What is it about hip Swedes with english accents?  Moneybrother released Real Control in 2009 and has been touring the US, a show you should have caught.  I did, at the Jefferson Theatre in Charlottesville. Great room, but being taken unawares by Anders Wendin blew it away.  This man is a huge star.  I bought an album from him after the well received set.  Lanky, handsome, real, and a showman.  Against Me! fleshed out the evening with their continued de-identification implosion tour but Moneybrother was the revelation. Later I looked up the band and found out about Monster and the earlier Moneybrother albums.

Real Control seems to be the first release entirely in english.  Anders sings in native Swedish and German too.  Then I had the chance to listen to the album.  Then again, and again.  This is a very good album. The best of punk, rock, Frankie goes to hollywood and ABBA and Violent Femmes and on and on, with a voice like Joe Strummer, if he had had range.  A lovingly crafted album, a sonic psycho-emotional journey far more effective than prozac.  Great to dance to, to make love to, to party to, to stage a resistance to.

Enjoy.

The album makes me mad, happy, sad smiling, dancing… it is a real gift.

So give the brother some money.

Bragging rights claimed by: Lou Wright  ’Sup  (though you had the kewl kids on the lower east side which has not been the cool place for twenty years, and Moneybrother ain’t even playing NYC - catch em at the Stone Pony in Asbury Park)

So I drove a couple hours to catch Against Me!, (full disclosure: Against Me! is one of my favorite current bands) in Charlotte, VA for their 2010 pre-album (White Crosses) release tour.  A note on the venue, the redone Jefferson Theatre is beautiful, and has perfect sound… but they sell this brand of beer called Nobel, which I unfortunately tried… gym-sock beer… it was the first time I ever returned beer to a bar.  Not a good omen, it turned out.

In the crowd an excited fan told his friend, “You are gonna love these guys… they are as good as it gets…”  His friend nodded eagerly as the support acts played. (Standout: Moneybrother)  Finally, Against Me! took the stage to massive cheers. What happened?  All that is revealed is Warren Oakes must be a genius.  The greatest live act in America, with a host of rocking songs, played the weakest, most tired set imaginable in the lovely Jefferson theatre.  Was it just a bad night?  Strain from the White Crosses Album reviews?

Barely held together by lighting, the bass players fist pumping, and Gabel’s fawning smile, the crowd hardly managed to move.  A quarter of the ‘pit’ populace stood with arms folded across their chests as the rest sang along fairly cheerfully.

Demi-gods of pure anarcho-punk genius, fallen below the state of man, to punk placeholder caricatures.  Warren clearly made a big and timely move up to sling burritos, and I have to wonder, is this a hole Against Me! can dig itself out of? (The rumor was Oakes was let go because he no longer has the passion… well, the replacement drummer showed as much flair as a doorman)

To add insult to injury (or rather, no injury… a nice hematoma would have been great), the artwork draped behind the stage and on the bass drum cover was of a distorted, faceless, naked woman. (The album cover ‘art’)  What?  Ah, Against Me!, we loved you too well, yet what have you become?  Your wisdom dissipated, your holy fire doused…  carrying the banner of misogyny and rote performance for the society of silence and porn.

Anarchy or bust, or, I was a teenage anarchist and now I am a mayo snacking democrat.  Gave up on struggle, gave up on conviction, gave up on themselves… just hoping for? (So Gabel is thirty now and a dad… too old for punk silliness and dreams of a future… well I am a forty year old anarcho-punk dad who had the sad experience of kids patting me on the back and thanking me for making the ‘mosh-pit’ happen… thanking me?!?  Not the band?… as if I had to pull it out of my ass… which, well, I did.  You ain’t so old Tommy, get over yourself.  And you can still set everything on fire, just like me.  And as an anarchist, I will never tell you what to do, or think, but to write it off?  The revolution was a lie?)

Against Me! opines in their latest album/single i was a teenage anarchist that the revolution was a lie… a lie… um, we are everywhere and we fight and plan mad love.

Because, the counter-revolution

is real as hell.

And there was nothing convenient about it.  What, you give in to the rigid and replace it with…?  Fight, with me, or against me, but fight.

