#settlersocieties — Public Fediverse posts

"Fire-resilient landscapes” and “fire-adapted communities” through biocultural restoration as a fire risk mitigation strategy.

A clear-eyed view on historic harms by settler societies: Settler transition to large-scale agriculture (plantations) transformed ecohydrological conditions and introduced weeds. The neglected land and extractive tourism practices drive increases in fire risks.

"We argue that decolonizing postplantation landscapes through the restoration and reconnection of people to land will not only help prevent future catastrophic fires, but also address social and environmental inequities.The connections of colonialism to contemporary extreme fire regimes are not unique to Hawaiʻi. The dispossession of Indigenous communities worldwide has suppressed cultural burning and altered fire regimes that support the production of food and material culture."
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On the anniversary of the Maui fires, a call for Indigenous land care to mitigate future disasters, D. Nākoa Farrant et al
https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2401045121
#bushfires #fires #colonialism #SettlerSociety #extractivism #water #plantations #SettlerSocieties #unsustainability #dispossession #IndigenousPeoples #IndigenousKnowledge #BioculturalRestoration #CulturalBurning #restoration

The fires of human-caused climate disruption are raging though California right now

"For millions of years the world’s tallest trees (Giant sequoias) have graced California peaks and coastlines, growing through centuries of changes."

"But those landscapes have seen significant shifts over the past century and the forests have suffered. Spurred by the climate crisis, devastating droughts and scorching temperatures have added new stressors for the redwoods, particularly the famous giant sequoias, which now struggle to bounce back after big wildfires."

"Part of the problem stems from California’s gold rush era, when settlers descended with an overzealous appetite for good timber, cutting down much of the old-growth forests. They also suppressed indigenous land management techniques, which included setting “healthy” fires that cleared out the forest. A century of fire suppression created an overabundance of vegetation that set the stage for larger, more catastrophic blazes."
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#SettlerSocieties #fires #trees #LandUse #NativeForests #FossilFuels #ExtremeHeat #climate #bushfires #FirstNationsPeoples

The degradation of public lands and biodiversity in settler societies:

"Grazing, fracking, logging, mining and permits for other private interests are imperiling wildlife, soil and vegetation already under siege by global warming...We are not safeguarding our public domain. The government agencies overseeing it are failing us. The private interests that want the land for profit have planted their teeth in the government. The national trend is against the preservation of the commons. Huge stretches are effectively privatized, public in name only... It is an infuriating battle when the agencies deemed to guard our public lands are the same ones putting them in jeopardy."

“This Land: How Cowboys, Capitalism, and Corruption are Ruining the American West”, Christopher Ketcham (review)
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https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/books/story/2019-07-26/review-this-land-chris-ketcham
#NSWLogging #LoggingIndustry #BiodiversityCrisis #ExtinctionCrisis #governance #Book #BellingenLogging #SettlerSocieties #extractivism #cattle #AgencyCapture #TheCommons #Bellingen #koalas #wildlife

Image: Logged biodiversity habitat rushing through Bellingen main street

Hyperincarceration

"First Nations people in Australia are the most imprisoned people in the world."

"Hyperincarceration of First Peoples is a common feature of former British settler colonies such as Canada, the United States and New Zealand. This shared experience shows us First Peoples are not the problem. We should instead be paying attention to the colonial motivation for incarcerating First Peoples."
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https://theconversation.com/first-nations-imprisonment-is-already-at-a-record-high-unless-government-policy-changes-it-will-only-get-worse-226612
#IndigenousPeoples #FirstNations #incarceration #SettlerSocieties #racism #NT #overpolicing #frontier #British #legacy #BritishColonialism #violence #governance #failure #Australia #TruthTelling

"Truth-telling is now more important than ever.

What has been a personal choice is now a national imperative […] Denialism is no longer a viable option. A wall of scholarship built by many hands over the last fifty years stands in the way." - Henry Reynolds, Truth-Telling. History, Sovereignty and the Uluru Statement

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Friday essay: neither a monster nor a saint … Sir Samuel Griffith, Queensland’s violent frontier and the rigours of truth-telling
https://theconversation.com/friday-essay-neither-a-monster-nor-a-saint-sir-samuel-griffith-queenslands-violent-frontier-and-the-rigours-of-truth-telling-222262
#TruthTelling #Australia #violence #denial #iconoclasm #CollectiveMemory #CulturalIdentity #IndigenousPeoples #SettlerSocieties #pastoralism #plantations #StructureOrEvent