Eko fascism ever heard of it or thought about it seems paradoxical but is it or is it a part of American history that has been there all along in an article dated August seven twenty nineteen G. Q.. Magazine yes yes G. Q.. Defined Eko Fascism as quote a belief that the only way to deal with climate change is through eugenics and the brutal suppression of migrants and quote. It's a philosophy that has roots in the American environmental movement. Dating back to the eighteen hundreds rate right down to the creation of our national park system. But let's start off with the recent events that inspired me to produce this episode on August Third Twenty nine a shooter in El Paso Texas Killed Twenty people at a Walmart near the border with Mexico. Nineteen minutes before the first nine one one call a hate filled. Anti immigrant manifesto appeared online. That was strangely called an inconvenient truth in the document the author makes his horrific case for ethnic cleansing as a solution to the climate crisis. I ask myself could. The shooter's deadly words and actions have been inspired by the rhetoric that has been spoken tweeted by the forty fifth president of the United States who has verbally attacked communities of color on more than one occasion this time. It's House Oversight Committee Chairman Elijah. Cummings he wrote wrote. This Cummings district is disgusting rat and rodent infested mess. If he spent more time in Baltimore maybe he could help clean up this very dangerous and filthy place. No human being would want to live there infested usually reserved for references to rodents and and insects. But we've seen the president invoke infestation to criticize lawmakers before you see a pattern here just two weeks ago president trump to protect four minority congresswoman. Why don't they go back to the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came reminder three of them were born here all of them are or American infested? He says a week before his inauguration January two thousand seventeen congressman. John Lewis should spend more time on fixing in helping his district which is in horrible shape and falling apart not to mention crime infested. Donald Trump has tweeted more than forty three thousand times James. He's insulted thousands of people many different types of people but when he tweets about infestation it's about black and Brown people September number two thousand fourteen at the height of an urgent health. Emergency why are we sending thousands of ill-trained soldiers into IMBOULA. If Ebola infested areas of Africa bring the plague to the. US Obama is so stupid infested. He says there's a revolution going on in California. So many sanctuary areas is one out of this ridiculous crime infested and breeding concept infested. He says the President says about congressman. Cummings district that no human would would wanNA live there. You know who did Mr President I did. From the day I was brought home from the hospital to the day left for college and a lot of people put care about still do their challenges. No doubt but people are proud of their commuted. One sound self-righteous but people get up and go to work there the care for their families there. They love their children. WHO pledge allegiance to the flag? Just like people. Oh who live in districts of Congressman. Who Support You sir? They are Americans too. We'll be right back. After after the El Paso tragedy. I started reading articles that referred to the term Eko fascism. There seemed to be more than one. Example of racially motivated terrorist wrist attacks in the news from Christchurch New Zealand to Pittsburgh Pennsylvania to California but none so directly connected to the climate crisis as the El Paso shooting which made me deeply concerned about the ways in which humans will react when the crisis worsens. Will it bring bring out the best in humanity or the worst. I began to think more deeply about the foundations of America. Correct me if I'm wrong but post colonial. The American history seems to be filled with examples of ECO fascist ideas and axe our very own declaration of independence refers to indigenous indigenous people of this continent as merciless Indian savages. And yet. This is still a document that we celebrate every year with a national holiday and the principles of manifest destiny. An eminent domain made way for a government led genocide children being separated from their parents put in detention centers and even killed by the American government. These practices are also not new from the slave trade to Indian residential schools. American history has already set precedence every single day that we wake up we are living out our lives on stolen land. This is our history. It's history that we shouldn't turn away from no matter how hard it is to look at it. I know this is a dark subject. But it's an important one one if we don't look directly at our shadows cells. How will we ever heal in a recent interview? In The Guardian activist writer. Naomi Klein referred referred to this concept as climate barbarism. because she connected the dots. So well I'm going to read her words here. She states quote white supremacy emerged. Not just because people felt like thinking of ideas that we're going to get a lot of people killed but because it was useful to protect barbaric but highly profitable actions. The age of scientific racism begins alongside the transatlantic slave trade. It is a rationale for that brutality. If we were going to respond to climate change by fortress seeing our borders then of course the theories that would justify that that create. These hierarchies orchids of humanity will come surging back. There have been signs of that for years but it is getting harder to deny because you have killers who are screaming it from the rooftops unquote and then Naomi speaks of the environmental movement quote when you have a movement that is overwhelmingly Wellm Ingley representative of the most privileged sector of society. Then the approach is going to be much more fearful of change because people who you have a lot to lose tend to be more fearful of change whereas people who have a lot to gain will tend to fight harder for it. I have had many many conversations with environmentalists over the years where they seem to believe that. By linking fighting climate change with fighting poverty or fighting racial justice. It's it's GonNa make the fight harder. We have to get out of this quote. Mike crisis is bigger than your crisis. I we save the planet and then we fight poverty and racism them and violence against women unquote. That doesn't work that alienates the people who would fight hardest for change unquote as middle middle class educated white women WHO considers herself an environmentalist for social justice. An ally in the struggle for racial equality and racial equity. I felt compelled up to bring the issues of Echo Fascism and environmental racism to the Isan Conservation. podcast I hope this episode shines light on our shadow selves an offers inspiration on how to move forward will start this episode with a close. The camps protest attended on August Thirty First Twenty nineteen scene in downtown San Francisco. I'm on my way down to the close the camps protest in downtown San Francisco right in front of the ICE building. This protest today is part of the month of momentum that has been a month long a series of events and protests and ways to get involved in the movement to close down the concentration camps that are are at the border of the United States and Mexico so every day when I turn on the news and I hear more stories about the conditions of the camps and the fact that children are in cages. Children are dying people are dying in the camps. I I'm I'm basically as heartbroken and petrified as I am about the climate crisis CICIS I see these both the climate craigslist and our humanitarian crisis. That's happening at the border right now. As one in the same basically the way that we're treating a world is the way that we treat ourselves and other people and eight and so I needed to do something and so I decided to come down and spend my Saturday morning here. At the close the camps is protest down at ice in San Francisco on August thirty first twenty