Justin Ellenbecker, one of the DGR members who joined the July caravan to the Unis’tot’en Camp, reports back on his experience:
I’ve had many opportunities over recent years to attend some of the best training in theoretical concepts and workshops. This action camp provided that and something deeper: a chance to join with those on the front lines, to be a part of actively resisting, guided by people who understand the need to militantly respond to the threats facing the living world. I personally witnessed before my eyes people undergoing radical changes as they saw the material needs for a true resistance as more important than their ideological purity. I spent hours on security, construction, and permaculture tasks where for once the work was more important than group affiliation or rumor mongering. Conversations always took a path towards how the environmental movement needs to start winning offensive battles, crippling the means for those in power to destroy living ecosystems. People new and veteran to this type of work were tossing away the shells of symbolic dogmatism they had long sheltered themselves in, and craving more concrete ways to challenge the dominant culture. I dare say I found a place where my pessimism and extreme caution weren’t a necessary facet of negotiating the world of activism.
This is a place to get work done, and there is much work left to do. If you think you can possibly make it to the area, directly support the camp. If you can’t make it in person, donations of money and materials are always needed, and there may be ways to volunteer from afar. Please get in touch!