Protecting Mother Earth by Rae Rose

Every life form on our planet has power and absorbs energy, our Mother Earth included. This energy comes from the sun and is absorbed or consumed by the life thriving on our planet even long after they are dead and buried. The earth itself is often referred to as our Mother or Grandmother, a living entity, because we the indigenous, know she is. We the people know that without the life that grows from her energy, fueled by other natural factors like the sun, wind, and waters, no life could exist.

I have learned about our Original Instructions, given to the indigenous, to care for their part of our Mother Earth. My belief is everyone is indigenous to somewhere and has a responsibility to care for their origin place on our Mother Earth. This responsibility, this connection, to our Mother Earth is important to our mental and spiritual health as well as our children’s future on a living planet.

Arvol Looking Horse sent a message out around 2003, he spoke of Mother Earth as a living being. The Black Hills is our mother’s heart, the great forest to the north her lungs, the amazon river and rain forest her kidneys, each part specific and necessary to her life and our own. His words have stayed with me along with the truth of our Mother Earth as a living being. For our Mother, this beautiful planet earth, we the indigenous, were given ceremonies to care for her. It is our responsibility to keep her healthy for the next generation. This is what I was told and what I believe to be true.

What does any of this have to do with the fossil fuel industry? Everything. The mindset of me, me, me and I, I, I is ingrained in all of us by the corrupt who want to rape and abuse the earth for monetary gains. The only way they can get away with this is to kill our connections to each other, our responsibilities to our children’s future, they have to disconnect us from each other, separate to mother earth and to the natural world we should be apart of. It is a toxic mindset, necessary to keep us numb, to keep us separate, blind to the abuse, and decimation of the natural world.

If we the people of this world remembered the earth as our Mother, would we be able to rape her? To kill off parts of her for personal gain and momentary convenience? Look to a woman you love and imagine someone ripping her apart, spreading her open to penetrate and take what is only momentary pleasure for personal convenience? Would you still be able to support the fossil fuel industry’s desecration of our Mother Earth?

In the same respect I believe this is why those who are lost to the greed and to the easy satisfaction, and consumerism of western ideologies oversexualize women. I believe this is why sex trafficking, rape, and drugs are so rampant in westernized “civilization”. Because if you valued us women, if you respected everyone yourself included, you would not be able to rape and disregard Mother Earth. If you respect the women around you, maybe all of us would be more inclined to respect Mother Earth as a living female being. The fossil fuel industry would die out because we the people would not be able to rape or devalue our Mother the earth.

What would a world in which we all returned to our Original instructions, our roles, and our responsibilities look like? I believe we would be healthier in mind body and spirit because Mother Earth would be respected, loved, and valued. Because if we learn respect and love for Mother Earth, there would be no man camps; Missing and Murdered Indigenous People would

be a rarity. We would not feel alone or empty our children would grow up strong, they would grow up healthy in mind, body, and spirit. In this future our planet, our children, all of our beautiful nations would be cared for. We would return to our ceremonies, our language, our way of life. In this dream we would regain our connections, leaving behind our loneliness and regain our right to belong to something more than selfish desire.

I believe we should have to understand where our resources come from in order to understand how, when, why, or even if we should use them. What are the impacts to our future and to Mother Earth herself? We should always ask; how does this affect our communities and the Mother we are supposed to care for? Is the cost worth the impact to our environment and our children’s future? Are there any healthier alternatives? Are there resources that would not harm our children’s future on this beautiful planet? I believe these are the questions we should be asking every single time we use a resource that comes from our beloved Mother.

What is a fossil fuel? What is it that we are desecrating our only planet to obtain? As I stated at the beginning, we as living creatures absorb energy primarily from the sun and foods we eat. Millions of years ago that was the same for the living creatures of that long ago time period as well. Fossil fuels including “Natural” Gas’s power comes from the energy those life forms absorbed from that sun millions of years ago. We are digging up creatures long ago laid to rest for the energy left over in their decomposed “fossil” remains.

To extract fossils, to create these fuels, you have to drill deep into the Earth. This process disturbs these long-ago resting places. You have to use dangerous, very toxic chemicals, and destroy millions of gallons of fresh water, a finite resource we cannot live without, to retrieve the fossils. The fuel extracted is a combination of toxic chemicals, remains of creatures long passed, and the loss of millions of gallons of fresh water.

All of these stolen fossils come at great cost. The act of raping Mother Earth for the fossilized remains of creatures and the energy they absorbed from our sun’s light millions of years ago comes at a great loss. There are better, safer choices. The same power is still here in our current sun and wind. Using our current sun and winds is a resource available now for our use with little to no harm to our home Mother Earth. These are the facts fossil fuel tycoons do not want you to know about.

There are many web pages and books I read to site before writing this article. All of them spoke about the harm caused to the earth by the fracking process. I will not site many of them because that is not my objective. I will not lecture you about the waste of millions of gallons of fresh water, and the unsafe chemicals used in extracting those lives. For me I want to talk more about how the fossil fuel industry is affecting our communities, our relationships, and especially our children’s future.

