Culture and Coexistence into the Great Unknown
Haiti now faces an unmitigated human disaster from the destruction of Hurricane Matthew. With extreme reports of death tolls, Dady Cherry examines the misinformation common in mainstream media reports of the destruction that reinforce the gringo-savior mentality, backed by western governments and their compromised and ineffectual non-governmental organizations like the Red Cross. The failures from the 2010 earthquake loom large.
The coup-backed neo-liberal government of Honduras, pushing tourism and expatriate resort developments, continues to repress and evict Garífuna communities along the Caribbean Coast. The Black Fraternal Organization of Honduras (OFRANEH) reports, with multiple personal statement videos.
Ecuadorian state capitalism has sacrificed significant tracts of one of the planet’s most important biosphere reserves, Yasuni National Park in the Amazonian region, to a massive new oil drilling project. It threatens multiple indigenous territories and the area’s biodiversity and ecosystem integrity.
The indigenous Rama people of Nicaragua’s Atlantic Coast speak out in a new documentary against an inter-oceanic canal which threatens their ancestral land, language, and traditional culture.
Berta Cáceres was assassinated by Honduran government-backed death squads on March 3. She fought for indigenous peoples’ power and for control over their own territories. She was not destined to die of old age. She spoke too much truth to power.
In the Malaysian state of Sarawak, on the island of Borneo, rampant industrial destruction is being stopped by people banding together to protect their communities, and the land. The Baram Dam proposal was just put on hold in response to a two year protest. But threats, and the corruption behind them, will continue.
Cuba may have been restricted politically and economically for the past 50 years, but its borders have remained open to wildlife for which Cuba’s undeveloped islands are an irresistible draw.