWeek #MovementPower4ClimateAction
Tokenism within our movements is, quite simply, incompatible with climate justice.
#ClimateJustice #DecolWeek
Make sure you're following our #DecolWeek content for the full interview with Bonita Qio, coming soon. We dive into Indigenous Knowledge, and #ClimateImpacts for Indigenous, Rainbow, and Sex Worker Communities.
In the meantime, you can amplify Bonita's work by RTing this thread!
"It's because of climate change, and to me that is, Loss and Damage. I'm losing these resources and at the same time my culture and my lifestyle is being damaged because of this. It also means that to access these herbs I have to travel a distance."
-Bonita Qio
#DecolWeek
On Loss & Damage:
"In my village, which is on the coast, we have something similar to a burial ground that sits on the beach front. It’s not only a burial ground, it’s got this small creek that provides the water to feed the plants that grow there."
- Bonita Qio
#DecolWeek
"So part of the conservation work that I do is really trying to use some of these advantages we have with culture, and using it in the work. We were able to collect our seeds together & then distribute them among everyone that needed help"
#DecolWeek #MovementPower4ClimateAction
"The good thing is that we have strategies, one that I shared was the Solesolevaki."
"A lifestyle where we help each other - I help you, you help me and that is the core of Solesolevaki within our system."
- Bonita Qio
#DecolWeek #MovementPower4ClimateAction #Decolonize
"But in the past, in our culture, we've had our own roles in the community. But then when Christianity came and it started to change, we started framing things differently, and naming things differently... We're losing a lot of our cultural identity."
- Bonita Qio
#DecolWeek
"Looking back, there was a particular incident when Cyclone Winston hit Fiji. It came out that people from my province said that the lifestyle that we were living has caused climate change, and has caused disaster to strike us."
- Bonita Qio
#MVPFAFF #ClimateJustice #DecolWeek
"We had roles in the community in the past but then people started to look at it in a different way, and that's because of the history of our country and the coming of Christianity."
- Bonita Qio
#Vakasalewalewa #MVPFAFF #DecolWeek #MovementPower4ClimateAction
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