(If you go to youtube and check the ‘teenage anarchist’ video, it has been removed for copyright infringement… )

They played a lot of good songs, but held back half the old favorites as usual.  When the crowd did get moving for “White People For Peace” they followed it with the good but pop-kitch   “Thrash Unreal”… which might have made a good first or second song, but comes across as an insult after “…Peace” as if to say, “here are the ‘hits’”.  (Really, who can slam to “Bop Bop Bop Bop Bop Bop Bah Bah Bah) It seemed the band should have gone out in the crowd to watch (bigger star than them) opener Moneybrother to see how you keep passion and soul and creativity through the years.  Remember The Ramones?  How they kept a crowd moving, and stayed in form for twenty years getting better all the time? (Bop ’till you drop, not bop bop bop) Come on Against Me!  Forget the haters who tell you what you must be, forget the fans who tell you that you are great.  Forget the dope and the groupies.  Remember the music.  Consider going back to playing amongst the crowd.

After the ‘encore set’ the young man said to his friend, “They will play one more… it will be good…” And his friend shrugged doubtfully as tape played and the lights went up.  The crowd filled out quietly. Maybe the album will be better than anyone is expecting…  Against Me! took the mantle of cheerleaders as their safe and fun form of direct action.  The pass they get is expired as they drift farther into the arms of the death system.

All is not lost, and the guys still have the right stuff to be legends, but if AM! can not get back on track soon, it should be lost.  Blew Against Me!  What a feeble wind.  Return the maelstrom.

Because, the counter-revolution

is real as hell.

(Authors None: Tom Gabel got angry at a troll, so his declaring global efforts and confederacies naught but a deception can be understood under those emotionally distressed conditions. Realizing this, life is a mess, isn’t it?  Keep fighting for the highest. See, it comes.)

White Crosses Album Review:

Having pulled the septic knife out of my back by deleting “I was a teenage anarchist” from my player, I have been able to give White Crosses a fair listen.  Now in a land where anarchists seem to be the only ones throwing themselves under the wheels; where anarchists daily go to jail, monkeywrench, become cops and lawyers, doctors and medics, teachers and nanotechnologists, and even married dads.  To say “the revolution is a lie” is absurd and self-centered.  I am sure it can look that way from a tour bus and having internet flame wars.

That aside, White Crosses is a fantastic album.  It does dwell in a very negative space:  Title track White Crosses insults the faith of mostly fine people,  Suffocation fails to address available solutions (NLP etc), Ache with me is miserable, and Lehigh Acres kicks people who are down.  Yet they are solid, and defend against any accusations of selling out.

Most of the songs are simply brilliant.  Bamboo Bones, We’re Breaking Up, High Pressure Low, Spanish Moss, One by One, all suitable to be radio hits, catchy, deep, and beautiful.  Against Me! is still making some of the best music available.

Kick Ass is garbage.  The only cool thing in Kick Ass is inappropriate, and that is Hit Girl, the killer child.  She is the entire movie, and kick ass himself is a whimpering, masturbating, pointless waste of space.  For a moment he gets the limp notion of standing up against evil, but he does it, well, limply.

The only truth in the movie (spoiler follows) is when Hit Girl says, “If not for you my father would not be dead.”  Too true.  And as soon as the movie ends, we see kick ass having quit his fight, making out with a girl, and still leaving the meting out of justice to a now orphaned and unmasked hit girl.

Pathetic fare for pathetic, irresponsible Americans.  The movie is superficially cool and fundamentally boring, trite, and insignificant save its violation of decency in exploiting children.  Why can’t they just stop wasting everyones time and make a movie of Transmetropolitan, the only good graphic novel ever.

Haiti does not need military occupation.

Haiti needs flour, rice, medical supplies, and active compassion.

No geopolitics.

No manipulation.

Only one love.

Is this a press story?  What is anything, but people?  This is a human story, and the tiny,  maligned island which encompasses Haiti, birthplace of African democracy, needs global assistance, nothing more, nothing less.

The nation hated for defeating French colonialism and enslavement, the nation hated for usurping American imperialism, this tiny island alone faces the equivalent total devastation of the asian tsunami.

Forget hatred for Haiti’s pride, and determination.  This time, reward that perseverance with unrestrained assistance.  Let every billionaire and millionaire send their little used yachts laden with food and clothes to this place.  Let every corporation send their jets and freighters to this place.

