No Thanks, No Giving 2022

An over the shoulder view of a member of Bvlbancha Collective member Ida handwriting their speech on the grass in a spiral notebook.

Transcript of the full speech that was to be given at the National Day of Mourning, Nov. 24, 2022. (Was interrupted and truncated at the event.)

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Aletu! Seyultcefuyat Ida, saktce-umah seyah. Ouma a mentele. Hello, I’m Ida, of the Red Crawfish Houma nation. I live around Houma, so called Louisiana.
I speak only as myself, a 2spirit land defender and water protector, an Indigenous person who lives and loves deeply these lands that have been deemed a “sacrifice zone” by the colonizing forces that do everything they can to remove us from the narrative and picture.
Since I last stood before y’all and spoke, many of those of us on the coast continue to rebuild after my lovely little hurricane, which I was quite a storm if I say so myself. Messed up from Louisiana to New York! Even just personally, my roof is still tarped. My floor still has a huge hole because the beams under the house are slowly rotting from the water damage. Insurance and construction companies keep going out of business. I’m thankful that we were given a reprieve of another hurricane disaster this year, but with the increasing number and strength of storms in the Gulf region, it’s a gamble that continues to also increasingly favor the dealer, not us. Tribes on the coast, for their own part for their people, are pushing hard for federal recognition, to increase getting FEMA assistance and other protections, among other benefits. This recognition would also “assure” consultation with tribal entities before, for instance, Army Corps of Engineers projects and the like. As it is now, they literally consult Oklahoma, Mississippi, and Florida federally recognized tribes for our Louisiana region projects, because they legally don’t NEED to consult us.
These people are my relatives. My cousins, my kin. The Southeast coastal tribal entities in my region are: the United Houma Nation, the Point-aux-Chien tribe, Isle de Jean Charles tribe, the Grand Caillou Dulac band of Biloxi Chitimacha Choctaw, and the Plaquemines Grand Bayou band of Atakapa Ishak. May we all fight for the land and our people.
Our people weather ongoing genocide- attempted assimilation and removal of our children from their culture, ongoing attempts to remove people from the furthest ends of the bayous, ongoing attempts to take away voting places, accessible and culturally relevant schools, housing and land rights, and that’s not even touching on the ongoing theft of mineral rights which continue to decimate the land and causes massive cancer rates. We are not ALLOWED to steward the land as we see fit. Our grown and foraged and hunted foods and medicines are poisoned, and we must take extra and intentional care to avoid these poisons as best we can. On top of all these disasters, we are also dealing with further desecration to our sovereignty. Challenges to ICWA aim to come after our children. A reminder that literally a tenet of genocide per the United Nations is “forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.” The Gulf lease/sale continues to use the southern Gulf coast as a sacrifice zone, which lemme tell you we did and do not consent to.
Did you know? That LNG, liquefied natural gas, creates 10 times the emissions of pipeline gas? And that’s before factoring in the emissions from transporting the LNG to Europe, where LNG imports are up by 65% because of the war with Russia. We are going to lose our land and take massive cultural blows because of the sheer greed of the gas and oil companies, because they refused to change their destruction because money. Greed. Corruption. Power. That they frankly suck at managing, too. The destruction they’ve caused in a mere 100 years is staggering.

Now for a bit of a timeline cleanse. Some positive news! We aren’t taking all this passively. We’re resisting now, as we always have. Some really exciting things are in the works too that we can’t even announce yet! Look forward to that.
This past year, the greater Bvlbancha Inter-tribal community has really accomplished a lot! For those who don’t know, Bvlbancha is the place name of “New Orleans” in Chata, meaning the place of many languages/tongues. This overview is by no means exhaustive, nor does it cover all that we do regionally, nor do I speak for or as any group. I’m just here to share my perspectives.