Greed, easy access to wealth and power are poison within our communities the same as the poison these fracking sites use to extract fossil fuels from the earth our mother. To give in to that corruption is to allow the most sacred part of yourself to die. When a person allows that poison to take hold, they open themselves up to do even worse acts against vulnerable populations. The irreparable harm caused puts women, children, our planet, and so many others that we should be protecting at risk.

Because the earth is a female spirit to cause her harm, I believe, opens a person up to harming the women and children around them. You hurt yourself when you take actions fueled by bad intentions, you lose an important part of yourself. It is something once lost, it becomes

almost impossible to regain. That is why when falling victim to these oil companies promises of easy money, it is the first step into your own spiritual death. Working out of camps almost completely comprised of men is a recipe for violence and sexual abuse to fester.

If you respect the earth as a female being, you will learn to respect and appreciate the women around you. It lands heavy on our shoulders as women, in how we treat each other, and it shows in how we raise our sons and daughters. These practices have a permanent impact on how we learn to view ourselves and others.

That is why our roles and responsibilities as women are so important to the earth and our future here. The current structure is not working. The big fossil fuel industry uses financial gain to prey on those who are desperate, to those in poverty, they use promises of financial gain to poison and corrupt.

This is the poison seeped into man camps along indigenous borders. This poison is the reason why these camps become places where women and children end up missing, sexually abused, or murdered. Most of these man camps are placed near reservations and indigenous communities, this is not accidental. Once these camps are set up to rape the earth disturbing long ago gravesites, an almost domino effect begins. The men there give in to violence, take advantage of sex trafficking, and drugs that flow as freely as the chemicals pumped into the earth. The poison creates an environment conducive to indigenous women, children, and men being abused and murdered.

A Shoshone elder, Carrie Dan once told me that the reason women are sexualized and treated badly by westernized culture is because “you can’t degrade, rape, or brutalize the earth’s spirit, a female spirit, unless you dehumanize women as a whole.” Please really think about that as you read about the fossil fuel industry. According to https://www.ucsusa.org/resources/hidden-costs-fossil-fuels there are significant cost to each step in the process of extracting and using fossil fuels. Costs accrue at every point of the fossil fuel supply chain. Extraction processes generate air and water pollution, and harm local communities. Transporting fuels from the mine or well can cause air pollution and lead to serious accidents and spills. When the fuels are burned, they emit toxins and global warming emissions. Even the waste products are hazardous to public health and the environment.

Understanding these impacts is critical for evaluating the true cost of fossil fuels—and for informing our choices around the future of energy production.”

Since 2013, energy companies that report their hydraulic fracturing chemicals to the FracFocus website have become less forthcoming, increasingly citing the use of proprietary compounds to limit disclosure, according to a new study from the journal Energy Policy.

The paper, written by two Harvard University researchers, is the most comprehensive analysis of FracFocus to date. They examined more than 96,000 disclosure forms filed between March 2011 and April 2015, highlighting trends and offering suggestions to improve the site’s accuracy and completeness. Cited from article by: Lisa Song Inside Climate News publication.

The chemicals used are extremely dangerous and harmful, at least the chemicals we know about, there are many they won’t even confess too. I can only assume the ones we do not know about are even worse. We also lose millions of gallons of fresh water, precious water, a finite

resource we cannot replace. It is a process that kills off the precious sources of life we need, our children need, and our Mother earth needs to live and nurture life here.

In my mind the chemicals used to penetrate and extract fossil fuels from our Mother Earth are similar to the drugs forced on women who are being sexually abused and sold. Much like the, it takes away your choice so an abuser can take from you what should never be taken. It is, in my opinion, rape enhanced by chemical reactions forced on the victim by their rapist.

We need to re-educate and decolonize our minds. We need to look past the multi-million-dollar propaganda and unfair reporting laws the oil tycoons have financed to dissuade the public from truth. Propaganda that tries to paint a very inaccurate and polished version of the rapist story. This is also a poison in our government with blatant examples like the Halliburton loophole curtesy of Dick Cheney’s Energy Task force during his vice presidency. Dick Cheney, Halliburton’s CEO, he is a prominent rapist of our Mother Earth who continues to profit on the rape and desecration of her body.

This to me is similar to a rape victim being brought forward, but her attacker is the judge and jury. I have been there as the system that is supposed to protect victims instead shames them. When someone is victimized and told “it’s not that bad” or it was “your fault”, and “you wanted this”, “it’s good for you”, or “you are lucky I did this to you”, you become a victim all over again. These words are never true, but to often women who come forward are hurt all over again. There are victims that never come forward because they fear the ridicule, we see inflicted all too often on victims.

This planet like our most vulnerable populations are sacred. They deserve to be protected, loved, and nurtured. We need to create space for all life to thrive. We should be looking to create a world to leave our children with clean air, clean water, and sustainable energy. Tell the oil tycoons, the United States Government, and all who profit off of the desecration of our home, our Mother enough is enough! Please stand up for our Mother Earth, for our children’s right to a future, stand with our Water Protectors to stop the desecration of Mother Earth once and for all.

Rae Rose is a Pacific Northwest author of Paiute, Mayan, and Japanese heritage. She writes historical fiction, poetry, picture books. “Stories are very important to me, I hope you enjoy these stories I share with you.” You can follow her @Rae_Rose7

*Cover photo from Our World of fracking waste water.