Stand together now, and set a standard, or face a future alone.

The choice is yours.

Yele Haiti.  Forget the negativists and the injured souls, act now for God’s sake.  The preacher will tell you, God does not care after persons.  That is so we shall learn to care after one another.

Give now, act now, help now.

Help Here

or Here

or even HERE, just help.

Now.

In 2009 we conducted a study of online distribution of pirated media.  The questions were: “How do they make money?”, “Why do the sites survive?”, and, “Who pays the operators?”.  The answers were strange, and changed noticeably over the course of a single year.

The pirate media distributors stream their wares out of server farms on sovereign native people’s territories in the West, and in Sweden, Ukraine, and China to the East.  Using legal loopholes, bribery, and protection from mob and government interests, the sites not only survive, they thrive and propagate.

Often it seemed there was hardly any money making involved, where it begged the question why so much time was being spent mounting the pirated materials beside the distribution of malware to steal private data.  Ad revenue visibly increased every month, however.

22% of studied pirate streams had ad placements for major corporate interests on Jan 1st, 2009.  By June major corporate placements had gone to 39.5%, and by September, 52.5%.  By Jan 1st 2010 it was 91%. It is what the slaves to cliche call a tipping point.

A man only identified as Hans, working out of a native people’s zone server farm in Canada, said his site had increased ad revenue in the year from €275,000 to €1.4 million.  With this increased revenue stream, he said he had stopped taking paid malware trojans which had earned his outfit an additional €320,000 annual previously.  This suggests that corporate advertising is making the watching of pirate media sites more attractive on several levels.

At first I was surprised to see World of Warcraft ads.  Later, I was shocked to see Visa, Bing, Liberty Mutual, and many other large MNC utilizing the pirate sites for advertising.

Really, when a customer goes to watch a TV show or film, and sees a Visa ad up front, can they not assume it is a legitimate broadcast of material?  Finally, Pillsbury, Sprint, Coca-cola, H and R Block, and most strangely, upcoming film promotions joined the fray… begging the question, who is at fault now?

The second shock we received in the study was the quality of the pirate sites over the big broadcasters sites.  29% of the time major broadcasters sites would fail when I attempted to watch shows on their sites.  In fact, 21% of the time their crash would crash my browser.  This compared to 7% stream failure rate on the pirate sites.

We would attempt to watch shows using OSX 10.5.4 on FOX, ABC, and USA Networks, and the failure rate would drive me to test the same program with rare problems on pirate sites.  How can the pirate sites deliver better service and technical expertise?  Presumably the answer lies with the money they get from large corporate funders.

As 2009 neared it end, the biggest advertiser on ’sidereel’ and other pirate link consolidators was ATT.

The East Coast Ledger is still awaiting responses from the advertising corporations or the film industry giants, the representatives of whom we spoke to only saying they were ‘astonished’ at the studies findings.  We will publish any full responses we receive here.

It seems only William Gibson understood the future.

Perhaps it is the organic ingredients, or the mountain spring water.  Could it be the natural hops, grains, and honey right from the farm?  Or, is Brett Nichols the greatest brewmaster to ever make beer.

Too much, you think?

Wait until you take the top off a Shooting Creek Farm brew: taste the silken, pure, complex taste, and then join me in exalting the best small brewery in North America.  High on the Blue Ridge, Shooting Creek Farm Brewery sits on Brett and Johanna Nichols’ certified organic Five Penny Farm in legendary Floyd county.

There are six distinct brews offered by the farm, and while I am the type to pick favorites, with this roster I am undone.

The Snapping Turtle IPA is a revelation in both flavor and clean finish.  It makes Sierra Nevada’s Pale Ale taste pale indeed…  Once a fan, I can no longer enjoy the Sierra Nevada, so spoiled am I by the new standard of excellence Shooting Creek Farm has set.

Red Tractor is so good, so drinkable and delicious, that during my tasting I unprofessionally yet unstoppably drank half the six pack.

Rebel Ale will make you take up arms under the Shooting Creek Farm Brewery banner.  Is it too good to share?  Well, when locals heard a reporter was writing about their brewery, I got several calls asking me not to mention the Rebel Ale for fear of a shortage.

