The Red Deal reaches out in Farmington
By Kim Cassels Indy Staff Writer
The Red Nation, a movement for global decolonization and environmental protection, made its way to Farmington, NM in late September.
The Red Nation website defines decolonization as “the action and practice of dismantling harmful structures of power, reclaiming previous subjectivities, and envisioning a future built on previous and current understandings of compassion, relation, and accountability.”
The Red Nation, a volunteer-run organization, campaigns for anti-capitalistic reform and indigenous resistance through education, said Hope Alvarado, an organizer for The Red Nation and and the treasurer of the Albuquerque freedom council.
The workshop was hosted at Identity Inc. to recruit supporters as well as lay out a document called the Red Deal.
Alvarado said the Green New Deal inspired the Red Deal. They want to incorporate justice not only for natural areas but also marginalized populations, she said.
“The main question that we’re asking with the Red Deal— and thinking about the Green New Deal— is why is it easier for some to imagine the end of fossil fuels but not about colonialism and not the continued dispossession of indigenous lands?,” Nick Estes, an organizer for The Red Nation and assistant professor of American studies at the University of New Mexico, said.
Issues concerning oil drilling on federally protected lands such as Chaco Canyon National Historic Park, Bears Ears and Mesa Verde National Monument, as well as the steep statistics from Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women were used in the presentation to exemplify part of The Red Nation’s reason to craft the document.
Widespread media coverage and 1.3 million Facebook check-ins for the Standing Rock Protest shed light on the impact of how federal, state and local governments and oil companies interact with residents of protected lands.
The Dakota Access Pipeline is one of many cases of indigenous resistance for contested pipelines, Estes said.
Focusing on the health of the environment means focusing on people’s health, specifically preventing and cleaning up contaminated water sources, Alvarado said.
The Red Nation plans to publish a detailed report Nov. 3 about the fossil fuel industry and crimes against indigenous people. The date was chosen because it is one year from the 2020 presidential election, Estes said.
A draft of The Red Deal can be found on the website where it advocates for a combination of international climate justice, demilitarization, indigenous liberation and many other societal changes.
“We’re not here to prop up the Democratic Party,” Estes said. “We’re here to actually build people power that actually reflects peoples’ demands.”
The Red Nation is based in Albuquerque, NM where organizers also host community leads and solidarity drives for the homeless, he said.
The Red Nation is currently working towards building databases that help reflect the multiple topics of interest in the Red Deal, Alvardo said. As of Oct. 13 there is no current date for when those databases will be available.