What Really Happened at Standing Rock | I Was There

indians as they exist in the imagination of the european west we're invisible we were captured and sterilized and objectified and tight-cast into whoever we were in the late 1800s according to the gregorian concept so when a story is about native americans we almost have to be the perfect victim in order for people to pay attention what are we doing our waters under attack what are we doing our people are under attack we want liberation we deserve liberation and we will have liberation but standing rock was part of the process my name is chase ironize and i was there during the dakota access pipeline protests i belong to the titua oyate na ocheti sakowi also known as the great sioux nation i'm the lead attorney for the lakota people's law project and so at the time that the pipeline fight was beginning in the in the early days there was a community meeting at what is known as long soldier district so that was kind of my beginning as to being noticed that energy transfer partners and their ceo kelsey warren intended to violate our treaty rights and our inherent rights and forced us at gunpoint to accept the financial extractive dictate especially when they had planned to put it north of bismarck north dakota which is i think something like 90 percent european american [Music] 18 million people depend on the integrity of the missouri river we have a pipeline made at the cheapest cost possible because this is what capitalism does this oil that is now flowing through our homelands illegally could destroy the entire river forever or for how long we don't know [Music] [Applause] [Music] i was there standing with standing rock on august 13th 14th and 15th during those days nobody knew what energy transfer partners were going to do as i remember those who were willing to risk their liberties and their freedom and get arrested would go in an act of civil disobedience and chain themselves to the very gate where energy transfer partners wanted to build a transport road several mounted horse women and men came onto the scene and that's what the enemy saw when they see us on our horses and those horses are leading us into those situations it backed up the entire police union and while that was happening four women up on the hill decided to go forward of their own volition and they crossed the fence line those women led us into unknown territory territory that we had not known since 1889 i was there when 80 people rushed that fence line after these four women demonstrated that bravery and these women went straight for the heavy equipment they offered their bodies in a sacrifice to put themselves between financial extracted genocide and echo side and the future of their families as soon as big oil found out where our sacred sites were they sent their team guarded by a private security firm with deadly attack dogs to go and destroy these sites they had moved their heavy equipment more than 20 miles from where they were working on highway 6 and they had leapfrogged all the way up to these sacred sites and begin to destroy them [Music] hundreds of us were putting ourselves in harm's way so when these attack dogs were being presented as a very credible threat to unarmed women and children the warriors of that day took it upon themselves to drive this security team and dapple's heavy equipment operators back to where they came from [Applause] after the dog attacks i mean camp filled up we're talking thousands droves of people begin to show up the security team they had identified an area that they could defend it was a bridge whereby they held that bridge and kind of stopped our forward rappelling of this threat those security forces begin to mace unarmed people and inflict that pain and brutality [Music] people were laying on the ground crying because they were being maced or pepper sprayed the police are protecting and serving the pipeline they're protecting fossil fuel profits over human beings they're amazing people they're tasting their face nobody who's been brutalized during that time was ever made whole i was there when peaceful water protectors were attacked and brutalized on backwater bridge flashbangs this is my first experience with this sort of weaponry and it was like the fourth of july there was all sorts of flares all sorts of less lethal bullets the things that they're using on protesters today black lives matter protesters but it's more than just black lives matter obviously there is a revolution happening right now but it begin at standing room i was there and i saw blood running from people's eyes i saw blood running from people's limbs where these security forces these private mercenaries were maiming people get the over here [Music] in 20 degree weather the national guard they had a fire hose and they were spraying all of the water protectors and coating them in water in freezing temperatures it is an endangerment to human lives and they knew this i was there on december 4th to see 3 000 veterans maybe 10 000 13 thousand people just a long line of cars going into ochetti because people had been given this great news and victories were hard to come by at ocheti but this day we had learned that president obama and the army corps of engineers were going to deny big oil's permit to drill under our river [Music] so we wanted something to celebrate but i was also very aware that three weeks prior donald j trump was elected president and he had invested at least a hundred thousand dollars in the energy transfer partners pipeline kelsey warren had also donated to donald trump for america or whatever his campaign is called so i knew that if it wasn't a complete ruse that it was at least an empty-handed promise from the united states government once again you had pipelines that couldn't be built i immediately approved them dakota how about dakota access that was a very unfair situation sure enough when president trump was sworn in january 20th within 72 hours he completely did a 180 and now energy transfer partners and kelsey warren and donald trump were dictating the energy policy of the entire united states i was there in the dark of february 1st 2017 when again hundreds of military vehicles law enforcement vehicles national guard vehicles begin to mobilize north of backwater bridge i was there when we all went to the bridge to find out what the private security apparatus was going to dictate after about five minutes of discussion officer stugelmeyer specifically asked for chase ironize and they let me know chase we know you are responsible for this and we want you to call all of them off of that hill and i was there when i replied you guys have been looking for one chief for 500 years and there is no one chief who commands those indians and their allies on last child's hillary looks like they're starting in the fire down that we formed a circle and we protected our sacred fire just like the buffalo people i was there in the freezing cold when those police forces and their bearcats and their already and their humvees begin to ascend last child's hill and arrest us morton county on behalf of the state of north dakota charged me with inciting a riot and criminal trespass which presented to me a potential to return to prison for six straight years august 23 2018 is when my charges were finally dropped this is chase iron eyes i'm standing outside the morton county correctional facilities it's time for the true patriots to stand up to tyranny because it's here and it's coming [Music] since standing rock i know that the american people are waking up to the nightmare that we experienced there at standing rock all the mothers all the fathers all the us military veterans who are now being shot with less lethal bullets who are now being shot between their eyes with concussion grenades who are now being snatched and grabbed by private police forces but it's clear to me that we're drawing a line and right now portland is part of the process minneapolis is part of the process los angeles black lives matter is part of the process the end of euro hetero patriarchy is part of the process but i've been re-recognizing that land is sacred life is sacred the universe is sacred i have available to me and everybody has available to them a more informed metaphysics a more compassionate way of navigating our experience here on earth and we have those at standing rock to thank for that [Music] you

Channel: VICE

Views: 1,063,301

Keywords: climate change, Native American, environment, archival footage, vice, journalism, documentary, culture, interview, vice videos, lifestyle, independent, vice guide, exclusive, vice magazine, vice.com, world, documentaries, docs, standing rock, native americans, dakota access pipeline, donald trump, standing rock protest, clean water, north dakota, sioux tribe, native americans react, standing rock protest dogs attack, standing rock protest buffalo, standing rock protest footage, dapl

Id: J1yD2J8vHAk

Length: 13min 11sec (791 seconds)

Published: Fri Sep 25 2020