Buffalo Brown is a beer I am confident will go on to win any taste test it enters.  Delightfully complex, yet smooth and satisfying, one Buffalo Brown surpasses the pleasure of six Rouge Ales’ ‘Brown Nectar’

Wildflower Wheat gets its name from the local honey that goes into this magical dunkelweiss.  Germans will suffer when they have to admit they have been outdone.  I could drink this beer any time.

Then there is the Farmhouse Stout.  As a lover of fine stouts, I was excited to try it, yet left it for last. I am overwhelmed.  This beer makes Guinness and Rubicon seem simple and passe.  A stout with maple syrup and secrets the brew-master will not share, I suggest any beer lover order this by the case.

It is hard to ask for any more from Shooting Creek Farm Brewery, and yet always, when something is this good, you have to wonder if the brews can survive commercialization.  As long as this is a micro-brewery, the magic will stay in the bottle.  Now, can the team at Shooting Creek use some of that magic to keep the quality, and make enough for everyone?  The restaurants and bars around the farm sell out their kegs the day they offer it.  Shops sell out their six-packs the day they put it out.  Locals hoard it.

I hope the beer making geniuses can maintain this excellence, for all of us.

UPDATE: Nirvana, Shooting creek has graced us with the sharp bite of a habanero stout, title: the Capsicum Stout.  By Jove, I think they’er got it.  Jesus wept chili tears and world eac was declared when all the members of the United Nations enjoyed a bottle together.

(Note: For the muslim friends, the Koran prohibits liquor, not beer and wine, as in the Prophets day, beer and wine were basic to survival.  Ao enjoy a habanero beer!  Inshallah!)

Gavin McKee writes reviews of food and drink for The East Coast Ledger and has been a reviewer for The Shadow and GNN as well as gourmet magazines.  Gavin McKee has written under many nom-de-plumes over the years to preserve his critical integrity.

The editors recommend checking out Ahniwanika’s site Intercontinental Cry regularly!

In the month’s Underreported Struggles: 20,000 Lepchas Vow to Die for Their Community; Nicaragua Recognizes Indigenous Land Rights; Dam workers attack the Enawene Nawe; and 18 other stories about the ongoing, world-side struggle for land, rights, and life.

December 29 – Indonesia Police Destroy Indigenous Village – Indonesian police forces have violently evicted 400 indigenous people from their land in the province of Riau on the eastern coast of Sumatra. According to Amnesty International, approximately 700 local security forces entered the village of Suluk Bongka, firing bullets and tear gas. As the villagers fled into the forest, two helicopters dropped what was thought to be a fire accelerant on the village, burning it to the ground.

December 26 – We shall give up our lives but not our land – “We shall give up our lives but not land.” The slogan is overwhelming across the state of Jharkhand against displacement induced by the development projects. It is not only a slogan for the Adivasis but it is also their determination, pledge and hope to ensure their ownership rights over the natural resources i.e. land, forest and water.

December 24 – Uprising against Barrick Gold in Tanzania – Earlier this month, thousands of villagers raided a gold mine in Northern Tanzania, setting fire to $7 million worth of mine equipment. Most reports claim the action was performed by “gold-seekers”, however, local reports say the uprising was the result of a murder by a Barrick Security Guard.

December 23 – Lepchas Vow to Die for Their Community – More than 20,000 Lepchas have vowed to die for their community and to ensure that their culture survives for coming generations. At the time, the Lepchas were gathered in Kalimpong, West Bengal, to celebrate the 227th birthday of their King Gyabu Achok.

December 22 – Turkey Goes Rogue on Ilisu – Turkish authorities have started a campaign of repression and expropriation against communities effected by the Ilisu hydro dam project. For starters, “on November 30, the Turkish President authorized the expropriation of more than 20 affected villages under an emergency rule which only applies if national security is at stake. (If completed, the dam will displace up to 70,000 people.)”

December 19 – Canadian Company Threatens El Salvador withCAFTA Lawsuit – A Canadian mining company intends to sue the government of El Salvador for several hundred million dollars if it is not granted permission to open a controversial gold and silver mine that would pollute local water supplies with mercury, cyanide, arsenic, zinc and aluminum.

December 18 – Nicaragua Recognizes Indigenous Land Rights – On December 14, 2008, the government held a ceremony, where it gave the Awas Tingni, an indigenous Mayan community in the Atlantic Coast region of Nicaragua, title to some 74,000 acres of densely forested land, marking the end of a decades-long struggle for land rights.

