December 11, 2021 marked the 24th anniversary of the Delgamuukw ruling by the Supreme Court of Canada. Celebrations of this pivotal moment are conspicuously absent in our society. In fact, it is probably a safe assumption that many living on the land in question, and across the rest of British Columbia—much less the entire country—are not aware of what the Delgamuukw ruling is or what it represents.

A zoning law would have opened up the southern Argentinian province of Chubut to large-scale mining by multinational corporations. But the law was defeated in just five days by an alliance of environmentalists, workers, youth, and indigenous people. Their fight points the way forward for other movements around the world.

In this interview, Indigenous climate activist, writer, and filmmaker Clayton Thomas-Müller talks to Canadian Dimension about his new memoir, Life in the City of Dirty Water, which recounts his early years of dislocation growing up in the core of the Manitoba capital—from the domestic and sexual abuse he endured to the drugs he sold to survive—to his career as a campaigner for 350.org.

We traveled to Wet’suwet’en territory to learn about the Unist’ot’en Healing Centre. The centre is located in the northwestern part of British Columbia on the territory of the Unist’ot’en—one of five house clans comprising the Wetsuwet’en Nation. It is a remote and rural area and most people living in southern urban communities are unaware of the remarkable activity taking place there to “heal the land and heal the people.”

Canada, like most of the Western (wealthy) world, is a self-styled “liberal democracy,” broadly considered the gold standard in global development. Liberal democracies are founded on a commitment to universal human rights and freedoms, values codified in international law. But in the last week in Canada, we have seen these liberal values rocked to their core.

Along with many other progressive forces in the settler community, Canadian Dimension stands in solidarity with the Wet’suwet’en and their struggle to exercise their sovereignty and protect their land. We are appalled at the never-ending injustice and violence visited upon Indigenous communities in Canada and committed to amplifying their voices and supporting their demands.

Just days after the conclusion of the United Nations COP26 climate summit in Glasgow and calls from international groups to stop the criminalization of Indigenous land defenders, militarized police violence against defenders in Canada has seemingly become normalized while a key deadline set by a UN committee that urged Canada to stop the Coastal GasLink pipeline has been ignored.

The extraction of Canadian radium by Eldorado Gold Mines Ltd. (later Eldorado Mining & Refining Ltd.) began with the exploitation of Dene land and labour on the coasts of Great Bear Lake and saw its calamitous fruition in the nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, a still misunderstood act of barbarism that was only made possible with massive supplies of Canadian resources.

For those who lived through BC’s legendary War in the Woods nearly 30 years ago at Clayoquot Sound, the blockades and mass arrests at Fairy Creek are indeed a déjà vu experience. The question is: Why is this still going on? Why is history repeating itself while the world burns, oceans rise and irreplaceable ancient forests disappear? What will it take to change the script?

Skyler Williams is dangerous in the eyes of the state because he is politically active; because he refuses the shackles of shame and poverty; because he speaks and refuses to be silenced. He is seen as dangerous because he questions the government in court, challenging development on the traditional land of the Haudenosaunee people with injunctions and peaceful resistance.