Humanizing Through Story

We are an advocacy platforM using visual journalism TO FOUCS ON environmental, social, and racial justice. We exsist to elevate, center, and celebrate the voices of the marginalized, overlooked, and oppressed.

Current MUTUAL AID OPPORTUNITY

Catiuska, a single mother of 3, fled the violence in Venezuela and journeyed for six months from Chile to the United States through the Darien Gap. She's now living in Aurora, CO, for over a year. She hasn't been able to find work (she hasn't been given a work permit yet) while she waits for her 2025 court case for asylum. She makes ends meet by making ice cream sundaes, cones, and other treats for those in the apartment complex and doing people's nails. On top of her having to worry about providing for her kids, the apartment complex is falling apart, with the landlord doing little to nothing to help. She's currently without hot water and no laundry, and the looming threat of eviction hangs over most people at the apartment complex.

To make all this worse, a couple of weeks ago, a video started spreading about Venezuelan gangs taking over apartment complexes in Aurora. The videos went viral across platforms like TikTok, spreading false information and dehumanizing rhetoric, then spreading it by media outlets far, far-right groups, and even some politicians. Because of all this, Catiuska and many other immigrants in these apartment complexes have been thrown into a whirlwind of emotions and fears.

Now, this is where you all can help. I'm currently raising funds to support Catiuska and her three kids. She broke down into tears several times as we talked, fearing how she would care for her kids. She feels trapped in these circumstances piled on top of each other. So, through Humanizing Through Story, in talks with local activists and community organizers, and permission to tell her story, we are collecting funds over the next few weeks to help.

We Spent around five months (until Sept) along the southern border collecting stories, working with organizations, and shedding light on the complex space that is the US/Mexico border. We spent two months in the Tucson & Ajo area of AZ working with several groups: Ajo Samaritans, ISDA, Quitobaquito Springs, Vets for Peace, Tucson Samaritans, Salavision, Sierra Club Borderlands, & Borderlinks. And now, in South Texas, the Rio Grande Valley document and highlight the work of more groups and individuals. These groups include The National Butterfly Center, LUPE, The Sidewalk School, Practicing Mercy Foundation, Los 53 migrants Memorial, Team Brownsville, Dulce Refugee Shelter, & Texas Civil Rights. We are putting together a series of short stories about the border and potentially a longer documentary film.

Our goal is to do our part to educate and humanize the space that has become so demonized by first: highlighting and celebrating the individuals and organizations who have dedicated their time and energy to the border to bring aid, hope, and love to some of the most vulnerable groups, refugees, and migrants. Secondly, we highlight those doing their part to restore and protect crucial, sensitive, and protected lands. The environment in the southern USA and along the border is one of the country's most biodiverse. It has been hit hard by border wall construction, climate change, failed policies, and other infrastructure. By doing this project, we can educate and give us all tools to help shift and correct the narrative coming out about this space and empower us to have conversations with friends, co-workers, and family. This is how real, lasting change happens.

The Weelaunee People’s Park (aka Intrenchment Creek Park), part of the South River Forest, is threatened to be deforested after a land swap between Ryan Millsap, owner of Blackhall Real Estate, and the county. The swap is in a current lawsuit. This is another danger that looms over the forest on top of the 180+ acres of land that is being developed for "Cop City," the country's largest police training facility. This project is being protested by community members, faith leaders, environmentalists, land defenders, indigenous members, and others as it threatens the land and the communities this forest surrounds. Photos just below are linked to Instagram posts and videos from out time there as well as a few links to resources about the movement.

The movement to protect the forest and stop the construction is an ongoing battle. Although it has been going on for years it got major headlines after police, who were performing a raid in the forest, shot (57 times) and killed the climate activist, Manuel “Tortuguita” Terán back in January 2023. Activists just held a 6th week of action at the end of June. There have been over 40 arrests and charges of “Domestic Terrorism” (NPR article from June 28th 2023). The city council has approved $31 million in taxpayer money despite 2 years of protests and over 16 hours of testimony from over 200 people hours before the vote. Read about this city hall meeting here (NYT article). activists adn community members are working to get 70,000 signatures for a petition to put the construction of Cop City on the ballot for the next election which would allowing the people of Atlanta to decide if they wanted it built or not.