December 16 – Brazil: Dam workers attack Enawene Nawe Indians – Hydroelectric dam workers have attacked a group of Enawene Nawe Indians who were fishing near a dam building site last week. Enawene Nawe spokesman Daliamase said the workers made the four Indians, two adults and two children, lie on the ground. They then threatened them, beat them with sticks and forced guns into their mouths.

December 11 – Makah Nation working to restore traditional justice system – The Makah Nation of Washington is working hard to restore its culture — and restore its traditional restorative justice system along with it. Practiced among many other Nations, the process of restoration was supressed when the government forced them to adopt the colonial legal system.

Victory! Brazil Supreme Court Affirms Indigenous Land Rights – Indigenous people are celebrating after a majority of Brazil’s Supreme Court judges ruled to uphold indigenous land rights in Raposa-Serra do Sol. Marking the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, eight of the courts’ eleven judges yesterday “affirmed the Indians’ rights to the land, saying it had been demarcated according to the constitution.”

December 10 – Botswana: Diamond mine gets government approval – on condition Bushmen receive no water – The Botswana government has given its approval to a controversial diamond mine on the land of the Kalahari Bushmen – on the condition that the mining company Gem Diamonds does not provide the Bushmen with water.

Indigenous Peoples Censored at UN Climate Conference – Indigenous People trying to speak at the UN Climate Conference were slamdunked by proponents of the global carbon market scam, designed to enrich the World Bank and chosen corporations by way of the sale of fictitious carbon credits. The following video shows statements by two non-governmental organizations, before Indigenous Peoples were denied a voice. The Indigenous Peoples’ censored statement, which was not read, follows the video.

2-year moratorium called in the Sacred Headwaters – A moratorium on coal-bed methane drilling in the Sacred Headwaters region of northwestern British Columbia was declared last week by the Provincial government. A welcomed decision by First Nations, environmental groups, commercial fisherman, and concerned citizens alike, the moratorium prevents Shell from going ahead with CBM development for at least the next two years.

December 8 – Navajo and Hopi under threat from coal mine expansion at Black Mesa
The U.S. Office of Surface Mining (OSM) is preparing to make a decision on whether or not Peabody Coal’s “Black Mesa Project,” a dirty coal strip-mining operation in the territories of the Hopi and Navajo, should be permitted to re-open. If the OSM rules in favor of Peabody Coal, the company would be given the rights to use the Navajo Aquifer, and wold further open the door to more evictions of Hopi and Navajo families living in Black Mesa.

December 6 – Indigenous Justice in Colombia – The town center of the Resguardo (Reserve) of Jambaló in Northern Cauca. On November 26th, seven people were kidnapped on the road leading out of Jambalo’s town center, in the village of Pioya. Five were liberated later that night, and the other two in the early hours of the next day. The hostages were liberated by the Indigenous Guard of Jambaló and members of the community, and four of the five kidnappers were apprehended.

December 5 – New Infrastructure Push Threatens Chiapas – The Mexican government is making a renewed push to exploit and destroy the land and people of Chiapas as the reborn Plan Puebla Panama (PPP, now renamed the “Mesoamerica Initiative”) pushes forward in Chiapas.

Haida Nation Opposed to Enbridge Pipeline – The Council of the Haida Nation has rejected Enbridge Inc.‘s plans to construct an 1170-km pipeline for moving petroleum from Alberta’s tar sands to the deepsea port in Kitimat, British Colombia, because it would force the Haida to bear a substantial “burden of risk”. Known as “the Northern Gateway project,” the pipeline would carry some 525,000 barrels of petroleum per day, bringing to the edge of Haida territory more than 150 oil tankers a year.

December 4 – Indigenous consultations in limbo – Peru’s Congress has approved a bill that strips the meaning and purpose of consultations with indigenous people over development on their lands, undermining ILO Convention 169 and the UN’s Declaration of Indigenous Rights.

