The two most recent of the 41 journalists imprisoned in China for “subversion of state power,” by writing about such things as government corruption and environmental destruction, face a ten year sentence and permanent exile respectively. Putting that in personal perspective, everyone I know and respect as a writer in the US would be in prison under that policy. I mean, if you’re a writer and don’t oppose tyranny, then you have no integrity. Going along to get along just doesn’t hold water.

In today’s article about rediscovering 13th century Puebloan agriculture, Indian Country Today speaks of the “sophisticated environmental understanding” and “acute observational skills” required in order to prosper in the harsh environment of the American Southwest. ICT’s Stephanie Woodard notes that this level of awareness gave the Pueblo tribes “a different way of looking at life.”

In 1996, Center for World Indigenous Studies Chair, Rudolph Ryser, presented at the University of Victoria on the topic of the Anti-Indian Movement in Canada. In this talk, Dr. Ryser discussed the war between indigenous nations and modern states over land and resources. He also observed that 90% of the varieties of corn, rice, and potatoes had become extinct, making world food supplies dangerously vulnerable.

Watching last week’s food riots — brought on in large part due to industrial agriculture’s mono-cropping for First World consumption habits — reminded me of the connections so clearly understood by indigenous peoples long before there were such things as scientists, free markets, or modern states. With forest destruction worldwide accelerating to satisfy biofuel consumption, aboriginal Fourth World leaders are the only ones left capable of addressing this catastrophe intelligently, effectively, and ethically. Seems like time for a little humility on the part of dominant societies, don’t you think?

I think that things like the protection of the environment bring people together. I think that we all have an innate sort of indigenous belief that we have responsibilities to the Earth, whether we’re aboriginal or not. And I also think that many Canadians are fed up with colonialism. I think a lot of Canadians are sick to death of having enjoyed advantages because of the suffering of others. There’s a moral uncertainty that goes with that and I don’t think they want to pass that on to their children and grandchildren.

—Bob Lovelace, jailed Algonquin negotiator

By all means vote if you feel like it. But don’t stop there. Real social change requires participation, not representation.

—Ken Knabb

Pine Ridge Lakota fight Canadian uranium mining company. Oglala Sioux declare nuclear-free zone. Chiefs Red Cloud and American Horse lead fight at NRC hearing.

Stories must not stop at the sight of blood, but give us the stench of money. Crime is a business and everybody pays in one way or another. And real heroism is not just in big gestures but when ordinary, good people resist, and refuse on their own terms.

—Roberto Saviano

Institutionally, Israel — like the United States — is a crime against humanity: nation-states founded on genocide, built on theft. Restitution is now the only humane agenda.

But the psychology and psychiatry of the Israeli state in world consciousness is a paradoxical matter. Even Nobel laureates like Nadine Gordimer — noted for her contributions to undoing apartheid in South Africa — can get it wrong.

In this letter from Gaza university lecturer Dr. Haider Eid, the relationship between apartheid states and the role of writers like Gordimer is put in plain language. Conflicting loyalties and ethical dilemmas are part of life, but for moral models like Gordimer, an explanation is in order.

Vanity Fair’s David Rose describes how President Bush, Secretary of State Rice, and National Security Advisor Elliott Abrams inadvertently rearmed the Hamas army in Palestine. Documenting the White House covert initiative intended to arm Hamas’ political rival Fatah in the June 2007 failed coup, Rose describes the bungled civil war in Gaza as “Iran-Contra 2.”

President Morales of Bolivia speaks to the UN on the imperative to end the capitalist economic system in order to save the planet and humanity. Morales seeks support from indigenous leaders to take action against exploitation of humans and pillage of nature. Real News has the video of his address to the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues.

The sex industry, like other global enterprises, has domestic and international sectors, marketing sectors, a range of physical locations out of which it operates in each community, is controlled by many different owners and managers, and is constantly expanding as technology, law, and public opinion permit. Many governments protect commercial sex businesses because of the monstrous profits. Like slavery, prostitution is a lucrative form of oppression.

—Melissa Farley, Yale Journal of Law and Feminism