TURNERS FALLS — Rain poured down on about 250 protesters gathered in Peskeomskut Park against the Dakota Access Pipeline in support of Native American rights Tuesday evening, and those protesting in Standing Rock, N.D.
The protest was one of many held in local communities across the nation Tuesday and was organized primarily through social media.
“You can’t replace water. There’s so much going on in terms of profit over people,” said Greenfield resident Diana Van Cott, while standing on the Montague side of the Turners Falls-Gill Bridge, where the protestors gathered before marching down Avenue A in the center of town to the park.
According to a news release from the Greenfield Guardians affinity group, a locally based social activist group, opposition to the project is because the pipeline, proposed to go beneath Missouri River, “would put at risk safe water for 18 million people in order to further their business model expansion.”
At the park, the group repeated chants, listened to speakers, and sang songs promoting unity, led by activist folksinger Ben Grosscup — who “found out about it at the last minute” and brought his guitar — and Tem Blessed, a “socially conscious” hip-hop artist.
“Think global, act local,” the rapper said after, while standing in the rain and puddles on Avenue A after the protest had ended. “People were awakened by this election — the stakes are really high, and it’s gonna take all of us to make a change in this world.”
Grosscup said he helps to put on politically minded gatherings and believes music adds value to “transformative social movements.” The folk singer said he’ll be participating in the People’s Music Network Winter Gathering, a workshop based event focused on music as a catalyst for social change, held Jan. 27 to Jan. 29 of next year.
Tuesday’s gathering, while mainly directed against the pipeline, also addressed other issues including race relations and Donald Trump’s presidential election — and more locally, the Turners Falls High School mascot.
“I’ve been calling President Obama every day, and the comment line, hoping it doesn’t get approved,” protestor Diane Jinson said, noting that she “came in solidarity with Standing Rock.”
Another protester, Suzanne Artemiess, said the protest was sponsored by a few non-governmental organizations including The Action Network and OurRevolution.com, and Some of Us. Artemiess said natives have been “victims of genocide since the beginning.”
Dolly Ryan, who was at the protest with Roban Roblee-Strauss, Jacqueline Strauss and Katie Mora, spoke for all of them and said “this is my thought, I’m here not only to support the rights of indigenous people, but to keep fossil fuels in the ground.”
Ryan was holding a red and green sign that read “protect our land, not utility profit.”
In Greenfield, 22 people protested in front of Bank of America and TD Bank Tuesday afternoon, both of which are among the institutions financing the Direct Access Pipeline. The group was organized by The Greenfield Guardians — originally formed to help shut down the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant — with support from The Sugar Shack Alliance, Greening Greenfield and Greenfield Rights of Nature.
Sandra Boston of Greenfield was among the protestors, carrying a sign that read, “We are the ancestors of all future generations.”
“We just recently were successful in pushing back a pipeline that would have gone through private property and across the Connecticut River, and it’s the same issue in North Dakota — the disruption that these pipelines cause and the threat that they are to water and soil,” she said.
Boston added that our descendants will be most affected by the pipeline, and America needs to reverse its addiction to making quick money and putting profits before people.
“I think the Native Americans out in North Dakota have shown us a very powerful witness that water is life, water is sacred. We can’t live without it, why would we put an oil pipeline in it?” she said, adding, “The status quo will destroy our planet.”