December 1 – Mapuche Increase Opposition Bío Bío River Dam – On November 26, Mapuche Pewenche authorities of the Bío Bío River in Chile met with the Environmental Minister, Ana Lya Uriarte, explaining their opposition to the construction of a new dam on the Bío Bío River. The minister promised to take their concerns under consideration, however, in the same fashion that they consider impacts on any other development project…

Defenders of Mount Tenabo Constructing Encampment – Shoshone men began constructing a permanent camp on the Southern flank of Mt. Tenabo, to monitor the Canadian mining company Barrick Gold. The camp was called on during a protest last week, when Shoshone Grandmothers and their supporters attempted to confront Barrick Gold and bring an end to the destruction of the pinion forest – which began almost immediately after the company got approval to go ahead with its ‘Cortez Hills Expansion Project.’

The Rights of the Land – An in-depth article about Onondaga Nation of central New York, who is attempting to restore health to their traditional territory, and especially to Onondaga Lake, the site where Ayonwatha (Hiawatha) first appeared with his message of peace. “Today, the soil where the Peacemaker walked is a Superfund site. In fact, it’s not soil at all, but a slippery white mass of industrial waste, thirty feet deep.”

Videos

Challenges Facing Indigenous People – A presentation by former Chief of the Cherokee Nation and Indigenous rights activist, Wilma Mankiller, about the “Challenges Facing 21st Century Indigenous People.”

Running For Their Lives – A documentary about the Raramuri, sometimes called “Tarahumara”, who live today in the forests and mountains of Northern Mexico. Faced with the destruction of their way of life, the Raramuri ran to the highlands 500 years ago. Today, however, in stead of running, the Raramuri have chosen to stand and fight those attempting to exploit the land

Evon Peter shares some wisdom – A short clip from the Energy Action Coalition’s 2007 youth summit on climate change, called Power Shift — featuring Evon Peter, former Chief of the Neetsaii Gwich’in in northeastern Alaska and executive director of Native Movement.

Republican’s like to say, it is not just the bank’s fault that this housing bubble has burst, but that some people spent beyond their means.

Bubble after bubble, each bailout finances the next overblown contraction. The savings and loan bailout, created by Bush Sr. and McCain’s deregulation festival, financed the dot com bubble. The 500 billion dollar hedge fund bailout, following the tech bubble bursting, financed the real estate bubble. And the prime irrational actor in spiraling home costs, little blamed by democrats or republicans, were REITs.

Real estate investment trusts are rich people funds to buy land and property. No one lives on the land, few ever see or know what a REIT holds, but half the drive in prices is attributed to their activities taking land and homes off the market for speculative purpose. In fact, the surge in available properties which drives home price drops in many regions is very much a reflection of the rich having dumped much of their REITholdings.

Here is some recent history of this profitable den of irresponsibility in the guise of savvy. Three years back-

Two years back… FED culpability and a Mickey in your drink

And one year back.

And today? Good old lessons.

“Buy when there’s blood in the streets” (Baron Rothschild in 1871)

This bailout will fund the bio-tech bubble.

And none of it is a mistake. The expansions and contractions are part and parcel of elite control and dominance techniques.

Some say buy low sell high. I say, don’t buy and aim for the chest.

(I also say, buy as much woodland as you can afford and preserve it and make a well organized militia.)

Post by: Johnny Civil has written extensively under many names for Cañamo, Hanf!, The Shadow, The East Coast Ledger and many other outlets.

By Charles Mostoller

Supreme Court case pits exploitation of the Amazon against Indigenous rights in Brazil

On August 27th, the Brazilian Supreme Court will decide a case that could have far reaching effects on the Amazon and the half-million indigenous people who live there. The case questions the legality of a process that created an Indigenous Territory in northern Brazil, and threatens to reverse decades of progress on indigenous and social rights throughout the country.

In 2005, after more than two decades of struggle for recognition, five indigenous groups in Brazil’s northern Roraima state won official recognition of their rights to their ancestral lands. Their efforts culminated in the creation of a new Indigenous Territory, Raposa Serra do Sol, covering a large swath of the Amazon Rainforest on the border with Guyana.

In a decree signed by Brazilian President Luiz Ignacio Lula da Silva, over 18 thousand indigenous Macuxi, Wapixana, Ingariko, Taukepang, and Patamona peoples were given 1.7 million hectares and non-indigenous peoples were compensated and forced to leave the area. Although this may have brought to an end the long struggle to have their territorial rights recognized, the indigenous peoples of Raposa have faced fierce opposition from entrenched economic interests in Roraima.