A banner with a variety of Bvlbancha organizations: Bvlbancha Collective (www.bvlbanchacollective.com), Hvrvnrvcukwv Ueki-honecv (Hummingbird Springs) Farm, Okla Hina Ikhish Holo People of the Sacred Medicine Trail: A network of femme and nonbinary Indigenous gardeners growing Food Sovereignty in the Gulf South, Bvlbancha Liberation Radio 87.9FM, The battle for Turtle Island continues BvlbanchaRadio.net, Bvlbancha Public Access publicity poster of Scierra LaGarde (www.BvlbanchaPublicAccess.com)

(At this point I realize my speech is way too long and I’m going over time, so this was very brief during the speech live, but I’ll expand here with appropriate linkage because I can.)

Houma Language Project got a grant from the Administration for Native Americans to create a youth internship program, where we successfully have had two groups of youth be able to choose either our reclaimed Uma’ language track, a Houma French track, or an archiving track. The team has been steady on releasing resources for free online for all of our people, including a dictionary, online classes and language games, and memes!

Tasso Time/Spring Gathering, year two!! More info: GoFundMe here

Water Glossary collaboration with Ripple Effect: Informing science education with Indigenous perspectives for some inner city Bvlbancha schools. Invisible Rivers Concert event- View here

Bvlbancha Liberation Radio recently celebrated its one year anniversary! There’s a weekly radio show live on Tuesdays, and content is always streaming online at BvlbanchaRadio.net. If you’re Indigenous and in Bvlbancha and want to come onto the show for an interview and promo your work, please feel free to email bvlbancharadio@gmail.com.

Bvlbancha Public Access has been a really great two years so far. In 2021 we did a 24-hour marathon stream of interviews, photography, and media art on contemporary Indigenous culture in the Gulf South. There was the 24-hour Twitch livestream on November 11, as well as two fundraiser streams for Hurricane Ida recovery, using our platform to spread awareness and mutual aid. More Info

Okla Hina Ikhish Holo, People of the Sacred Medicine Trail. We also recently celebrated a one year anniversary- this time for the year of having communal land in Southwest ‘Louisiana’ that we are helping to build and grow into not just a sustainable food growth place, but a safe high ground place for disaster events.

Last but certainly not least, (I could honestly go on about even more community projects) shout out to Hummingbird Springs Farm that my dear ceremony sister and fellow Bvlbancha Collective cofounder Angie Comeaux started and maintains over in Alabama. She has since been asked to be on and serves on the board of the Alabama Sustainable Agriculture Network among many, many things she does. Recent article

I do have one last heavy parting sentiment. I want to give honor to all of our warriors, defenders, and protectors who have walked on this year. We could all probably come up with names of dear ones who fought as hard as they could for the land and the people.

I want to bring forward someone you probably don’t know.
Nashoba Tohbi was my ceremonial brother. My cousin. My dear relative. He was a true Houma warrior. A Standing Rock veteran, L’Eau est la Vie veteran, and cofounder of the former Cancuba (pronounced Chan-choo-ba) Collective, Nashoba was a young elder who grew up thinking he and his family were some of the only natives around, constantly told by the greater society that we were all gone and dead. He went out to Standing Rock alone at 21. He knew what was at stake, and fought desperately against our destruction both here and there.
When he was at Standing Rock, he largely spent time outside of the front lines in the medic tent, learning and giving aid, even as he suffered from severe injuries given by the colonial forces that sought to remove the people.
Despite sad personal family trauma, despite struggling with the trauma of colonization and poverty, the violence of what happened at both Standing Rock and L’Eau est la Vie, and the violence of simply being queer, trans, and 2-spirit from both so-called relatives or fellow natives and settlers alike… despite all that, he pushed people to fight, to defend, to create real, tangible change. He challenged the status quo every step. He tried so hard to learn and facilitate healing. For his self, his tribe, his family, and especially for the babies. He loved the babies so much. He stood up loudly for others and his self and the land. Ooo, what a fussin you could get if you didn’t come humble or take ceremony seriously.
I miss my fiery friend every day.
Tceyulluleh, anakfi. I’ll tell all the nahullo “Améskesã apah!”