How did we arrive here? A planet on the brink of collapse due to the greed of a few and the plundering of the Earth. As the network of resistances Futuros Indigenas states: “the 12th October of 1492 disembarked from Europe the illness that we know today as the climatic and civilizational catastrophe.”

Between the fifteenth century and the beginning of the seventeenth century, the number of death reached 56 million, 90% of the population prior to colonization in Abya Yala (also known as America) was exterminated by enslavement, hunger and pandemics used as a strategy of war. If that wasn’t enough, 15 million people were traded like commodities and forced to leave their homes in Africa to be enslaved in the new colonies. In the modern era, between 1970 and 2020, 94% of the animal population has been exterminated in Abya Yala. In those same years the wealth of the 1% has literally, rocket launched.

COP26 is around the corner. Nation States and Corporations will gather together to negotiate the future. But what makes us think that those who prioritize profit over people and the planet will be willing to make the structural changes that our present needs? It is upon genocide and ecocide that the western civilization was imposed: colonialism, capitalism and racism are the building blocks of what we know today as climate crisis. Climate solutions need social justice.

That is why today we honor those who have resisted for 529 years. Those who with their diverse ways of knowing and being have cared for what matters the most: life. Those who survived and with their actions are showing us the path. As of 2021, 80% of the remaining biodiversity exists and resist in indigenous territories around the world. Land defenders are living alternatives to the climate crisis.

In preparation for the upcoming Culture Hack Content Labs we share with you this briefing document to set the context for our webinar. Culture Hack Labs has been tracking an emerging narrative space that looks at the relationship between Indigenous custodianship and climate collapse. During the briefing on Oct 15 at 11am CST, we will share what narratives can be amplified in defense of cultural and ecological life in times of climate crisis, pandemics and war.

This is a call to journalists, artists, media hackers, community organizers, content creators, and funders. We need your support to help create more awareness around the role of Indigenous stewardship of land as a critical solution to the climate emergency. We invite you to be part of the resistance. We invite you to take action and amplify the stories and voices of those who are on the front lines defending the future.