In particular, a group of seven wealthy rice farmers has refused to leave the region, throwing the reserve into chaos. These large-scale farmers—known as fazendeiros in Portuguese—have rejected compensation and relocation, despite having arrived in the area less than 15 years ago.

A recent spate of violence against the indigenous peoples in the Raposa Territory has further increased tensions. In April, an indigenous leader was attacked when a bomb was thrown at his house. In May, ten Macuxi—including six children—were attacked and shot by armed men working for rice farmer and local mayor Paulo Cesar Quartiero. Quartiero was detained by police and later released, despite the discovery of a large weapons cache on his property.

Earlier, in April, the Supreme Court had suspended an operation by the federal police to remove the remaining seven illegal occupants of the reserve, because the farmers set up blockades and destroyed bridges in order to fight their eviction.

“Even with all the destruction carried out by the rice growers, the Supreme Court decided in their favor,” Macuxi chief Dionito Jose de Sousa told the AP in April.

According to Catarina Vianna, a member of Makunaima Grita—a Brazilian group dedicated to helping the indigenous people at Raposo Serra do Sol, the current struggle is a basic one for the peoples of Raposa.

“This is really a local conflict. It’s about use of water, about the farms getting bigger and bigger. Now the indigenous people are saying “enough, this has been recognized as our land,” she said by phone from London.

With the support of the Roraima state government, the farmers and state Governor José de Anchieta have appealed to Brazil’s Supreme Court to break up the Raposa Territory and free up large amounts of the land.

“The farmers want the indigenous land to be divided into islands. They don’t want the indigenous land to be a continuous tract of land. But legal experts in Brazil maintain that there is no legal basis to annul the 2005 demarcation,” said Vianna.

The Army wants in

All of this comes at a time when President Silva has signed a decree to station troops permanently on all Indigenous Territories on the border. Top officials in the Brazilian Armed Forces have been talking about foreign meddling in the largely indigenous border region. It appears the military brass feels threatened by the formation of Indigenous Territories, speaking constantly of risks to national sovereignty.

“The military has an agenda,” said Vianna, “to protect Brazilian sovereignty. It’s been their main discourse since the dictatorship in the 60’s and 70’s. They are against the demarcation of continuous indigenous lands near the border because they want to control what happens, and they’re afraid that what they call “foreign interests” will use the Indians to then exploit the Amazon.”

The military is using the conflict in Roraima to support these goals—suggesting the presence of drug traffickers and guerrilla groups in indigenous lands—and has called for the Supreme Court to annul Raposa Serra do Sol’s boundries.

According to Tim Cahill, a researcher on Brazil with Amnesty International, the military has long tried to taint social movements in Brazil by claiming connections to foreign revolutionary groups.

“Whenever there’s some criticism or attack to be made against social movements in Brazil,” he said, “the FARC are always dragged out, although very little evidence is ever provided to prove these allegations. It seems once again that it’s an attempt to criminalize social movements in Brazil and discredit their work in favor of the poor and the marginalized.”

Cahill says that the military—which has total access and freedom of movement in Indigenous Territories—does not have a good reputation among indigenous peoples.

“Indigenous people across the Amazon have persistently complained to Amnesty and denounced violations committed by soldiers who work indigenous areas—sexual abuse, physical abuse, and intimidation,” he said. “Indigenous areas are meant to limit the access into those areas to guarantee their safety and protection. Yet when the Army goes in there, time and time again we see that their rights are violated.”

However, the military is unrepentant and has been very clear that nobody’s rights supercede those of the Brazilian Armed Forces.

“We want to be clear on something fundamental — Indian lands are Brazilian lands,” said Defense Minister Nelson Jobim according to a May Reuters article. “There are no nations or Indian peoples, there are Brazilians who are Indians.”

The Brazilian Ministry of Defense was contacted for this piece, but declined to comment.

Economics or indigenous rights?

But Cahill believes that the real causes for the current conflict over Raposa go deeper than the military’s security concerns. He says that this case represents a key moment in the face-off between indigenous rights and the interests of big business in Brazil, and big agrobusiness in particular.