This is a forever changing and updating issue that has many moving pieces so go follow the organizations on the group for constant updates and resources. FOLLOW: Stop Cop City Instagram , The Weelaunee Defense Society, and this Linktree with many other links to read and follow.

On April 6th, 2023, the supermajority Republican-led House voted to expel both Justin Jones & Justin J. Pearson from their elected house position, the two youngest Black elected officials in the state. In a surprise turn, Gloria Johnson was not expelled from the house. These votes came in response to the three representatives taking to the house floor and walking to the well, demanding that actions be taken to stop the killing of kids in schools. They joined in solidarity with the protesters that had been showing up at the Capitol in response to the mass shooting at the Covenant private school just days before. A decision by the three to take to the well was after 40-plus minutes of not being recognized by the speaker of the house and a refusal to talk about gun reform.
There have been only three other cases of expulsion from the Tennessee House, and in all three of those cases, it was because of illegal actions, from sexual assault to bribery. Jones and Pearson were expelled for simply taking to the well and talking without being called upon by the speaker, an action both said was to voice the concerns of their constituents and much of Tennessee. Members of the house including the speaker, Cameron Sexton, compared this peaceful protest to the Jan 6th insurrection and lied saying the protesters tried to barge into the chamber. Yesterday one accused them of trying to create a mutiny and another said they were just having a tantrum and wanted attention…

…Days later Justin Jone was reinstated by the Nashville Metropolitan Council as the interim representative and Justice Pearson was reinstated 2 days later by his district.

*** Although the Line 3 movement (direct actions and pipeline construction) is over in some capacity, it is still very relevant to this day (2023 and beyond). Legal battles are still unfolding, like court dates lawsuits over Enbridge action, environmental damage, and arrests of protesters. Moreover, the ideas, values, and purpose of the line 3 movement are still needed. Currently, other pipelines, BigOil construction, mining, and deforestation projects are unfolding or planned on native lands, through our waterways, in our oceans, wetlands, old-growth forests, and healthy/vital echo systems. We must continue being aware and standing against these issues that destroy and poison our communities and planet. Enbridge is currently trying to build in the gulf off the coast of Corpus Christi, TX, on Karanakawa Peoples' land, where thousands of artifacts are buried. They are not federally recognized, making it harder to fight the Canadian corporation. This is just one example of many. 

LINE 3 RESISTANCE

*written in June 2021, and some information is out of date but the fight continues in MN and all over the world. Our planet and water is sacred and needs our help!

The indigenous people and their allies fighting this pipeline for over five years are doing it to protect life as we know it. It isn't about just stopping a pipeline, but it's about protecting is sacred, and all life is sacred. The Prayer camps in northern Minnesota have been set up to stand against Enbridge corporation building a pipeline directly through treaty territories. Treaties hold the supreme law of the land, according to the Constitution, yet every treaty has been broken in some form or fashion. Enbridge is a foreign (Canadian) corporation coming into the US during a pandemic and an extreme drought to build a pipeline through Native Treaty land, taking billions of gallons of water to do this, all while they are kicking out the indigenous people from their land and paying police and security to arrest, harm, and harass these indigenous people and their allies (water protectors) who are peacefully protesting and protecting the land and water for all of us. This pipeline line has already had several frac-out spills during the build; they have spilled chemicals in a wetland right near the headwaters of the Mississippi, and Line 3 workers have been arrested in Sex Trafficking.

The fight against this pipeline has been going on for years, but it's about much more than just a pipeline. It's about protecting indigenous people because pipelines bring man camps which brings a rise in #mmiw (missing and murdered indigenous women); it's about protecting the sacred land and animals that need these habitats. The fight is to preserve the water for future generations of all people, fight climate change, honor treaty rights, and so much more.

I covered some of the unfolding stories in northern Minnesota around Enbridge Inc trying to build a tar sands pipeline through Anishinaabe treaty land, some of which is going through the headwaters of the Mississippi. I will be sharing some stories and interviews here as soon as I can but until them, follow along on INSTAGRAM for daily updates and photo stories about this movement.