“This is something we see not only in the Amazon, but across Brazil”, he said. “The cultural, social and economic rights of indigenous peoples tend to come into conflict with the economic interests of big agro-industry. And big agro-industry has been the driving force of the recent economic boom that’s occurring in Brazil, and we’ve seen that there’s a lot of political and judicial support for their interests.”

“When the federal authorities comply with their obligations under the Constitution—and under international legislation—to identify and guarantee indigenous access to their ancestral lands,” he added, “The challenges which come up tend to be around the economic interests of big agro-industry—in this case, the rice farmers. And time and again, the indigenous peoples are losing out because vested interests tend to side with those with economic power.”

“In this case, it’s not that the military has allied itself with the farmers,” said Vianna. “Rather, two separate interests have come together. This handful of farmers, they’re extremely wealthy. It’s not about them. It’s about how Brazil will use the Amazon. Are they going to just leave it to the Indians, who won’t develop it? Or does Brazil have a plan for developing the Amazon? This is a discourse of economic development.”

“That’s why the farmers are using economic arguments,” Vianna added. “They are saying ‘what we do is good for the state and national economy’. They call themselves the ‘Nationalist Resistance’. They consider themselves those who represent the nation, against the Indians who are supported by ‘foreign interests’. They never say who these ‘interests’ are. But by conflating the local conflict into this language of nationalism and development—of developing the nation—they were able to get closer to the military’s cause.”

Legal precedent

Rogerio Duarte do Pateo—a Sao Paulo based member of Makunaima Grita—signaled that the consequences of the court’s ruling could extend far beyond Raposa’s borders.

“A decision against Raposa would create the legal precedents to revoke all indigenous titles to land in Brazil,” he said. “Any other territory could be contested, like the Yanomami, Kayapó, etcetera.”

Both Pateo and Cahill believe that a decision against Raposa would not only go against the Brazilian Constitution, but it could put at risk the gains made over the last 30 years in terms of indigenous rights, throughout Brazil.

“What is on the line here is Article 231 of the Brazilian Constitution and the indigenous rights that are layed out in that article,” Pateo said. “It’s not that the court decision will directly affect the Constitution, but the arguments that are being used go against Article 231—it seems that the justice system is going to favor the big landowners—and this will open up the way to revise Article 231.”

“The 1988 Constitution allows indigenous people the process to set out and identify their ancestral lands,” said Cahill. “There’s a real fear that this will set back cases across the country of indigenous peoples who continue to fight for the rights to their land. And who, through this process, continue to seek the provision of their basic human rights and cultural rights.”

According to a statement signed by 85 Brazilian NGO’s in support of Raposa Serra do Sol, the Constitution “defined the rights of indigenous peoples over their lands and established that these rights enjoy over-riding precedence over any subsequent rights granted to non-indigenous holders”.

However, Brazil’s indigenous peoples are still fighting for these rights—and those outlined in the recently-adopted UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples—to be upheld and put into practice.

“The demarcation process doesn’t give indigenous people the full rights to their land, but allows the land to be held by the Federal government in custody for them,” Cahill said.

“Indigenous peoples are considered minors under Brazilian law and thus do not have the right to hold the land for themselves and decide on the land for themselves,” he said. “[It is] an issue which has been hotly contested and which many believe limit the rights of indigenous peoples to their full citizenship and full rights under international law.”

Lasting effects

Whatever the Supreme Court decides on August 27th, the case represents a key moment in the decades long struggle for indigenous rights in Brazil.

“It would seriously undermine the whole system of Indian reserves in Brazil if the courts were to bow to pressure from influential landowners and politicians, particularly given the violence the Indians have been subjected to,” said Miriam Ross, from Survival International.

According to Pateo, a ruling against the Raposa territory would not only undermine the recent successes in relation to indigenous rights, but would “mark the future of development in Brazil in relation to the Amazon”, giving a clear signal to logging, hydroelectric, and agricultural companies that the Amazon is fair game.

“Will we continue a predatory model of exploitation that doesn’t respect the law?,” he asked. “Or will Brazil be transformed—definitively—into a country that develops itself sustainably, and respects human rights?”

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To help the peoples of Raposa Serra do Sol maintain their current territory, please sign thispetition, which will be sent to the Supreme Court Justices a week before the ruling is expected.

Watch video of the May attack on Macuxi Indians in Raposa Serra do Sol