MORE STORIES & MOVEMENTS

On April 11th, 2021, Daunte Wright was killed by police. Setting in motion weeks of protests from the community, a community still trying to heal from the public killing of George Floyd. I found myself within this community in Minnesota, as I was covering the trial of Derek Chauvin (the officer who killed Mr. Floyd) and documented what I witnessed on the streets as the community demanded answers for the death of Daunte Wright. These are some of the stories and observations.

Links to latest stories, photos, and more:

We mourn the sacred lives taken on Oct 7th, the actions that killed over 1000 people. We simultaneously condemn the response from Israel and their mass killing of over over 40,000 Palestinians as they continue to bomb and displace the poeple Gaza, Lebanon, The West Bank and Beyond.

We also refuse to be silent when a nation chooses to commit genocide against a people, and this is precisely what is happening in Gaza. We are watching an ethnic cleansing of Palestinians by the hand of Israel, and our country, the USA, is openly and fully supporting it by words and by our tax dollars. Over 16,450 (recorded) children have been murdered so far, and the total death toll reaches over 50,000 but some estamtes have it over 200,000.

⬇️ PLEASE READ OUR FULL STATEMENT ⬇️

We understand that the news and information coming out about the Palestine conflict can be disorienting and overwhelming, as well as painful and heartbreaking. Where do we begin to understand the complex long history of this region that spans over 150 years? How do we engage? I have been asking these questions myself and wanted to create a space for some of these questions to begin to be answered. We are compiling a long list of resources to help us on this journey. Some of this information may ask you to question what you've known or have been taught most of your life. It may shift your worldviews and push you into uncomfortable places, but let it. All those emotions are valid, so engage and sit with them. We don't need to know all the details to say something, but we must be vocal so that radical love can overcome and be present in spaces of war and conflict. We must not lose our humanity.

*Written in Early 2021 and since then Dereck was convicted on all charges*

The trial of Derek Chauvin, the officer who killed George Floyd in May 2020, is currently underway. Of now, on March 15th, there are eight jury members selected. George Floyd's death sparked a massive racial reckoning across the country and beyond this summer that continues to happen in cities all over the country. The trial has brought attention back to the movement, and Minneapolis is demanding George's killer be convicted for his actions. That police brutality and racism be rooted out of the system. A system has been oppressing, discriminating against, and killing Black people at alarming rates in Minneapolis and all over the country.

Im only getting to spend about a week here, but I've already met amazing people and been part of some incredible, powerful, and humbling events. From a vigil for Breonna Taylor, who (was killed a year ago on March 13th), several protests about the trial, a press release from the Floyds Family, Asian Solidarity March, and other small events. Some of the photos and stories are linked right below, and one video on YouTube, "To My Black Queens." 

I spent two week in Rapid City SD where I worked with the Red Ribbon Skirt Society that works to educated about MMIW(Missing & Murdered Indigenous Women) and provide a space of healing for those effected by it. I also did a small video interview with Hippie Haven, the very first Zero Waste store in SD. I then traveled to The Roots Prayer Camp a little North East to a small indigenous led camp that is fighting the Keystone XL pipeline. This pipeline was stopped by a Presidential Executive order at the border of the Sioux nation but TC Energy & the State of SD is actively trying to push the pipeline through. They have been and are still on treaty land building this pipeline illegally. SD currently ( of March 8th) has a bill on the table HB 1194 that states:

“ The Executive Board of the Legislative Research Council may review any executive order issued by the President of the United States, if the order has not been affirmed by a vote of the Congress of the United States and signed into law, as prescribed by the Constitution of the United States.”

I’m collecting stories surrounding the camp, the pipeline, the connection of MMIW & mancamps, and some independent short stories by elders about then history of the land, pipelines, and other history. They are also looking to protect the land where the campo is permanently to bring back and protect native plants and animals pushed out/destroyed by cattle grazing. You can see some of the work i’ve done here on Instagram & specific Stories linked right below

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